ABSTRACT
ARE there any comparable forms of influence exercised by groups in the attempt to educate individuals? This question follows naturally upon the one dealt with in the last chapter.
To a large extent it seems true to say that the "teaching" undertaken by groups is less deliberate than that attempted by individual parents or teachers. The social controls employed by brothers and sisters, acquaintances, companions and friends are, however, no less real on this account. They can be observed in simple forms among quite small children; and from th~ age of five or six onwards their structure and organisation are fairly well defined. The social situation again consists of two parts. It is not now a relationship between a dominant (or would-be dominant) individual who through prestige, leadership or attractiveness succeeds in raising his "instruction" to the status of an accepted "suggestion". The picture is rather that of a closed circle into which an outsider seeks an entry; and it is a recognised part of the situation that entrance is only afforded to outsiders to the degree to which they yield to the requirements of the group.
