Man, due to his gregarious nature has often been referred to as a “social animal” (Aristotle) in both academic and non-academic mentions, with a constant need to be surrounded by people, either in a destined form as parents, siblings & relatives or in a deliberately planned form, such as friends and spouses due to his inborn desire to build associations and relationships.
This human need for companionship or association, created an established set-up called “society”, which, according to Dictionary.com “is a highly structured system of human organization for large-scale community living that furnishes norms, protection, continuity, security, and a national identity for its members, associated together for religious, benevolent, cultural, scientific, political, patriotic, or other purposes.” Actually, “it is this element of sociability that defines the true essence of the society” (Simmel), making it indispensable for the basic survival of man. Society as the basic unit of the existence of human civilization, has continued to determine and influence man’s relationship with his environment from ages, manifested in the form of his lifestyle, including academic and professional pursuits undertaken, which, in the long-run, also have a bearing on his overall quality of life, depending on the level of success or failure he experiences, thereby, inviting increased scholarly research interests and efforts from globally renowned academicians and behavioral scientists to explore the interaction between this social arrangement and God’s unique creation, and their impact on each other. Man’s evolutionary transition from the Paleolithic & Neolithic Age to the current Modern Age, has established many different types of societies, most of which, according to sociologists and anthropologists only represent how members interact with each other broadly, providing only a macro-level picture to an outsider. However, in reality human psyche is such that people do not interact with every member on the same level, and with the same ease or comfort. This is because the way five fingers of a hand are not of equal length, similarly, two individuals don’t have the same attitudes, thought processes, likes-dislikes, backgrounds and beliefs, thereby, creating differences in their proximity and communication styles with each other. People make their life easy by forming social groups within their large societal set-up. Social groups are nothing but “a structured collection of two or more like-minded people with certain common characteristics, which make them come together and interact, giving rise to a mutual feeling of being a single social entity”. Groups are the most stable and enduring social units because of their importance to not only the members but also the society at large, as they play a major role in predicting and guiding individual behavior. All the like-minded group members, through a mutual consensus, decide the group norms (written, spoken & unspoken rules/standards governing behavior in group), including definition and demarcation between both acceptable and unacceptable behavior. For example, a family, a village, a political party and a trade union can be called social groups because not only are they structured, but their members are also fully cognizant of the group’s existence.
Sociologists and other behavioral scientists worldwide, basically refer to the following main types of social groups:
a. Primary Groups ─ Primary groups are marked by primary relationships amongst the group members, who not only interact informally but also have emotional attachment with each other. For example, family, friends, peers, neighbors, and church members. Finally, these primary relationships are more common in small & traditional societies instead of large, industrialized and modern ones of today.
b. Secondary Groups ─ Secondary groups, on the other hand, in contrast to the primary groups are marked by secondary relationships, manifested in formal communication amongst the group members as well as weak (sometimes even nil) emotional ties and attachments between them, as compared to the primary group members. Secondary group members may not know each other quite well, and also not indulge in much of face-to-face-interaction. For example, the relationship between an attorney and his client is purely secondary in nature, since the attorney will relate to him/her on in terms of business. He will probably not socialize with him or even if he does, it would have a professional dimension to it, unlike his socializing acts with his primary group of family & close friends. Finally, the contemporary large industrial and post-industrial societies present a classic example of secondary groups marked by such secondary relationships where people are so busy in their own lives, that there is shortage of time to meet anyone, leave aside the question of developing deep emotional relationships, thereby, resulting in feeling of isolation. To get rid of this feeling, many people often resort to forming primary relationships through online dating services, singles’ groups, church groups etc.
c. Reference Groups ─ According to Merton, “reference groups are the reference points of the individual, towards which he is oriented and which influence his tendency, behavior and opinion.” People judge their own behaviors or form opinions about themselves by using reference groups as benchmarks or standards for self-appraisals. For example, a church Parish might judge his own spiritual acts and accomplishments by comparing them to that of a particular denomination, and may feel good and satisfied about meeting them. Such a positive self-evaluation represents that normative effect that the reference group has on its members. However, if most of the Parishioners have outstanding spiritual accomplishments, then others make them as the standard benchmark, trying to compare themselves with them, leading to comparative effect of the reference group on the members.
