Socialisation

What is socialisation?

Socialisation is the process of learning the expected rules for your culture. This can happen to small babies who are taught good manners by their parents, but also to older people who may have learn the rules for success in a new job. People need to learn new rules for any situation, so they will experience socialisation into very old age.

Key terms:

1. Primary socialisation

2. Secondary socialisation

3. Informal socialisation

4. Formal socialisation

Primary socialisation definition

Primary socialisation is probably the most important form of socialisation. It usually takes place when we are young and learning the basic rules of society. We are socialised at first in our families and we develop our personalities. Families teach us norms, values, attitudes, behaviours and beliefs that we may have all through our lives.

Defionition of secondary socialisation:

Secondary socialisation takes places when we begin to interact with the winder world. We learn what is acceptable and not acceptable to other people. There are many groups (or agencies) who are part of the process of teaching us and the mass media such as television or films. We learn that the rules from our families may need to be adapted to new situations.

Definition of informal socialisation

Most socialisation happens by chance. We live our normal lives and learn from people around us so we see things happen and we learn the rules from them. If people in your family are very tidy, you may not be tidy yourself, but you will still think that being tidy is a good thing.

Formal Socialisation definition:

This is when people or organisations set out to change us deliberately. For example, in schools, teachers deliberately try to teach children to be hard working. They train children to follow schools rules and punish them if they misbehave. There are other groups who deliberately try and hange how people act and how they think. Examples might be the Army or a religious group who will try and change people on purpose.