ABSTRACT
Each time a man enters a new communication channel-subscribes to a new periodical, joins a new circle of friends, purchases a television set, or begins to listen regularly to some radio program-he is introduced into a new social world. Self-control is essentially social control in that each individual restrains himself by evaluating his projected line of action in terms of the group norms that he has incorporated as his own. Much of the consistency that is found in overt, voluntary conduct arises from the fact that each person maintains a reasonably stable conception of himself. The act of controlling oneself is itself a part of the on-going social current; for as each individual adjusts in advance to the situation in which he is involved and reacts upon it, he makes more complex forms of cooperation possible. When sociologists speak of social control, however, they are in no way opposing freedom.
