FOREWORD

A society, or a human society, is a group of people related to each other through

persistent relations, or a large social grouping sharing the same geographical or virtual territory,
subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations.
Human societies are characterized by patterns of relationships (social relations) between
individuals who share a distinctive culture and institutions; a given society may be described as
the sum total of such relationships among its constituent members. In the social sciences, a larger
society often evinces stratification and/or dominance patterns in subgroups.
Insofar as it is collaborative, a society can enable its members to benefit in ways that
would not otherwise be possible on an individual basis; both individual and social (common)
benefits can thus be distinguished, or in many cases found to overlap.
Culture, on the other hand, is an important part of our lives. It tells us how to cooperate
among groups of people and how to survive as a species. Culture is defined as a body of learned
behaviors shared by individuals within a society. It is made up of shared
values, norms, and beliefs as well as material objects such as tools, automobiles, televisions,
shoes, and anything else that is made by humans. The Latin root of the word cultura means “to
cultivate.” We humans shape or cultivate the world around us to suit our needs. Culture is
something that we cannot live without.
This module intends to introduce concepts, theories, and perspectives vital in the
understanding of society and culture. An in depth discussion of basic social institutions forming
the social structure will be emphasized in order to increase the awareness regarding the current
issues confronting the present social structure. In so doing individual and collective functions in
confronting such issues will be realized.
Furthermore, a special discussion will be devoted on family planning, taking into account
family planning and reproductive health concepts and issues that are significant agendum of the
society’s project on social order.

DIOSDADO P. ZULUETA

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 CONTENTS

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION 3
Nature and Beginnings of Sociology and Anthropology 3
PerspectiveS in Understanding the Society 9

CHAPTER II. SOCIETY 13

Socio-cultural Evolution: Transformation of Societies 13
Social Groups and Organizations 19
Understanding Socialization 30

CHAPTER III. CULTURE 57

What is Culture? 57
Components of Culture 58
Characteristics of Culture 61
Issues in Understanding Culture 62

CHAPTER IV. BASIC SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS 66

Religion and Society 67
Government and Law 70
Economy 71
Education 73
Marriage and Family 75

CHAPTER V. MARRIAGE, FAMILY PLANNING 77

AND RESPONSIBLE PARENTHOOD
Marriage 77
Reproductive Health 87
Family Planning 89
Responsible Parenthood 96

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 CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION

Objectives:

Learn about the nature and beginnings of Sociology and Anthropology and develop better
perspective in understanding the Society such as the Conflict Perspective, Symbolic-
Interactionist Perspective and Structural-Functional Analysis.

A. Nature and Beginnings of Sociology and Anthropology

The central concern of Society and Culture is the interaction of persons, societies,
cultures, environments and time. Society and Culture draws on cross-disciplinary concepts and
social research methodologies from anthropology, communication, cultural studies, media
studies, philosophy, psychology, social ecology and sociology.

Society and Culture has direct relevance to the immediate needs of students and to their
future lives by enabling students to develop understanding of:

 themselves
 their own society and culture
 the societies and cultures of others.

Nature

Anthropology is the study of humankind, in all times and places. In other words, it is the
science of man which denotes the natural history of mankind. In the general classification of
knowledge it stands as the highest section of zoology or the science of animals, itself the highest
section of biology or the science of living beings. To anthropology contribute various sciences,
which hold their own independent places in the field of knowledge. Thus anatomy and
physiology display the structure and functions of the human body, while psychology investigates
the operations of the human mind. Philology deals with the general principles of language, as
well as with the relations between the languages of particular races and nations. Ethics or moral

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science treats man's duty or rules or conduct toward his fellow men. Lastly, under the names of
sociology and the science of culture, are considered the origin and development of arts and
sciences, opinions, beliefs, customs, laws, institutions generally among mankind, their course in
time being partly marked out by the direct record of history, while beyond the historical limit our
information is continued by inferences from relics of early ages and remote districts, to interpret
which is the task of pre-historic archaeology and geology. Not only are these various sciences
concerned largely with man, but several among them have in fact suffered by the almost entire
exclusion of other animals from their scheme. It is undoubted that comparative anatomy and
physiology, by treating the human species as one member of a long series of related organism,
have gained a higher and more perfect understanding of man himself and his place in the
universe than could have been gained by the narrower investigation of his species by and for
itself. It is to be regretted that hitherto certain other sciences -- psychology, ethics, and even
philology and sociology-have so little followed so profitable an example. No doubt the
phenomena of intellect appear in vastly higher and more complete organization in man than in
beings below him in the scale of nature, that beasts and birds only attain to language in its lower
rudiments, and that only the germs of moral tendency and social law are discernible among the
lower animals. Yet though the mental and moral interval between man and the nearest animals
may be vast, the break is not absolute, and the investigation of the laws of reason and instinct
throughout the zoological system, which is already casting some scattered rays of light on the
study of man's highest organization, may be destined henceforth to throw brighter illumination
into its very recesses. Now this condition of things, as well as the accepted order in which the
sciences have arranged themselves by their mode of growth, make it desirable that anthropology
should not too ambitiously strive to include within itself the sciences which provide so much of
its wealth, but that each science should pursue its own subject through the whole range of living
beings, rendering to anthropology an account of so much of its results as concerns man. Such
results it is the office of anthropology to collect and co-ordinance, so as to elaborate as
completely as may be the synopsis of man's bodily and mental nature, and the theory of his
whole course of life and action from his first appearance on earth. As will be seen from the
following brief summary, the information to be thus brought together form contributing sciences
is widely different both in accuracy and in soundness. While much of the descriptive detail is
already clear and well filled in, the general principles of its order are still but vaguely to be

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discerned, and as our view quits the comparatively distinct region near ourselves the prospect
fades more and more into the dimness of conjecture.

Sociology, on the other hand, is defined as the scientific study of human society and
human interaction. Sociologists are interested in many different aspects of society such
as culture, socialization, criminology, social inequality, social groups, organizations, social
change, and social institutions (and the list could go on and on). In order for you to understand
more about human society, you should first become acquainted with the discipline of sociology.

Sociology is the study of the populace in various groupings and settings. It involves the
systematic examination of human social activity, from everyday face-to-face encounters to the
movements of civilizations throughout history. Unlike disciplines that focus on a single aspect of
society, sociology stresses the complex relationships governing all dimensions of social life,
including the economy, state, family, religion, science, social inequality, culture and
consciousness. Its inquiry is guided by several theoretical traditions and grounded in the
empirical observation of social reality.

While the experiences of modern, Western societies gave rise to formal sociological
inquiry, the insights to be gained from the discipline are not limited to this realm. For example,
sociology has particular relevance for understanding global change, as much of the world
engages in its own process of modernization. Moreover, sociologists maintain that their
perspective, as well as many of their insights, is generalizable beyond the specific historical
context in which they were first conceived.

Sociology is characterized as a discipline by several distinct modes of inquiry. First and

foremost, sociology emphasizes human sociality as central to its pursuit. In this view, human
action is to be understood within a web of social relationships and broader structures. Particular
studies may focus on intimate, face-to-face interaction or on the movement of entire civilizations
through history, but all sociology views human action in context. In this way, sociology
distinguishes itself from psychology and some forms of political philosophy that considers the
autonomous individual to be a meaningful unit of analysis. Sociology sees humans as
fundamentally social.

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 Sociological inquiry is holistic in maintaining that human action can be understood only
by linking it organically to the whole of social life. Social theories are central to sociological
investigation, in part, because they provide comprehensive statements regarding the connections
among the various facets of social life. While particular theories may emphasize certain forces
(e.g., economic, cultural) as having greater significance in shaping society, as a discipline
sociology seeks to understand the relationship among these forces within social life as a whole.
In this way sociology may be distinguished from disciplines like economics and political science
that focus on a particular dimension of social life as the center of their inquiry.

Sociological inquiry is analytical and structural. Sociology does not accept at face value
common sense understandings or publicly stated positions about society; rather, it seeks to probe
beneath the surface for the actual dynamics. The political implications that particular sociologists
draw from such a critical understanding may vary from conservative to radical, but critique is
common to all sociological analysis.

Sociology demands empirical evidence that links sociological ideas to lived experience.
Sociologists employ a wide variety of techniques to collect and analyze the data of human
experience, but all sociological knowledge must be grounded in some form of empirical or
historical reality. In its demand for empirical foundations, sociology is appropriately regarded as
a "science"--whether it is as an interpretive science concerned with meaning of social events and
cultural values, as a historical science concerned with social institutions and structures, or as a
positivistic science concerned with discovering explanatory laws of human behavior.

Finally, sociology is a morally engaged discipline. The substance of sociological inquiry

has direct relevance for ethical issues regarding the human condition. Sociologists differ in
whether or not they maintain that sociological inquiry can or should serve as a basis for
establishing moral truths. Nevertheless, the systematic investigation of what is in our society,
particularly those aspects of society that we identify as social problems, naturally raises ethical
questions about how society should be. A distinctive aspect of sociology is the study of the
conflicts and contradictions between social values and ideals, on the one hand, and social
structures and reality on the other. In this way, sociology provides an important bridge between

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the objective inquiry of the natural sciences and the morally engaged approach common to the
humanities.

As a discipline practiced by trained professionals, sociology breaks down into several

subfields, reflecting the special interests of its practitioners. The American Sociological
Association identifies several sections, many with their own publications and sessions at national
professional meetings--religion, family, medical sociology, theory, and so on. Typically, upper-
level courses in sociology programs are organized to reflect these interests.

Beginning

The history of anthropology goes back to the days of discoveries and explorations from
the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries and to the accounts of early Western explorers,
missionaries, and colonial officials of the strange behavior and beliefs of people they had come
in contact with. Discoveries of flint tools and other artifacts in France and other parts of Europe
in the early nineteenth century gave evidence of the existence of man a million years ago. These
discoveries happened at a time when advances in chemistry and physics were made, arousing an
interest in scientific inquiry (Haviland, 1978). Modern anthropology in both its physical and
cultural aspects started only around the twentieth century.

On the other hand, sociology, considered one of the youngest of the social sciences, was
developed by Auguste Comte around the middle of the nineteenth century. Comte believed that
the methods and techniques of the natural sciences could also be applied to the study of society.
He coined the term “sociology” to designate the new science, a term derived from the Latin word
socius, meaning “society in interaction,” and the Greek word logos, meaning “study.” Other
pioneers were Herbert Spencer, Karl Marx, and Ferdinand Toellies, who were also armchair
philosophers. Not until the time of Emile Durkheim, George Simmel, and Max Weber in Europe,
and eventually Charles H. Cooley, Robert E. Park, and W.I. Thomas in the United States was
empirical investigation used in the study of social phenomena. Durkheim laid the foundation for
modern sociology by using empirical investigation in the study of suicide in France, the division
of labor in society, and the elementary forms of religious life.

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 Sociological and anthropological theories were developed to explain various social
phenomena. Some were divergent, but the theories eventually converged on some common
grounds. These ideas were diffused in Europe, in the Americas, and Asia. Eventually, the
disciplines of sociology and anthropology were introduced in the Philippine colleges and
universities.

Development in the Philippines

Anthropology started as a practical activity of colonizers in the service of Christianity

and the Spanish Government. Ethnographic data were provided by the early chroniclers like
Pigafetta, Loarca, Placencia, and Fr. Chirino who wrote the early culture and society in the
rediscovered archipelago which was named “Filipinas” in honor of King Philip II of Spain.

Frenchman Alfred Marche led archeological explorations in 19th century. It was followed
by the American government which became interested in the various ethnic groups in the
country. Ethnological surveys in the Philippines replaced the Bureau of Non-Christian Tribes.

Otley H. Beyer (1914) elevated anthropology as an academic discipline at the

University of the Philippines. It was offered as one of the courses in the department of history,
and later on, merged with sociology.

Anthropology prospered as a distinct course in Philippines schools. Schools who have

doctorate degree in the early years were University of San Carlos (Cebu), Ateneo De Manila
University, and Xavier University (Cagayan De Oro City).

Fr. Valentin Marin introduced sociology in the Philippines in 1896 as a course on

criminology at the University of Santo Tomas. In 1919, Sociology was introduced at Siliman
University and the Theological Seminary.

Serafin Macaraig was the first Filipino to receive a doctorate degree in sociology in
1939. “Introduction to Sociology” was the first text in the University of the Philippines written
by Serafin Macaraig.

Sociologists after Macaraig were:

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  Juan Ruiz – offered courses in social work in the University of the Philippines
 Prof. Marcelo Tangco – succeeded Dr. Macaraig
 Flora Diaz Catpusan – invited to teach sociology at the Centro Escolar University in
1946, and
 Dr. Benicio Catapusan – invited to serve as a professional lecturer in sociology at the
University of the Philippines in 1948.

Philippine Sociological Society was organized by a group of Filipino educators and

visiting professors in the different regions. Its objectives are:

 To increase knowledge about social behavior

 To gather data on social problems for their possible solutions
 To train teachers and researchers in the field of sociology, and
 To develop cooperation and unity among social scientists in the Philippines

Considerable efforts have been made to define and to determine the fields of sociology.
There are considerable specializations in subject matter and in approach. Sociological principles
are being employed in the analysis of an increasing number of social situations. The study of
various problems led to discovering, refining, and perfecting new methods of sociological
investigations. In 1960s and 1970s researches were undertaken along different aspects of social
and cultural life.

B. Perspectives in Understanding the Society

1. Conflict Perspective

The conflict perspective, which originated primarily out of Karl Marx's writings on class
struggles, presents society in a different light than do the functionalist and symbolic interactionist
perspectives. While these latter perspectives focus on the positive aspects of society that
contribute to its stability, the conflict perspective focuses on the negative, conflicted, and ever-
changing nature of society. Unlike functionalists who defend the status quo, avoid social change,
and believe people cooperate to effect social order, conflict theorists challenge the status quo,
encourage social change (even when this means social revolution), and believe rich and powerful
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people force social order on the poor and the weak. Conflict theorists, for example, may interpret
an “elite” board of regents raising tuition to pay for esoteric new programs that raise the prestige
of a local college as self-serving rather than as beneficial for students.

American sociologists expanded Marx's idea that the key conflict in society was strictly
economic. Today, conflict theorists find social conflict between any groups in which the potential
for inequality exists: racial, gender, religious, political, economic, and so on. Conflict theorists
note that unequal groups usually have conflicting values and agendas, causing them to compete
against one another. This constant competition between groups forms the basis for the ever-
changing nature of society.

Critics of the conflict perspective point to its overly negative view of society. The theory
ultimately attributes humanitarian efforts, altruism, democracy, civil rights, and other positive
aspects of society to capitalistic designs to control the masses, not to inherent interests in
preserving society and social order.

2. Symbolic-Interactionist Perspective

The symbolic interactionist perspective, also known as symbolic interactionism, directs

sociologists to consider the symbols and details of everyday life, what these symbols mean, and
how people interact with each other. Although symbolic interactionism traces its origins to Max
Weber's assertion that individuals act according to their interpretation of the meaning of their
world, the American philosopher George H. Mead (1863–1931) introduced this perspective to
American sociology in the 1920s.

According to the symbolic interactionist perspective, people attach meanings to symbols,

and then they act according to their subjective interpretation of these symbols. Verbal
conversations, in which spoken words serve as the predominant symbols, make this subjective
interpretation especially evident. The words have a certain meaning for the “sender,” and, during
effective communication, they hopefully have the same meaning for the “receiver.” In other
terms, words are not static “things”; they require intention and interpretation. Conversation is an
interaction of symbols between individuals who constantly interpret the world around them. Of
course, anything can serve as a symbol as long as it refers to something beyond itself. Written
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music serves as an example. The black dots and lines become more than mere marks on the page;
they refer to notes organized in such a way as to make musical sense. Thus, symbolic
interactionists give serious thought to how people act, and then seek to determine what meanings
individuals assign to their own actions and symbols, as well as to those of others.

Critics claim that symbolic interactionism neglects the macro level of social
interpretation—the “big picture.” In other words, symbolic interactionists may miss the larger
issues of society by focusing too closely on the “trees” (for example, the size of the diamond in
the wedding ring) rather than the “forest” (for example, the quality of the marriage). The
perspective also receives criticism for slighting the influence of social forces and institutions on
individual interactions.

3. Functionalist Perspective

According to the functionalist perspective, also called functionalism, each aspect of

society is interdependent and contributes to society's functioning as a whole. The government, or
state, provides education for the children of the family, which in turn pays taxes on which the
state depends to keep itself running. That is, the family is dependent upon the school to help
children grow up to have good jobs so that they can raise and support their own families. In the
process, the children become law-abiding, taxpaying citizens, who in turn support the state. If all
goes well, the parts of society produce order, stability, and productivity. If all does not go well,
the parts of society then must adapt to recapture a new order, stability, and productivity. For
example, during a financial recession with its high rates of unemployment and inflation, social
programs are trimmed or cut. Schools offer fewer programs. Families tighten their budgets. And
a new social order, stability, and productivity occur.

