Man is part of society. Existing in society, he constantly has certain social needs.
Human social needs are an integral part of his personality.
Concept
What concerns the social needs of a person?
Social needs - These are the desires that a person has in the process of his life in society and interaction with other people.
Social needs are secondary to primary biological or physiological (food, water, sleep, rest), existential needs (safety, comfort). Primary needs are inborn.
They occur in a person regardless of his presence in society. Man cannot exist without water, without food, etc. Secondary needs, which include social needs, arise directly in the process of life in societythat is, are acquired.
Social dissatisfaction, in contrast to biological problems, cannot lead to the death of an individual, but can significantly lower the level of his psychological health and make socialization difficult.
Also the inability to satisfy social. needs can lead to a significant reduction in the quality of human life, and this, in turn, sometimes leads to the limitation of options for satisfying primary biological, existential needs.
For example, an unfulfilled social need for work can lead to a loss of a sense of security.
Kinds
What are social needs? There are a large number of social needs of a person, which can be divided into three main groups:
- For myself. This needs, the satisfaction of which allows a person to achieve the desired level of development, position in society. This may include the desire for self-development, leadership, career growth, power, recognition.
- For others. This kind of needs differs from the previous one in that it contains no signs of selfish aspirations. A person wants to commit acts aimed at meeting the interests of other people. This is the need for mutual assistance, altruism.
- Together with others. Such needs unite people as equal members of society.
A person, experiencing these needs, feels support from other people with similar desires.
This may include the desire for communication, peace, order, discipline, etc.
Basic sociogenic needs
The list of basic social needs experienced by a person living in society:
- Work. A full member of society is in need of professional implementation, which allows him to gain the respect and acceptance of other members of society, to develop his own skills and to receive material benefits. Realization of the need for labor allows to satisfy simultaneously several social needs - in communication, in recognition, in obtaining material benefits, in approaching power, etc.
- Development. A full person always seeks to gain knowledge. A person can acquire new knowledge throughout his life, satisfying the desire to learn and comprehend new things.
- Communication. No man can exist without society, without communication.
Forced isolation by all means leads to the degradation of the individual, the loss of social skills.
Through communication, a person shares his thoughts, gains new experience, gets support, etc.
Examples of satisfaction
Consider the examples of human satisfaction of emerging social needs:
- In development. Group - "for myself." A child from an early age seeks to know the world around him. As soon as the baby acquires the first communication skills, he begins to be interested in everything going on around him, asking numerous questions to those around him. Having acquired reading skills, the child begins to independently draw information from books. Getting knowledge happens all the time: in the process of communication with parents, walking on the street, classes in kindergarten, watching cartoons, etc. Later, the child gains knowledge at school, college, etc. Having got a job for the first time, an adult person begins to comprehend his profession, to acquire practical skills in it. In everyday life, faced with the issue of interest, people make efforts to obtain the necessary information.
At this moment they are driven solely by the need for development, curiosity.
- In public order. Group - "together with others." A person feels the desire to live in a prosperous society, in which the norms of morality, discipline, law and order are observed. His desire for a similar way of life is expressed in compliance with existing norms of the law, building communication with people on the principles of equality and respect, observing elementary rules of behavior (social needs demonstrate a person’s need to clean up trash, walk dogs in designated places, come to work without delay, vote on elections, etc.).
- In altruism. In modern society, this type of needs is underdeveloped. Altruism involves the rejection of their own desires, aspirations in favor of the interests of other people. Not all members of society are able to sacrifice themselves for the sake of others. As a rule, altruists are gentle, calm people genuinely interested in helping others. They can satisfy their needs in various ways: organizing a shelter for homeless animals, helping elderly people, helping dying patients in hospices.
All their actions are carried out free of charge.
Significance
Satisfying social needs from the group “for oneself” is necessary condition for the formation of a full-fledged personality.
Compliance of a person's life with his social expectations guarantees a positive socialization of such a person in society, eliminates the manifestation of any forms of deviant behavior.
A person who is satisfied with his level of development, education, career, friends and family life is a useful member of society.
Each of its satisfied needs leads to the appearance of some kind of social significant result: a strong family with children is a full-fledged unit of society; career achievements are the successful fulfillment of labor functions, etc.
Meeting the needs "for others" and "together with others" is the key to a positive functioning of society.
Only a positive interaction of people with each other, their ability to act together in the public interest, and not just one by one for personal ends, will help to create mature society.
The problem of modern society lies precisely in the unwillingness of people to meet common needs. Each person approaches the question from an egoistic point of view - only does what is beneficial for him.
At the same time, there is no initiative in committing important public actions. leads to disorder, violations of the law, powerless.
As a result, the integrity and well-being of the society in which the person lives is violated, and this immediately affects the quality of his own life.
That is his selfish interests in any case affected.
Result
Human activities caused by social needs? Needs - source of personality activity, the motivation of its activities.
A person performs any actions solely from the desire to achieve a certain result. This result is the satisfaction of need.
Human actions can contribute fulfillment of desire directly. For example: when there is a need for communication, a teenager leaves the house on the street to his friends sitting in the courtyard and engages in dialogue with them.
Otherwise, the activity is manifested in the implementation of certain actions that will subsequently lead to the satisfaction of social needs. For example, the desire for power can be achieved through purposeful activities in the professional sphere.
At the same time, people do not always perform actions. to meet the needs that they have present.
Unlike biological needs, which cannot be ignored (thirst, hunger, etc.), a person can leave social needs unfulfilled.
The reasons: laziness, lack of initiative, lack of motivation, lack of sense of purpose, fear, etc.
For example, a person may have a strong need for communication and at the same time be constantly at home alone, not having friends. The reason for this behavior can be a strong lack of self-confidence, internal psychological conflicts.
As a result, the person will not take actions that he could take to achieve the desired result.
The lack of necessary activity will lead to the lack of fulfillment of existing desires, to a low quality of life, but there will be no threat to life.
Do animals have?
On the one hand, social needs can be peculiar only to people in view of the fact that only members of society can experience them. On the other hand, animals in their groups exist certain hierarchy of behavior, rules and rituals.
From this point of view, it is customary to single out animal welfare needs: parental behavior, play behavior, migration, the desire for self-preservation, adaptation to the conditions of life, the hierarchy in the pack, etc.
These needs can not be called social in full, but they are the primary source for the development of further social needs in people.
Thus, social needs there are every person in large quantities. Satisfying them, a person must act not only in his personal interests, but also in the interests of the people around him.
The need to be necessary and communication - the social needs of a person:
