Primary and Secondary Socialisation — Sociology (Grade 11)

Define and explain Primary and Secondary Socialisation in your own words
Use key terms such as Secondary socialisation accurately
Apply what you have learned to new examples and questions
Avoid the common mistakes learners make with this topic

This lesson focuses on Primary and Secondary Socialisation: compare childhood's first lessons with the ones that come later.

Definition: Primary and Secondary Socialisation

Compare childhood's first lessons with the ones that come later.

Key ideas

Primary socialisation starts at home

In the early years the family teaches the essentials: language, table manners, right from wrong, and what it means to be a boy or a girl in that culture. Because these lessons come first and carry powerful emotions, they sink deepest and are hardest to undo. Sociologists regard the family as the most important agent of socialisation, though families differ greatly in what they teach.

Secondary socialisation never stops

From the first day of school, new agents take over part of the teaching: teachers and the hidden curriculum of rules and routines, peer groups with their fierce codes of cool, and the media with its flood of images and stories. Peer groups become especially powerful in the teenage years, sometimes pulling young people away from family values. Workplaces, partners and religions continue the process deep into adult life.

Key term — Secondary socialisation: Later socialisation by agencies such as school, peer groups, the media and the workplace, which build on and sometimes challenge primary lessons.

Learning the Playground Rules

Imagine a five-year-old, Amara, starts school. Within weeks she queues for lunch, shares equipment and comforts a crying classmate. Which agents of socialisation taught her what, and where does Mead's me appear?

Step 1: Credit primary socialisation: her family taught her language, kindness and basic right and wrong. Step 2: Credit secondary socialisation: the school taught queuing and sharing through routines and teacher praise. Step 3: Credit peers: other children taught her the unwritten playground codes through inclusion and disapproval. Step 4: Spot the me: when Amara imagines how her classmates will judge her before she acts, she is using her internalised generalised other.

Answer: Amara's behaviour is a joint product: family laid the primary foundations, while school and peers added secondary lessons. Her me, the self seen through others' eyes, now guides her playground conduct before she even moves.

Common mistakes

Thinking socialisation finishes at eighteen Socialisation is lifelong: new jobs, partnerships, parenthood and retirement all require learning new roles.
Assuming the media has no real effect The media is a major secondary agent, shaping ideas about beauty, success and normality, especially for young people.

Practice

What is the difference between primary and secondary socialisation?

Think first lessons versus later lessons.

Primary socialisation is the first, intense learning of basic norms and values in the family; secondary socialisation is later learning from school, peers, media and others.

A teenager starts dressing like her new friends and arguing with her parents' views. Which agent is at work, and is this primary or secondary socialisation?

Which group becomes powerful in the teens?

The peer group, and this is secondary socialisation, which can challenge primary lessons from the family.

Name four agents of socialisation.

Start at home, then move outward.

Any four of: family, school, peer group, media, religion, workplace.

An adult moves abroad for work and must learn new greetings, food customs and workplace norms. What does this show about socialisation?

Remember the concept about lifelong learning.

It shows socialisation continues throughout life: adults learn new roles and norms whenever they enter new cultures or situations.

Quick check

Primary and Secondary Socialisation — quick check

Which of these best defines "Secondary socialisation"?

Later socialisation by agencies such as school, peer groups, the media and the workplace, which build on and sometimes challenge primary lessons.

Give one example of the hidden curriculum at school.

Any valid example, e.g. learning punctuality, obedience to authority, competition, or gendered expectations through routines and teacher behaviour.

Explain Mead's distinction between the I and the me.

The me is the self as an object, how we think others see us, built from the generalised other; the I is the spontaneous acting self that responds to the me.

Key takeaways

Primary and Secondary Socialisation: compare childhood's first lessons with the ones that come later.
Primary socialisation starts at home: In the early years the family teaches the essentials: language, table manners, right from wrong, and what it means to be a boy or a girl in that culture.
Primary socialisation: The first and most intense stage of socialisation, usually in the family, where a child learns language, basic norms and fundamental values.
Watch out for: thinking socialisation finishes at eighteen

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