Functionalists believe that society is held together by social consensus, or cohesion, in

which members of the society agree upon, and work together to achieve, what is best for society
as a whole. Emile Durkheim suggested that social consensus takes one of two forms:

Mechanical solidarity is a form of social cohesion that arises when people in a society
maintain similar values and beliefs and engages in similar types of work. Mechanical solidarity

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most commonly occurs in traditional, simple societies such as those in which everyone herds
cattle or farms. Amish society exemplifies mechanical solidarity.

In contrast, organic solidarity is a form of social cohesion that arises when the people in
a society are interdependent, but hold to varying values and beliefs and engage in varying types
of work. Organic solidarity most commonly occurs in industrialized, complex societies such
those in large American cities like New York in the 2000s.

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 CHAPTER II
SOCIETY

A. Socio-cultural Evolution

1. Transformation and Change of Societies

Included in socio-cultural transformation is the evolution and transformation of society as

a whole. This comes about through the influence of the totality of individuals and communities,
groups and movements within that society as a whole.

Such transformation is difficult to achieve, because the center of gravity of such societies
is almost always at a very low, exoteric, non-gnostic, level. In the West it is based on religion and
secular modernity. In non-Western countries it is almost always religious, generally
fundamentalist, interwoven with folk superstitions, and occaisonal esoteric insights from
authentic indigenous mystics.

Social and cultural transformation will always lag behind individual transformation,
because of the even greater inertia and lesser consciousness in the larger collectivity.
Nevertheless there does seem to be something of a revolution of consciousness occurring,
especially in the Western world, which can for the sake of convenience be called Postmaterialism

The following then represents a simplistic mapping of Socio-Cultural transformation,

from negative to positive.

 Delusional. Extremist religion, paranoid or genocidal regimes, gospels of hate; at war

with or in league with the selfish and dualistic above who have totally lost all contact
with larger reality. Puppets of adverse forces.
 Egocentric/Selfish. Imperial Consciousness (Korten - SD equivalent is Multiplistic-
achievist in part), Social Darwinism (based on the As above, the untransformed lower
emotional body, necessary for survival in the wild environment, but only one half of the
natural equation), unregulated capitalism, imperialism, jingoism, totalitarianism,
authoritarianism (may be religious or secular), dominated by lack of empathy. May be

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 selfish/narcissistic (if secular) or Ego-shadow (if religious) psychological dynamics.
Secular and conservative religious factions fight with Reformist ideologies for the heart
and soul of the "Ethnocentric"/Dualistic/Baseline mainstream. For example
Egocentric/Selfish corporations support polluting the Earth and exploiting Third World
people in order to maximise profits, deny climate change for short term gain, and so on.
Politicians and political parties will tend to support either Egocentric/Selfish,
Ethnocentric, or Pluralistic/Reform/Worldcentric pressure groups. In non-western
countries, takes the form of authoritarian regimes, terrorist organisations, and so on. In all
cases, under the influence of adverse forces. Of course, even the adverse and anti-divine
ultimately further the Divine, so things should never be considered in too simplistically
dualistic a manner.

 "Ethnocentric"/Dualistic/Baseline. Ordinary society, the moral baseline that needs to

be transformed. May be Traditional/Religious, Rational/Modern and similar religio-
/ethno- / anthropo- and other -centric society and culture, status quo, most social
interactions, Socialized Consciousness, "Good citizens", Conservatism, limited
consciousness rather than bad or exploitative. Current world situation; attempts reform of
selfish and delusional by selecting some as global pariahs, while maintaining business as
usual with others; often actively support them. In natural ecologies and ecosystems takes
the form of predation, parasitism, inter-species competition, intra-species
competitiveness, old paradigm view of "survival of the fittest" and "nature red in tooth
and claw", a subset of the larger synergetic whole. Mix of selfish and altruistic: Some
higher influences, but also under the sway of adverse forces, can go either way.

 Pluralistic/Worldcentric/(R) Evolutionary. In natural ecologies and ecosystems takes

the form of Emergent evolution, ecosystems, ecology. In human societies the movement
to pluralistic, postmodernist, multicultural, ecologically sustainable, society, which is
resisted by traditionalism. This stage represents a Worldcentric, "Aquarian", emerging
Rising Culture/Postmaterialism, which is finally rising to the level of synegetic nature. In
the human social realm this reform movement is resisted by traditionalism (and
interestingly even by elements of integral movement: egotistic rivalry/jelousy?).
Representatives of this stage of development fight with Egocentric/Selfish ideologies for
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 the heart and soul of the "Ethnocentric"/Dualistic mainstream. Inspired by ideational
plane pure ideas, but mixed with lower influences. Represents consciuousness under the
influence of higher impulses, with the adverse receding.

 Holistic/Systems/New Paradigm/Integral. This is the Rising Culture/Postmaterialism,

New Age as subculture, movement to pluralistic, postmodernist, multicultural,
ecologically sustainable, societies, which is resisted by traditionalism. The Alternative
and New Age and New Paradigm society, including Commercial and pop New Age
(wherein some cases the influences are mixed with baser selfish-imperialistic
consciousness), and social and spiritual ideology and Cultural Creatives. Understanding
Gaia, nature as synegetic biological and spiritual interactions, quantum mysticism and
other ideas. There is the ideal of establishing new global Civilization and Integral world
government, not yet achieved. Inspiration is from the ideational and higher emotional
plane, pure ideas and empathy.

 Mesoteric/pre-gnosis The Ideal of New global Civilization; is not yet realised. Inspired
by spiritual hierarchies, subtle physical in interaction with gross physical. Mixed energy,
some pure ideas, some subtle/astral/spiritual experiences, some lower influences, surface
astral/mental.

 Esoteric/Gnostic. It may be that a few societies e.g. Egypt, India, Tibet, etc attained this
in the past (collective esoteric worldview), but this was alwaus mixed up with religious
literalism. There is also the New Age/mythic/messianic "Golden Age", as well as
traditionalist ideas of a past Golden Age, subtle physical spiritual hierarchies behind
events and behind the the natural world; spiritual and esoteric traditions and teachings,
celestial hierarchies, adepts, realisers, active in the world, but not yet actualised
collectively or globally. Inspiration here from subtle physical/astral/spiritual realms
(include positive, mixed, and sometimes negative).

 Partial and Complete Realisation and above. So far individual only, requires
Divinisation to be collectively attained.

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2. Socio-Cultural Change

A change is a means, a process or an end. It can be an ideology or a doctrine. It may be an

adoption of new objects and materials to attain certain goals.

a. Characteristics of Social Change

 Pervasive. Change cannot be avoided and is happening in every culture, society and
even personality. The process by which a person or group of persons work together to
prevent, resist or accept change due its possible consequences is reffered to as a social
movement.

 Continuous transformation. It is continuous since man is continuously interacting

with people and has to survive in the community where he lives.

 May be constructive or destructive. Any change has an effect and impact on the
concerned society. It is constructive if it has positive results and destructive if in the
course of time, social problems have accelerated and positive values have vanished
slowly.

b. Sources of Social Change

 Physical environment. Physical environment includes the climate and the natural
and physical resources of the land. Any change among these will result in the change
of people’s life pattern for people will find ways to cope with such change in order to
survive.
Drastic changes in physical environment will make people change their lifestyles and
adopt mechanisms in their social organization.

 Population. Any change in a country’s population size is most likely to have an

effect in the lives of its people. A country with zero population growth rate or decline

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 in number is in danger of being extinct while a country with excessively large
population may not be able to provide for all the people’s needs.
 Technology. Technology is considered as a major source of change today. It is
observed that in a country, as the pace of technological development becomes
rapid,so does the pattern of behavior of its people.

 Cultural innovation. Introduction of cultural innovation among groups possessing

similar cultures is faster than among the groups with varied cultures.

 Conflict and change. Conflict which arises from the struggle between capitalists and
workers, or between the exploiting and the exploited class, changes society.

 Ideology. Ideology of charismatic personalities in religion and in politics led to the

formation of social movements.

 Individual action. Actions of individuals (political and religious leaders) may also
influence the course of social change.

 Collective behavior. Collective behavior is a relatively spontaneous action which

occurs when people try to work out common responses to situation. The behavior
includes rumors, riots, demonstrations and rallies. These represent an attempt by the
people to change aspects f their social government. In some cases, the effects may be
lasting, bringing about major social v\changes.

c. Causes of Social Change

 Man’s Physical, Psychological and Sociological Needs. Aside from man’s basic
needs such as food, water and air, he also has other needs to satisfy in order to cope
with the changing environment and the demands of society in which the changing
environment and the demands of society in which he is part of. In order to satisfy
these needs, man used his mind and ability, resulting to inventions, discoveries and
innovations that brought anout social change.

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  Group Conflict and Social Inequality. The long time social conflict oof the peasant
and the bourgeoisie and the capitalist and the laborers resulted in class struggle and
imposed a forced change in every society.

 Thoughts and Ideas. Man is a thinker. He has the capacity to think and influence
others – whether by speaking up or writing – resulting to social change.

d. Theories of Social Change

 Evolutionary theory views society as moving in a definite direction, characterized by

constant development or change.

 Unilinear evolutionary theory views society as progressing from a simple to a complex

form of organization.

 Multilinear evolutionary theory, in contrast, views the occurrence of change in several

lines that do not lead to a single direction.

 Conflict theory, exponented by Karl Marx, the conflict theory views society’s structure
and elements as constantly changing resulting in conflict. Conflict is accepted as a normal
and desirable aspect of social change and cannot be avoided.

 “Rise and fall” or cyclical theory sees society, culture and civilization moving in cycles.
Some civilizations which experienced progress and glory before slowly regress while
socities which have been weak before intechnology and in political power have now
accelerated.

 Structural functionalism theory or functionalist theory believed in a balanced system

of institution. This theory, forerunnered by Talcott Parsons, emphasized that society is
composed of different parts, each of which has complementary functions. Identified here
are the four processes of social change:

 Differentiation refers to the increasing complexity of social organization.

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  Adaptive upgrading happens when social institutions become more specialized in their
purposes.

 Inclusion refers to the assimilation of groups into society which were previously
excluded due to gender, social class and other factors.

 Value generalization means the development of new values lead to legitimizing and
tolerating activities.

B. Social Groups and Organizations

1. Nature of groups and its classifications

In the social sciences a social group can be defined as two or more humans who interact
with one another, share similar characteristics and collectively have a sense of unity. By this
definition, a society can be viewed as a large group, though most social groups are considerably
smaller.

Man is by nature a social being. He does not live in isolation but has to relate with other
people. His relation with others results in the formation of a group that will help him in the
development of his personality. The impact of influence will bear either a positive or a negative
effect on him depending on the kind of people he is interacting with and how these people will
react to him and to his environment.

A true social group exhibits some degree of social cohesion and is more than a simple
collection or aggregate of individuals, such as people waiting at a bus stop, or people waiting in a
line. Characteristics shared by members of a group may include interests, values, representations,
ethnic or social background, and kinship ties. Paul Hare regards the defining characteristic of a

19
group as social interaction. The members of the groups contact each other which Ackeema
Johnson calls a "regular interaction." This group also should have, a common identity, rules,
structure, etc.

Man’s need to associate with other people, to belong as a social being and depend on
other people as others depend on him in some aspects gradually turns him into a member of a
group which exerts influence in shaping his personality.

a. Concept of Society and its Characteristics

Society is a group of different personalities from identified and classified groups with
distinct characteristics.

 Largest among the groups because it has various types. A number of small groupings
may comprise a particular society.
 Society has a distinct culture shared by most or almost all of its members. A pattern
of behavior, values and language exist among the members.

 Membership comes from a reproductive source. Individuals almost automatically

become members of society when they are born while the old ones who passed away are
replaced by young individuals who are socialized according to the adopted culture.

 Society lasts longer than its lifetime individual group members. If a member with a
lifetime membership passes away, the society remains as a human race and still exists on
this earth.

b. Nature and Concepts of Groups

Social groups may have varied forms and may be classified into several categories
depending on one’s perception. Some sociologists have identified groups depending on their
shown behavior and practices in the society, others have perceived social gropings into two level
concepts: macro and micro-social systems. These are very important for sociology because they
are the keys to the whats, whys, and hows of behavior.

Y M 20
OU E
  Dyad, the simplest social relationship, is a pair of people with attached roles. It is
characterized by a high exchange of information and intimacy because it allows the
greatest opportunity for total involvement between two persons.

NA
ME 1

NA NA
ME 2 ME 3
 Triad is composed of three or more people interacting as a group.
 Subgroup is simply a group that is a part of a larger group.

Groups may be contrasted to social categories which is a set of people with one or more
social statuses in common. Being of similar status, members of social categories often become
oriented with similar cultural ideas, but do not usually identify themselves as units nor interact
with one another in a regular patterned way as members of a group do.

2. Social Groups

A group is a unit of interacting personalities with an interdependence of roles and statuses

existing between the members. Iti is a collective effort of behavior in a particular organization in
society. Members usually share same beliefs, behavior, attitudes and actions based on adopted
norms and standards. A group also refers to one or more people who identify and interact with
one another.

Some sociologists refer to social group as any system of social relationship in which
members have a culture that defines the roles and statuses from whom members are
differentiated from nonmembers. Social groups vary in form each member has his own role
expected of him to perform in the social grouping to which he belongs.

21
 Groups or social groups are organizations of people where individual members are aware
that they belong to it. Group is visible and real because they exist in time and space. It vary in
size, quality of group interaction, purpose, structure or combinations.

Furthermore, groups are basic units of sociological analysis. We perform most of our
roles with time. Roles are important sources of both social control and conflict. The cultural and
structural characteristics of many social groups affect not only the lives of individuals, but the
fate of the entire society as well.

a. Characteristics of Groups

 A group consists of people who interact and form social patterns. A group is at least
one person larger than a dyad. It has three or more people. Groups are different from
dyads in that they depend less on the individual actor for continuity.

 Increase in size equals loss of freedom. As the group grows in numbers, the individual
freedom of any particular member is de-emphasized. Furthermore, as the group grows in
size, more emphasis is put on the well-being of the group.

 Interaction reaffirms social patterns. Groups depend on interaction to affirm and

reaffirm social patterns. The strength of patterns in the group depends on the history of
the interaction. Usually, the longer the group exists, the stronger the bonds become.

 Groups contribute to larger organization. Social organization at the "formal level" is

sufficiently large that continuous interaction among all actors is impossible. Even in large
organizations interaction between individuals still occurs in small groups. The interaction
of small groups within the frame work of larger organizations reaffirms the social
patterns of the larger social organizations.

 Groups define reality for the individual. The group's definition of reality is a pattern
that the individual assumes. The individual forms expectations about the world through
group involvement. One learns within the group what the important issues are and the
guide lines (the rules) that the group expects you to live by.

22
  Group members interact with one another over a period of time. The process of
interaction may be done through words, actions, symbols or through music where one’s
action is influenced. If well-organized, a group will exist longer for a period of time
especially if the channel of communication is always open.

 Each member identifies with the group and is recognized as part of the group by
other members. Each member are acknowledged and the belief that their group is
distinct from other groups. A well-organized and managed group can motivate each
member to love the group, always identify with it and display loyalty too the group.

Each member is expected to accept responsibilities and duties abide by certain norms.
Members may enjoy some benefits and privelges the group would extend.

Members follow specialization in carrying out performances of their respective roles. In a

cooperative organization, a group is assigned a particular role to perform.

b. Importance of Groups

Some basic needs cannot be provided by an individual alone. Everyone needs the help of
group members to procure these needs.

 Group is a transmitter of culture. The process of socialization carries a strng influence

in the dissemination of information within a group. Each member of the group is
considered as an agent of culture.
 Group is a means of social control. The process which induces a person to comply with
the collective standards of action and belief is called social control. It includes the
imposition by the leaders of the group in order for the members to conform to acceptable
standards of the group to be considered as a member. Thus, a group helps shape one’s
personality; it imposes restrictions and disciplines on its members to some extent which
the members must conform to get the group’s approval and acceptance.

23
  Group socializes the individual. The full development of a person starts from where he
belongs – the group. This can be shown clearly in the family, being the basic social unit.

 Group is the fundamental source of ideas. The daily interactions of the group’s
members influence their thinking, feelings and even their behavior and actions. It has
been noted that a member of a group has his own personal biases and prejudices because
he is a unique individual. However, his actions can be modified or adjusted either
favorably or unfavorably, depending on how he reacts to his social and physical
environment, based on the influence of his groupmates.

 Group trains the individual in communications. Through communication of the

members, the group is a source of information. The more active members of a group
share available information with their other passive members. Thus, the group is
considered as the “communication network.”

c. Classification of Groups

c.1 According to Social Boundaries and Adherence to a Special Set of Norms

 Categorical group refers is where members tend to share certain characteristics and
interests and are aware of their similarities with other members in their own social
category. The idea of categorical groupings has a practical application to life situations
wherein the focus is on the support of the members.

 Aggregate group is where members stay in one place, but do not necessarily interact
with each other. Members of this group are concerned only with their own feelings and
attitudes.

 Collective group refers to a crowed whose members are not governed with laws or
norms, but share the same beliefs that motivate them to action.

