Sociology of the Family Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Sociology of the Family - Essay Example The secondary stage of socialization usually takes place outside of the home, it can be at school, with peers or at a workplace - this is when most people begin will to socialize with people from different cultures (Laslett, 303). During this stage you may gain achieved roles such as getting a good job or becoming a mother/father and the changes in trends are recognized too from the jargon that is used, to the seasonal change in fashion trends. Norms are the things we are expected to do as they are regarded as being normal, values on the other hand are the principles we follow but we tend to take for granted e.g. writing. If a person breaks the norm then they are deviant and agencies of social control such as the police take over. These basic fundamentals are recognized by most people nowadays and explain why there arent as many cultural conflicts as there has been in the past. An example of cultural conflicts is during the early 19th century when White Americans came into contact with Native Americans - many conflicts and a few massacres had taken place simply because most of the White Americans were not willing to socialize and understand this Native culture (Kain, 955). A general perception of sociology is that it is the same as psychology. This is only correct to an extent, both the subjects are a part of social science and they look into the behavior of people (Bar-Yosef, 69). However, the difference is that psychology is the study of the mind and its mental states, whereas sociology looks at people on a broader scale, as it looks at the study of the structure and development of human societies. Today families are confronted with many problems. One issue is the imbalance in household and childcare labor done by men and women (Haralambous, 5). Another problem facing families today is the sharp rising in the number of elderly people. Changes to society may help fix some of these issues. Although society has made