Social rule

(social: L. socialis, from socius, companion. Role: Fr. role; L. rotulus, cylinder). Character or agency through which one participates in the affairs of society. A person’s s.r. has both psychological and sociological aspects. Each individual performs a certain part, depending on their position in the social structure, according to their social status. A person’s conduct is related, not only to their personal characteristics, but also to their social status, situational demands and circumstances. Within a given social group, each person plays a particular role (or roles). These roles change along with modifications in people’s status and circumstances. Each role has its functions, obligations and advantages, and requires correlation with others; that is, it is subject to specific norms, expectations, and has its moral value. These norms regulate interpersonal relations and contribute to the socialization of personal behavior and to the resolution of conflicts within the social group and within society. Thus, social roles can be viewed as one segment of the culture. With social progress, there is a diversifying of social roles, and each citizen plays more numerous and complex, not only throughout life but in each one of its periods. This allows the individual to develop their personality multifacetically, to overcome the uniformness of certain roles, step outside them. From the point of view of humanist psychology (*), the set of social roles constitutes the system of behavioral structures, that make up the different layers of the individual’s personality.