 Associational group is composed of a group of people who organize themselves to

pursue a common interest with a formal organizational structure. In an associational

24
 group, there is a set of officers elected by its members which is responsible for running
the association.

c.2 According to Interaction and Relationship

 Primary group refers to a small, informal group of people who interact in a more
personal, intimate manner and who always have direct and face-toface communication
with each other. It is characterized as the nursery of human nature because it is the group
where the child is socialized, acquires and experiences love, affection, sympathy,
kindness, tolerance, fairness, loyalty and justice. The individual learns the meaning of
personal worth and dignity of a person.

 Secondary group involves indirect, impersonal interaction where members are forced to
interact because of business transactions and the likes. Members can function effectively
because of the absence of the touch of familiarity where subjectivity comes in.

c.3 According to membership

 In-group refers to a group of people with strong sense of belongingness. It is a group to

which we do belong and a group that an individual identifies in positive direction. Its
members have a strong “we feeling,” share common orientation, come from the same
background, roots and origin and adhere to the ideology. An in-group is further
characterized by a feeling of companionship and a great sense of loyalty.

 Out-group is exactly the opposite of in-group. It is a group to which we do not belong

and a group that an individual identifies in negative direction. This group is made up of
people whose feelings are antagonistic to the group itself. There is physical membership
but in mind and heart, the members dislike the group because of the concept that another
group is superior to their group. It is a stereotype where members of the group have
specialized trademarks.

 Reference group is a group where people identify themselves physically and

psychologically to which other people refer in evaluating their behavior and actions. The

25
 group becomes the individual’s frame of reference for his motivations, aspirations,
experiences, attitudes and social affiliations. A reference group often tends to give an
impression to a articular person as to his social, economic and even political status in the
community. Sometimes, individuals try to identify themselves with groups whose
standing is well-known regionally, nationally or even internationally to demand high
respect and special treatment from others.

 Peer group is a group with members of approximately the same age, social status, and
interests. It is a small kind of grouping whose members have the same level, interests and
economic standing in the community. Consciously and unconsciously, the members
group themselves because they share the same interests and talents. There is also a sense
of belongingness, sympathy and loyalty among themselves. Generally, people are
relatively equal in terms of power when they interact with peers.

 Voluntary association is an organization where membership is free and voluntary.

Though voluntary in nature, members follow some seta of rules or policies. Voluntary
associations are found usually in some relatively simple societies composed of members
with varied and competing interests.

 Military associations are noncommercial societies whose goals are to unite members
through their common experiences. Memberships in these associations are voluntary and
based on a member’s achieved criterion.

 Secret societies are principally characterized by limited membership and by secret rituals
(taboos) generally believed to increase the supernatural powers of its members.

 Regional associations are clubs that bring together migrants from common geographical
backgrounds. It actually gives
rise to out-groups, particularly when in a foreign milieu. The tendency towards “crab
mentality” is heightened in certain cases.

c.4 According to Their Nature, Form, Objectives and Interactions

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  Informal group is the most common type of grouping based on nature, form, objectives
and interaction. It occurs when two or more people interact with each other on issues
affecting their welfare. An informal group could be a product of an impulsive act but later
on grows into a partnership endeavor with the constant sharing of emotions and
sentiments of members. The group ensures cooperation from each member because of
their sense of belongingness and self-confidence.

 Formal group is an organization where the specific organizational structure is

constructed to achieve specific goals and objectives. This group has to fulfill a variety of
specialized social and personal needs that influence one’s personality. Regardless of its
nature, a formal organization has an established philosophy, mission, vision and goals as
its guiding premises in the discharge of its functions. It is in this concern that formal
organizations meet their fundamental needs and continue their collaborative efforts to
attain these aspirations in a highly complex, industrial and business society.formal
organization plays an important role in social interaction.

It enables people to work harmoniously to achieve a common goal. There is a focus

among its members because members work not as individuals but as a team with a
common goal following one direction.

It defines the specific functions of each personnel in the organization. There are clear-cut
policies that guide the members so members are aware of their statuses and roles.
Specialization of tasks is observed which results in better productivity in the organization.

It creates a level of authority as to the channeling of communication. The flow of

communication should be open to all channels so that members can readily present their
ideas or feedback to the right person in authority.

c.5 Gemeinschhaft communities and Gesselschaft Societies

 Gemeinschhaft is a community characterized by informal associations due to close

geography or line of ancestry wherein relationships are personal or traditional. Filipino
Gemeinschhaft community may be seen in rural barrio characterized by a monotonous

27
 life where members exhibit sympathy and sentimentalism. Community’s activities and
interests revolve around family groups and neighbors. Values, customs, traditions,
languages and moral beliefs account for close relationship.

 Gesselschaft societies, the contrast of Gemeinschhaft community, are distinguished as

having formal businesslike, impersonal, independent, specialized, limited, realistic and
fragmented relationships. Gesselschaft societies, described as a “society in contrast,” are
dynamic and industrialized.

c.6 Other types of groups include the following:

 Clique - A group of people that have many of the same interests & commonly found in a
High School/College setting; most of the time they have a name & rules for themselves.
 Club - A club is a group, which usually requires one to apply to become a member. Such
clubs may be dedicated to particular activities: sporting clubs, for example.
 Household - All individuals who live in the same home. Anglophone culture may include
various models of household, including the family, blended families, share housing, and
group homes.
 Community - A community is a group of people with a commonality or sometimes a
complex net of overlapping commonalities, often–but not always–in proximity with one
another with some degree of continuity over time.
 Franchise - An organization which runs several instances of a business in many
locations.
 Gang - A gang is usually an urban group that gathers in a particular area. It is a group of
people that often hang around each other. They can be like some clubs, but much less
formal. They are usually known in many countries to cause social unrest and also have
negative influence on the members and may be a target for the law enforcers in case of
any social vices
 Mob -A mob is usually a group of people that has taken the law into their own hands.
Mobs are usually groups which gather temporarily for a particular reason.

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  Posse - A posse was originally found in English common law. It is generally obsolete,
and survives only in America, where it is the law enforcement equivalent of summoning
the militia for military purposes. However, it can also refer to a street group.
 Squad - This is usually a small group, of around 3 to 15 people, who work as a team to
accomplish their goals.
 Team - Similar to a squad, though a team may contain many more members. A team
works in a similar way to a squad.

Groups can also be categorized according to the number of people present within the
group. This makes sense if the size of the group has consequences for the way group members
relate with each other. In a small group, for example, "each member receives some impression ...
of each other member distinct enough so that he or she ... can give some reaction to each of the
others as an individual person." This personal interaction is not possible in larger groups.

d. The Importance of Group Status and Role in Social Interaction

Status, considered as one of the building blocks of social structure, is a position that an
individual occupies in a particular group or society. Social identities help one define his
relationship in an organization. Each has a specific function to perform and has corresponding
targets to achieve.

Status set is the varied atatuses a person holds. It incorporates all the occupied statuses of
an individual. With these status sets, one has varied roles to perform.

d.1 Classification of Status

 Ascribed status refers to a social position a person receives at birth or assumes

involuntarily later in life. It is hereditary and without regard to a person’s ability or
performance. Each of us possesses an ascribed status.

 Achieved status refers to a position a person ssumes voluntarily and reflects personal
ability and efforts.
29
  Master status is the most important status occupied by an individual which affects
almost every aspect of his day-to-day existence.

Role, another component of social interaction refers to the behavior expected of someone
who holds a particular status. People hold a status to perform a role. Actual performance varies
according to an individual’s unique personality.

d.2 Kinds of Roles

 Role conflicts are difficulties that occur when incompatible expectations arise from two
or more social positions held by the same individual. It occurs when one’s responsibility
in one of his social positions interfers with the other.

 Role strain refers to tensions among roles connected to a single status. Role strain
presents a serious problem in performing roles inherent even to one’s status.

 Role exit is a process where the person starts to disengage from his particular role or
social role. This is exemplified by the so-called “exes.”

C. Socialization
Socialization is a complex lifetime social experience by which individuals develop their
human potentials and learn culture. Individuals need social experiences to learn their culture and
survive. Socialization shapes individual’s self-image and is the foundation of personality.
Society has basic agents to socialize and mold one’s personality from womb to tomb. As
such, individuals are always in contact with one another, thus establishing person-to-person
relations or “social relations.”

1. Understanding Socialization
As individuals assume new social and occupational positions, it is necessary to discard
their previous behavior patterns and accept the new behavior patterns of his/her new status. This
process is known as socialization.
a. Concept of Social Interaction

30
 According to sociologists, group interaction is the process of defining and responding to
various actions and relations of individuals in social situations. It provides aframework for a
dynamic social relationship. Social interaction is the way persons or groups act or communicate
with one another. It takes place in social, political and economic institutions and social structures
which give impetus to social relationship. It is the process of defining and responding to various
actions and reactions of individuals in social situations.
b. Classification of Social Interaction
 Structural interaction is where a communication network is established based on
structure. Interaction is more formal based on the role function of each member.
 Cultural interaction emphasizes cultural aspects of social relationships.
 Religious interaction refers to innovation and changes which can be affected through
interaction among religious organizations.
 Geographical interaction is based on geographical domains and its varying effects on
social interaction.
c. Social Processes
Social process refers to any mutual interaction experienced by an individual or a group on
each other in an attempt to solve problems and achieve desired goals.this process may be in
varied froms depending on the degree of its complexity. Social process consists of repetitive
forms of behavior commonly found in social life and refers to a consistent pattern of social
interaction which can be identified in the society.
c.1 Classification of Social Processes
 Conjunctive social process is where members maintain and practice consensus,
cooperation and unification.
 Cooperation is sharing the responsibility or act of working together in order to achieve a
common goal or vision. It is a social process where people work together to achieve a
group’s common objectives and share some benefits derived from it. Basic cooperation is
experienced in the family and other social group where members share their talents, time,
resources and expertise along their fields of specialization.
1. Types of Cooperation
 Informal is a spontaneous give-and-take relationship. It is commonly shown in
primary groups or in Gemeinschaft societies.
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  Formal sets formal goals and objectives in social interaction. It is contractual in
nature with reciprocal rights and obligartions of members.
 Symbiotic cooperation is where one or two members of society live together
harmoniously and support one another for mutual interest.
2. Function of Cooperation
 It crerates social cohesion and integration among the members of the group
 It contributes to social stability and order.
 It fosters consensus and compromise in various social, economic and political issues.
 Accommodation, defined by sociologists as the adjustment of hostile individuals or
groups, is an adjustment to conflict, past, present and incipient. Likewise, another
authority described it as either permanent or temporary termination of conflict which
permits the rival parties too function together without open hostility. Accommodation is a
process of establishing temporary agreements, compromises or negotiations among group
members to be able to work for a particular period of time without friction.
Accommodation refers to the actual act of working together among individuals or groups
in spite of differences or latent hostility. Different forms of accommodation are planned
and formally negotiated or unplanned, the product of group interaction or brainstorming.
Unplanned displacement occurs when the source of frustration is vague and intangible
or when the person responsible for the frustration is so powerful than an attack would be
dangerous, aggression may be displaced and the aggressive reactions may be directed to
an innocent person or object rather than toward the actual cause of frustration. Hence, it
is a process of ending a conflict by using a scapegoat wherein the failure of one person or
group for poor performanceor noncompliance to certain norms and standards.
A conflict occurs between persons or groups with unequal status and ends by the
acceptance of defeat by the weaker group over the powerful group.
 Superordination-subordination works only when it is impossible for one group to
continue the aggression against the more powerful group. There is a realization of the
weaker group that their effort of struggle to prevail is futile.
 Compromise is where extreme demands are given up to achieve limited goals and could
be described as a “loss-loss” or “win-win” situation.

32
  Release from hostility is where most individuals who are in trouble experience problems
but still find ways to release their worries through relaxation.
 Toleration occurs when both parties realize that a settlement of conflict is impossible. If
an agreement is not necessary to solve the problem, then the group will just let go or
accept each other’s rights to different actions to the problem’s resolution.
 Assimilation refers to the process of interpretation and fusion in which persons and
groups acquire the memories, sentiments and attitudes of other persons and by sharing
their experiences and history, which are incorporated with them in a cultural life.
As proces it reduces social conflict because the person assimilated in a group tends to
combine or integrate their own culture with the group’s culture. On the negative note,
hoever, there were some cases that a member loses his own social identity as a result of
adapting to changes to conform to the group standards and norms in order to be accepted
and gain the group’s approval. Assimilation process is easier when there is direct contact,
intimate and personal interaction.
 Amalgamation is a biological interbreeding of two peoples of distinct physical
appearance until they became one stock.
 Acculturation is a processand effect of significant change through mutual barrowings
and adoptions by people of different cultures in contact with some continuity. It is also a
process of acquiring the culture of another ethnic group. In other words, one may adopt
the culture and practices of the society where he works but still retain his own social
identity or nationality.
c.2 Disjunctive Social Processes
 Conflict occurs when two goals of equal importance are scarce. There is a need to
prioritize social needs. Conflict occurs when a particular goal is opposing one’s own
principle in attaining the desired or targeted purpose. It is a struggle in which the claims
of the conflicting parties are not only to give the desired values but also to neutralize,
injure or eliminate rivals (Coser, 1968). In conflict, there is pgysicl or psychological
sacrifices on the part of the persons involved.
 War is a destructive and violent way to settle conflicts and disputes which are resorted to
by men when they have tensions and economic, demographic, religious, cultural and
technological differences.
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  Feud is rampant among clans, fraternities, and politics; it is triggered by feelings of
bitterness between parties or groups because of some injustice done ot their members.
 Litigation or Legal Battle occurs when conflict between individuals or groups can no
longer be resolved amicably so it is taken to the courts where a judge presides on the
merits of the case.
 Conflicts of ImpersonalIdeals is carried on by individuals or groups for a principle or an
ideal, not for personal benefit but for the group or society’s wellbeing.
 Arbitration, a less formal process, is resorted to when decision of courts tends to be slow
and litigation is expensive for both conflicting parties. The two conflicting parties agree
to accept the decision of a third party.
 Compromise occurs when the conflicting parties agree to settle for less than their
demand objectives. It is difficult because both parties have to surrender their principles to
reach an agreement.
 Competition may have merit and demerit in human behavior. It is a from of opposition,
struggle or competition between two or more parties who vie for superiority or to secure
any predefined endeavor.
 Personal competition involves direct and face-to-face contact where individuals or
groups may employ varied strategies to excel in their fields of specialization to be
superior to others. Innovations and creative works may be employed by individuals or
groups just to outdo their opponents in securing promotions in positions.
 Impersonal competition refers to individuals or groups or business entities struggling,
not directly aware of each other’s presence. It may be person-to-person or by groups,
referred to as teams.
 Differentiation is a social process of iliminating competition. It is thecreation of interest
in individuals or groups needing or wanting different things or services rather than the
same thing. Differentiation of status, lifestyle and prestige leads to the creation of
subcultures as as well as in the development of social stratifications.

c.3 Interalationships of Social Processes

34
 Conjunctive and disjunction social processes are interrelated. They are intertwined and
occur simultaneously. Competition occurs when resources are scarce, leading to variation or
differentiation. Specialization leads to delineation of functions, but it can also lead to cooperation
and integration of groups.

Cooperation exists side by side with competition. Conflict, on the other hand, as a
condition and as a process. As a process, accommodation refers to the conscious efforts of man
to develop working arrangements arrangements among themselves in order to suspend conflict.
Likewise, as a condition, accommodation refers to the fact of equilibrium between individuals
and groups and the rules of the game which have to be followed.

c.4 Socialization and Personality

Personality is the sum total of a person’s character traits. It is the person’s fairly
consistent pattern of acting, thinking and feeling (Maciones, 2002). Personality may also be the
product of hereditary and emvironment (Santos, 1995).

Etymologically, personality, originated from the Latin word persona which means a
theatrical mask worn by Roman actors in Greek drams to Project a role or false appearance.
Psychologists, however, see personality as something more than the roles people play. It is a
pattern of relatively permanent traits, dispositions or characteristics that give some measure of
consistency to a person’s behavior and these may be unique, common to some group or sharedby
people.

c.5 Factors of Personality Development

Personality development is the development of all aspects of personality, the total

development of personality. This leads to the full development of a person’s potentials
(Biological/physical, sociological, geographical, cultural, mental, intellectual, emotional and
moral).

1.1 Socialization and Self

 George Herbert Mead: The Social Self

35
 George Herbert Mead developed the Theory of Behaviorism to explain how social
experience creates individual personality which recognized the environment as a powerful
influencing factor in shaping a person’s personality dwelling on inward behavior.

Theories:

Self, that part of an individual’s personality composed of self-awareness and self-image

and is not part of the body and does not exist at birth, is his central concept.

Social experience is the exchange of symbols. Only human beings communicate by

words or signals to create meaning, find meanings in action and respond according to
their purpose or intention, animals do not.

People emphatize using symbols. This way, they can anticipate how others will react to a
given situation. Social interaction then is taking the role of the other which involves
seing the self as others see it.

Two Parts of Self

 I – the active side

 Me – the object

Development of the Self

 Significant Others. Infant take the role of other initiation without understanding
the underlying intentions, so they have no self. As they learn to use language and other
symbls, the self emerges through play. Playing the role of adults helps young children
imagine the world from the adult’s points of view.
 Generalized Others. Gradually, children move from initiation, simple plays to
games, to complex games involving others in team sports. This refers to widespread
cultural norms and values we use as references in evaluating ourselves.

 Charles Horton Cooley: The Looking-Glass Self

36
 Theories:

The looking-glass self refers to the self-imagae based on how people think others see
them. This means that people can see themselves according to how others see them. It is a
development of the self through the use of language and provides that an individual
acquires a social self when he has already developed the Ability to take hold of the
attitudes and roles of others and see how others see him.

Three phases of developing a sellf-concept or self-identity: (1) our imagination of how

we present ourselves to others, (2) our imagination of how we are evaluated by others,
and (3) our own feeling about ourselves as we are seen by others.

1.2 Theories of Socialization and Personality

1.2a Psychoanalytic Theories

Psychoanalytic theories focus on the mental amnd emotional processes that shape the
human personality.

 Sigmund Freud:

A person builds or develops his/her personality by interacting with others in society.

Sigmund Freud was the proponent of psychoanalytic theory and a foremost psychoanalyst who
formulated the first comprehensive theory on personality and left a deep impact on subsequent
psychologists.

Theories:

Personality is the sum total of a person’s character traits, a form of biological

determination and that socialization was a process characterized by an internal struggle
between the biological component and the social-cultural environment.

Elements of Personality: the Three Major Systems

37
 Id, the psychological component; the original system of personality and the matrix
within which the ego and t6he superego become differentiated. It is a structure of the
mind which represents the human being’s basic unconsciousness, drives and
demanding immediate gratification. It consists of everything psychological, including
the instincts which are inherited.
 Ego is the executive of personality and is the mediator between the needs of the
organism and the objective world of reality. It represents the person’s conscious effort
to balance innate pleasure-seeking drives with the demands of society. Its
psychological component has control over all the cognitive and intellectual processes
and tries to control the gateways to action
 Superego is the social component; the internal representative of the traditional values
and ideals of society as interpreted to the child by its parents. It represents the
person’s conscience; the operation of culture within the individual which tells the
person why he/she cannot have everything that he/she wants. It is the moral arm of
personality and consists of the conscience and ego ideal

Five Major Stages of Development

During each of Freud’s five major stages of development, the id’s pleasure impulses
focus on a particular area of the body and on the activities in that area.

1. Duing oral stage (infants) infants derive pleasure from nursing, sucking and putting
any in their mouths.
2. In the anal stage, children find pleasure both in withholding and expelling feces.
There is conflict with parents who impose early toilet training.
3. During the phallic stage (3-6 years old) children of three to six years old derive their
in fondling their genitals, observing sex differences and directing their awakening
sexual impulses toward the opposite sex.

At five to six years old, boy’s sexual impulses are directed toward their mother. They
perceive their fathers as rivals to their mother’s affection. This is termed Oedipus
complex by Freud derived from Greek Mythology where Oedipus kills his father and

38
 marries his mother. Boys fear castration from their fathers as retaliation against their
sexual impulses.

Elektra complex, the female version of Oedipus complex, wherein the female child
develops sexual feelings toward her father.

4. Latency period (7-12) is characterized by children becoming less concerned with

their bodies and developing skills for coping with their environment. It is when
Oedipus and Elektra complex are resolved.
5. Genital period (adolescence and puberty)is the age of maturity, adult sexuality and
functioning.

 Alfred Adler:

Adler is known for his work on individual psychology.

People begin life with both innate striving and physical deficiencies which combine to
produce feelings of inferiority. These feelings stimulate style to set a goal of overcoming their
inferiority. Social interest or a deep concern for the welfare of other people is the sole criterion
by which human actions should be judged.

Theories:

The three major problems of life are neighborly love, work and sexual. These can only
be solved through social interest. All behaviors are consistent with a person’s final goal.
Human behavior is shaped by people’s subjective perception of situations.

Heredity and environment provide the building materials of personality but people’s
creative power is responsible for their lifestyle.

Excuses, aggression and withdrawal are some of people’s various safeguarding

tendencies as conscious or unconscious attempts to protect inflated feelings of superiority
against public disgrace.

39
 Birth order, early recollections and dreams are used to foster courage, self-esteem and
social interest.

 Karen Horney:

Horney espoused the psychoanalytic social theory and insisted that cultural influences
wre more important than biological influences in shaping an individual’s personality.

Theories:

Anxiety was triggered by the feelings of isolation and helplessness in a potentially hostile
world form the lack of warmth and affection and failing to meet their needs for safety and
satisfaction during their younger years.

The three neurotic trends, the tendency to move toward, against or away from people,
were generated by the inability of people to use different tactics in their relationship with
others.

Healthy people solve their basic conflict by using all three neurotic trends while neurotics
compulsively adopt only one of these trends. Both healthy and neurotic people
experience intrapsychic conflicts that have become part of their belief system and this
has two major kinds.

Idealized self-image results in the neurotics’ attempts to build a godlike picture of

themselves.

Self-hatred is the tendency of neurotics to hate and despise their real slef.

Any psychological differences between men and women are due to cultural and social
expectations and not to biology.

Horney’s psychotheraphy goal is to bring about growth toward actualization of the real
self.

 Eric Fromm:
40
He called his approach on psychoanalysis the humanistic psychoanalysis.

Theories:

Self-awareness contributes to feelings of loneliness. To escape these feelings, people

strive to become united with others and with nature.

Only the unique human needs of relatedness, transcendence and rootedness, sense of
identity and frame of orientation can move people toward reunification.

Sense of relatedness drives people to unite with another person through (1) positive
freedom or the spontaneous activity of a whole, integrated personality; and (2) biophilia
or submission, power of love.

Transcendence is the need for people to rise above their passive existence and create or
destroy life.

Rootedness is the need for a consistent structure in people’s lives.

Sense of identity gives a person a feeling of I or me.

Frame of orientation is a consistent way of looking at the world.

Basic anxiety, a sense of being alone in the world, was acquired as a consequence of
gaining economic and political freedom. To relieve this, various mechanisms were used,
particularly authoritarianism, destructiveness and conformity.

Though some people succeed in becoming one with the world, live productively and
acquire the syndrome of growth (i.e. including a passionate love for life and love of
fellowmen), other people live unproductively and acquire things by passively receiving
and hoarding objects, exploiting others, and marketing or exchanging things including
themselves. In rare situations, people are motivated by the syndrome of decay.

 Necrophilia is the love of death.

 Malignant narcissism is the infatuation with one’s own self.
41
  Incestuous symbiosis is the tendency to remain bound to a mothering person or her
equivalent.

Fromm’s psychotherapy goal is too establish union with problematic’ people so that they
can reunite with the rest of the world.

 Harry Stack Sullivan:

Sullivan’s interpersonal theory, believed that people develop their personality through
their interpersonal relationships.

Theories:

Experience takes place on three levels: (1) prototaxic or primitive/pre-symbolic, (2)

parataxic or not accurately in communication with others, and (3) syntaxic or accurate
communication.

The two aspects of experience are tensions (potential for action) and energy
transformations (actions or behaviors).

Tensions are of two kinds: (1) needs which is conjunctive and facilitates interpersonal
development, and (2) anxiety which is disjunctive in that it interferes with the
satisfaction of needs and is the primary obstacle to establishing healthy interpersonal
relationships.

Dynamisms are typical traits or behavior patterns resulting from energy transformations
that had become organized.

Typical dynamisms include malevolence (a feeling of living in enemy country),

intimacy (a close interpersonal relationship with a peer or equal status) and lust
(impersonal sexual desires).

Various development stages:

42
  1st Infancy (from birth to the development of syntacxic language) is a time when an
infant’s primary interpersonal relationship is with the one him’her mothering.
 2nd Childhood stage (from syntaxic language to the need for playmates of equal
status) is where the relationship with the mother continues to be the most important
interpersonal relationship, although children of this age often have an imaginary
playmate.
 3rd Juvenile stage (the phase where the child needs playmates of equal status
necessary for the development of intimacy) is a time when children should learn
competition, compromise and cooperative skills that will enable them to move
successfully through succeeding stages of development.
 4th Preadolescence (starts with intimacy with a best friend to the beginning of
puberty) is the stage wherein mistakes made are exceedingly difficult to overcome
later.
 5th Early adolescence is when young people are motivated by both intimacy (usually
for someone of the same gender) and lust (ordinarily for a person of the opposite sex).
 6th Late adolescence is reached when people are able to direct their intimacy and lust
toward another person.
 7th Successful completion of late adolescence culminates adulthood, a stage marked
by a stable love relationship.

Psychotherapists of Sullivan’s psychotherapy serve as a participant observer and attempts

to improve people’s interpersonalrelations.

 Melanie Klein:

Klein’s object relations theory assumes that the mother-child relationship during the first
four or five months is the most critical time for personality development.

Theories:

Internal psychic representations of early significant objects, such as the mother’s

breast or the father’s penis, is an important part of any relationship. Infants absorb these

43
 psychic representations into their own psychic structure and then project them into an
external object – the other person.

The ego which exists at birth can sense both destructive and loving forces, i.e., both a
nurturing and a frustrating breast.

A dual image of self results from infants’ splitting the destructive forces and the loving
forces into good and bad while also splitting the ego.

Superego comes into existence much earlier than Freud had expeculated and that it
grows along with the Oedipal process rather than being a product of it.

The child’s relationship with the mother plays a central role in the Oedipus complex.
During the early Oedipal years, the male child adopts a feminine position and has no
fear of being castrated as punishment for his sexual feelings for his mother. Later, he
projects his destructive drive unt his father, who fears will bite or castrate him. Oedipus
complex is resolved when the boy establishes good relationswith both parents and fee;s
comfortable about his parents having sexual intercourse with one another.

Female child also adopts a feminine position in the Elektra stage. She ahs a positive
feeling both for her mother’s breast and for her father’s ppenis, which she believes will
feed her with babies. With most girls, however, the female Ekektra complex is resolved
without any antagonism or jealousy toward the mother.

 Erick Erikson:

Erick Homberger Erikson is a post-Freudian theorist who proposed the eight

psychosexual stages of development, explaining the challenges that are met throughout life.

Theories:

44
Epigenetic Principle. Each component proceeds in a step fashion, with subsequent
growth building on earlier development. During every stage, people experience an
interaction of opposing syntonic and dystoniic attitudes which leads to a conflict or a
psychosocial crisis. Resolution of this crisis produces an appropriate basic strength or ego
quality and enables a person to move to the next stage.

8 Stages of Development

 Stage 1 (birth-18 months) – Infancy: Trust vs. Mistrust. Infants face the first
challenge of life, which is to establish a sense of trust that their world is a safe place.
Family members play key roles in how the child meets this challenge.
 Stage 2 (19 months-3 years) – Childhood: Autonomy vs. Doubt and Shame. The
next challenge is to learn the skills to confidently cope with the world. Failure to gain
self-control leads children to doubt their abilities.
 Stage 3 (4-5 years) – Preschool: Inititive vs. Guilt. During the play age, children
experience genital-lpcomotor psychosexual development and undergo a psychosocial
crisis of initiative versus guilt with either the basic strength of purpose or the core
pathology of inhibition.
 Stage 4 (6-13 years) – Preadolescence: Industriousness vs. Inferiority. Children
enter school, make friends and strike out on their own more. They feel proud of their
accomplishments, or fear that they do not measure up. Schoolage children are in a period
of sexual latency but face the psychosocial core pathology of inertia.
 Stage 5 (teenage years) – Adolescence: Identity vs. Confusion. During teen
years, young people struggle to stablish their own identity with others, but they also want
to be unique. Almost all teens experience some confusion as they struggle to stablish an
identity because one’s clear and consistent sense of identity is expected to emerge during
adolescence period. Identity confusion may dominate the psychosocial crisis thereby
postponing identity. Fidelity is the basic strength of adolescence and role repudiation is
its core pathology.
 Stage 6 (18-30 years) – Young Adulthood: Intimacy vs. Isolation. The challenge
is for young adults to form and maintain intimate relationships with others. Falling in
love involves balancing the need to have a separate identity. This stage is characterized
45
 by the psychosexual mode of genitality, the psychosocial crisis of intimacy versus
isolation, the basic strength of love and the core pathology of exclusivity.
 Stage 7 (31-60) – Middle Adulthood: Difference vs. Self-Absorption. The
challenge is in contributing to the lives of others in the family, at work and in the larger
world. Failing at this, people become stagnant and caught up in their own limited
concerns.

This stage is the time when people experience the psychosexual moode of procreativity,
the psychosocial crisis of generativity versus stagnation, the basic strength of care and the
core pathology of rejectivity.

 Stage 8 (60-death) – Late Adulthood/Old Age: Integrity vs. Despair. Near the
end of their lives, people hope to look back on what they have accomplished with a sense
oof integrity and satisfaction. For those who have been self-absorbed, old age brings only
a sense of despair over missed opportunities.

Psychosexual mode of generalized sensuality, crisis of integrity versus despair and the
basic strength of wisdom or the core pathology of disdain mark this final stage.

1.2b Behavioral Theories

Behavioral theories of personality emphasize the importance of environment or

situational determinants of behavior. Behavior is shaped by environmental conditions through
learning and, in turn, a person’s behavior shapes the environment. Contemporary behavioral
theories are called social learning or social-cognitive teories which basic tenets is that people
behave in ways that are likely to produce reinforcement and that individual differences in
behavior result primarily from differences in the kinds of learning experiences a person
encounters growing up.

Learning may be defined as a relatively permanent change in behavior that occurs as a

result of practice and it has two basic types.

46
 Classical Conditioning as a learning process was undertaken by Ivan Pavlov. Its
learning process involves association of a neutral stimulus with another stimulus through
repeated pairings.

Operant Conditioning is where certain responses are learned because they operate on,
or affect, the environment.

 E.L. Thorndike:

Thorndike’s series of experiments at the turn of century marked tah start of the study on
operant conditioning. He was greatly influenced by Darwin’s theory of evolution.

Theories:

Experimented with a cat who appered to engage in a trial-and –error behavior.

When a reward immediately follows one of those behaviors, learning is strengthened and
reffered to this as the law of effect.

 Burrhus Frederic Skinner:

B.F. Skinner is a behaviorist. He based his work, The Behavior of Organisms (1938), on
the principles of operant (observable) conditioning.

Theories:

With operant conditioning, the organism’s behavioral responses in a situation are

reinforced or discouraged according to a system of rewards and punishments. It can be
used to control one’s own behavior as well as others’.

An undesirable behavior exists because it is reinforced.

47
 Julian Rotter:

Rotter proposed the concept of behavior potential into the behaviorist approach.

Theories:

Behavior potential pertains to the likelihood of occurrence of a specific behavior in a

particular situation being determined by reinforcement value and expectation.

Behavior of an individual in a situation would depend on the result of what developed

last time he was in a similar situation.

 Albert Bandura:

Bandura’s social-cognitive theory emphasizes reciprocal determinism in which external

determinants (e.g. rewards and punishments) and internal determinants (e.g. beliefs, thoughts
and expectations) are parts of a system of interacting influences that affect both behavior and
other parts of the system.

Theories:

Reciprocity, wherein the environment affects behavior and behavior affects the
environment determines relationships.

When people act, they use symbols.

Through the observation of the behavior of others, which were either rewarded or
punished, people learn how to behave when caught in varied situations.

1.2c Humanistic Theories

Humanistic theories of personality adopt the holistic approach wherein the condition of a
human being is viewed in its totality, taking into account their physical, social and psychological
components. Human potentials for self-direction and freedom of choice are maximized.

48
 Abraham H. Maslow:

Emphasized in his work, Motivation and Personality, is human freedom and man’s
capacity for self-actualization.

The Self-
need to Actualization Needs
fulfill one’s
Esteem needs: to
unique
achieve, be competent;
potential Psychol
gain approval andandlove ogical Needs
Belongingness
recogiton
needs: to affiliate with others; to
be accepted and to to
belong Fundam
Safety needs: feel secure, safe
ental Needs
and out of danger
Physiological needs: to satisfy hunger, thirst and
sex drives

Figure 1. Maslow’s hierarchy of

Needs
 Hierarchy of needs is one of the key concepts advanced by Maslow. These needs
are unchanging and genetic in origin.
 In his study of self-actualizers’ (men and women who have employed their
products to the fullest) self-actualization, he hoped to help people achieve hope,
freedom, self-fulfillment and strong self-identities.
 Theories:
 He termed transient memories of self-actualization as peak experiences,
characterized by happiness and fulfillment (a temporary nonstriving, nonself-
centered state of goal attainment). Experiences nay occur in various contexts.
Responses may be termed as alive, perfect, unique, self-sufficient, and so forth.
 Carl Ransom Rogers:

49
 Theories:

Actualizing tendency is the basic force motivating an individual as – a tendency toward

the fulfillment or the actualization of all the capacities of an individual to move towards
maturity, growth and positive change.

Real Self vs. Ideal Self

Self or self-concept is the central concept in Roger’s theory of personality. Real self
contains ideas, perception and values characterized by “I” or “me”, including an
awareness of “what I am” and “what I can do;” while ideal self is one’s conception of the
kind of person he/she would like to be.

1.2d Cognitive Theories

Cognitive theory focuses on “information processing” and views each person as an

“information processor” (Vander Zanden, 1997). This theory deals with the cognitive structures
and processes that allow a person to mentally represent events that transpire in the environment.

