Mass Media Influencing Political Socializing in United States of America

Mass Media Influencing Political Socializing in United States of America

Introduction

Political socialization is an idea relating to the way where the individual obtains the information, attitudes, beliefs and values that assist an individual to comprehend the operations of the political system of a nation. It is the study telling the developmental process through which children and adolescents gain political cognition, behaviors and attitudes. This associate to the learning and the developmental process through which norms and behavior required for the running of the political system are passed on from a generation to another generation. It is because of the political socialization that individuals are educated into the political culture and the orientations are formed regarding the political objects and working. Most of the children obtain the initial and basic orientation regarding the political behavior pattern. The attributes we hold too will change and evolve over the period, but the basic be hold to will remain the same through the whole life of an individual (Dyck, 2006).

An individual over the period changes so does the prospectus towards politics changes with the evolution of feelings and attitudes towards it. On the prevailing levels, the changes are due to the beliefs, religion, gender, ethnics, nationalism, self-image, ideological commitment and understanding of rights and duties. The differences of religion and ethnic create the attachment with the individual and hold a prestigious position since they are the one of the basis of self-image. During the initial stage, an individual have a minimal amount if emotional attachment to the attitudes towards politics and governmental institutions.

There are three major points that are to be highlighted regarding the political socialization. First, the political socialization can be either direct or indirect. The direct political socialization is there being explicit communication regarding the information, feelings and values towards politics. The indirect political socialization is when there is a molding of the political views due to the experiences person hold. The molder can be the relation to friends, parents and teachers who can mould the person's outlook towards politics or can be the hardship or economic instability a person has faced during the time and experiences a person has gone through which makes a person more concerned about the economic well-being (Ethridge & Handelman, 2010,).

The second point to it is that socialization is a continual process in an individual's life. Initially influence of the family is the soul creating of an individual's value but over time these values changes because of factors like, social group, travelling, migration, social roles, social shifts, change of marital status and having one's own family and being employed or unemployed all leads to the change in the political values of an individual. These kinds of events lay a heavy impact on the young generation, an individual who are becoming involved in politics, for example, the first time voters, and another all effected to extent (Almond, 2004).

Thirdly, socialization patter of a society can be either unifying or divisive. Events that take place in any country like a death or a conflict of ...