d. In-Groups and Out-Groups ─ Reality of groups is that their existence depends on the presence of even those groups that are outside it. In other words, if we want to categorize a bunch of people as belonging to a particular group, then logically, we also need people whom we can label as being outside that group or not belonging to that group, so as to draw a boundary that undoubtedly demarcates and identifies the in-group members from the out-group members. For example, in a gathering comprising of professors, doctors and lawyers, though all of them represent an “educated in-group”, however, they can also form their own exclusive in-groups based on their professional backgrounds with academicians vs. non-academicians like professors vs. doctors & lawyers (in-groups vs. out-groups). Similarly, the doctors can perceive each other as one in-group, segregating lawyers and professors as an out-group.
Regardless of the type and nature of the group, a common thread running through each group is its similarity in terms of having a distinct group culture - “shared beliefs, behaviors, objects and other characteristics of all the members”, which though vary from one group to another, but at the same time represent some of the common cultural building blocks found in any state or district worldwide that lend an individual identity to the groups present in that setting. Normally a culture includes many societal aspects; languages, customs, values, mores, norms, rules, tools, technologies, products, organizations & institutions i.e. “clusters of rules and social meanings associated with specific social activities.” For example, family, education, work, religion, healthcare etc.
Talking about United States of America, we find that though, the country, comprises of fifty independent states, with some of them representing North America, South America & Latin America, and each geographical division housing hundreds and thousands of people in the form of both primary groups (families) and secondary groups (professional relationships and acquaintances), but each individual member of the American society, regardless of the geographical divide or group to which he/she belongs, is bound together by the common cultural thread of speaking English language, which is his mother tongue and lends an independent entity to the States as an English speaking nation. Similarly, festivals like Halloween and Thanksgiving Day are celebrated with equal enthusiasm and rigor by everyone irrespective of whether he/she is a North/South American or even a Hispanic or Mexican, since they are more than just festivals, and depict the centuries-old cultural heritage of the American people.
Another example about the existence of social groups with a common cultural pattern can be found if we skim through the pages of history. All of us have heard about Mesopotamia, one of the earliest of the human civilizations. Sumer was a civilization and a historical region in southern Mesopotamia, the modern Iraq during the Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age. Historians and Archaeologists, based on their discoveries about the people living in that region suggest existence of a lifestyle with a cultural pattern built exactly using the same building blocks of language, music, values , customs etc., as used by any social group either in their times or in today’s current times. For example, archaeological revelations point out towards the fact that people belonging to the Sumerian culture employed almost the same sets of tools and technologies to survive as anyone during that time did. All of them used three kinds of boats for transportation purposes, namely:
i. Clinker-built waterproofed sailboats stitched together with hair
ii. Animal skin boats; and
iii. Wooden-oared ships
Similarly, all families in the Sumerian culture were not only male dominated, but also used vases, bowls and dishes made mostly of pottery to store food items, thus, making us reiterate the fact that all forms of societal organizations; societies, and dynasties or social groups within them, existing worldwide, have a distinct culture, that lends an identity to them. No matter, how different they may appear to an onlooker, causing them to be viewed skeptically, but in reality their culture is also built using the same building blocks as ours, thereby, necessitating mutual respect and appreciation for each other’s diversity.
This is just one factor which all social groups have in common. Another way in which they relate to each other is by virtue of the same feelings of honesty, trust & mutual respect, embodying any human association. Because social groups denote relationships amongst human beings only, they cannot be devoid of such feelings and emotions, however, what varies is the intensity of impact of these emotions on the relationship, which again depends on factors such as the degree of such emotional involvement amongst the members, as well as the group culture that paves the way for group norms, values and expectations.
