The Role of Communication and Social Impact on Formation of A Religious Behavior

Abstract

Accomplishment of educational activities is proportional to the extent of behavioral objectives that the person achieves. The performance of religious education and instruction is also comparable to the degree of formation of religious behavior. The formation of religious behavior is more complex than achievement knowledge, as well as the achievement of religious behavior is. Among the factors, “communication” and “social impact” are the two noteworthy factors. In communication, there needs to be four elements; source of communication (i.e. a speaking agent), message (the subject desired to be transmitted), channel (means), and listener (message receiver). But they are not enough by themselves for an effective communication unless each of them has some particular features. About the source of communication, these features are expertise, reliability, and to be beloved. One of the main causes of ineffective communication in terms of religious behavior is the source’s lack of competency which expertise requires, and that he/she could not sustain it. The reliability of the source of communication is the another main condition for effective communication. Unreliable parents, teacher, or preacher fails to create an effective communication with the addressees. As a consequent, a religious behavior will not be acted by kids, students, congregation or anyone else who is the object of the education in question. The third condition is to be beloved. If the source of the communication is beloved, approved and respected, it will make the effective communication easier. On the other hand, the message aimed at the formation of a religious behavior should be clear and easily understood. Also it should have explanatory information for the person who needs a change of religious behavior about where he/she starts and what stages he/she needs to pass. The channel chosen for the message should be the same in the minds of both message sender and receiver, which should avoid both of them to associate different meanings. For this, the message sender should know about the socio-cultural background of the receiver and the connotations of words or symbols in the receiver’s world. For the effective communication in terms of formation of a religious behavior, the message receiver should have some specific features, too. For example, a person who is biased, unwilling to communicate, learn and understand can make a perfect message and its sender disfunctional. Thus, its characteristic example in the history of prophets is the people who deliberately resist to the message and its sender, prophets. One of the methods in motivating a person to a particular behavior is “social effect”. Social effect can be defined as changes in his/her attitudes, ideas, and convictions emerged as a result of being exposed to those of another person. After the social effect, the behavior develops in two manners: “conformity” and “obedience”. Conformity as the result of social effect occurres without any difference in status. The major factor of conformity behavior is social norms. Person can change his own behavior or idea in order not to incompatible with those norms. So, we can say, it is important, for a person who is desired to behave in a particular manner, to be in a social environment or with friends behaving like that. In obedience behavior as the another result of social effect, there is a status difference between the source of effect (message sender) and the target (message receiver), or one of them is authoritarian above the other. In this kind of social effect, the source makes the target person or people (no matter what they think) appear the approved behavior by using his status or authority, and then control him/her or them. But in the conformity behavior, there is not a status difference or authority. This social effect is the reason why respected and notable people due to their knowledge, values and virtuous behaviors are naturally regarded as authority in religious issues and obeyed by the others. So, taking the apparent commands of the Qur’an and hadiths with obedience is a sign of belief and respect in God and the Prophet. The authority established by the Qur’an and the Prophet brought the obedience behavior with it. It is obvious that the educator having a higher status and authority is burdened with more responsibilities, so he/she should be more controlled in his/her words and behaviors. Because, when they say wrong or behave badly, there could be a risk that people affected by them adopt those behaviors. This is a responsibility in itself.

Özet

Eğitim faaliyetlerinin başarısı, bireyin hedeflenen davranışı ne ölçüde kazandığı ile doğru orantılıdır. Din eğitimi ve öğretimindeki başarı da, bireyde dinî davranışın oluşma derecesi ile karşılaştırılabilir. Davranış oluşumu, bilgi elde etmekten daha karmaşık bir yapı arz eder. Aynı şey dinî davranış elde etmek için de söylenebilir. Davranış oluşumunda etkin rol oynayan faktörler arasında, "iletişim" ve "sosyal etki" dikkate değer iki önemli faktördür. Dolayısıyla bu makalede bu iki faktörün, "dinî davranış" oluşumundaki rolleri açıklığa kavuşturulmaya çalışılacaktır.

Keywords: İletişim, Sosyal etki, Dinî davranış, Din eğitimi, Davranış kazanma