Thursday, March 31, 2011

Chapter 4: Socialization and the Life Course




SOCIALIZATION AGENTS AND ACTIVITIES OF YOUNG ADOLESCENTS. By: Arnon, Sara, Shamai, Shmuel, Ilatov, Zinaida, Adolescence, 00018449, Summer2008, Vol. 43, Issue 170

INFLUENCE OF SOCIALIZATION AGENTS ON LEISURE-TIME ACTIVITIES OF YOUNG ADOLESCENTS
Research examined the relative importance of peer groups for young adolescents as compared with diverse adult socialization agents — family
, school, and community. The factors involved were teenagers' activities, preferences, feelings, and thoughts as to how they spend their leisure time, their preferences for help providers, and their sense of attachment to their community. These comparisons were made with religious and non-religious youngsters, in both rural and urban communities, and in gender subgroups. Questionnaires were administered to teenagers at secondary schools in a northern peripheral region of Israel. Findings showed the primary importance of peer groups and family in leisure activities and support, and the secondary importance of school and community. No evidence was found of a sharp generation gap.Community could also be significant if its organizations accepted youth as a peer group, and not only individually, on an equal and cooperating basis.
The aim of this research was to examine the relative importance and impact of peer groups, family, school, and community on young adolescents. The relative influence of these socialization agents were demonstrated mainly by the activities, preferences, feelings, and thoughts of the teenagers concerning the way they spend their leisure time, their preferences for help providers, and the sense of attachment to their community. This study examined "normative" adolescents, in contrast to many studies that deal with problematic behaviors and their prevention. It focuses on three elements of the youngsters' cultural background which are considered important explanatory factors of their subculture: gender, level of religiosity, and nature of their community. Participants (7th- 9th-grade adolescents) living on the Golan Heights, a peripheral area in the north of Israel.
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
The process of the separating from childhood dependencies and parents, and moving on to a wider social milieu with extra-familial relationships is generally considered a crucial developmental stage which the adolescent must pass through in order to achieve maturity (Roberts, 1985; Coleman, 1992). Western research has found that youth spend much less time with the family, which may reflect individualistic rather than collectivistic values with greater value placed on individualism rather than family (Larson & Verma, 1999). This distancing of youth is also from teachers and other significant adults and from official institutions (such as school and organized leisure institutions). The increasing importance of the peer group makes it an effective socialization agent, which may encourage idle activity that is negatively correlated with adolescents' school achievement and positively with higher rates of delinquency and anti-social behavior (Coleman, 1989, 1992; Larson & Verna, 1999). Group Socialization theory asserts that it is not the home but the peer environment that has lasting effects on adolescents' psychological characteristics when they become adults. Self-categorization processes of assimilation and differentiation tend to make adolescents more similar to each other within peer groups and less similar to adults (Harris, 1995). The gap leads to intergenrational conflict. Adolescents threaten the authority of parents, educators, and traditional institutions. According to social control theory (Hirschi, 1969), the detachment of young persons from parents and community institutions of conventional society weaken social control over them. In its moderate mode the conflict is a "generation gap" and in its extreme mode it is a "generation war." On the other hand, from a positive point of view, a degree of separateness from parents and other adults is essential for establishing independence; generally it is normal and moderate (Chen & Farruggia, 2002; Coleman, 1989; Hendry et al., 1993).
Peer groups act as a source of behavioral standards, particularly where parental influence is weak. Acceptance by peers is perceived as important especially by young adolescents, with conformity to the group the price that has to be paid. It is sustained by peer pressure which transmits group norms and fosters loyalty to the group (Hendry et al., 1993).