 Jean Piaget:

Jean Piaget, a Swiss psychologist recognized as a giant of 20th century psychology, was
most interested in the study of growing children and how they adjust to the world they live in.

Theories:

Key Concepts of Cognitive Theory

 Scheme
 Assimilation
 Accommodation
 Equilibrium

Four Stages of Cognitive Development

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  Sensory-Motor Stage (1-2 years old). An individual experiences the word only
through his senses: touch, taste, smell, sight, and hearing.
 Preoperational Stage (2-6 years old). The individual first uses language and other
symbols. There is a lack of understanding of abstract concepts; the child cannot judge
an object’s size, weight or volume.
 Concrete-Operational Stage (7-11 years old). An individual first perceives causal
connections in his/her environment. A child focuses on how and why things happen
and attaches more than one symbol to a particular event or object.
 Formal-Operational Stage (12 years old and above). An individual thinks abstractly
and critically. A youngster begins to reason abstractly rather than thinking only of
concrete situations, can understand events or situations more than their literal
meaning and can understand the contextual or implied associations of situations and
events.

 Lawrence Kohlberg:

Lawrence Kohlberg relates moral reasoning to Piaget’s model – how individuals judge
situations as right or wrong. Development is again seen in stages.

Theories:

Moral Development

 Pre-conventional Level. The childhood stage of value formation wherein children

comply with the values of those who assert power over them, preconventional level is
when young children experience the world in terms of pain and pleasure. “Rightness”
amounts to “what feels good” to them.
 Conventional Level. The youth stage in value formation when the adolescents
identify with their peers, idols and teachers due to interpersonal communication.

51
 Young people lose some of their selfishness as they learn to define right and wrong in
terms of what pleases their parents and what are consistent with broader cultural
norms. They try to assess intentions or ends in reaching moral judgments instead of
simply observing what others do right.
 Post-conventional Level. The adulthood stage when individuals internalize the
values they have imbibed in the first two stages without fear.

Male reasoning – rule-based; have a justice perspective relying on formal rules or

regulations to define right and wrong.

Female reasoning – person-based; have a care and responsibility perspective judging a

situation with focus towards personal relationships and loyalties.

 Carl Jung:

Jung’s work on analytic psychology is an echo of Freud’s own work.

Theories:

The personal unconscious is formed by the repressed experiences of a particular

individual and is the reservoir of the complexes. Humans inherit a collective
unconscious that helps shape many of their attitudes, behaviors and dreams.

Archetypes are contents of the collective unconscious.

8 basic types of archetypes

1. Persona represents the part of personality that people show to the rest of the world.
Psychologically healthy people recognize their persona but do not mistake it for the
whole personality.
2. Shadow
3. Anima is the feminine side of men responsible for many of their irrational moods and
feelings.

52
 4. Animus is the masculine side of women responsible for their irrational thinking and
illogical opinions.
5. Great mother is the archetype of fertility and destruction.
6. Wise old man is the the intelligent but deceptive voice of accumulated experience.
7. Hero is the unconscious image of a person who conquers an evil foe but who also has
a tragic flaw.
8. Self is the archetype of completeness, wholeness and perfection.

The two attitudes of introversion and extroversion can combine with any one or more of
the four functions (1) thinking, (2) feeling, (3) sensation and (4) intuition to produce
the eight basic archetypes.

Dream analysis and active imagination are used to discover the content of a patient’s
collective unconscious.

 Carol Gilligan:

Carol Gilligan compared the moral development of boys and girls and concluded that the
two sexes use different standards of Piaget’s sensory motor stage of moral development

Theories:

Bringing Gender

Gilligan notes that impersonal rules have long governed men’s lives in the workplace,
whereas personal relationships are more relevant to women’s lives as they take the roles
of wives, mothers and caregivers.

 George Kelly:

Theories:

Individuals are characaterized on dimensions (judgement, categorizing, labelling and

interpreting) they themselves built to interpret themselves and their social worlds also

53
 known as the personal construct theory. Differences in personality are results of
differences in behavior.

Self-Schemas

Schema is a cognitive structure that helps us perceive, organize, process and utilize
information (Atkinson, 2000). It is stable, differs in each individual and can be used to
explain differences in personality

Self-schema, the most important schema, consists of cognitive generalizations about the
self derived from past experiences.

1.2e Evolutionary Personality Theory

The evolutionary personality theory ppresicts that men and women look for different
features when selecting a potential mate (Burger, 2001). Advocates of this theory think of
romantic relationships in terms of male and female members of a species getting together to
eventually reproduce. Parental investment is the concern when choosing a p-artner. Because both
sexes have different ideas about parental investment, the theory predicts that they look for
various characteristics in their mates.

This theory proposes intersexual selection, which is the competition among members of
the same gender for mating acces to the best members of the opposite gender (Burger, 2001).

This theory shows that men are more likely to consider physical attractiveness when
selecting a dating partner or spouse. They also prefer a younger partner. On the other hand,
women have preference for a man who possess resources to raise a family.

1.2f Evolutionary Adaptation Theory

The behaviors of individuals are studied in the evolutionary adaptation theory from a
biological point of view. The theory relies heavily on Charles Darwin’s evolutionary theory.

54
 Proponents of this theory stressed that evolution applies not only to anatomy and
physiology, but also to predispositions for certain types of behavior. Individuals are said to be
genetically prepared for some responses in particular situations.

2. Agents of Socialization

Every social experience, which may come from social institutions like the family, school,
church/religion and government/politics peer group, mass media and health services available to
individuals, affects the individual in one way or another.

1.a Agencies and types of socialization

 Family. The basic social unit; the first school of life and love; the seedbed of values and
“nurturer of human nature;” the family has the greatestvimpact on the individual. It is the
most influential agent of socializatyion and plays a pivotal role in shaping the personality
of children. Thus, the family is the main link between the individual and society. Here is
where the child is oriented into the culture of a group – its norms, goals, types of
concensus, and sanctions. Parents do the delicate task of personality formation by
inculcating values and role modeling and guiding them to personnal integrity, civic
consciousness and social responsibility.performamc eof socially accepted behavior is
rewarded, while the socially undesirable ones are punished. Hence, the family is an ever-
pervasive influence on the individual’s behavior, even up to adulthood.
 School. The second home of children where teachers, by principle of loco parentis, are
their second parents, the school is the primary agent for weaning children from home and
introducing them to the society. Schooling broadens children’s social milieu and expands
their interactions with people of different personality traits while learning the knowledge,
skills, values and attitudes expected of them which would prepare them for life ahead.
The school reinforces what the family misses.
 Peer Group. A social group whose members have common interests, social position and
age, and have the same economic standing in the community, peer group has a unique
understanding of how to behave and trying to escape direct supervision from adults. As
an influencing factor in socialization, the peer group arises from the individual’s need to

55
 belong and be recognized. Vigor is built into man’s nature s a social being. Peer pressure
exists such that a child or a teenager conform his or her behavior to the behavior of his or
her peers in order to belong and be accepted in the peer group. Because of the powerful
influence the group may have, to avoid negative influences on its members peer group
needs adult guidance to serve as a check and balance and to direct its members’ potentials
and activities toward wholesome endeavors.
 Mass Media. An impersonal communication aimed at a vast audience, either print or
broadcast mass media plays an important role in the socialization process. The term
“media” comes from the Latin word middle, suggesting that media serves to link or
connect people of different races and religious affiliations. The wide array of
informations brought about by technology in the Information Age either positively or
negatively influence the way people think and act.
 Church/Religion. An agent of socialization known as “conscience formators” of people,
church is a social institution entrusted with the task of teaching morality to individuals
and groups who reach out to others and learn obligations toward self, family, church,
society and God.
Religion refers to a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature and purpose of the
universe. Ecumenism, i.e., different religions strongly encouraged to be friendly and
tolerant with one another, is encouraged in a democratic society.
 Government/Politics. Individuals belonging to the other societal agencies continue to
expand their social interaction and learn to obey laws and perform social functions in the
community with civic consciousness and commitment. Respect for authority, or officials
in the government, is fostered and bureaucracy which started in school is more
understood.
Government and politics exist in all human organizations, groups, or societies, but in
form both have different dimentions. Politics refer to the processes in society; the way
people manage thaie affairs and activities in society. Government, on the other hand, is
the organization through which the state expresses and enforces its will. A government
exists for the good of its constituents. It is there to protect its people from harm, ensure
safety and security, as well as promote their economic, cultural, moral, and social
wellbeing.

56
 Health Sector. Health affects the way a person behaves and interacts with others. That is
why the health sector providing health services also affects the socialization process of
the individual. A person suffering from illness limits his/her social functions and social
activities. A healthy person, on the other hand, has the vigor to join social functions and
civic activities.
Study Guide:

57
 CHAPTER III
CULTURE

Objectives:

Gain an understanding of some of the positive and negative aspects of the concepts of
culture and society and a sense of the wide range of topics that can be described as aspects of a
particular culture or society.

A. What is Culture?

As illustrated in the excerpt above, culture is an important part of our lives. It tells us how
to cooperate among groups of people and how to survive as a species. Culture is defined as a
body of learned behaviors shared by individuals within a society. It is made up of shared
values, norms, and beliefs as well as material objects such as tools, automobiles, televisions,
shoes, and anything else that is made by humans. The Latin root of the wordcultura means “to
cultivate.” We humans shape or cultivate the world around us to suit our needs. Culture is
something that we cannot live without.

Culture is also about species survival. What makes us different from other animals is that
rather than living on instincts, we must rely on culture for survival. Birds instinctively know to
fly south for the winter, and bears know that they need to hibernate to survive harsh climates.
Humans, however, cannot survive harsh climates unless we learn from one another how to
change our environment to suit our needs. If you were to be dropped off in the desert with no
knowledge of how to survive, would you be able to? The Bushmen of the Kalahari Desert have
survived the climate of the desert for many years. Their culture is an important tool for survival.
They have extensive knowledge of their environment and can locate water sources and identify
animal tracks in the sand. They are a Hunter/Gatherer society which is one of the oldest and
smallest societies in the world. They are a sharing culture and live as nomads, traveling in small
bands or tribes. Every element found in their culture is a tool for survival.

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B. Components of Culture

The various constituent elements of the culture are norms, values and material culture.
Each element contributes to cultural life.

1. Norms. In our common everyday activities like eating, dressing, cooking, sleeping,
schooling, and working, and in some special occasions like Christmas, fiestas, weddings, or
burials, there are rules or standards of behavior expected of us to be followed. These are
called norms.

Homans (1950) defines norms as “an idea in the minds of the members of a group, an idea
that can be put in the form of a statement specifying what the other members or men should
do, ought to do, or are expected to do under the certain circumstances.” What is important in
a norm is that any departure from it is followed by some punishment or sanction.

Norms prescribes proper ways of behaving for a number of situations. In some situations,
whether the norms are followed or not is unimportant as in the folkways. In other cases, it is
important that they are followed, as in the mores. They are the group’s or society’s standards
of morality, propriety, ethics, and legality. They are important for the formation and existence
of groups; they define the tasks and group expections to make group activity and cooperation
possible. They are followed automatically, although their existence may be questioned by
some from time to time. They also influence the emotions and perceptions of individuals.

Like any aspectst of the culture, norms may vary from society to society or from one group to
another in societies. Norms differ according to the age, sex, religion, or race of the group.
What may be appropriate behavior in one culture may be disrespectful or inappropriate in
another culture.

 Prescriptive norms are those which are right, legal, ethical, good, proper, moral and
appropriate.
 Proscriptive norms are those which are unethical, wrong, bad, immoral, illegal,
iappropriate and improper.

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2. Folkways are customary ways of behaving which usually have no particular moral
significance. It is the general rules and customary and habitual ways followed without much
thought given to the matter.

Folkways are accumulated and repetitive patterns of expected behavior and tend to be self-
perpetuating. Some evolve into the present form out of a slow but continuous process of trial
and experimentation. Some are rational, some are irrational. It include such innumerable
group expectations as rules of eating, sleeping, dressing, cooking, studying, working, modes
of greetings and farewell, rituals and ceremonies in institutional setting.

Folkways, however, tend to have strong controlling power over the behavior and social
activities of the individual which become regulative for the succeeding geeeenerations and
take on the character of social force. They may change slowly or fast. They may be modified
or discarded, and new ones may emerge.

3. Mores are strongly-held or specials norms which are essential to the welfare of the people
and their cherished values. They have moral or ethical value. Mores consists in large part of
taboos. Enforcement of the mores takes the form of negative sanctions. Violation of the
mores is considered immoral, unethical or sinful and may be ostracized, exiled, orexecuted.

Taboos are acts which are forbidden or prohited.

4. Laws are formalized norms formulated by a governing body. Some of the mores are enacted
into laws and enforced by political and legalauthorities. Some laws which are not based on
the mores are difficult to enforce. The violators of the law are punished by fine,
imprisonment, or death.

 Rewards are positive sanctions for those who behave properly

 Punishments are are negative sanctions for those who behave improperly.
 Sanctions are rewards for conformity. In order for the members of society to conform or
behave in ways prescribed for them, there are ways and means to make them do so.
Conformity is attained through the use of sanctions or a system of rewards and
punishment.
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 Informal sanctions – are gossip, unfavorable or favorable public opinion, giving or
withdrawal of affective love or friendship.

Formal sanctions – are used for violation s of norms in organizations or associations.

Formal positive sanction may be a promotion, salary increase, medals of honor, or other
merit awards and citations. Formal negative sanction may be demotion, removal from
office, fine or jail sentence.

5. Material culture refers to the the physical, tangible, and concrete objects produced by man.
They are the product of some cultural activity. Behind the artifact or material object is the
pattern of culture that gave form to the idea or the artifact, its use or function, and the
techniques for using or applying it.

 Language is the central feature of all human cultures. It is a purely human and
noninstinctive method of communicating ideas, emotions and drives by means of
voluntarily produced symbols.

Language, considered as the most important channel for communication, is a medium for
determining society’s values. It holds people together and is vital for cross-cultural
understanding. It promotes and perpetuates one’s cultural heritage and expresses national
identity and history.

 Technology refers to the techniques and knowledge in utilizing raw materials to produce
food, tools, clothing, shelter, means of transportation and weapon.
 Values are those standards by which a group society judges the desirability and
importance of persons. They are concepts which we use as points of reference or criteria
for recognizing, expressing and evaluating social realities in the environment in terms of
their desirability, importance, significance, worth, quality, merit, price, and usefulness to
us.

Values are generalized conceptions of the desirable and describe what members of society
consider to be desirable, good, right, and important. They are so general that they do not
specify appropriate ways of thinking, feeling, or behaving and they constitute the

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 foundations of social conscience or a whole way of life of a society. They underlie the
norms of the society and give the culture its unity, form and identity. Values influence the
modes of behavior, thinking, and feeling.

C. Characteristics of Culture

1. Culture is social. Culture does not exist in isolation. It is a product of society. It develops
through social interaction. No man can acquire culture without association with others. Man
becomes a man only among men.

2. Culture is shared. Culture is not something that an individual alone can possess. Culture in
sociological sense is shared. For example, customs, traditions, beliefs, ideas, values, morale
etc. are all shared by people of a group or society.

3. Culture is a group product. Culture is the result of a group’s habits and experiences, passed
on to succeeding generations for posterity.

4. Culture is learnt. Culture is not inborn. It is learnt. Culture is often called "learned ways of
behaviour". Unlearned behaviour is not culture. Man acquires culture through learning via
language and writing, enabling them to pass this to succeeding generations.

5. Culture is transmissive. Culture is transmissive as it is transmitted from one generation to

another. Language is the main vehicle of culture. Language in different form makes it
possible for the present generation to understand the achievement of earlier generations.
Transmission of culture may take place by imitation as well as by instruction.

 Culture is continuous and cumulative. Culture exists as a continuous process. In its

historical growth it tends to become cumulative. Sociologist Linton called culture 'the social
heritage' of man. It becomes difficult for us to imagine what society would be like without
culture.

 Culture varies from society to society. Every society has a culture of its own. It differs from
society to society. Culture of every society is unique to itself. Cultures are not uniform.
Cultural elements like customs, traditions, morale, values, beliefs are not uniform
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 everywhere. Culture varies from time to time also. Culture is diverse that each culture is
different, hence, individuals must be cautious to avoid assuming that their way of doing
things is the only right or practical way.

 Culture is dynamic. No culture ever remains constant or changeless. It is subject to slow but
constant change. Culture is responsive to the changing conditions of the physical world.
Hence culture is dynamic.

 Culture is gratifying. Culture provides proper opportunities for the satisfaction of our needs
and desires. Our needs both biological and social are fulfilled in the cultural ways. Culture
determines and guides various activities of man. Thus, culture is defined as the process
through which human beings satisfy their wants.

 Culture is patterned and integrated. A unified or integrated culture is one where there is
conformity between ideal norms and actual behavior. The members’ biological,
psychological and social needs are met.

 Culture is adaptive and maladaptive. Culture is adaptive when used by man to make the
environment viable for a stable economy. In contrast, culture is maladaptive when scarce
resources are destroyed or depleted.

 Culture is compulsory. Culture restrains man from violating existing rules and regulations
of society. Members of a group have to follow the group’s culture if they wish to be in
harmony with one onother.

