Classification of social group
- Group based on the type of contact:
(a) Primary group: Primary group are categorized by face-to –face contact, direct cooperation with each other and common interest among the members. Group members have strong “we-feeling “; small in size, for example, family, and play group etc.; generally informal in structure and there are no drafted rules followed by those group members.
(b) Secondary group: In this group, relationship is indirect, impersonal; and large in size for example a red-cross society consist of thousands of members scattered around the world. There are set rules and regulations, and are supposed to follow by the group members. Secondary groups are goal oriented e.g., political party, cooperative etc.
- Based on the social class:
(a) Horizontal group: Horizontal group is used to describe members who are alike in terms of position/status in the class system of society. Examples are blacksmith or carpenter would be members of their respective horizontal group in the village. Those falls in the horizontal class are more or less equal in terms of facility, economic etc.
(b) Vertical group: Small division such as caste, clan because the vertical group is a part
of horizontal group. In this group, members may differentiate in terms of class, status, opportunity etc. By principle all Brahmins are same, but there may be variation among them with respect to economic status, social status, opportunities etc. In this way society classified them as they are in the vertical class.
- Based on the stability: The degree of stability could be-
(a) Temporary group: examples are, crowd, movie etc. (b) Permanent group: Political party, organization etc.
- Based on the feeling and belonging:
(a) In-group: Relationship is usually ethnocentric and “we-feeling”. The individual belongs to a number of groups which are his/her in-groups. Thus, the family, the tribe, the college to which a person belongs is his/her in-group calling forth similar attitudes and reaction in their members. The members of such group identify themselves with one another and with group as a whole. For example, our school, our club, our village etc.
(b) Out-group: All other group in which an individual does not belong. The out-group consists of those individuals, whether formally organized or not, towards whom we feel as indifference, disgust, competition or outright conflict. For example, Brahmin calls Gurung ethnic group as their out-group.
- Reference group:
A reference group is a collection of people that we use as a standard of comparison for ourselves regardless of whether we are part of that group. We use reference group to evaluate the relative worth or desirability of our appearance, thoughts, feelings and behavior as a source of models that we imitate often, an anticipation of becoming members, and as a source of expectation that we can use to judge the appropriateness of our appearance and behavior.