Lecture One

Welcome to Child/Sociology 6: Child, Family, Schools, and Community. I look forward to working with everyone throughout this course. There are no major papers due for this class, but there are several small projects that need to be completed. It looks like a lot of work, but if organized well it all flows together?When you do your community resource file, pick three of them to visit, and make sure you include one preschool/daycare in your list. Make sure you print out your syllabus with the weekly outline of due dates, and the assignment sheet. You will be able to assess your own grade once you have gotten all your grades back?no surprises.

My office hours will be Tuesday and Thursday from 9-10 pm. I will be online during those times to answer any questions you may have. Email is the easiest way to contact me. I won?t go into my experience or personal information, as it is in the instructor?s information area. I am very reasonable and accommodating to special needs and requests for valid reasons. If you have questions regarding any of the content of the course, or if you disagree with any of the quiz questions or answers, please feel free to contact me. They are taken from the book publishers materials and have been known to be wrong. I don?t always catch all the mistakes made.

Chapter One: Ecology of the Child

Ecology is the science of interrelationships between organisms and their environments. This could be flies and manure, or kids and school. Socialization on the other hand is unique to humans. Most social scientists agree that socialization is unique to humans and that language is what enables humans to develop mind and self. Socialization begins at birth and continues throughout life. Newborns come into the world with certain needs which change as they develop. As their development changes, so do parental expectations for behavior. Babies are not expected to walk and talk, but two and three year olds are. Parents that have too high or too low an expectation are setting their children up for failure and social/medical problems. Children play a significant role in their socialization that increases with age and developmental stage. A child?s temperament impacts their socialization as well. Those children with easy going temperaments are better accepted and rewarded than those with more difficult temperaments.

Socialization can be an intentional or unintentional process. Parents that smoke are unintentionally socializing their children that it is okay to smoke, even if they tell them that smoking is bad for them. If it is good enough for their parents, it is good enough for them. Children imitate their parent?s behaviors and activities through unintentional socialization. Intentional socialization is purposeful teaching, such as different lessons we sign our children up for and things that we intentionally set out to teach our children.

As society changes, more challenges are posed to socializing agents. That is to say that as television gets more and more graphic with sex, drugs, and violent behavior, the more desensitized our youth become: making it possible for the next generation to allow even more graphic sex and violence to be on television. As society changes, more challenges are posed to socializing agents. Some results of societal change are that child rearing and education have been linked to an increased concern with the development of intellectual skills, and the value of the child?s place in the family has been shifted.

During the fourteenth to sixteenth centuries, children were viewed as miniature adults. Their dress and behavior were similar. This is where the old adage of being seen and not heard came from along with the philosophy that children were born with certain socialized behaviors.

During the sixteenth century, children were viewed as "unformed adults" who could be taught, thus schools were established. This is when the philosophy of children being born with a "blank slate" and purposeful instruction of behavior began.

By the twentieth century, compulsory education laws and child labor laws were established in many western countries, which in effect lengthened the span of childhoods.

During the twenty-first century, childhood is once again being shortened by the demands of modern-day society. Children are expected to take on too much responsibility too young. Latchkey children of dual working households are becoming larger in numbers, and without proper supervision and structured time they are being raised by the likes of Jerry Springer, BET TV, MTV, and other inappropriate content programming on television.

Socialization is complex and involves manipulating the "input" to induce the desired "output" on individuals. In other words children/people can be manipulated based on the situations they are put in. The two examples given in the book by BF Skinner?s Walden Two and Sherif?s Robber?s Cave experiment. These are examples of intentional socialization.

Urie Bronfenbrenner believes that the social context of individual interactions and experiences determine the degree to which individuals can develop their abilities and realize their potentials. According to Bronfenbrenner?s model of the ecology of human development, there are four basic structures that make up what is called the chronosystem. The chronosystem allows for the systematic study of interactions, including the child?s role in their own development over time.

First is the microsystem, which refers to the activities and relationships with others experienced by a developing person in a particular small setting. These others are family, peers, media, community, and school/daycare.