D. Issues in Understanding Culture

1. Subcultures are small groups within the society that act and behave differently from the rest.
2. Countercultures, also reffered to as “contra-culture,” results from the opposition and
conflict between the larger society and the group.
3. Idiocultures, a culture created by every group, is a system of customs, behavior, beliefs and
knowledge created through group interactions. It is formed from the moment of interaction
among group members and may be said to consist largely of idiosyncracies that are the said

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 group members’ common denominators. Its members, after being together for an extended
period, would have developed their own program and set of practices that would seem alien
to outsiders.
4. Culture shock is the term used for the feeling of unpleasantness or disorientation
experienced when one goes to an unfamiliar setting. Initial reactions of being culture shocked
are anxiety, stress, frustration and dismay. Accompanying symptoms of culture shock are fear
of being alone, loneliness, being contaminated by viruses, and feeling of being laughed at or
cheated.

An individual may experience culture shock even in his own country.

Culture shock is also experienced by sociologists and anthropologists who do field work in a
different country, as well as by tourists, exchange students, missionaries, migrants, and most
commonly, by overseas workers.

5. Cultural diversity. Various factors account for the diversity of culture. While men all over
the world have similar biological drives and needs, the ways of meeting, the ways of meeting
them differ. Each culture adapts to its environment in its distinctive way.

Difference in geographical characteristics accounts for social and cultural differences. People
coming from varying climates and topography are sometimes said to exhibit differences in
character traits. The presence or absence of certain natural resources is also considered as a
crucial factor in determining the socio-economic development of a community. However,
while geography may influence a nation’s development, its influence is minimal; it is unable
to determine the form of society or influence its culture because man can alter it to some
degree.

Culture plays an important role in molding and shaping one’s way of life. Habits, attitudes,
and the likes are culturally defined. Definitions of appropriate behavior are culturally
prescribed. People’s view or perspective of circumstances or problems differs from one
society to another. People’s behavior can therefore be understood in terms of their culture.

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 All cultures have developed out of shared human activities centering on common needs or
problems. However, we can only understand culture by looking at their totality as represented
in the symbolic system that provides reality for the people who share the culture and not by
looking only at its part.

6. Cultural relativity states that culture is relative – it is neither good nor bad. From the facts
about cultural diversity emerged the principle of cultural variation. Anthropologists, from
their extensive studies, hold that there is no single universal standard to be used to judge any
culture’s way of life.

The exact opposite of ethnocentrism, cultural relativism views that a cultural practice is
neither good nor bad in itself and that its desirability depends upon their meaning, value and
function in the culture which they are part of. All cultures have customs, practices and traits
which may be viewed as offewnsive and eccentric by other cultures.

This notion views each culture as being a unique adjustment to a particular set of
circumstances. Its principle is that every culture must be judged by its own standards, and a
culture pattern or trait must be viewed in terms of its meaning, function or significance in the
culture of which it is a part. So, before considering certain culture traits or patterns as
ridiculous, improper or wrong, we have to consider its meaning in the culture to which it
belongs. In such a way, we develop understanding and tolerance for people in another
culture.

7. Ethnocentrism is the tendency to believe that one's ethnic or cultural group is centrally
important, and that all other groups are measured in relation to one's own. The ethnocentric
individual will judge other groups relative to his or her own particular ethnic group or
culture, especially with concern to language, behavior, customs, and religion. These ethnic
distinctions and sub-divisions serve to define each ethnicity's unique cultural identity.

Why then is ethnocentrism bad? Ethnocentrism leads us to make false assumptions about
cultural differences. We are ethnocentric when we use our cultural norms to make
generalizations about other peoples' cultures and customs. Such generalizations – often made
without a conscious awareness that we've used our culture as a universal yardstick – can be
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 way off base and cause us to misjudge other peoples. It also leads us to make premature
judgments such as “They may not be very good at what we are best at.” By evaluating them
by what we are best at, we miss the many other aspects of life that they often handle more
competently than we do. Hence, ethnocentrism can lead to cultural misinterpretation and it
often distorts communication between human beings.

8. Xenocentrism is the opposite of ethnocentrism which means preferring ideas and things
from other cultures over ideas and things from your own culture. It is the belief that one’s
own lifestyle, ideas or products are inferior. At the heart of xenocentrism is an assumption
that other cultures are superior to your own.

9. Temporocentrism, the belief that one’s own time is more important than the past or future, is
prevalent among people who lack historical perspective.

10. Culture universals, practices found in every culture, are similarities in the broad areas of
culture. Its existence can be accounted for by:

 Biological similarities. The occurrence of similar culture patterns may be azttributed to

similarities in biological structures and drives.
 Necessary prerequisites for social living. In order to function, each society must fulfill
certain requirements. Every culture has some kind of world view or explanation of the
world, as perceived by the members of society, and some kind of religion trherefore.
 Psychic unity of mankind. All human beings are alike in having similar ranges of
emotions, in the need for security and response, in being subject to conditioning, and in
having a symbolic language. This psychic unity is a source of cultural similarities but
does not determine specific adaptations or identical cultural patterns.
 Geographical environment. Geographical environment is characterized by certain
limitations and possibilities. As a result, there are similarities in meeting man’s needs and
solving common problems.

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 CHAPTER IV
BASIC SOCIAL INSTITUTIONS

A social institution is a complex, integrated set of social norms organized around the
preservation of a basic societal value. Obviously, the sociologist does not define institutions in
the same way as does the person on the street. Lay persons are likely to use the term "institution"
very loosely, for churches, hospitals, jails, and many other things as institutions.

Sociologists often reserve the term "institution" to describe normative systems that
operate in five basic areas of life, which may be designated as the primary institutions. (1) In
determining Kinship; (2) in providing for the legitimate use of power; (3) in regulating the
distribution of goods and services; (4) in transmitting knowledge from one generation to the
next; and (5) in regulating our relation to the supernatural. In shorthand form, or as concepts,
these five basic institutions are called the family, government, economy, education and religion.

The five primary institutions are found among all human groups. They are not always as
highly elaborated or as distinct from one another, but, in rudimentary form at last, they exist
everywhere. Their universality indicates that they are deeply rooted in human nature and that
they are essential in the development and maintenance of orders. Sociologists operating in terms
of the functionalist model society have provided the clearest explanation of the functions served
by social institutions. Apparently there are certain minimum tasks that must be performed in all
human groups. Unless these tasks are performed adequately, the group will cease to exist. An
analogy may help to make the point. We might hypothesize that cost accounting department is
essential to the operation of a large corporation. A company might procure a superior product and
distribute it then at the price which is assigned to it, the company will soon go out of business.
Perhaps the only way to avoid this is to have a careful accounting of the cost of each step in the
production and distribution process.

 General Functions of Social Institution

1. Institution Satisfy the Basic needs of Society

2. Instituttion define dominant social values. “Bills of Rights”

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 3. Institutions establish permanent patterns of Social Behavior monogamy

4. Institutions support other institutions. “Adultery”

5. Institutions provide roles for individuals. Husband and wife.

A. Religion and Society

Religions, whatever their form, can have major social impact in some societies - for good
or for evil. Of course in some religions any social impact they have may be secondary or
incidental to their main declared aim of relating people to God. This site is not here concerned
with considering the religious aspect of religions, but only with considering their impact on
society. And the social impact of religions is normally less to do with the religion itself than its
institutional form or church.

The social impact of any one religion in any society is strongly affected by whether it is
supported by the majority of the population or by a minority. A majority religion not only
directly impacts more people, but is also likely to have substantial impact on government and on
society values. Generally it is the poorest societies that have the greatest proportion of the
population supporting religion, though that may mean several religions rather than one religion.
But for religion's social impact, the major difference will often be between poorer societies and
less-poor societies.

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 Poorer Societies. Religions generally have greater social impact in poorer societies,
where they tend to be supported more strongly by the majority. Often one religion will
predominate and will have substantial effect on the government - either the religion
controlling the government, or the government using the religion in a majority-poverty
society.

It is this type of situation that Karl Marx referred to when he stated that "Religion is the
opium of the masses". Any religion that has a 'better afterlife' will tend to help the poor to
live with their poverty and perhaps with exploitation and government oppression. So the
poor will tend to more strongly support religion, and governments in poor societies can
tend to encourage or use religion to help maintain social control. Churches as institutions
tend to support governments and the wealthy who can finance churches better than poor
believers can. In these societies religions will help maintain a social order that can
include exploitation and oppression.

While a religion can be an ally of government or a tool of government, there are of course
cases of a religion gaining control over government and effectively being government,
and this often means church policies dominating a society - especially 'spread our
religion'. This can mean other religions being oppressed and wars being encouraged or
started against other religions. Christian Europe saw anti-heretic and anti-witch
oppression and crusade wars against 'Infidels', moving to missionary-led worldwide
oppressive colonisations - and societies motivated by other religions have done similar.
And where a poor society had substantial support for two or more religions then fierce
civil wars have often resulted. An additional issue when a religion controls government is
that they are often lacking in the kinds of skills needed for efficient government, lacking
skills in business, in dealings, in compromising and in handling opponents. So with the
best intentions, religious government often achieves little actual good.

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 News. The world economic crisis that hit in 2009 sees poorer countries being hit by
dramatic declines in trade and in foreign investment, and their poor facing more hardship
now. This economic downturn seems to have increased the abandonment of children and
of elderly women in poorer countries, and to have increased the murder of children and of
elderly women in poorer countries. Often with 'justifications' that they are witches or
devil-possessed, with total annual numbers estimated to be some millions.

 Less-poor Societies. In less-poor societies, religions generally are not supported as

widely or as strongly as in poor societies, and many people will generally have less social
problems also. There is somewhat less of a social need for religion, and generally religion
has a somewhat weaker social impact.

Where the poor have become a minority, support for a formerly majority religion tends to
coming predominantly from the non-poor and shrinks among the poor who see the church
as having deserted them. Many of the minority poor will tend to switch to other minority
religions, while the mainstream religion continues to give weakened support for a social
order that can include social exclusion of the poor and other minorities.

 Minority Religion. However, religions can often be socially at their best where they are a
minority religion - especially if the minority concerned is oppressed or socially excluded.
Then the church may have a useful role in socially supporting that minority. The church
will be seen as independent of government and of the wealthy, and be seen as 'our
church'. In this case the minority religion may also be able to somewhat press
government to moderate the social exclusion of that minority. In the modern richer
countries which have seen a general shrinkage in support for religion, there has also
tended to be an increase in the diversity of religions with particular religions associated
with particular social classes or with particular minorities.

 Charities. In many societies there are charities that have been set up often by churches or
religious individuals, and by others. These charities generally aim to somehow help some
people with some problems. Sometimes their good intentions do actually achieve a lot of
real good, sometimes a little good and sometime more harm than good.

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 One main problem with charities is that they are often run by people who do not really
understand the needs of those they are meant to help. Charities for the poor are generally
run by the rich. Some do try to find out what help is really needed but many charities
only do what they think is needed and get it very wrong. Instead of giving training a
charity may give food, and instead of helping a family a charity may split-up the family.
Of course government 'help' will often have similar problems and often also do little real
good.

 The social significance of different religions. The relative social significance of different
religions in the world today is perhaps somewhat difficult to estimate.

Statistics indicate Christianity as currently having the world's largest number of

supporters, around 33%, and as being concentrated more in richer countries. But at
present Islam seems a close second on number of supporters, about 22%, with Hinduism
in third place at around 15%. Currently Buddhist supporters seem to follow on about 6%,
with Chinese Traditionalism at around 4% and Judaism at only about 0.2%.

However, these numbers do not fully take account of the fact that most religions are
divided between often many different competing churches. And these numbers do not
take account of strength of support - for some religions including many more nominal or
marginal supporters than for other religions. Also some religions may help or encourage
business or political action more by its members, than other religions do.

Generally it seems that the social impact of religions is tending to fall as countries get richer, but
much of the world does still remain in poverty with religions having much influence.

NOTE. Some religions have a 'God made the universe and mankind' creation story and, despite
the fact that such religious stories are about God and do not claim to be science, some see a
claimed conflict with evolution science. Interestingly the Jewish-Christian creation story
involves mankind (many of whom are very ungodly) being created 'in the image of the
maker' and then immediately the maker 'ends his work and rests'. This looks quite like the
development of an intelligent species progressing to making robots in their own image to
do their work - like the development of mankind, or of another intelligent alien species ?
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B. Government and Law

At one point, the study of politics was considered to be merely a part of the study of
social organization, owing perhaps to the holistic nature of the discipline. Later, however,
anthropologists interested in political studies worked hard towards the recognition of political
anthropology as a subdivision of social anthropology. Its reclassification emanates from the
contention that politics begin where kinship ends. Here the interplay of other factors into the
political organization was seen.it is the maintenance or establishment of social order with
territorial framework, by the organized exercise of coercive authority through the use or the
possibility of use of physical force.

 Political organization is a part of the total organization concerned with the preservation
of social order within a specified territory by a duly recognized authority. In many
instances, the said authorities are recognized through formal election, while in some tribal
societies, the basis or criteria for their designations are informal and loose.
 Criteria of leaders in a tribal society. Hunting and gathering societies throughout the
world are classified as bands composed mostly of kinsmen. Members ranged from 30-
100 and hardly had any concept of property (except for personal possessions like clothes,
weapons, and tools used for economic activities). Since survival required them to move
from palce to place at certains seasons of the year, made it imposible for these nomadic
band to establish a formal government. Thus, informally, among themselves, they
recognized as leaders the best hunters, the eldest (because of their knowledge of
tradition), or the strongest who did not only serve to provide the group with subsistence
and economic training but those who had a complete grasp of the tradition also served as
adjucators in case of conflicts within the groups and perhaps with outsiders.

Since the bands were composed of kinsmen, cases brought to the attention of leaders
were those which basically concern their day-to-day activities. Moreover, since the laws
of these groupswere unwritten, and since one criterion used in the recognition of a leader
was his knowledge of tradition and recollection of cases in the past, solutions were then
arrived by using past cases as the bases for deciding cases.

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  Clarrifying relationships between economic and activities and modes of government.
Since there is a correlation between economic activities and political organization,
primary problems among band socities are also centered around territories, the
distribution of resources and relations between bands. Each band has its customary range
or sovereign area, to which it is linked by practical economic considerations, by history
and sentiment, and usually by mythological and religious associations. Violations of the
well-defined rules governing the use of territory and its accompanying resources as well
as the relations of the group to neighboring units become the basic concern of the leader.

C. Economy

The economy is the institution that provides for the production and distribution of goods
and services, which people in every society need. Sometimes they can provide these things for
themselves, and sometimes they rely on others to provide them. When people rely on others for
goods or services, they must have something to exchange, such as currency (in industrialized
societies) or other goods or services (in nonindustrialized societies). The customs surrounding
exchange and distribution of good and services shape societies in fundamental ways.

 Macrosociology vs. microsociology. Sociologists use two approaches when studying

society. In macrosociology, sociologists analyze large-scale social forces, such as
institutions. They identify and analyze the structure of societies. The second approach
sociologists use is microsociology, the study of social interaction. These sociologists
focus on face-to-face interaction, how people act around others. This method is focused
more on individuals than groups.

 Economic Systems. The two dominant economic systems in the world are capitalism and
socialism. Most societies have varying blends of the two systems. Common hybrids of
capitalism and socialism are welfare capitalism and state capitalism.

 Capitalism. It is a system under which resources and means of production are privately
owned, citizens are encouraged to seek profit for themselves, and success or failure of an
enterprise is determined by free-market competition.

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 Welfare capitalism is a system that features a market-based economy coupled with an
extensive social welfare system that includes free health care and education for all
citizens.

State capitalism is a system under which resources and means of production are
privately owned but closely monitored and regulated by the government.

 Socialism vs. Capitalism. No one economic system has succeeded in satisfying all the
needs of its citizens. Several economic studies over the past few generations have shown
that, in general, citizens in societies with capitalist economies enjoy a higher standard of
living than those in socialist societies.

 Marx’s Economic Theory. Philosopher and historian Karl Marx believed that the
economy was the basic institution of society and that all other institutions, such as family
and education, served to fuel the economy. As societies became more industrialized, he
theorized, they also became more capitalistic. Marx disliked the fact that capitalism
created a two-tiered system consisting of factory owners and factory workers, in which
the groups were constantly in conflict with each other. Factory owners wanted to pay
their workers as little as possible to maximize profits. Factory workers, on the other hand,
wanted to make as much money as possible. The advantage was always with the owners,
who could choose to fire workers who wanted too much and hire workers who would
work for less.

Marx was a conflict theorist, believing that in any capitalist society there was always
conflict between the owners of the means of production and the workers. He believed that
the only way to resolve the conflict was for workers to unite, mount a revolution, and
overthrow their oppressors. Marx believed that once the dust settled after the revolution,
all societies would becommunist, meaning that all the means of production would be
owned by everyone and all profits would be shared equally by everyone. His ideas
inspired the Russian Revolution of 1917.

