Final Flashcards
(46 cards)
1
Q
What is socialization?
A
The lifelong social experience by which individuals develop their human potential and learn culture
2
Q
Discuss Sigmund Freud’s contributions to socialization.
A
- Basic human needs: eros and thanatos as opposing forces
- Model of personality: id (basic drives), ego (balance), superego (culture)
- Criticism: studies reflect gender bias that devalues women, difficult to test theories
3
Q
Discuss Jean Piaget’s contributions to socialization.
A
- Cognition: how people think and understand
Stages of development:
1. Sensorimotor stage: sensory contact understanding
- Preoperational stage: use of language and other symbols
- Concrete operational stage: perception of causal connections in surroundings (cannot think “what would happen if I did something life-threatening”)
- Formal operational stage: abstract, critical thinking (post-gratification, imagine negative consequences)
- Criticism: view mind as active and create, result of biological maturation and social experience but can it apply to other cultures?
4
Q
Discuss Lawrence Kohlberg’s contributions to socialization.
A
- Moral reasoning: ways in which individuals judge situations as right or wrong
Stages of moral development:
1. Preconventional: young children experience world as pain or pleasure
- Conventional: teens lose selfishness as they learn to define right or wrong in terms of what pleases parents and conforms to cultural norms
- Postconventional: final stage, considers abstract ethical principles
- Criticism: viewed as stages, many people do not reach final stage, research limited to boys but generalized to population
5
Q
Discuss Carol Gilligan’s contributions to socialization.
A
Theory of gender and moral development:
- Boys develop justice perspective (formal rules define right and wrong, tend to be inclusive)
- Girls develop care and responsibility perspective (personal relationships define right and wrong, exclusive and about personality)
- Girls are socialized to be controlled and eager to please
- Criticism: cannot generalize entire sexes, differences may change as women enter workforce
6
Q
Discuss George Herbert Mead’s contributions to socialization. Mention Cooley.
A
Theory of the social self:
- Self: part of personality composed to self-awareness and self-image
- Develops from social interaction (exchange of symbols)
- Understanding intention requires imaging situation from other’s point of view
- By taking role of other, we become more self-aware
- Self is developed by imitation, play (taking on roles of significant others without rules), games (taking roles of several others at once and following rules and learning about groups)
- Generalized other: widespread cultural norms we use as reference in evaluating ourselves
Cooley’s looking class self
- Others represent mirror in which we see ourselves
- I (subjective element) is in constant interply with Me (objective element)
- Criticms: doesn’t allow biological elements
7
Q
Discuss Erik H. Erikson’s contributions to socialization.
A
Stages of development:
- Stage 1 (infancy): trust vs. mistrust
- Stage 2 (toddlerhood): autonomy vs. doubt/shame
- Stage 3 (preschool): initiative vs. guilt
- Stage 4 (peradolescence): industriousness vs. inferiority
- Stage 5 (adolesence): gaining identity vs. confusion
- Stage 6 (young adulthood): intimacy vs. isolation
- Stage 7 (middle adulthood): making a difference vs. self-absorption
- Stage 8 (old age): integrity vs. despair
- Criticism: not everyone confronts challenges in same order, do other cultures share this definition of successful life?
8
Q
What are the agents of socialization?
A
- Family
- Most important
- Gender socialization, values, beliefs, languages
- Household environment stimulates development, parental attention resuts in well-adjusted child - School
- Experience diversity of other races and genders
- Gender socialization continues (certain activities reserved for genders)
- Hidden curriculum: informal lessons (self-concept based on how others see you)
- First bureaucracy (teaching you how to behave in society and follow rules) - Peers
- Social group whose members are similar
- Sense of self beyond the family
- “Generation gap” between parents and peers
- Peers govern short-term goals while parents influence long-term
- Anticipatory socialization: learning that helps achieve a desired position - Mass media
- Impersonal communications aimed at wide audience
- Canadian children watch TV before they learn to read
- Average Canadian watches 22 hours of TV per week
- TV makes children more passive and less creative
9
Q
Discuss TV and socialization.
