When we aim to be liked by everyone, we’re sacrificing a part of ourselves

Reference Group is a term coined by Herbert Hyman, which was further developed by Muzafer Sherif and R.K. Merton.

Reference group refers to any social group that the individual uses for shaping and evaluating his own feelings actions & attitudes, thus any social group that one uses as a standard (or as a frame of reference) in order to shape one's own behavior actions, achievements is a reference group.

According to Group Theory, human beings live in groups and the groups to which we belong (of which we are members), known as membership groups, affect our conduct greatly. Groups expect something from the individual members and the individual members act accordingly because they seek the group's approval, therefore the groups members evaluate their conduct with reference to the norms and values of the group.

Merton identified that sometime we use non-membership groups to evaluate ourselves.

Many times several social groups of which one is not a member or which one aspires to join may also greatly affect the individual's behavior. In other words non-membership groups may also serve as reference groups.

Anticipatory Socialization refers to the process of preparing oneself for entry into a group of which one is not a member but one which one aspires to join by adopting it's norms, values, and lifestyle.

Anticipatory socialization is functional for the individual undergoing it because :

• It enhances his chances of getting into non-member reference groups.
• Having once joined it will also ease his adjustment in the group.

Negative consequences -No guarantee of acceptance - norms and values may clash.

However, the process of anticipatory socialization may be dysfunctional for the individual if the norms and values of ones membership groups clashes with those of the non-membership reference group. In such cases. the individual may get alienated from ones membership group while he is still yet to be accepted by the non-memberships reference group, thus ending up as a marginal men.

Reference groups change with time.

When we aim to join a reference group we try acting in a way which we think might be likable by them and thus end up creating an illusion of ourself for the world. We tend to distance ourself from ourself to be able to be liked by people. In this fast paced world we will sometime have to join multiple groups for our own prosperity but we must not lose our true selves.

I would like to conclude with a story I remember from when I was a student, I was then preparing myself for college and deciding on my career path, there was a sir who used to give us random life lessons during the classes to keep us focused but we were young and reckless and couldn't understand the lessons when we were being told those incidences, but I am glad that I can fully recollect this one and still think about it when facing a dilemma. He was telling us about an incident that had occurred with him, the touch screen phones had newly started emerging into the markets, like they had been in the market for quite a few years but they were suddenly getting popular and everyone wanted to have one, but sir preferred using his old keypad phone and wasn't even excited to get a new smartphone. One day he met with his friends and one of them asked him why would he not switch to a smartphone to which the replied that he found no utility in them for himself. Later his friend mockingly said that he would find it shameful to walk around with him if he doesn't own a smartphone to which sir replied that he would not feel bad if he won't walk around with him.

Most of the times we fail to realize that we tend to do things similar to what people around us are doing just to get their validation but later with time we realize that it was not needed in the first place. We must always stand on our principles and take decisions which might turn out beneficial for us and not under any social pressure.