Leisure and Free Time of Young Adolescents

Leisure is a central sphere of life, described by Roberts (1985) as intrinsically satisfying experiences that individuals derive from recreation during their free time. Free time and leisure activities are major facets of adolescents' lives. In developing and postindustrial societies, it is schoolwork that most clearly replaces household and paid labor in youths' time use. The amount of time spent on schoolwork is inversely related to the amount of time devoted to nearly every other activity, particularly leisure activities (Larson & Verma, 1999; Zeijl et al., 2001).
Adolescents' free time activities are not just a source of intrinsically satisfying fun experiences, but also an important part of their socialization process. They give adolescents the opportunity to experience their immediate social environment.Leisure activities also construct and manifest their own youth cultures. The freedom adolescents have for their leisure activities enables them to socialize outside the family, to establish independence from adults, to practice the skills required for entering conventional adult roles, to develop their future adult identities, to express their own interests, and to build their own cultures with their peer groups. These activities also reveal the possible conflict between adolescents' need for self-identity and skill development and the constraints of roles, expectations, cultural norms and values of adult socializationagents. As a result, leisure activities are an important and appropriate source for comparing the relative place and influence of peer groups associalization agents with those of adult agents (Coleman, 1988; Hendry, 1989; Hendry et al., 1993; Larson & Verma, 1999; Lefstein, 1982; Medrich, 1982; Roberts, 1985; Zeijl et al., 2001).
But evidence from various Western countries shows a decline in the rate young people participate or show interest in traditional youth organizations.Although in general, young people respect boundaries to use of leisure time, research shows that they prefer alternative and independent ways, especially with peers, over activities that are organized for them by adults. The more peer-oriented adolescents show less interest in formal groups and achievement; they tend to spend more of their time "hanging out" and have less involved parents. Adolescents spend a lot of time in public areas with their peers. The street, bus shelters, and malls serve as meeting places for experimentation; they are locations for self-display, observation, and development of group solidarity — away from parental supervision (especially boys). Conversing is one of their main activities when hanging out.
By their attitudes to leisure, young adolescents can be divided into three types: a very small minority that is heavily committed to intensive organized after-school activities; a small group that does not participate in organized activities; and the majority who participate regularly but not intensively in organized activities (Hendry et al. 1993). A study of 11- and 12-year-old youngsters in Oakland demonstrated the small amount of time they spent in organized activities: TV 3-4 hours a day), "on their own" (or with friends, 2-3 hours a day), with parents (1.5 hours a day), job and chores in and out of the home (1 hour a day), functions supervised by adults ( 1-2meetings a week) (Medrich, 1982). Youngsters (aged 10-15) are characterized by their high energy, striving for self-definition, and a need to prove personal competence in a variety of areas.
COMMUNITY AS A SOCIALIZATION AGENT AND ADOLESCENTS' ATTACHMENT
We maintain that community is not just a part of the general surroundings that provide teenagers with formal and informal social services, but one of their most important socialization agents. The institutions of community in modern society, especially schools, have assumed an important part of parents' roles (Coleman, 1961; Hurrelman, 1989). Although in the past three decades "community" and "social capital" have emerged as two of the most salient concepts in the social sciences, they do not enjoy special interest in research on adolescents, just as adolescence is almost absent from general community research and discussion.
Despite changes and enlargement of community definition in the global era (e.g., internet communities, virtual communities), its basic definition — as a significant common place of living, and as a mediating social structure between individuals and the forces of the larger society — endures (Chekki, 1990; Delanty, 2003; Lyon, 1989). The classic definition of community has three main dimensions: a locality or territory; a social system and structure with economic, political, cultural, and social institutions, functions and interactions; social relations and symbols which provide feelings of solidarity, cohesion, trust, unity, security, identity and significance (Chekki, 1990; Clark, 1973; Hillery, 1955; Lyon, 1989; Turner & Dolch, 1996). But community can also be a source of feelings of alienation and social pressure which can harm the personal autonomy of individuals and minorities (Bender, 1978; Levin, 1980).Social capital is the central component in community building; it is a quality created between people, which consists of three elements: social networks; trust among people, community institutions and community leaders; and norms of reciprocity which enhance solidarity and civic engagement. Generally social capital strengthens the individuals and the community as a whole, but it can also have negative consequences when it is channeled toward anti-social goals (Burt, 1997; Coleman, 1988; Lin, 1999). Putnam (2000) argues that social capital makes better communities for bringing up children, providing better schools, and reducing crime.
Hirsch (2005) conducted a study over a four-year period at six Boys & Girls Clubs all located in low income, predominantly minority, urban neighborhoods. Hirsch showed that the culture of the after-school center meets the needs of urban youth by drawing upon and replicating positive features of the youth's familial environment and peer group. These club environments are repeatedly referred to as a "second home" by participating youth and seem to thrive even though formal psychoeducational programs often fail to reach their full potential.
In adolescence the social world is widening, and young people see their community as representative of the whole society. Significant relationships with adults occur in structured community organizations: schools and sports club. Community leaders and other adults serve as moral, societal, and occupational role models. They also provide new role opportunities including volunteering that contributes to the "public good." (Cotterell, 1995).
An important aspect of community is the "sense of place" or "place attachment" it provides. Sense of place is defined by Datei and Dingemans (1984,p.135) as "the complex bundle of meaning, symbols, and qualities that a person or group associates (consciously and unconsciously) with a particular locality or region." It is a social phenomenon (Canter, 1977; Eisenhauer et al., 2000). Social ties are related to a geographical unit (Lidskog, 1996); Israeli studies found that cultural and social factors are related to that sense of place (e.g., it was found that a rural population had a higher sense of place than did an urban population (Shamai, 1986; Shamai & Kellerman, 1985; Shamai & Kellerman, 1985; Shamai & Ilatov, 2005). Feelings for places vary and may be negative (Arnon, 2001; Piveteau, 1969; Relph, 1976; Shamai & Kellerman, 1985; Shamai, 1991). Some studies have suggested a ranking procedure for this phenomenon. Different scales have measured the intensity of sense of place, ranging from a dichotomous scale ("yes" or "no") (Gold, 1980) to a scale of 11 ranks, from negative through "placelessness" to positive feelings of place (Shamai & Arnon, 2005; Shamai & Ilatov, 2005).
Young adolescents begin to explore their own neighborhood as well as more distant areas. In a highly supportive socialization environment the child learns to be effective in that environment. Accordingly, it is most important to know how the community treats its adolescents (Thomas et al., 1974).

Background Variables: Gender, Type of Residence, Religiosity

Culture influences adolescents' physical, cognitive, and socioemotional development and their behaviors. Adolescents in different cultures spend different amounts of time with their peers, and consequently peer influence tends to vary (Chen & Farruggia, 2002). Sociological theories of adolescence posit that there is no one youth culture but different youth cultures. Youth of different ages, gender, race, and place of residence, and mainly of different social classes, are exposed to different opportunities, contradictions, and inequalities, learn different skills and values and are exposed to different free-time activities (Larson & Verma, 1999; Roberts, 1985; Zeijl et al., 2000). Leisure patterns of adolescents reproduce conventional gender, class, and environment life-style differences and opportunities (Cotterell, 1995; Roberts, 1985). The present research uses gender, type of residential community, and school religiosity as explanatory factors for the different adolescent characteristics.
Early adolescents tend to spend much of their free time with peer groups of their own gender. Boys are relatively more privileged than girls in their use of leisure. They have more freedom to stay out late and, as in the adult world, public areas are seen to be more suitable for them than for girls (Larson & Verma, 1999). Girls tend to socialize with peers and pursue casual leisure activities earlier than do boys, but generally they have less access to public areas, and tend to use their homes as the base for their free-time activities (Hendry et al., 1993).
Traditional societies allow their youth less freedom, supervise their free-time activities more, and prefer institutionalized frameworks like schools that promote knowledge and human capital development that benefit both the individual youngster and society at large (Larson & Verma, 1999). A study among adolescents aged 15-18 years from rural and urban areas found that boys and rural adolescents in general had smaller and less diverse networks and asked help from parents more frequently than did girls and urban adolescents. Another study examined the social world and the important people in the lives of 15-16-year old (9th grade) boys and girls from both town and country and found that girls has stronger sociability and higher levels of maturity, while the town-dwellers had smaller networks (Bö, 1989).
Religiosity is a manifestation of conforming and of internalized traditional behaviors and attitudes. Female adolescents tend to be more conforming to cultural norms, especially religious than are males (Thomas et al., 1974). Usually a strong religious or ethical code is used as a rationale for avoiding conflict.
Until the 1970s a collectivistic ethos of "youth in service of society" dominated Israeli Jewish life. It was associated with the central place of familial, communal, and social authorities and values, and the conformist nature of Israeli adolescents. It was also characterized by a farreaching and centralized adult-supervised informal education, which included political-ideological youth movements. Until recently, youth movements in Israel have been powerful as a socialization institution which cultivated an autonomous youth culture. They were perceived as a central social and political social agent, an educational, ideological, task-oriented framework that served the purpose of conveying national goals. This trend gradually eroded, and a new individualistic Western ethos of "youth in the service of youth" emerged, with heterogeneous youth subcultures. Youth movements in Israel represent a special model of organization which operates between a formal organized institution for adolescents and one that is informal and self-directed. Today they serve as a supervised framework for leisure and recreation (Rapoport et al., 1995). In a typical Israeli youth movement today, young adolescents meet with their peers of the same age in groups under the guidance of two adolescents, usually two years older than they, in their own place in the community. A young person supervises the activities of all the groups, and a regional committee of adults manages all activities which include social games and sports, discussion of issues, field activities, and camps during vacations (Shulman, 1992). A survey by the Brookdale Institute (1994) showed that 25% of 6th-11th graders were members of a youth movement or a youth club,' and that the rate decreased with age. The exception is religious Zionist youth who maintain the previous trend and the institution still serves as a national and political religious youth movement (Ichilov, 1992; Lamm, 1999; Rapoport, 1989; Rapoport et al., 1995; Shapira et al., 1980).
Lamm (1999) claims that an ideological and actual polarization exists, a deep disagreement and lack of dialogue between Jewish secular adolescents and religious Zionist adolescents. The leisure patterns of these two groups are quite different: The religious families and communities supervise their adolescents more strictly and prefer them to spend their free time at home or in activities organized by adults (Elboim, 1987). Sivan (1984) found that students at religious schools preferred to spend their free time in activities that provided general knowledge, while students at secular schools preferred pleasure activities. A survey of 100 boys and girls in grades 9 to 12 at a religious and a secular school in Israel revealed that in both groups leisure time was first for pleasure activities and then as an expression of the adolescents' need for autonomy and for meeting socially with peers. But more religious than secular students saw leisure time as an opportunity to contribute to society by helping others; they spent more time in youth movements. On the other hand, more secular than religious students defined leisure time as an opportunity to meet youngsters of the other gender and spent more time hanging around in pubs and discos, and using mass media (Yogev, 2005).

