ABSTRACT
Social relationships can affect individuals as much as their biology and psychology. As sociologists have long observed, society is a structure that, although composed of individuals, exists apart from any given individual within it. An individual may contribute to the structure of a pair, a group, or a society, but he does not have sole responsibility for the composition of that grouping. The workings of the larger entity of society affect the individual profoundly. Precisely how they will do so, of course, involves personal biology and psychology. But the world presents the individual with circumstances, and those circumstances are to a certain extent “outside” the individual. Individuals may have an impact on the world, but the world also has an impact on individuals. Society is encountered as a force that can help or harm individual mental functioning.
