What is Socialization?
Basically, socialization is a general term for
the many different ways and processes by which children
come to be able to function as members of their social
community. It is in part a process of learning and in
part a process of being taught, but modern views of socialization
also stress the active role of children in making sense
of their social world, and constructing their own ways
of being part of their social group. There are also strong
predispositions, visible even in very young infants, to
engage and interact with other people in preference to
all the other objects in the world. Infants seem to be
born as social beings.
But although babies come into the world with this ‘preparedness’
to be social, the immensely rich variety of different
cultures in the world means that there is a lot of learning
that has to happen. A large part of what goes on between
parents and their children, in all cultures that have
ever been studied, is to do with ‘training’
children in the ways of the culture, not just in ways
of relating to others - including learning the culture’s
language - but also in the myriad technologies to do
with the necessities of everyday life.
Socialization is also a long, drawn-out process and
in some respects can continue throughout our whole lifetime:
for example when adults find themselves interacting
with people from unfamiliar cultures. Even when we join
a new social group in our own culture there may be a
need to adjust to new ways of behaving.
| 
