Question

On average, a person's position in our U.S. stratification system is a product of some combination of that which happened to them (e.g. born in a certain family, place, century, race, gender, religion) vs. that which they accomplished as a result of their own efforts or actions. Thus if someone becomes a successful engineer, it is always the result of a combination of these, and the difficult question is the proportional contribution of each. This pair of intertwined social processes is known in sociology as __________________________________.

Answer 1

The correct answer is ascription and achievement

A scription is the tendency to assign status based on birth.

Achievement is the tendency to value more as social positions that each member of society is.

The preconceived concepts that we use to position ourselves in the social environment are generally equivalent to the social role we assume to have. To better understand, let's go back to the example of the police. Ordinarily, it is considered that a police officer has a set of behaviors common to all police officers, without taking into account the personal perspectives of that specific subject. The responsibilities attributed to this group of professionals and which, of course, are expected to be fulfilled, are linked to certain values, such as the idea of ​​justice and honor, which are automatically attributed to individuals who assume this profession.