internalization

Internalization is the process by which individuals adopt external attitudes, values, norms, or rules and incorporate them into their own beliefs and behavior, so that they come to regulate actions without external pressure. It spans cognitive, affective, and social dimensions and can be deliberate or unconscious.

In psychology and sociology, internalization is central to socialization. Children learn norms by observing others and through feedback, eventually integrating rules into self-regulation. The concept is linked to moral development, identity formation, and personality. Theorists such as Piaget, Kohlberg, and Freud have described how external standards become part of the psyche through mechanisms like identification, introjection, and cognitive restructuring.

In economics, internalization refers to the incorporation of externalities into an agent's decision-making. When actions impose costs or benefits on others, policy instruments aim to align private incentives with social costs or benefits, for example through taxes, subsidies, or marketable permits. The Coase theorem and Pigouvian taxes illustrate decentralizing or pricing externalities to achieve efficiency.

In linguistics and cognitive science, internalization describes how individuals acquire and internalize rules of language or other cognitive systems, resulting in tacit knowledge that guides behavior and performance.

In organizational and educational contexts, internalization underpins corporate cultures, ethical norms, and professional practices as external guidelines are absorbed and enacted by individuals within groups.