A
- Liberal critics say that TV shows mirror society’s patterns of inequality and rarely challenge status quo
- Conservative critics are concerned about TV shows advancing liberal causes
- ⅔ of TV contains violence that is unpunished
- There is a link between violence on TV and in society
10
Q
Discuss the life course.
A
- Childhood (0-12)
- Care-free time for learning/play or hurried child - Adolescence (teenage years)
- Turmoil as struggle to develop own identities - Early adulthood (20-40)
- Managing daily affairs while juggling conflicting priorities - Middle adulthood (40-60)
- Concerns over health, appearance, career and family - Old age (mid-60s and older)
- Anti-elderly bias will diminish as proportion of elderly increases
- Leave roles that provided satisfaction and social identity - Dying (79 years; 76 for males but 83 for females)
- Denial, anger, negotiation, resignation, acceptance
11
Q
What is total institution?
A
- Setting in which people are isolated from society
- Formal rules, standardized environment, supervision by staff
12
Q
What is resocialization?
A
- Rapidly changing someone’s personality by carefully controlling environment
- Staff erode inmate’s existing identity and builds new self using rewards and punishments
- Can leave people institutionalized (without capacity for independent living)
13
Q
What is social interaction and social structure?
A
- Social interaction: process by which people act and react in relation to others
- How we create the reality in which we live
- Social structure: any relatively stable pattern of social behaviour used to make sense of everyday situations and frame people’s lives
14
Q
What is status, status set, ascribed status, achieved status, and master status?
A
- Status: social position that a person holds
- Status set: all statuses held at one time (eg. teenage girl, daughter, sister)
- Ascribed status: social position one receives at birth or assumes involuntarily later in life
- Achieved status: social position a person assumes voluntarily that reflects ability and effort (eg. honours student, Olympic athlete, spouse)
- Master status: status that shapes one’s entire life and holds special importance for identity (eg. occupation, recognized family name, illness)
15
Q
What is role, role set, role conflict, role strain, and role exit?
A
- Role: behaviour expected of someone who holds particular status
- Role set: number of roles attached to single status (eg. professor’s role of teacher, colleague, and researcher)
- Role conflict: conflict among roles connected to 2+ status (eg. police officier who catches own son using drugs at home)
- Role strain: tension among roles connected to single status (eg. manger who tries to balance concern for workers with task requirements)
- Role exit: disengaging from social roles can be very traumatic without proper preparation (examination of new roles and learning new expectations)
16
Q
What is the social construction of reality? What is Thomas Theorem and ethnomethodology?
A
- Process by which people creatively shape reality through social interaction
- Social interaction is complex negotiation of “reality” and involves some agreement about what is going on, but interests and intentions can affect perceptions
- Thomas Theorem: situations we define as real because real in their consequences
- Ethnomethodology: study of way people make sense of everyday surroundings (break rules and observe reactions)
17
Q
According to Goffman, what is dramaturgical analysis, idealization, personal space, embarassment and tact?
A
- Dramaturgical analysis: the study of social interaction in terms of theatrical performance
- Idealization: we construct performances to idealize our intentions
- Doctors and other professionals describe work as “helping others” but there are less honourable motives such as income and power
- Personal space: surrounding area over which person makes some claim to privacy
- Being caught staring is embarassing because seen as imposing on one’s personal space
- Embarassment: discomfort following a spoiled performance
- Tact: helping someone “save face” from embarassment
18
Q
Discuss Goffman’s presentation of self.
A
- Presentation of self (impression management): a person’s efforts to create specific impressions in the minds of others
- Adopt persona and manage what people think about us
- Role performance involves stage setting and use of props (costume, tone of voice, gesture)
- Part of performance is nonverbal (body language, gestures, facial expressions)
- Unintended body language can contradict our planned meaning
- Research shows that although behaviour is often spontaneous, it is more patterned and has been thought about
- Demeanour is clue to social power
19
Q
What are the 6 basic emotions and emotion management?
A
- 6 basic emotions: happiness, sadness, anger, fear, disgust, surpirse
- Most people are freer to express their emotions at home than on the job
- Emotion management happens when we socially construct our emotions to fit our social environment
20
Q
Discuss language and social interaction with gender.
A
- Language communicates surface reality as well as deeper levels of meaning
- Language defines men and women differently
- Power: men refers to things they own as “she” and women traditionally take the man’s name in marriage
- Value: what has greater value is treated as masculine
- Attention: directing greater attention to masculine endeavours
21
Q
Discuss humour and social interaction.
A
- Foundations of humour: contrast between conventional and unconventional realities
- The greater the opposition, the greater the humour
- Humour is tied to common culture and doesn’t translate easily (won’t understand if outsider)
- Humour allows us to assert our freedom and prevents us from being prisoners of reality
- First jokes in life are about bodily functions
- Some topics are too sensitive for humour treatment
- Humour can act as safety valve (it was just a joke) or oppress others (put down disadvantaged)
22
Q
Discuss sex.
A
- Sex: biological distinctive between females and males
- 23 pairs of chromosomes (biological codes that guide physical development) combine to form fertilized embyro
- X from father produces female embryo (XX)
- Y from father produces male embryo (XY)
- Primary sex characteristics: genitals used for reproduction
- Secondary sex characteristics: bodily development that distinguishes biologically mature females and males
- Intersexual people: people whose bodies have both male and female characteristics
- Transexual: people who feel they are one sex even though biologically they are the other
- Our biology does not dictate any specific ways of being sexual
- Sexual practices, showing affection and timing of sexuality varies between cultures
- However, incest taboo is found in virtually every society
23
Q
Discuss sexual attitudes in Canada.
A
- In North America, sexuality is regulated with laws, norms and attitudes
- In 1967, PM Trudeau declared “the state has no place in th ebedrooms of the nation”
- Kinsey’s studies (1948, 1953) were bestsellers
- Youth culture (late 60s) was “if it feels good, do it” without marriage
- The pill in 1960 removed fear of pregnancy
- By 1980, climate of sexual freedom was criticized by conservatives as evidence of moral decline due to prevalance of AIDS
- Opposed cohabitation, single parenthood, sexual freedom
- Premarital sex within Canada has gained approval
- High percentage of teens are sexually active
- 75% of the time when people have their first sexual encounter, they are impaired
- Sexual double standard still persists (fun vs. love aspect of sex)
- Average age of marriage in Canada is 26-27
24
Q
Discuss sex between adults.
A
- Canadians seem to be more sexually satisfied by Americans
- 24% rarely or never, 23% 1-3 times per month, 53% at least once per week
- Least satisfied is in Thailand, China and Japan (less gender equality)
- People who are married report greater sexual satisfaction
- Adultery is widely condemned
- 53% of married people say they would forgive an affair
- However, 63% of divorces can be attributed to affairs
25
Discuss sexual orientation and homosexuality.
- Heterosexuality: romantic and emotional attraction to other sex
- Homosexuality: romantic and emotional attraction to same sex
- Bisexuality: romantic and emotional attraction to both sexes
- Asexuality: no sexual attraction to either sex
How do people develop sexual orientation?
- Product of society: people in any society attach meaning to sexual activity
- Product of biology: difference in size of hypothalamus
- Most people experience same-sex attraction at some time in their lives
- 2011 National Household Survey counted 64 575 same-sex couples, 43 560 of them in common-law unions
- Greater acceptance of homosexuality in Canada than in US
- Homophobia: dread of close personal interaction with non-heteros
- In 1974, APA declared that homosexuality was not an illness but simply a form of sexual behaviour
- In 2005, same-sex marriages were legal through Canada
26
What are some sexual issues?
- Teen pregnancy: most are unplanned
- Abortion: deliberate termination of pregnancy
- Pornography
- Prostitution: most are women, little protection, trapped in it, frequently victims of sexual abuse/violence
- Call girls: elite workers who arrange own clients and offer companionship for a fee
- Sex workers in massage parlouts and brothels receive only portion of money
- Streetwalkers are most victimized
- Robert Pickton: charged with murder of at least 26 women
- Sexual assault: often underreported, mostly women (10% men)
- 75 reported incidents per 100 000 population
27
Discuss sociological perspectives with regards to sexuality.