The Golan Region Youth

This study was conducted in the Golan Heights region. There is one town, Katzrin, with about 7,000 people, which is run as a local municipality. About 20% of its citizens are religious with about 25% new immigrants from the former Soviet Union. Thirty-two rural settlements, with a total population of about 25% new immigrants from the former Soviet Union. Thirty-two rural settlements, with a total population of about 14,000, belong to the "Golan Regional Council." These are small communities with 30 to 200 households each. Two-thirds of them are non-religious settlements and the rest are religious. Most of the children study in the Golan area at religious or non-religious schools. At elementary religious schools boys and girls are in separate classes, and religious high schools are separate for boys and girls. Most of the settlements cultivate a rich cultural life on their own and through community centers. Katzrin has its own community center, while the Golan settlements attend three regional community centers (in the north and south, which cater mainly to a secular audience, with one in the center catering to the religious groups). The community centers offer many activities for children and adults. Youth are of particular interest for the community centers, and they are offered sports, music, and other courses. Youth groups hold their meetings there, and special activities such as summer camps and trips are held under the supervision of a guide, usually someone a few years older than the teenagers. The community center operates after school hours; participation is voluntary and usually payment is required.
METHOD
The sample included 526 Jewish residents from the Golan Heights region, who was born in Israel. Both girls and boys in grades 7 to 9 (M = 13.9 years, SD = 0.9) studied at religious or secular schools and lived in various rural settlements of the Golan Region or in the town of Katzrin. Our main consideration was to assemble a sample that was homogeneous in many aspects (age, living area, regional organizations, and leisure opportunities) in order to compare teenagers' cultural subgroups by community type, religiosity of school, and gender (see Table 1).
A questionnaire consisting mainly of closed questions, was administered in class at the schools. Questions were of Likert or yes/no type and included four kinds of variables representing the impact of socialization agents. Data reflected the youths' subjective assessment of how they "usually" behaved.
The Background variables represent subgroups of the adolescents, which may explain the differences among the impacts of socialization agents: 1) Gender (G); 2) Religiosity of school (RS), which reflects adolescents' religious or non-religious way of life; 3) Community type (CT), with Katzrin representing a small urban community or the small rural communities of the region.
Impact of socialization agents. This was measured by respondents' preferences regarding leisure activities after school ( 1-5), satisfaction with the leisure opportunities ( 1-10), those from whom they preferred to seek advice or help (0/1), and a sense of attachment to community of residence (-5-+5).
Free-time variables included an obligatory instrumental "work" factor (homework) and free-choice non-instrumental leisure activities (seeing friends, participating in community center activities, and volunteering for the community) each with different companions (family, peers, community).
Data were analyzed concerning each socialization agent:
  • Family. Spending time with family members, satisfaction with the possibilities for leisure time offered by the family, seeking help from family members.
  • Peer group. Seeing friends; asking for their help.
  • School. Doing homework in free time, going to school in the afternoon free time to take part in recreation and social activities, and satisfaction with these activities, seeking help from a teacher.
  • Community. Taking part in community activities or courses, satisfaction with these activities, involvement in volunteering for public benefit (e.g., medical services, fire brigade), sense of attachment to community.
  • Youth movement. Participation in youth activities, asking help from youth movement leaders.
Each question was analyzed by GLM Univariate statistical procedure (using SPSS) to determine average differences between teenagers' subgroups according to community type, religiosity of school, and gender, and their interactions. In binary questions (coded 0 = no, 1 = yes) the mean denotes the proportion of positive answers.