Second is the mesosystem which consists of linkages and interrelationships that are intermediate between two or more of a developing person?s Microsystems. These interrelationships include censorship between community and the media, guest speakers in the community or school/daycare, conferences between school/daycare and the family, friends that visit the home, and friends going to a movie which involves peers and the media.

Third is the exosystem, which refers to outside settings in which children are not active participants, but which affect them in one of their Microsystems. A parent?s line of work, school boards, social services, federal and state commissions, and community boards are all components that have an impact on the community?s socialization.

Lastly is the macrosystem which consists of the society and subculture to which the developing person belongs with particular reference to the belief systems, lifestyles and options, and patterns of social interchange. These include religion, culture/ethnicity, economics, political ideology, and science/technology.

Edward T. Hall went further in defining macrosystems as being "low" or "high" context. Low context macrosystems are characterized by rationality, practicality, competition, individuality, and progress, whereas, high-context macrosystems are characterized by intuitiveness, emotionality, cooperation, group identity, and tradition. There was a good example in the book of two separate families and their parenting styles that demonstrate this concept very well. Page 19 or your text.

The chronosystem involves temporal changes in ecological systems or within individuals as they develop, that produce new conditions affecting children?s development. They are: changes in technology, significant societal events, and physical changes during puberty.

Glen Elder compared the life-course development of children whose families had experienced change in their socioeconomic status due to the Great Depression and those who had not. Elder?s study showed that it is a combination of variables that affect the socialization process. Every socialization agent-family, school, peer group, media, community-engages in the paradox of rearing children for stability as well as for change. This is where many of the theories that promote "it takes a village to raise a child" come from.

Societal trends that impact children include the following: biotechnology, reconceptualization of societal and individual responsibilities, mobile technology, globalism/nationalism, and information intermediaries. Ecological trends challenge families, schools, and communities? commitment to children?s needs. The federal government uses the following indicators to measure the status of the nation?s children: economic security, health, behavior and social environment indicators, education indicators. That is why so many presidents are concerned with healthcare, and education: our continued success as a nation depends on the well being of our children.

Garbarino argues that society must redefine childhood "as the space in which to lay the foundation for the best that human development has to offer". Osofsky cites "evidence that many adolescents and young adults who first become delinquent and later develop into criminals were exposed earlier in their lives to much violence, disorganized families, poor education, and limited opportunities" Hewlett and West show how government, business, and the media have waged a silent war against parents. All of these professors and educators seem to say the same thing, "Families are disintegrating as economics force couples to work more to keep up with the pressures that society and the media put on our children and us to "keep up with the Jones?". It is up to us as society, voters, and consumers to stand up and be heard with a loud voice that we want our families back and a simpler way of life that includes family dinners, games, values, morals, and communication.

Chapter Two: Ecology of Socialization

What it means to be human and the aims of socialization are covered in this chapter. The goals of socialization are to develop a self concept, enable self-regulation, empower achievement, acquire appropriate social roles, and implement developmental skills.

In order to develop a self-concept it is essential to develop an identity that is distinct from that of other people?s.

Erikson?s Theory of Psychosocial Development has eight stages that all people go through. Infancy is labeled as trust vs. mistrust; Early Childhood is autonomy vs. shame and doubt; Play Age is initiative vs. guilt; School Age is Industry vs. Inferiority; Adolescence is identity vs. identity diffusion; Young Adult is intimacy vs. isolation; Adulthood is generality vs. self-absorption; and Senescence is integrity vs. despair. Each of these stages has a choice that is made by the participants. Parents instill trust or mistrust in their infants by the care they give them; children are molded and shaped into paths of positive or negative outcomes based on the reinforcement, and example given by the parents; teenagers know who they are and are industrious, or struggle to find their place and feel as though they don?t belong; adults are either productive and social, able to make positive relationships with others, or self-absorbed and introverted loners with anti social behaviors or somewhere in between based on their experiences with society as a whole; Seniors based on their development and what they choose to do through adolescence and young adulthood and adulthood will give them a sense of integrity or despair about their life and what they did or did not accomplish over their lifetime.