1. Structural-functional
- Social institutions regulate with whom and when people seek to reproduct (eg. adultery and incest are condemned, people are labelled as illegitimate)
- Latent functions of prostitution: sex for those without access and in loveless marriages
- Criticism: patterns of sexuality are varied over time and cultures
2. Symbolic-interaction
- Social construction of sexuality: great change in sexuality patterns (eg. virginity and sex education)
- Sexual practices vary from culture to culture
- Criticism: not all sexual practices are so variable (eg. men see women in sexual terms more than vice versa)
3. Social-conflict
- Sexuality reflects social inequality (poverty drives women into prostitution, women get arrested more)
- Sexuality can create social inequality (pornography shows men’s power, degrades women)
- Queer theory: challenges heterosexual bias (stigma to anyone who is not heterosexual as “queer”, heterosexism is tolerated and in the law) in Western society
- Criticism: sexuality can deepen commitment and not a power issue, doesn’t consider that societies have taken steps to reduce inequality
28
Discuss toxic masculinity.
- Every man hears “be a man”
- Ball field: athletic ability
- Bedroom: sexual conquest
- Billfold: economic success and power
- Alexithymia: inability to put emotions into words
- 80% of American men suffer from some form of this
- Empathy deficit disorder: unable to understand others’ emotions
- Men are isolated as cannot enter meaningful relationships with people and medicate feelings away
- Masculinity should come down to relationships and commitment to a cause
29
What is deviance, crime, social control and the criminal justice system?
- Deviance: recognized violation of cultural norms
- Crime: violation of society’s formally enacted criminal law
- Social control: attempts by society to regulate people’s thought and behaviour
- Criminal justice system: formal response by police, courts, and prison officials to alleged violations of the law
30
What are the differing perspectives on deviance?
1. Biology
- Early faulty studies showed relationship of criminality with head shape (Lombroso) and body size (Sheldon)
- People’s overall genetic factors and environmental factors are strong predictors of crime
- Criticism: offer limited explanation of crime
2. Psychology
- Focus on abnormality in individual’s personality
- Containment theory: individual factors like ability to cope with frustration and identifying positively with cultural norms are related to fewer problems with the police
- Criticism: the most serious crimes are committed by those whose psychological profiles are normal
3. Sociology
- Deviance varies according to cultural norms
- People become deviant as others define them that way
- Both norms and the way people define rule-breaking involve social power
31
Discuss structural-functionalism and deviance.
Durkheim’s functions of deviance:
- Deviance affirms cultural values/norms
- Responding to deviance clarifies moral boundaries and brings people together
- Deviance encourages social change
Merton’s strain theory:
- Deviance depends on whether society provides the means to achieve cultural goals
- Conformity: uses approved means
- Innovation: strain between cultural goals and opportunities to get them; people may use illegitimate means (eg. crime)
- Ritualism: inner rejection of cultural goals
- Retreatism: dropping out
- Rebellion: seek new cultural goals
Deviant subcultures:
- Deviance/conformity arises from relative opportunity structure that frames a person’s life
- Criminal subcultures offer knowledge and skills needed to succeed in unconventional ways
- Conflict subcultures appear when there is no opportunity and violence is ignited by frustration
- Retreatist subcultures involves dropping out
Criticism: not everyone seeks success, attention focused on poor, communities do not always come together in reaction to crime, not everyone who breaks important rules are labelled deviant
32
Discuss symbolic-interactionism and deviance.
- Labelling theory: deviance and conformity result not so much from what people do as from how others respond to those actions
- Primary deviance: violations are minimal and have no effect on self-identity (eg. skipping school)
- Secondary deviance: if perceptions of people label someone as deviant, a person may adopt the identity (eg. labelled an alcoholic)
- Stigma: powerful, negative label that greatly changes one’s self-concept and social identity
- Operates as master status, discrediting a person in minds of others
- Retrospective labelling: interpreting someone’s past in light of present deviance
- Projective labelling: a deviant identity is used to predict future action (eg. repeated molestation)
- People have a tendency to treat difference (eg. living on the street) as deviance or illness
- Medicalization of deviance: deviant behaviours are defined today as illnesses
- Labels influence who responds to deviance (police or doctors), whether someone receives punishment or treatment, whether someone is sick or bad
- Sutherland’s Differential Association Theory: a person’s tendency toward conformity or deviance depends on amount of contact with others who encourage or reject conventional behaviour
- Learning takes place in groups
- Hirschi’s Control Theory: conformity is linked to 4 types of social control
- Attachment: strong social attachments
- Opportunity: access to legitimate opportunity
- Involvement: time and energy spent on legitimate activities
- Belief: strong belief in conventional morality and respect for authority
- Criticism: some kinds of behaviour are universally condemned, labelled may discourage further deviance, some people actively seek deviant label
33
Discuss social-conflict and deviance.