                  Discrimination against age




Fifteen lyrics
Songwriters: Swift, Taylor Alison;

You take a deep breath and you walk through the doors
It's the morning of your very first day
And you say hi to your friends you ain't seen in a while
Try and stay out of everybody's way

It's your freshman year and you're gonna be here
For the next four years in this town
Hoping one of those senior boys will wink at you and say
"You know, I haven't seen you around before"

'Cause when you're fifteen and somebody tells you they love you
You're gonna believe them
And when you're fifteen feeling like there's nothing to figure out
Well, count to ten, take it in
This is life before you know who you're gonna be
Fifteen

You sit in class next to a redhead named Abigail
And soon enough you're best friends
Laughing at the other girls who think they're so cool
We'll be outta here as soon as we can

And then you're on your very first date and he's got a car
And you're feeling like flying
And you're momma's waiting up and you're thinking he's the one
And you're dancing 'round your room when the night ends
{ From: http://www.elyrics.net/read/t/taylor-swift-lyrics/fifteen-lyrics.html }
When the night ends

'Cause when you're fifteen and somebody tells you they love you
You're gonna believe them
When you're fifteen and your first kiss
Makes your head spin 'round
But in your life you'll do things greater than
Dating the boy on the football team
But I didn't know it at fifteen

When all you wanted was to be wanted
Wish you could go back and tell yourself what you know now

Back then I swore I was gonna marry him someday
But I realized some bigger dreams of mine
And Abigail gave everything she had to a boy
Who changed his mind and we both cried

'Cause when you're fifteen and somebody tells you they love you
You're gonna believe them
And when you're fifteen, don't forget to look before you fall
I've found time can heal most anything
And you just might find who you're supposed to be
I didn't know who I was supposed to be at fifteen

Your very first day
Take a deep breath girl
Take a deep breath as you walk through the doors 

Other websites on the Topic: 

http://www.flatworldknowledge.com/pub/1.0/sociology-understanding-and-ch/251019#web-251019 This website talks about five agents of socialization including; family, schools, religion, mass media and peers.  It also gives examples of different countries and how socialization factors in America compare to those of different cultures and societies. 

http://www.apa.org/monitor/may03/fighting.aspx  This is another website that deals with topics in chapter 4. This specific site focusses on ageism and age stereotypes.  It talks about the amount of people living in the world that are 60 years and older and how a large majority of them have experienced some sort of prejudice because of their age.

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Ageism: the institutionalized practice of age prejudice and discrimination.
Life Course: perspective to describe and analyze the connection between people’s personal attributes, the roles they occupy, the life events they experience, and the social and historical aspects of events. 
Self: What we imagine we are
Peers: Those with whom you interact on equal terms, such as friends, fellow students and coworkers.
Socialization: The process through which people learn the expectations of society.
Identity: How one defines oneself.
Personality: A person’s relatively consistent pattern of behavior, feelings, predispositions and beliefs.
Resocialization:  The process by which existing social roles are radically altered or replaced.
Role: The expected behavior associated with a given status in society.
Internalization: Behaviors and assumptions are learned so thoroughly that people no longer question them, but simply accept them as correct. 

Chapter 4: Socialization and Life Course

When I first read the directions for this assignment and realized I needed to choose 4 chapters out of the book that I found the most interesting I immediately thought of chapter 4.  What most interested me about this chapter was reading about the different agents of socialization. There are so many different aspects of life that help shape the kind of people we turn out to be.  Examples of this include; religion, peers, schools, sports, the family, and the media.  I also found reading about age discrimination and stereotypes to be extremely intriguing.  As I was reading about ageism I couldn't help but remember some things my Grandma would say about people treating her differently and acting as if she was too old old to function and think for herself.  It was eye opening to read about the fact that many people go through and experience age stereotyping and ageism.  

The picture I chose to include in my post represents one of the socialization agents known as peers.  It also shows that socialization starts at a very young age, and the agents continue to impact people until they die.  I also found a scholarly article that explains the affects socialization agents have on young adolescents.  It directly relates to the topics in chapter four and adds even more information to help readers better understand the ideas on socialization.  The video I chose gives examples of age discrimination which I believe is one of the most important topics discussed in this chapter.  It talks about the difference between how we treat each other today based on peoples ages compared to how we used to treat each other and how it often differs between cultures.  The lyrics of the song "Fifteen" represent the section of the chapter that discusses aging and the life course.  The song talks about what it's like to be an adolescent including the trials and tribulations and the joy that occur during that stage of life.  Lastly, I chose those two specific websites to add to the page because I believe they will help explain the topics in the chapter and they go into further detail regarding age discrimination and socialization.