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  Economic Trends. The ways the world and the U.S. economies work are changing
rapidly. There are several important trends:

a. Globalization: The expansion of economic activity across many borders characterizes

the global economy. Poorer, developing nations now produce the raw materials for the
world’s multinational corporations. These multinational companies control most of the
world’s economy.
b. Demand for educated professionals: The postindustrial economy is driven by trained
professionals such as lawyers, communications professionals, doctors, and teachers.
c. Self-employment: New, affordable communications technology has allowed more people
to go into business for themselves.
d. Diversity in the workplace: Once the bastion of white males, professional offices are
heavily populated by women and minorities in today’s society.

D. Education

Education plays a large part in the socialization of children into a society. Most of the
child’s day through these years is devoted to activities involving school such as attending classes,
doing homework, and participating in extracurricular activities. The school format is designed to
teach children to be productive members of society. Schools bear most of the responsibility of
preparing young people for the working environment. Children learn from punctuality, time
management, and to respect the authority of their teacher whish prepares them to respect their
boss. The curriculum also plays an mportant role. A class in civics teaches a child to be a good
citizen, and a class in home economics teaches a child how to operate a household. Most
socialization, however, occurs beyond the curriculum. Extra curricular activities such as student
government, being a part of a school news paper, or being in a business club provide anticipatory
socialization for adult jobs.

Education and deviance have a close relation ship. The education system serves different
purposes in regard to deviance. Foremost, education is a detterent for deviance. Child learns very
early about crime and punishment. They learn in the curriculum but they also learn it in a
particular way. They are punished from cheating, fighting, and other deviant behaviors.

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Therefore, eduction system plays a vital role in social control by producing compliant citizens
that understand what deviance is and how to avoid it. Although education is used as a tool to
deter deviance, it can unknowingly perpetuate it as well. If a child is labeled as stupid, a teacher
expects less out of that child. The mainstream peer population avoids any peer that is deviant.
Thus, these students feel that their only identity is their so-called deviant behavior. It seems to
the child that they will never be able to escape this label, so they continue with the behavior that
is considered deviant.

Social stratification and education are tightly linked. Schools may promote social
inequality by limiting the opportunities of women, minorities, and those in the lower classes.
This can be caused by purposeful discrimination, but more often it is because the social
institution of education has sexism and racism built into it.

Study after study has shown that students from upper classes consistently do better in
school and continue their education, whereas lower classes students do not have the same
success.

Schools perpetuate gender and race stratification as well. Boys tend to receive more
encouragement to take more math and science as well as more advanced courses that girls do. in
the professional world, women are shut out of occupations involving higher math and science
skills. Minorities also have less opportunity to do well in school. Minorities are more likely to
grow up in poverty and live in unhealthy environments. Minorities are concentrated in the inner
city where the worst, most impoverished schools are located. Therefore, even they wish to attend
school, they still have less access to good teachers and a good learning environment. And
perhaps the most detrimental issue that minorities face is that they are often stigmatized as
inferior. This causes them to be treated differently and it causes them to have low expectations
fpr themselves, which leads to poor performance.

Education is a vital part of society. It serves the beneficial purpose of educating the
children and getting them ready to be productive adults in today’s society. But the social
institution of education is not without its problems. Continual efforts to modify and improve the

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system need to be made to reap the highest benefits that education has to offer to children and the
society as a whole.

E. Marriage and Family

To provide a safe lifestyle and environment for the perpetuation of the human race, the
institution of marriage was created by various societies based upon an agreement by a man and a
woman to become husband and wife.

Within this sytem of dealing with responsibilities and safeguards of property rights and
family lines, the family unit of husband, wife and children born to them, establish, preserve and
maintain morals. They also cultivate, improve and perpetuate our civilization, legal, social and
ethical codes and maintain the concept that marriage is a powerful commitment between a man
and a woman to become husband and wife. That commitment has peripheral legal and personal
responsibility factors.

While the actual dynamics of marriage fnctions have changed throughout the centuries,
as have perceived public needs, opinions and practices, the concept of a man and a woman as
husband and wife bonding together in love, forming a family unit, with the potential of having
children born of the marriage, has not changed.

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 CHAPTER V
MARRIAGE, FAMILY PLANNING AND RESPONSIBLE PARENTHOOD

A. Marriage

Humans emerge from the complex process of cells deciding to join and become
tissues…

Marriage is the process by which two people who love each other make their relationship
public, official, and permanent. It is the joining of two people in a bond that putatively lasts until
death, but in practice is increasingly cut short by divorce. Of coures, over the course of a
relationship that can last as many as seven or eight decades, a lot happens. Personalities change,
bodies age, and romantic love waxes and wanes. And no marriage is free of conflict. What
enables a couple to endure is how they handle that conflict. So how do you manage the problems
that inevitably arise? And how can you keep the spark alive?

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1.a Nature of Marriage
1.b Biblical View on Marriage

 Marriage was designedand created by God

 Marriage is solemnagreement between twopeople made in the presence of God
 Marriage is the only suitable relationship in which sex can happen
 Marriage is the ideal relationshipin which to bring up kiddies
 Marriage is intended to be permanent relationship
 Couples are meant to be faithful within marriage

1.c Reasons of Getting Married

Not everybody wants to get married. Most liberal women prefer to saty single because
they have the belief that having a permanent partner and children to rear is an en
cumbrance. On the contrary, most people wat to get married due to any of the following
reasons:

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  If you love someone, you should marry them - The thinking behind this statement is
that when you declare your love for someone, your saying it is going to stay forever, so
marriage should naturally follow since it cannot hinder this thinking but only solidify it.
 Marriage shows the other person how much you love them - This is saying that in order
to prove to your loved one that you indeed love them you need to make a commitment to
them and get married.
 It ensures that you will stay with each other for as long as you live - Since marriage is a
promise to stay with someone for the rest of your life, whenever the thought of you being
with someone else comes to your mind, you will remember that you are married, and
only love one person with whom you shall share your entire life with.
 If you truly love someone, why would you not want to marry them? - When you say you
love someone, nothing else should matter. Why does this commitment scare you if you
say you love them? Maybe you are afraid that this marriage will mean you will have to
force yourself to be with this person even in the future when your feelings might change.
But if you say you love this person, how can your feelings in the future possibly change,
therefore why are you afraid to get married?
 If the marriage doesn't work out, there is always divorce! - Assuming that later in life,
you find out that your love was not true and it needs to end, you always have the divorce
to fall back on.

1.d Other reasons for marriage

 To beget children and have a happy family

 For economic and social upliftment or insurance.

1.e Forms of Marriage

As marriages cut off across different races and different cultures, marriage patterns
emanate in accordance with established norms as well as laws.

The most commonly accepted forms of marriage are Monogamy and Polygamy.

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  Monogamy. Monogamy is a “one-union” marriage wherein a man marries one woman.
This is the most accepted legal form of marriage among Filipinos. As provided by
Philippine law, when a man marries more than one woman at a given time, he commits
bigamy which is considered a crime. In other countries where there are high rates of
divorce and remarriage, monogamy as a form of marriage has been described by
sociologists as serial monogamy.
 Polygamy. Is a “many-union” marriage. A person marries two or more persons of the
opposite sex at the same time. This form of marriage is practiced among Muslims,
especially those from the upper class, as they are permitted by their religion to have more
than one wife at the same time as long as each one is financially supported.

Types of Polygamy:

Polygyny – is marriage uniting one man to two or several women. This is practiced
among Islamic nations. However, the number of polygynic marriages is declining
because only a few can afford to simultaneously sustain several families. They usually
belong to extremely wealthy families.

Polyandry – is marriage uniting one woman to many man. This form of marriage is very
rare. Polyandry has been practiced in Tibet where agriculture is difficult. Polyandry
discourages the division of land into small parcels so people are unable to support a
family.

1.f Selection of Marriage Partners

Mate selection is the practice wherein a prospective groom or bride chooses future
husband or wife. This is a crucial stage in the selection process. The kind of person one
chooses to marry determines the kind and quality of life the family one will have.

Selection of future mates is often limited on the basis of group mores and patterns. For
instance, the presence of incest taboos is dominant among Filipinos. The systems of
marriage such as endogamy and exogamy likewise limit the selection of mates.

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 Endogamy requires a person to marry someone from his own locality, from his own race,
social class and religion.

Exogamy mandates marriage between people of different social categories.

1.f1 Principles of Mate Selection

Zaide (1998) states that in the process of selecting mates, people are usually guided by
certain principles, although they may not aware that they are using one.

 Principles of Assortative Mating refers to an individual who consciously or

unconsciously selects a partner exhibiting characteristics more or less similar to his/her
own.
 Principle of Preferencial Mating refers to the individual who selects a mate exhibiting
certain characteristics which he/she considers desirable.
 Principle of Automatic Factors is subdivided into:

Consciousness of kind refers to a person who marries somebody belonging to the same
group.

Residential propinquity refers to an individual who marries somebody living nearby.

Occupational propinquity refers to a person who marries somebody working in the same
place or who is engaged in the same or allied profession.

Short time exposure refers to a person who marries somebody whom he/she has known
for a short time and in a company he/she has been thrown constantly.

Marriage partner selection should be done thoroughly and unhurriedly and several factors
on mate selection be considered. Too often, after a “romantic” marriage, when reality
finally sets in, couples fall out of love and statrt quarelling until it leads to their
separation.

1.f2 Courtship

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Courtship paves the way for a man and a woman to know each other better from the
moral, social, spiritual and emotional points of view. It should be analyzed not only on
the basis of love and affection but also on role expectations, commitment and
competitiveness.

Four Stages of Courtship

1st Dating usually refers to an arrangement or appointment between a aman and a woman
to meet socially. It is a social engagement, usually with the opposite sex. It fulfills a
number of important functions in the lives of the youth.

Premarital Sex is sex outside marriage which diminishes the symbolic meaning of
couple’s’ commitment for life.

The following are the reasons why premarital sex is strongly discouraged:

 A Binding Force. Sex befor marriage can become a binding force leading to marriage
based on sex and not on friendship and love.
 Memories. Flashbacks of previous sexual encounters can haunt a marriage and may
inflict conflict in couples.
 Makes it Difficult to Distinguish between Real Love and Infatuation. Because
sexual intercourse is designed to bring people together as one. When sex is
experienced outside of marriage, it can confuse a person’s feelings and decision-
making ability. Premarital sex makes couple believe that it is enhancing oneness and
is safe to go ahead and not get married. But the fact is, premarital sex only promotes
body unity and mind and soul unity that is necessary for a lifetime commitment
(emotional pleasure).
 Guilt. Guilt of having sex with a persons not your husband/wife can be carried over
to sex in marriage.
 Premarital Pregnancy. Premarital pregnancy most often leads to abortion and singl
parenthood for unwed mothers and fathers.

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  AIDS and other diseases. Sexually transmitted disease (STDs) such as gonorrhea,
syphilis, herpes and Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) can add
emotional grief to persons inflicted with these diseases.
 Weakness Marriage. Most often, marriage with couples who have engaged in
premarital sex end in divorce or separation.

2nd Going Steady happens when a person decides to date another person exclusively and
seems to be a prelude to a private understanding between two people. During this period,
a young couple tries to explore and test the personality of another, identify his/her main
characteristics, discover his/her temperaments and find out each other’s common ideas
and values. Compatibility is a factor in a lasting relationship.

3rd Mutual Understanding. Among Filipinos, mutual understanding is thye stage when
a man, after years of courtship and has known a woman very well, now proposes
marriage to the woman. His intentions may be seen in his open declaration of love and
affection to the woman and his obvious determination to have her as his wife.

4th Engagement practice is still predominant among many Filipinos. Enagagement has
been associated with either giving an enagaement ring or giving a dowry, assumed as a
bride price. Bride price may roughly be defined as a marriage payment made by a
prospective husband or by his family to the family of the bride.

According to Beals, bride price and dowry are synonymous. He stated many functions of
dowry.

 It symbolizes the socioeconomic statuses of the families to be united.

 It establishes an economic tie between the families of the bride and the groom to
further ensure the stability of the marriage.
 It provides the family of the bride with a means of replacing her with a daughter-in-
law.

1.g Requisites for Marriage

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 Essential requirements as provided in Article 2 of the Family Code of the Philippines
states that no marriage shall be valid unless the following essential requisites are present:

1. Legal capacity of the contracting parties who must be a male and a female; and
2. Consent freely given in ythe presence of the the solemnizing officer.

 Formal requisites of marriage as stated in Article 3 are as follows:

1. Authority of the solemnizing officer;

2. Valid marriage license;
3. Marriage ceremonywhich takes place with the appearance of the contracting parties
before the solemnizing officer and their personal declaration that they take each other
as husband and wife in the presence of not less than two witnesses of legal age.

 Other requisites for Marriage:

1. Age must be eighteen years or onwards for any male or female not under any
impediments;
2. Personal appearance of the contracting parties and their declaration witnessed by not
less than two witnesses of legal age. Declaration shall be contained in the marriage
certificate which shall be signed by the by the contracting parties and their witnesses
and ettested by the solemnizing officer;
3. Where marriage license is required, each of the contracting parties file separately
sworn applications for such license with the proper local civil registrar which specify:

a. full name of the contracting party;

b. place of birth;
c. age and date of birth;
d. civil status;
e. if previously married, when and where previous marriage was dissolved or annulled;
f. present residence and citizenship;
g. degree of relationship of the contracting parties;
h. full name, residence and citizenship of the father;
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 i. full name, residence and citizenship of the mother; and
j. full name, residence and citizenship of the guardian or person having charge, in case
the contracting party has neither father nor mother and is a minor or under the age of
twenty-one years.

1.h Solemnizing Marriage

From the same code under Article 7:

1. Any incumbent member of the judiciary within the court’s jurisdiction;

2. Any priest, rabbi, imam or minister of any church or religious sect duly authorized by
his church or religious sect and registered with the civil registrar general, acting
within the limits of the written authority granted him by his church or religious sect
and provided that at least one of the contracting parties belongs to the solemnizing
officer’s church or religious sect;
3. Any ship captain or airplane pilot only in the cases of articulo mortisb between
passenge3ers and crew members not only while the ship is at sea or the plane in
flight, but also during stop overs at ports of call;
4. Any military commander of a unit to which a chaplain is assigned, in the absence of
the latter, during a military operation, likewise only in cases where a military
commander of a unit who is a commissioned officer, shall likewise have authority to
solemnize marriage in articulo mortis between persons within the zone of military
operation, whether members of the armed forces or civilians; and
5. Any consul-general, consul or vice-consul in tha case provided in Article 10
(marriages between Filipino citizens abroad).

1.h1 Void and Voidable Marriages

 Void marriage is an invalid marriage.

 Voidable marriage is a marriage which can be made invalid or annulled.

Marriages which shall be void from the beginning (article 35 of the Family Code of the
Philippines):

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1. Those contracted by any party below eighteen years of age even with parents’ or
guardians’ consent;
2. Those solemnized by any person not legally authorized to perform marriages unless
such marriages were contracted with either or both parties believing in good faith that
the solemnizing officer had the legal authority to do so;
3. Those solemnized without a license, except those covered by exmptions;
4. Those bigamous or polygamous marriages under Article 41 of this code;
5. Those contracted through mistake of onecontracting party as to the identity of the
other; and
6. Those subsequent marriages that are void under Article 53 of this code.

Also considered void marriages:

1. Marriges contracted by any party who, at the time of the celebration, was
psychologically incapacitated to comply with the essential obligations of marriage,
even if such incapacity manifests only after its solemnization; and
2. Marriages between ascendants and descendants of any degree and between brothers
and sisters, whether full or half-blood.

Due to reasons of public policy, the following marriages shall be void from the beginning
s stated in Article 38:

1. Between collateral blood relations, whether legitimate or illegitimate, up to the fourth

civil degree;
2. Between stepparents and stepchildren;
3. Between parents-in-law and children-in-law;
4. Between the adopting parent and the adopted child;
5. Between the surviving spouse of the adopting parent and the adopted child;
6. Between the surviving spouse of the adopted child and the adopter;
7. Between an adopted child and a legitimate child of the adopter;
8. Between adopted children of the same adopter; and

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9. Between parties where one, with the intention to marry the other, killed that other
person’s spouse or his/her own spouse.

The same section under Article 45 of the same code states that a marriage may be
annulled for any of the following causes existing at the time of the marriage:

1. That the party in whose behalf it is sought to have tha marriage annulled was eighteen
years of age or over but below twenty-one, and the marriage was solemnized without
the consent of the parents, guardians or persons having substitute parental authority
over the party, in that order, unless after attaining the age of twenty-one, such party
freely cohabited with the other and both lived together as husband and wife;
2. That either party wa of unsound mind, unless such party, after coming to reason,
freely cohabited with the other as husband and wife;
3. That the consent of either party was obtained by fraud, unless such party afterwards,
with full knowledge of facts constituting the fraud, freely cohabited with the other as
husband and wife;
4. That the consent of either party was obtained by force, or intimidation or undue
influence unless the same havig disappeared or ceased, such party thereafter freely
cohabited with the other as husband and wife;
5. That either party was physically incapable of consummating the marriage with the
other, and such incapacity continues and appears to be incurable; or
6. That either party was afflicted with a sexually transmittable disease found to be
serious and appears to be incurable.

