Primary group

Under primary group understands sociologist Charles H. Cooley one that is characterized by intimate connections with contacts face to face and cooperation.

A primary group is "primary" in several ways; but mainly in this sense that it is of fundamental importance for the formation of the social nature and ideals of a particular individual. The psychological result of the intimate connection is the merging of the individualities into a common whole, so that precisely the individual self, in many ways at least, is absorbed in the common life and purposes of the group. Probably the simplest way to describe this social wholeness is to call it a "we". It involves the kind of social empathy and mutual identification for which "we" is the natural expression. One lives in the feeling of the whole and finds the main goals of one's will in this feeling.

In the background of this term is Cooley's special understanding of the social nature of man. For Cooley, society is a mental way of organizing individuals; as artificial he refuses to conceptually oppose the individual and society to one another.

Structural features of primary groups

Cooley names five of them:

• communication of the group members face to face ( face-to-face )
• low specialization / division of labor
• relative constancy of the primary group (e.g. family )
• a small number of members (at least 2 to 3)
• comparatively great intimacy of the group members with one another (e.g. family, close friends )

These characteristics are also essential to the group dynamics of primary groups. These structural features are used methodologically as an ideal type , since not every primary group can necessarily be characterized by them.

On the other hand there are the secondary groups , which in the course of life can acquire a completely different kind of meaning and function for the individual.

See also

Secondary group Clan

Social group social network

Tribalism

literature

• Charles H. Cooley: Social Organization. A Study of the Larger Mind. New York 1909 (especially chapter 3)
• Bernhard Schäfers: Introduction to group sociology. Quelle & Mayer, Wiesbaden 1980, pp. 97-107. (detailed discussion of the term)
• Ulrich Bröckling: Battlefield Research . Sociology in War. In: Mittelweg 36 , 5/2000, pp. 74-92 (on the historical / ideological content of the concept).

Individual evidence

1. ^ Charles H. Cooley: Social Organization. In: The Two Major Works of Charles H. Cooley. Social organization. Human Nature and the Social Order. With an Introduction of Robert Cooley Angell. The Free Press, Glencoe, Ill. 1956. pp. 23 ff.
2. ^ Cooley: Human Nature and the Social Order. In: The Two Major Works of Charles H. Cooley. Social organization. Human Nature and the Social Order. With an Introduction of Robert Cooley Angell. The Free Press, Glencoe, Ill. 1956. pp. 118f.