Socialization, Norms, Deviance, and Conformity

Humans rely heavily on social experiences to learn culturally acceptable behavior.
Socialization: The process of developing, inheriting, and spreading norms, customs, and beliefs.
- Individuals acquire knowledge, skills, habits, and behaviors necessary for societal inclusion.
- Widely held views become accepted viewpoints, adopted by most.

Cultural transmission (or cultural learning): Passing down beliefs, customs, and norms from one generation to another.
Cultural diffusion: Spread of norms, customs, and beliefs from one culture to another.

Primary socialization: Initial learning of acceptable actions and attitudes in childhood, mainly through observing parents and close adults.
- Sets the stage for future socialization and personal opinions.
Secondary socialization: Learning appropriate behavior within specific sections of the larger society, outside the home.
- Based on learning rules of specific social environments (e.g., school, sports, church).
- Typically associated with adolescents and adults.
- Involves smaller changes and refinements to behaviors established in primary socialization.
- Can occur when moving, changing schools, or professions.
Anticipatory socialization: Preparing for future changes in occupations, living situations, or relationships.
- Example: A premedical student emulating physicians.
Resocialization: Discarding old behaviors for new ones through intensive retraining.
- Can be positive (e.g., military training) or negative (e.g., cult indoctrination).

Norms: Social rules defining the boundaries of acceptable behavior.
Moores: Widely observed social norms.
Provide a mechanism for regulating behavior, serving as social control.
Sanctions: Penalties for misconduct or rewards for appropriate behavior, used to maintain social control.
- Negative sanctions: Punish deviant behavior.
- Positive sanctions: Reward compliant behavior.

Formal sanctions: Enforced by formal social institutions (governments, employers).
- Examples: Promotions, jail sentences.
Informal sanctions: Enforced by social groups.
- Examples: Inclusion/exclusion from a social group.
Norms dictate what is appropriate, acceptable, and taboo in behavior, speech, dress, home life, etc.
- Differ between groups within a society and between different cultures.
- Example: American extroversion vs. Japanese reserve.
Folkways: Norms referring to polite behavior in social interactions.
- Example: Handshakes after a sports match.

Agents of socialization: Aspects of society important for learning social norms and values.
For children: Parents or family members.
For adolescents: Social circles (friends, peers, teachers).
For adults: Colleagues and bosses.
Environment (e.g., college) leads to shifts in acceptable behavior.
Workforce: Socialization within organizations.
Ethnic background, religion, and government also influence learned behavior.
Geography: National, regional, and neighborhood levels dictate norms.
Media: Influences what is accepted within a society.
Popular culture: Common trends and beliefs influenced by the media.
Mass media: Television, radio, newspapers, internet deliver impersonalized communication and establish trends.

Deviance: Any violation of norms, rules, or expectations within a society.
- Sociological context: Any act that goes against societal norms.
- Varies in severity: Jaywalking to murder.
- Includes acts meeting disapproval: Promiscuous sexual behavior.
Social stigma: Extreme disapproval or dislike based on perceived differences.
- Deviations include differences in beliefs, abilities, behaviors, and appearances.
- Medical conditions (HIV, dwarfism, obesity) can be stigmatized.
- Stigma can affect those associated with an individual (e.g., family of a criminal).
- Evolves over time: Divorce stigma decreased over time.

Deviance, stigmatization, and reputation are linked to labeling theory.
Labeling theory: Labels affect how others respond and influence self-image.
- Labels can channel behavior into deviance or conformity.
- Example: Labeling a woman "promiscuous" can lead to further promiscuity or behavioral change.

Resistance to negative labels.
Groups may embrace deviant labels (e.g., biker gangs).
Role engulfment: Internalizing a label and assuming the role, taking over a person's identity.

Differential association theory: Deviance, especially criminal behavior, is learned through interactions.
- Exposure to deviant behavior lays the groundwork for engaging in it.
- Differential association: Degree to which one is surrounded by ideals adhering to social norms versus those against them.
- More numerous or intense associations with deviant behavior lead to gravitating toward it.

Strain theory: Deviance as a reaction to the disconnect between social goals and social structure.
Example: The American dream (wealth through achievement) is a social goal, but society can't guarantee the education and opportunity needed to achieve it.
Deviant behavior (e.g., theft) may arise as an attempt to achieve the social goal outside the limited social structure.
Functional theorists argue deviance is necessary for social order.
- Provides clear perception of social norms and boundaries.
- Encourages unity within society.
- Can promote social change.

Conformity, compliance, and obedience are ways of adhering to social expectations.

Conformity: Matching one's attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors to group or societal norms.
- Pressure to conform can be real or imagined.
- Also known as majority influence.
- ASH experiment showed the strength of social influence on normative conformity.
Types of conformity:
- Internalization: Changing behavior to fit the group while privately agreeing with the ideas.
- Identification: Outward acceptance of others' ideas without personally taking them on.

Classic experiment on internalization: Philip Zimbardo's Stanford prison experiment.
Participants randomly assigned as prisoner or guard.
Guards and prisoners quickly adopted their roles and displayed related behaviors.
Guards became aggressive; prisoners became submissive.
Study ended after six days due to ethical concerns.
Participants who internalized their roles were shocked by their behavior.
Western cultures are less likely to conform, while eastern cultures tend toward conformity.

Obedience: Changing one's behavior in response to a direct order from an authority figure.
- People are more likely to obey than comply due to the social power of the authority figure.

Stanley Milgram's obedience experiment series.
Participants were told they would be controlling an electrical panel that would administer shocks to the learner if they made mistakes.
Teachers were told to increase the voltage by $15 v$ each time an incorrect response was given.
Researchers were able to get $65$ percent of the participants to administer shocks to the maximum of $450 v$ .
This type of experiment has been repeated many times and has consistently shown that more than sixty percent of people will obey even if they do not wish to continue.