Stages of socialization
The notion of political culture seeks to retain the psychological subtleties of the earlier national character studies while giving appropriate attention to the distinctive features of the political sphere and to the intervening stages of personality development between childhood and induction into adult political life. This is achieved by conceiving of two stages of socialization; the first is the induction into the general culture, while the second is the more particular, and usually more explicit, socialization to political life. In some forms of analysis it is useful to distinguish an additional stage, political recruitment to special roles within the political process. These stages are not necessarily sequential; explicit political socialization can occur at a very early point, when the individual is still being socialized into his general culture.