Lesson 3 - Social Behaviorism

THE SELF GEd 101: Understanding the FROM Self THE PERSPECTIVE OF SOCIOLOGY & ANTHROPOLOG Y Lesson 3 First Semester SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE OF THE SELF 2 WHAT IS SOCIOLOGY? Sociology is one of the disciplines in the socia...

THE SELF GEd 101: Understanding the FROM Self THE PERSPECTIVE OF SOCIOLOGY & ANTHROPOLOG Y Lesson 3 First Semester SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE OF THE SELF 2 WHAT IS SOCIOLOGY? Sociology is one of the disciplines in the social sciences which aims to discover the ways by which the social surrounding/environment influences people’s thoughts, feelings and behavior. It presents the self as a product of modern society. 3 Sociologists are concerned about the following questions: How does the society influence you? How do you affect the society? Who are you as the person in the community? 4  “Not only the self is entwined in the society; it owes society its existence in the most literal sense” - Theodor Adorno 5 GEORGE HERBERT MEAD Social Behaviorism is the approach he used to describe the power of the environment in shaping human behavior. - The self emerges from social experience. It is not part of the body and it does not exists at birth. 6  STAGES OF SELF-FORMATION Play Stage Game Stage Preparatory Children begin Children are now Stage Children imitate “role-taking” in aware of their significant others which they position in the to learn meaning mentally relationship to the behind symbols, assume the other numerous gestures and perspective of social positions in language. another and society. respond from - Taking into that view- account the societal7 point. rules Mead identified the two phases of self: 1.Me Self - the phase which reflects the attitude of the generalized other - the "me" is the social self - Mead defines the "me" as "a conventional, habitual individual 2. I Self - the phase that responds to the attitude of generalized other or the “I”. - the "I" is a response to the "me - the “I” as the “novel reply” of the individual to the generalized other. 8 CHARLES HORTOON COOLEY He made use of the socio- psychological approach to understand how societies work. Cooley coined the term “looking- glass self” – self is a product of social interaction. 9 10  I am not what I think I am I am not what YOU think I am I am what I think YOU think I am 11 ERVING GOFFMAN He used the concept of Dramaturgical Approach - the idea that life is like a never-ending play in which people are actors. He coined the term “impression management” to refer to our desire to manipulate others’ impressions of us. According to Goffman, we use various mechanisms, called Sign Vehicles, to present ourselves to others. 1. Social setting 2. Appearance 12 3. Manner of interacting 13 ANTHROPOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE OF THE SELF 14 “What man is now is the product of his past” 15 WHAT IS ANTHROPOLOGY? Anthropology is a field of the social sciences that focuses on the study of man. The field looks into man’s physical/biological characteristics, his social relationships and the Subfields of Anthropology: influences of culture. Archaeology (fossils and artifacts) Linguistic Anthropology (language) Biological Anthropology 16 (genetics) There is an old debate regarding the relative contributions of genetic inheritance and environmental factors to human development. NATURE NURTURE Refers to genetic inheritance Refers to socio-cultural which sets the individual environment which influence the potential individual 17  CULTURE described as a group of people’s way of life. Theory of Cultural Determinism – human nature is determined by the ideas, meanings, beliefs and values learned as members of a society. 18  SYMBOLS the words, gestures, pictures or objects that have recognized or accepted meaning in a particular culture 19  HEROES persons from the past or present who have characteristics that are important in culture 20  RITUALS activities participated by a group of people for the fulfilment of desired objectives and are concerned to be socially essential 21  VALUES considered to be the core of every culture These are unconscious, neither discussed or observed, and can only be inferred from the way people act and react to situations. 22