Understanding Social Groups, Family Structures, and Societal Concepts

Posted on Jan 13, 2025 in Social sciences

Social Group: A group of individuals who interact and communicate with each other, share common goals and standards, and have a feeling of group identity.
Reference Group: A group (to which one may or may not belong) that a person or group uses as a basis for evaluating their own behavior, values, and attitudes.
Primary Group: A group of people closely connected by affinities of origin, such as a family. It can also form outside the family and have a lasting partnership.
Secondary Group: A group that has no close ties or close proximity among its members, usually formed for a certain time.
Household Social Group: A group of people who share the same temporary space but not identical interests and goals, e.g., people in a childcare setting.
Social Category: A set of people with the same characteristics, e.g., all students who wear glasses at school.

Bureaucracy: A set of rules and regulations written to establish a system of hierarchy of jobs and wages, which govern the conduct of individuals and detail the work processes of an organization, such as a business school.
Globalization: A process started in the second half of the twentieth century leading to increasing integration of economies and companies from various countries for the production of goods and services, financial markets, and the spread of information.
Singles: People who prefer to live alone; they are more numerous in big cities than in rural areas.
Citizenship: The term means the exercise of rights, active engagement, political participation, and accountability.
Social Institutions: A set of ideas, values, rules, and organizations to ensure the stability and orderliness of a society.
Social Action: According to the German sociologist Max Weber (1864-1920), it is any action a person consciously takes based on another person, e.g., a greeting, a warning.

Exogamy: Marriage between people of different groups.
Endogamy: Marriage between members of the same group.
Conjugal Family: Also called a nuclear family, it consists solely of the parents and children.
Types of Status: Assigned and acquired.
Types of Family: Nuclear or conjugal, extended, patriarchal.
Functions of the Family: Biological (consisting of procreation), economic (including food, clothing, morality, healthcare), socialization, cultural transmission, and social control.
Changes in Family: Fewer children, changes in behavior, and the evolving role of women.
Causes of Change in Family: The reduction in family size is a general phenomenon worldwide; Brazil is no exception.
Marriage and Number of Spouses: Monogamy, polygamy.
Types of Separation: Conceptual, judicial, and divorce.
Features of the Brazilian Family Today: Marriages are less durable, and people marry later.

Positive Aspects of the Internet: Closer ties between relatives and friends, formation of groups with different affinities.
Negative Aspects: Viruses; practices of crimes such as pedophilia.

Acquired Status: “The best lawyer in town.”
Ascribed Status: “The son of the worker.”
Dominant Status: Someone who is superior to others (e.g., President).
Role Set: The behavior that the social group expects of any person occupying a certain status.
Social Norms in Society: Domestic work.
Example of a Social Norm: In school, wearing a uniform.
Examples of Symbols: A flag, a religious cross.

Types of Leadership: Institutional (e.g., manager of a pharmacy), personnel, intelligence, moral standing.
Crowd: A large number of people gathered in a given space, unrelated to each other.
Public: A group of people who follow the same stimuli.
Mass: The public is not passive in receiving; it expresses opinions.
Social Category: A set of people with the same characteristics.