Occupational Socialization Essay

Family is the most important agent of socialization as it molds the individual. It plays the most important role in the formation of personality. An individual’s outlook to the society is shaped by the family’s values, beliefs, political views and religious inclinations. However, it may also be problematic as parents may reproduce the negative modelling they have experienced as a child. They are responsible for teaching children to function and care for themselves. They are also the biggest influence for social development of children as they, along with the rest of the family; teach children close relationships, group life, and also how to share resources. They also provide the first system of values, morals, norms and language. In addition, the family’s race, social class, and religion also plays and important role in raising children. For example, wealthy families tend to emphasize creativity and judgement when raising their children while poor families usually emphasize conformity and obedience. Also, children are raised and socialized to abide by the gender norms, perceptions of race and class-related behaviours. Peer Group is a person’s first major socialization outside their family. It is made up of people with common characteristics like age, sex, social status or interests. Peer group socialization gives the person a chance to develop social skills as they learn to build relationships without the supervision of adults. It’s important to adolescents as they begin to develop an identity different from their parents and exert independence. It also provides its own opportunities for socialization since children engage in different types of activities with their peers than they do with their families. It begins in the earliest years of childhood such as when children on the playground teach younger children the rules of taking turns or rules of a game. Since members of a peer group are at the same stage of socialization, they interact freely and spontaneously with each other. Peers have a great impact on a person’s thoughts and line of thinking. A person learns to behave in a manner that they think will be acceptable to their peers as peer acceptance is an important part in socialization. School opens a door to a new social world. It enlarges an individual’s social world to include people with backgrounds different from their own. Schools not only teach basic skills such as reading and writing, they also teach individuals to develop and discipline themselves, to cooperate with others, to obey rules and to know right from wrong. Schools help pass on knowledge, create awareness and inculcate the feelings of tolerance in individuals. It provides information for individuals to better understand …show more content…
Occupational socialization is not that different from the socialization that an individual experiences during childhood and adolescence. Individuals are generally exposed to occupational roles by observing the parents working, people who they meet while performing their jobs and people that are portrayed in the media. At the workplace, an individual meets people of different ages and belonging to different social and cultural backgrounds. The individual is then in close contact with different thought processes, ideas, belief systems and more. Socialization then helps broaden the individual’s view of social acceptance and tolerance towards others. The individual also learns to develop behaving mannerisms towards the superiors as well as their