Fraud referd to in No. 3 refers to any of the following circumstances as stated in Article
46:

a. Nondisclosure of a previous conviction by final judgment of the other party to a crime

involving moral turpitude;
b. Concealment by the wife of the fact that at the time of the marriage, she was pregnant
by a man other than her husband.

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 c. Concealment of a sexually-transmittable disease, regardless of its nature, existing at
the time of the marriage; or
d. Concealment of drug addiction, habitual alcoholism, homosexuality or lesbianism,
existing at the time pof the marriage.

B. Reproductive Health

Within the framework of the World Health Organization's (WHO) definition of health as
a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease
or infirmity, reproductive health, or sexual health/hygiene, addresses the reproductive
processes, functions and system at all stages of life. Reproductive health, therefore, implies that
people are able to have a responsible, satisfying and safer sex life and that they have the
capability to reproduce and the freedom to decide if, when and how often to do so. Implicit in
this are the right of men and women to be informed of and to have access to safe, effective,
affordable and acceptable methods of birth control of their choice; and the right of access to
appropriate health care services of sexual andreproductive medicine that will enable women to
go safely through pregnancy and childbirth and provide couples with the best chance of having a
healthy infant.

According to the WHO, "reproductive and sexual ill-health accounts for 20% of the
global burden of ill-health for women and 14% for men."

An unofficial working definition for sexual health is that "Sexual health is a state of
physical, emotional, mental and social well-being in relation to sexuality; it is not merely the
absence of disease, dysfunction or infirmity. Sexual health requires a positive and respectful
approach to sexuality and sexual relationships, as well as the possibility of having pleasurable
and safe sexual experiences, free of coercion, discrimination and violence. For sexual health to
be attained and maintained, the sexual rights of all persons must be respected, protected and
fulfilled." However, this is not an official WHO position, and should not be used or quoted as a
WHO definition.

Early childbearing and other behaviours can have health risks for women and their
infants. Waiting until a woman is at least 18 years old before trying to have children improves
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maternal and child health. If an additional child is desired, it is considered healthier for mother,
as well as for the succeeding child, to wait at least 2 years after previous birth before attempting
to conceive. After a miscarriage or abortion, it is healthier to wait at least 6 months.

The WHO estimates that each year, 358 000 women die due to complications related to
pregnancy and childbirth; 99% of these deaths occur within the most disadvantaged population
groups living in the poorest countries of the world. Most of these deaths can be avoided with
improving women's access to quality care from a skilled birth attendant before, during and after
pregnancy and childbirth.

C. Family Planning

1. The Family

It is generally accepted that the family is the first and oldest social institution in
society. It consists of parents and children who interact with one another. Through this
socialization process, parents are able to hand down socially acceptable cultural practices that
serve as initial training for the young to become future responsible citizens in the future.

According to Zaide (1998), the family refers to a group of people united by ties of
marriage, blood or adoption.

Family is a universal institution that has common characteristics.

1. Family members associate with one another in their respective roles as husband and
wife, mother and father, son and daughter or brother and sister.
2. As the members of the family enjoy life together playing their different roles, they
tend to create a common subculture where a member is made to feel aware of his role
through a long period of socialization during childhood.

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1.a Family Structures

The nature of each family structure and the interactions therein has been observed to
influence the personality development of its members.

Family structures are based on internal organization, descent, residence and authority.

 Based on Internal Organization

1. Conjugal family is composed of only the husband and the wife as in a newly-wed
couple.
2. Nuclear family is often reffered to as either a primary or an elementary family. It is
composed of the married couple and their children.
3. Extended family is composed of two or more nuclear families or several generations
of families together under one roof.

 Based on Descent

Families tend to trace their ancestry from either the paternal or maternal side.

1. Patrilineal family traces the family members’ relationships and affiliates with
relatives on the father’s side.
2. Matrilineal family traces the family members’ relationships and affiliates with
relatives on the mother’s side.
3. Bilateral family traces the family members’ relationships and affiliates with relatives
on both parents.

 Based on Residence

1. Patrilocal residence wherein the newly-married couple lives with or near the
domicile of the bridegroom’s parents.
2. Matrilocal residence wherein the newly-married couple lives with or near the
domicile of the bride’s parents.

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 3. Bilocal residence wherein the couple chooses to stay with either the groom’s or the
bride’s parents, depending on factors like the relative wealth of the families or their
status, the wishes of the parents or certain personal preferences of the bride and the
groom.
4. Neolocal residence wherein the couple resides independently from the parents of
either groom or bride.
5. Avunculocal residence wherein newly-married couple is prescribed to reside with or
near the maternal uncle of the groom.

 Based on Authority

1. Patriarchal family is a type of family where authority is vested in the oldest male in
the family, often the father. The sons, especially the eldest, also enjoy special prestige
and priveleges. The males speak for the familial group with regard to property
relations, legal obligations and criminal offenses. This type is characterized by family
solidarity and ancestor worship.
2. Matriarchal family is a type where the authority is vested in the mother or the
mother’s kin. This type is very rare and can be found in societies where the mother
dominates the household.
3. Egalitarian family is a type where the husband and the wife exercise a more or less
equal amount of authority.
4. Mtricentric family which is a recently emerged type found in the suburbs of the
United States where the prolonged absence of the father gives the mother a dominant
position in the family, although the father may also share with the mother in decision-
making.

1.b Functions of the Family

With the passage of time family’s vital tasks as a basic social institution were either
weakend or strengthened due to social and cultural changes.

 Socialization of children. Parents act as a basic socialization agents for their children.
They transmit to their children standards of behavior, value systems, basic skills,
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 motivations and work attitudes. These are integrated in their personalities, which they use
to further socialize as they go beyond their family, peer group, school and work group.
 Regulator of sexual behavior and activity. Universally, incest taboo is a regulation. It
forbids marriage between closest kins. This norm minimizes sexual competition within
families by restricting legitimate sexuality to spouses. It also forces people to marry
outside of their immediate families. Reproduction between close relatives can mentally
and physically impair offsprings. The close reproduction among close relatives would
also confuse kinship ties and threaten social order.
 Social placement. Reproduction of children maintains social organization. Birth is
preferred to married parents where they can confer their own social identity in terms of
race, religion or social class.
 Material and emotional security. To a greater extent, most families look to kin for
physical protection, emotional support and financial assistance. It is no surprise that
people living in families tend to be healthier than those living alone.

1.c Healthy Family

Healthy home is a place where every member is taken seriously as a person and where
he/she knows he/she is values, respected and loved. Happiness always resides in a
healthy family.

 Healthy family maintains a spiritual foundation. A shared religious core supported by

a church affiliation gives stability to the individual and his family.
 Healthy family makes the family a top priority. Mother Theresa observed that “the
world today is upside down, and is suffering so much because there is very little love in
the homes and in the family. We have no time for our children, we have no time for each
other, there is no time to enjoy each other.” do not allow work or other activities infringe
family life. Make time to be together.
 Healthy families ask and give respects. Respect is a two-way street. In order to receive
respect, you must first give it.
 Healthy families communicate and listen. Here are five qualities common to active
listeners from Mary Durkin:
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 a. Giving the other person opportunity to express ideas and feelings without
interrupting,
b. Making an honest attempt to understand those ideas and feelings,
c. Setting aside preconceived opinions about the other person,
d. Showing respect for the other person’s right to hold a view different from yours, and
e. Demonstrating your appreciation of the effort the other person is making.

 Healthy families value service to others. Focus on raising children who care about
others and who work to improve conditions for the less fortunate.
 Healthy families expect and offer acceptance. Good family provides a psychological
safety net that makes members feel accepted.

2. Family Planning Methods

Family planning, which is understood as the regulation of fertility so as to have limited

number of children, is one important component of population education. To attain this, one must
understand the advantages and disadvantages of each method of family planning and choose
which suits them best.

2.a Classification of Family Planning Methods

 Folk Methods

a. Postcoital douching is done by flushing the vagina with medicated solution

immediately after intercourse to remove or kill the sperm. This, however, is relatively
ineffective as the sperm cells may have entered the cervical canal and are unaffected.
Frequent douching may also damage the vaginal lining.
b. Prolonged lactation, an ancient practice of preventing preganacy, is prolonged
breastfeeding which delays ovulation. This practice is safe and free but it may not be
effective to those whose ovulation period returns from two to four months after a
baby’s delivery.

 Behavioral Methods

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 a. Natural method or rhythm method does not require the use of any drug, chemical
or plastic sheaths. It is called the rhythm method because its success depends upon
the woman’s monthly menstrual cycle. The husband simply refrains from having
sexual intercourse with his wife during the latter’s fertile period.
b. Ovulation method is done by determining the woman’s period through the use of the
calendar, thermometer or appearance of cervical mucus or vaginal discharge in the
vaginal canal. Women with normal regular cycles’s body temperature usually drops
sharply a day or two before ovulation and rises sharply after ovulation has occurred.
The presence of mucus or vaginal discharge in the vaginal canal which usually occurs
three days after menstruation is a sure indication that ovulation is soon to occur.
During the “peak symptom,” when women’s discharge turns clearer and more
slippery, sexual union should be avoided.
c. Withdrawal method is known as coitus interruptus because the act of sexual
intercourse is interrupted by the withdrawal of the male organ prior to its ejaculation.
This calls for maximum self-control and precise timing on the part of the male.
However, this method could be unreliable due to the emission of pre-ejaculatory
fluid, which may contain enough sperm cells that may cause pregnancy, over which
the husband has no control. Deprivation of considerable physical satisfaction for both
husband and wife may also occur which may later have psychological effects.

 Mechanical Contraceptives

a. The condom is a thin sheath of elastic rubber worn by the male over the penis during
sexual intercourse. The sheath prevents the male sperm from entering the female
uterus, thus preventing the possibility of conception. This method is cheap because
condoms are sold cheaply and are readily available. One of the advantages of using
condoms is that the risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases such as AIDS,
syphilis, gonorrhea and the likes is minimized.
b. The diaphragm is a shallow rubber cap with a flexible spring that is compressed and
inserted into the vagina so that it fits snugly over the cervix. It is usually covered with
spermicidal jelly or cream to prevent the entry of sperms into the uterus. A doctor has

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 to check it annually to see that it stays in place. Sometimes, diaphragms are dislodged
during sexual union.
c. The cervical cap is made of rubber with a tapering dome appearance designed to fit
snuggly over the cervix. When fitted by a doctor, it stays in place during sexual
intercourse and over longer periods.

 Chemical Contraceptives

a. Vaginal suppository is a samall bullet-shaped substance containing chemical capable

of killing sperms. It is inserted in the vagina 10-15 minutes prior to intercourse.
Likewise, the vaginal foaming tablet is moistened with water or saliva then inserted
into the vagina 10-15 minutes before intercourse. It melts inside the vagina and forms
a coat of foam to prevent the sperms from entering the uterus.
b. Jellies and creams and vaginal foams are often packaged in bottles and sold with
plastic applicators. They are inserted into the vagina just before sexual intercourse.
The purpose is to immobilize or kill the sperms. The spermicides, however, only last
for at least an hour. There should be no douching or washing of the vagina for six
hours after intercourse for effective usage.

 Intrauterine Device (IUD) resembles a coil made of plastic or metal and is inserted
properly into the uterus through the cervical canal by a doctor. However, many women
refrain from using IUD as it usually causes bleeding. Sometimes, it is expelled through
minimum pushing during sexual intercourse. Its latest form is the Copper T380A which
prevents fertilization primarily by creating an intrauterine environment that is
spermicidal. A foreign body reaction of the endometrium – a sterile inflammation –
prevents viable sperm from reaching the fallopian tube. Copper is said to exert its action
locally on the endometrium, heightening the inflammatory response; it increases the local
protogland in production and inhibits endometrial enzymes.
 Oral contraceptive/pill is taken through the mouth. It is made up of synthetic hormones
that prevent conception by inhibiting the ovaries from releasing egg cells. It has to be
taken regularly for 21 dys based on the woman’s menstrual cycle. The first pill is taken
on the fifth day of menstruation and continued for 20-21 days each month. When it is

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 stopped, menstruation occurs. The pill, however, is known to have caused some side
effects, the most serious of which is blood clotting especially among women over forty
years of age.
 The injectibles is one of the latest methods of family planning which uses injectible
contraceptive drug known as DepProvera (DMPA). The woman is injected with this
drug at the hip muscle instead of taking pills. The effectivity of one injection lasts for
three months. Some side effects, however, derived from using it were reported to include
headaches, bloating of the abdomen or breasts and mood changes.
 Surgical methods of sterilization

a. Tubal ligation for women refers to the act of tying or cutting the fallopian tubes to
make a woman sterile. When the fallopian tubes are severed or tied, no egg cell could
pass from the ovary to the uterus. Thus, when the egg is prevented from meeting the
sperm, no pregnancy occurs. It is 100% effective. So, before the mother subjects
herself for ligation, she must be very sure that she does not want to conceive
anymore.
b. Vasectomy for men is a minor and cheap operation done wihtin 15-20 minute
wherein the male vas deferens, a tube-like passage that stems from each testis that
produces the sperms is cut or tied. The sperms pass through the vas deferens to the
seminal vesicle where they mix with the semen before they are discharged from the
male organ into the female genital tract during sexual intercourse. Once the vas
deferens is cut or tied, the sperm cells cannot mix with the semen thus preventing
pregnancy on a woman. The male body will still continue to produce sperm cells but
these are absorbed by the body. This is medically known as phagocytosis.

 Abortion is the interruption of pregnancy before the fetus is mature enough to survive
outside the womb. It deprives the unborn child of its right to life and places the women’s
life in danger.

D. Responsible Parenthood

1. Rights and Obligations of Husband and Wife

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 Knowledge of their rights andobligations as husband and wife can be a start of a healthy
and vigorous married life and a happy family.

1. The husband and wife are obliged to live together, observe mutual love, respect and
fidelity, and render mutual help and support.
2. They shall fix the family domicile. In case of disagreement, the court shall decide.
3. Spouses are jointly responsible for the support of the family.
4. Management of the household shall be the right and duty of both spouses.
5. The aggrieved party may apply to the court for relief if the other spouse neglects
his/her duties or commit acts, which tend to bring danger, dishonor or injury to the
other member of the family.
6. Either spouse may exercise any legitimate profession, occupation, business or
activity.

Parenting has its rewards and pleasures, hardships and inconveniences. The parent’s life
as a couple changes with the presence of children. Hence, couples should give considerable
thought to the duties and responsibilities involved in parenthood and learn to accept, love the
experience as parents and strive to be the best possible parents by fulfilling their parental roles of
meeting the needs of the children and sharing of responsibilities.

2. Meeting Children’s Needs

Meeting the children’s needs is the simple role of parents. Chldren’s primary needs are
physical, emotional, social and intellectual which parents’ responsibility to share with.

 Physical needs. The tendency to grow is natural; hence, the parental task is to discover
the physical needs of their children and to provide for these needs in order to hasten their
development.
 Emotional needs. Children need love, affection, understanding, approval and security.
When parents give these emotional needs, children develop positive feelings and become
emotionally secure and stable. When these emotional needs are denied or thwarted,
children become hostile, fearful, anxious, secure, and develop a feeling of resentment
toward toward their parents.
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  Social needs. Gregariousness is an inborn tendency. As children grow, they want to be
with others. They want to be accepted by the group but do not know how to relate. The
task of parents is to provide their children with the opportunities necessary for
socialization. Being a part of society means that one should learn and belong to the group
by knowing their customs, mores, habits and manners.
 Intellectual needs. Intelligence is biological equipment. Chidren’s potential for
intellectual growth is inherent. They are naturally curious and desire to delve in several
new experiences. The parental role in fulfilling this need is for them to provide the
necessary stimulation and variety of learning experiences necessary for cognitive,
affective and psychomotor development.
 Moral needs. Children have the capacity for moral growth. They rely on people they
trust. Parents should take this opportunity to teach their children values so they could
distinguish right from wrong. Their abilities have to be developed through moral
reasoning and imitating the good examples set by elders.

3. Sharing responsibilities.

Children’s physical, intellectual, emotional, social and moral needs cannot be met by only
one parent. Both father and mother should take care and rear their children properly. The mother
should not be expected to take care and rear the children all by herself because this would be
unfair to her and her children. Every parent has strengths and weaknesses. Most fathers can
contribute something positive to a child’s life. The best fathers are almost indispensable.
Andalthough most fathers think that it is the mothers’ job to take care for the babies, fathers also
benefit from caring for their children for this could develop a father-child closeness that enriches
family ties.

A marriage without some basic structural undertakings about each person’s expected
contributions and involvement in the joint venture is analogous to trying to build a house without
any plans involving both the owners and the builders. Attempting to build a home based on male-
centered parental and marital roles is a certain blueprint for disaster. An unstructured home is
unsatisfactory especially in a stormy weather.

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 The ideal is authenticity and fulfillment, which comes from submerging each family
member into a large group releasing one’s natural impulses like honest emotions, cultivating
subjectivity and developing a radical openness to existence by refusing to impose order on
anyone.

Being a parent is more than playing a role. It is more than a lifestyle – it is an ethical
vocation. The undeniable burdens of family responsibility must be more openheartedly borne.

If a Filipino home is a locus of private life, it is alos critical to public life, to the life of
the community and to civic associations.

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