- Norms reflect intersts of powerful
- Belief that laws are natural masks their political character
- Deviant labels are applied to those who interfere with operation of capitalism (threaten private property, don’t work, resist authority, challenge status quo)
- White-collar crime: crimes committed by people of high social position in course of occupations
- Corporate crime: illegal acitons of corporate or people acting on its behalf
- Organized crime: business supplying illegal goods/services
- Hate crime: criminal act against person or person’s property by offender motivated by racial or other bias
- Common in all societies, highest in Ontario in Canada
- Virtually every society in the world applies stricter normative controls to women than to men
- Criticism: laws also exist to protect non-rich, deviance does not just exist in capitalist societies
34
Discuss crimes, crime types, and trends.
- Violation of criminal law enacted by federal government
- Act itself
- Criminal intent (mens rea; guilty mind) which ranges from negligence to willful conduct
Types of crimes:
- Violent crime
- Property crime: theft of property belonging to others
- Victimless crime: violations of law in which there are no obvious victims
- Property and violent crime rising from 1962-late 1990s and then slowly declining
- Victimization surveys show higher crime rate because of unreported crimes
- Street criminals tend to be 20-34, males, lower social position, - Aboriginals and Blacks (may be police enforcement)
- US homicide rate is 4x higher than Canada and 5x higher than Europe
- Sexual assault rate is 2.6 and 7x higher
- May be due to lacking social safety nets and availability of guns
35
Discuss the criminal justice system.
- Police is main point of contact between population and criminal justice system
- Discretion in who to arrest depending on seriousness of crime, if suspect is uncooperative or has history of crime, bystanders, and other biases
- Courts: determine innocence/guilt but many cases are resolved before going to court
- Plea bargaining: legal negotiation in which prosecutor reduces a charge of defendant’s guilty plea
- Bargain-counter justice: spares judical system time/expense of court trial
Criticism: media coverage of crimes make punishment a public event, recidivism remains high so deterrence is questionable, prisons provide short-term protection but rehabilitation may not work among criminals
36
Discuss methods of punishment.
- Retribution: society makes offender suffer, moral vengeance
- Deterrence: discourage crime through punishment (eg. fines)
- Rehabilitation: program for reforming offender to prevent more offences
- Societal protection: rendering offender incapable of more offences either through incarceration or execution
37
Discuss restorative justice.
- Correctional programs operating within society rather than in prison
- Probation: offender remains under supervision of an officier in the community
- Parole: early release to serve remainder of sentence in the community
- Sentencing circles: for Aboriginal offenders, including accused, victim, families, and other community members
38
What is socioeconomic status and its components?
- Canada is highly stratified because we welcome immigrants
- Socioeconomic status: composite measure of social position that considers wealth, power, occupational prestige and schooling
- Income: occupational wages/salaries, earnings from investments and government transfer payment
- In 2011, average family income was $75 900
- Dual-earner families have higher income
- Top 20% shares 44.3% of income while bottom 20% has 4.8%
- Wealth: total amount of money and other assets, minus outstanding debts
- Distributed less evenly than income
- Includes stocks, bonds, real estate and privately owned property
- In US, richest 20% control 89% of all wealth
- Occupation is a major determinant of income, wealth, and power
- Physicians, lawyers and engineers are ranked near the top on prestige while cashiers and janitors are ranked near the bottom
- White-collar work that involves mental activity only has greater prestige than blue-collar work
39
Discuss schooling and social class.
- Determines labour force participation, occupation, and especially income
- Educational differences between men and women in similar jobs are minimal
- However, women have completed more years of schooling than men overall
40
What are the categories of merit and caste?
1. Ancestry
- Determines point of enter into system of social inequality
- Certain families with wealth and power have become well-established over generations
- Being born to prvilege or poverty sets stage for future schooling, occupation and therefore income
2. Race and ethnicity
- Higher average incomes for Japanese, British and French vs. Chinese, Black and Aboriginal
- Quebecois and First Nations have the lowest income
3. Gender
- Women earn less income, accumulate less wealth and have less occupational prestige than men
- Single-parent families headed by women are more than 2x as likely to be poor than those headed by men
41
What are the hierarchies?
1. Upper class
- Upper-uppers (1%): inherited enormous wealth (blue bloods, old money, high society)
- Lower-uppers (2-4%): working rich (nouveaux riches), high level of education
- Dual-earner families in which both wife and husband are professionals can make it into this lower-upper stratum of society
- Success stories fascinate us because it is accepted cultural goal
2. Middle class (40-50%)
- Tremendous influence on our culture (TV and media)
- Most commercial advertising is directed to middle class
- Has greater ethnic and racial diversity than upper class
- Upper-middles: professionals that accumulate considerable property , usually have university educations
- Average-middles: managers, tellers, clerks or highly skilled blue-collar jobs, accumulate some wealth, children go to local universities
3. Working class (⅓%)
- Otherwise known as lower-middle class
- Blue-collar jobs: little opportunity for imagination and high level of supervision
- Little or no accumulation of wealth, may own house in low-cost neighbourhoods
- Children have little chances of going to university
4. Lower class (20%)
- About 15% of Canadian population is classified as poor
- Working poor: incomes from full-time or multiple part-time jobs fall short of what is required to cover necessities of food, shelter and clothing
42
What difference does class make?
1. Health
- Children born into poor families are 3x more likely to die from disease, neglect, accidents or violence
- Richer people live 7 years longer due to nutritious food, safer environments and medical care
2. Values and attitudes
- Rich favour understated tastes while nouveau riche favour conspicuous consumption
- Richer people are more tolerant of controversial behaviour
- Working-class people tend to be less tolerant due to rules
3. Family
- The more money a family has, the more parents can develop their children’s talents and abilities
- Lower-class families tend to be larger
- Middle-class marriages are more egalitarian, share more activities and have greater intimacy
- Working class friendships are sources of material assistance
43
Discuss trends and definitions of social mobility.
- Canada is credential society that needs proof of knowledge to get a job.
- Upward: with college degree or higher-paying job
- Downward: drop out of school, losing a job, business failure or divorce
- Intragenerational mobility: change in social position during one person’s lifetime
- Intergenerational mobility: upward or downward social mobility of children in relation to their parents
IN CANADA:
- Long-term trend is upward
- Occupational inheritance occurs for men whose fathers are professional, white-collared or farmers
- Those at very top and bottom may experience significant occupational inheritance, while those in the middle do not
- Women’s opportunity for upward mobility has been less than men’s, but narrowing
44
Discuss types of poverty and how it is measured as well as trends.
- Relative poverty: universal and inevitable, refers to deprivation of some people in relation to those who have more
- Absolute poverty: deprivation of resources that is life-threatening
- Formerly the elderly, now children
- Higher rates for poorly educated, visible minorities and Aboriginals
- Feminization of poverty: trend by which women represent an increasing proportion of the poor
- In Canada, measured by LICO or low-income cut-off (people who spend at least 55% of pre-tax income for food, shelter, and clothing)
- Slowly decreasing through years, around 10%
- Working poor: includes men and women who labour for at least 50 weeks of the year and yet cannot escape poverty
45
What are the 2 ways of explaining poverty?
1. Blame the poor
- The poor are responsible for their poverty
- They cannot or will not take advantage of opportunities
- Culture of poverty: resignation leads to self-perpetuating cycle of poverty
2. Blame society
- Society that distribute wealth badly face significant poverty problem
- Lack of ambition of poor people is consequence and not cause of lack of opportunity
46
Discuss homelessness.
- ⅓ of all homeless people are entire families
- Children are fastest growing category of homeless
- Due to societal factors (lack of affordable housing, low-paying jobs, structural changes in Canadian economy) or personal traits (mental illness, drug use, inability to cope with society)
