Social Class and Ethnic Status and Personality
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The following research is on the subject of the inter-relation of personality with social class and ethnic status. The personality of the individual is determined by a number of factors. There is first of all an apparent mechanism within the individual which causes the personality to develop along certain lines according to age. There are variations within certain parameters, and in part other factors affect those distinctions. The environment is another important factor in the development of personality, and this includes experiences which help to shape individual differences. Freud first focused on the similarities in the development of the personalities of all when he discussed the familial factors which were seen as so important in the development of the mental life of the person. Social class and race are also important factors in the development of the personality, though their contribution is not always recognized. Lidz (1968) notes that certain child-rearing techniques, personality traits, or prejudices are attributed to idiosyncracies of the individual, but they are in fact residues of ethnic differences or characteristics of social class differences. He notes a number of examples: A husband might confess that he had never seen his wife in the nude, and the physician might take this to indicate extreme inhibition on the part of the wife; however, the lower-class husband of Polish origin would be shocked if his wife ever undressed in his presence. A woman fr
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Roles can be regarded as units of a social system, but they also part of the personality through directing behavior to fit them and by giving cohesion to the functioning of personality. The individual does not learn patterns of living entirely from scratch; rather, in many situations the individual learns roles and then modifies them to the specific individual needs.
Also within the family, the child learns about basic institutions and their values, including such institutions as the family, marriage, extended family systems, and institutions of economic exchange. The family inculcates the values of the social system by example, teaching, and interaction. One of the major drives in the development of personality is the wish to participate in or to avoid participation in such institutions. The family is intended to transmit to the child the things that are prescribed, permitted, and proscribed as values of the society, and what means are acceptable or unacceptable toward achieving goals. The child is involved in a multiplicity of social phenomena in the family, and these leave a permanent imprint upon him and his personality. Among these phenomena are several that relate directly to social class: the value of belonging to
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Some common words found in the essay are:
Coleman Rainwater, United Negro, Greek Orthodox, CONCLUSION Ethnic, Catholic Jewish, CONCLUSION Personality, Arthur Koestler, , United Actually, Human People, social class, skin color, development personality, personality development, lidz 1968, social standing, farb 1978, ethnic status, personality traits, social status, farb 1978 pp, coleman rainwater 1978, lidz 1968 pp, social class differences, social class ethnic,
Approximate Word count = 6571
Approximate Pages = 26 (250 words per page)
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