Sociology: Unit 2, Chapter 4: Socialization
9/4/13
Due 9/6/13
Name:
Section 1 – Why is socialization important?
1) Define socialization. Also what is meant by “cultural transmission”?
2) Describe Harlow’s experiment with the monkeys and then explain the results he found.
3) What do the cases of Anna, Isabelle and Genie (p. 109) tells us about socialization?
Section 2 – How does socialization influence the self?
4) Compare how the functionalist and conflict perspectives explain socialization.
Symbolic interaction concepts about socialization:
5) Compare Mead’s ideas of self-concept and the looking-glass self. How do they differ?
6) Explain the example (pp. 116-117) of the new teacher and how it shows how the student’s looking-glass self
was affected. How might this lead to problems in schools?
7) Why are the beliefs of our significant others so influential to our self-concept?
8) How does role taking affect our socialization? Also, what concept that we learned before is this similar to?
9) Describe Mead’s three-stage process for how children develop the ability to take roles.
10) Explain this sentence (not in your textbook): “The development of the concept of the generalized other
keeps us from taking our pants off in a public park on a hot summer day.”
11) How does Mead distinguish between I and me?
Section 3 – Who and what socializes us?
12) After the family, what is the next primary source of socialization for children?
13) What does a school’s hidden curriculum mean? (NOTE: this is very important – please read carefully)
14) How does peer group socialization differ from that of the family or school? What is Judith Rich Harris’
belief about the peer group?
15) Make a list of positive and negative ways that the mass media socializes us.
Section 4 – The processes of socialization
16) Describe the four processes, as defined by symbolic interactionism, for socialization in adulthood.
17) How do the military and cults (for example) desocialize new members? What effect does it have on the
members?
18) Explain how students in high school go through anticipatory socialization and find new reference groups
for themselves.