For example, a couple decide to get married and start a family (primary group),based on feelings of honesty, trust, mutual respect, commitment etc., which automatically create a culture revolving around those feelings, and pave way for certain unwritten rules, expectations and norms, that both husband and wife are supposed to abide by. However, if either of them has an extra-marital affair, or indulges in any form of infidelity, it is an outright breach of trust or violation of the initially created open culture of honesty and transparency between them, causing a lot of pain to their relationship.
Similarly, a professional work environment comprising of formal work relationships (secondary group) also does not remain untouched by the same set of human emotions, but at a different level. Both the employer and employee start their new work relationship with a set of expectations that go way beyond the formally documented terms and conditions of employment. The company expects the employee to work honestly with full commitment and resort to open communication, to fully honor the existing open work culture. However, any breach or violation of this mutual trust or set of expectations on the part of either of the parties would hurt them professionally, though at a different level than that of primary groups. An employee convicted of embezzlement would, more than anything else, hurt the future shape of his own career graph by blacklisting his resume. This does not mean that his employer would remain unaffected. This particular act has tried to pollute the otherwise honest and open culture he has toiled hard to create and sustain for years. Things become more complicated and painful if this secondary relationship is an offshoot of a prior primary relationship that both the parties shared with each other. Everything remaining the same, if the employee in question is a close family member of the employer, the breach would be more personal than professional, due to betrayal of the trust and belief the employer deposed in him. Further, unlike the former scenario, where the same breach would make the employer reconcile quickly with the situation, with self-fulfilling thoughts like, “greed is a part of human nature, so it is not a big deal that he also gave into it”, the latter one would be much more painful and inconsolable for him due to the personal familial relations both of them shared with each other. Similarly, an employee who starts working in a company fully assured of the openness and transparency in its operations and work culture might experience a cultural shock upon being exposed to an environment full of clandestine appraisals and discriminatory performance reward systems. Further, if his attempt to remind a co-worker about the principles of honesty and values that the company stands for, upon catching him red-handed while taking a bribe is punished by the company by implicating him in a false case, it would leave him shattered. Consequently his dissatisfaction level is sufficient to spoil the company’s reputation in the market by starting a sporadic pattern of “negative word of mouth” labeling it as a “least preferred employer.” Thus, it is clear that the same emotional ties that keep human relations alive, do impact secondary social groups also, but with a different look and feel than that of primary groups.
Finally, both reference groups and in-groups-out groups also have traces of emotional involvement in them, thereby influencing the behavior of the individual members. People normally use reference groups as reference points and guideposts to their own behavior, trying to match it up to behavior of the reference groups they are part of, and then feeling assured about the correctness of their own behavior. However, this benchmarking stems from the unshaken trust and faith deposed by them in the perfection of these groups, with respect to whatever they say and do. But the day these very role models get derailed from their ideals and value systems and fall prey to their instincts, the same followers would stop offering their patronage to them. This is quite common in India, where numerous god men hoodwink their followers in the garb of religion and sacredness, for years, before getting convicted for raping/molesting and murdering women. Similarly, all medical practitioners seek refuge in their universally strong medical fraternity, that acts as a powerful in-group. Their firm commitment to their professional duties towards their fellow doctors, stems not only from the Hippocratic Oath taken by them at the time of obtaining their degree and license, but also from an inner and personal sense of responsibility towards their comrades, thereby, preventing one doctor from accusing another out rightly of an incident of medical negligence.
Works Cited
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Cragun T. Ryan, and Cragun Deborah. “Introduction to Sociology”.www.en.wikibooks.org. 1st ed. 6 Mar 2006. Web. 11 Mar 2012.
“Reference Groups”. www.sociologyguide.com. (n.d.). Web. 10 Mar 2012.
“Society”. www.dictionary.com. (n.d). Web. 7 Mar 2012.
“Society”. www.sociologyguide.com. (n.d.). Web. 7 Mar 2012.
“Social Groups”. www.sociologyguide.com. (n.d.). Web. 9 Mar 2012.
“Sumer”. www.en.wikipedia.org. (n.d.). Web. 11 Mar 2012.
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