After establishing self-concept one must begin to self-regulate, which involves the process of bringing one?s emotions, thoughts, and behavior under control. By having goals society gives meaning and purpose to adulthood. To be part of a group, individuals must have a function that complements the group. Havighurst?s Theory of Developmental Tasks is "midway between an individual need and a social demand". In other words, if there is a need in society for the talents of the individual, they will have a sense of belonging. Developmental tasks arise from social pressure on individuals according to their development. These pressures start early in life and continue throughout all stages of life.

The agents of socialization are the family, schools and childcare, peers, mass media, and the community. The family is the child?s introduction to society and bears the major responsibility for socializing the child. The family functions as a system of interaction that affects the psychological development of children. The family is the first reference group for values, norms, and practices. Dimensions of ethnic behavior patterns are developed by orientation, coping style, attitude toward authority, and communication style. Families either foster family community or individual orientation, active or passive coping mechanisms, submissive to egalitarian attitudes toward authority, and an open and expressive to restrained and private communication style. All of these have a part in the socialization of the child.

Schools are a societal agent organized to perpetuate society?s knowledge, skills, customs, and beliefs. Socializing children for a society of rapid change is a continual challenge. John Goodland found four broad categories of goals relating to the purpose of schooling: academic, vocational, social and civic, and personal. Teachers evaluate according to norms and standards. Teachers as models for our children to imitate may have once been the case when teachers were above reproach and held themselves to a higher standard of behavior than they do today. Childcare has become an important socialization agent due to societal changes. Many children of the privileged have been given the advantages of exposure to many positive and useful things before entering school, while those who are disadvantaged have little exposure to positive things and more exposure to poor coping mechanisms. With more programs for disadvantaged children in place, it is the working poor that are now struggling to compete with their peers to keep up in school.

Peer groups give children experiences in egalitarian types of relationships, in that they can choose whom they want to be associated with. Peer groups reward sociability and reject deviations, thus the child learns to obey the "rules of the game". Peer groups also provide information about the world and oneself from a new perspective, and provide support for the expression of values and attitudes.

Mass media teaches many of the ways of society, as well as provides information about the society. The mass media also provides role models for children to emulate. Many of the concerns regarding the media?s influence are: children?s cognitive immaturity leaves them susceptible to believe whatever is portrayed via media, and that children are susceptible to media?s advertising, both in demanding the products they see and in basing their behavior on portrayed characters.

The community provides a sense of belonging, friendship, and socialization of children. Many professionals are concerned with the erosion of community ties. Many adults today do not have friends from childhood, and do not have a sense of hometown, which has a negative impact on society as a whole. Population distribution affects children?s interactions. The types of agencies within a community affect children?s experiences due to either having opportunities for exposure or not having them. Services provided by the community affect which parts of society are opened to children, they are either child friendly places or not. Communities can be a valuable support system for families if they are approachable and available.

There are many methods of socialization: Affective methods (effect emerges from feeling) utilize attachment theories. Operant methods (effect emerges from acting) involve using reinforcement, extinction, punishment, feedback, and learning by doing. Observational methods (effect emerges from imitating) are created through modeling. Cognitive methods (effect emerges from information processing) is obtained through instruction, standard setting, and reasoning. Sociocultural methods (effect emerges from conforming) combine group pressure (attraction to the group, acceptance by the group, and type of group), tradition, rituals and routines, and symbols. Lastly there are apprenticeship methods (effect emerges from guided participation) which involves structuring, collaborating, transferring.

Outcomes of socialization are a society with values, attitudes, motives and attributes, self esteem, self-regulation/behavior, morals, and gender roles. Gender roles being qualities that individuals understand and that characterize males and females in their culture.

Throughout both of these chapters it is clear that development from birth and interactions with everything that we are exposed to from birth play a role in the socialization of our children and our society as a whole. It is up to each of us to take personal responsibility for what we teach our children whether intentionally or unintentionally. It is up to society to determine what is appropriate for society as a whole, not as individuals.

DISCUSSION

Our question for this week is: Who is responsible for the increasing violence and nudity on television?