Pierre Bourdieu & Habitus (Sociology)

Habitus is a concept from French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu. It refers to the deeply ingrained habits, skills, and ways of thinking that individuals develop through their upbringing and social environment. Habitus shapes how we see the world, what we value, and how we act – often without us even realizing it.

What is Habitus?

Think about how you move through daily life.

You walk on the right side of the sidewalk, say “Bless you” when someone sneezes, or know when it’s appropriate to speak up and when to stay quiet—all without giving it much thought.

This is habitus in action: an internalized sense of how to behave, shaped by your environment and life experience.

It’s not about following a fixed list of rules. Instead, it’s more like a social instinct—a set of habits, dispositions, and ways of understanding the world that guide your actions automatically.

Rather than being imposed from the outside, habitus is something we acquire through years of living in particular social settings.

It helps us fit in with our community, speak the “social language” of our group, and navigate situations with ease. For example, people from the same class background often share similar senses of humor, tastes, or ways of interacting.

This is because they’ve developed a similar habitus over time.

Bourdieu was interested in how people make individual choices—even when their behavior seems shaped by social norms.

He asked a key question: how can behavior be regular and predictable, without being the result of strict rule-following?

His answer was habitus. It explains how socialized behavior emerges not through obedience, but through an intuitive sense of what feels natural, acceptable, or possible in a given situation.

Habitus doesn’t tell us exactly what to do—it gives us a sense of what will work, what will fit, and what will feel right. It’s a kind of embodied common sense.

Over time, this sense becomes part of who we are.

As the word suggests, habitus is the social world turned into habit – something we carry in our bodies, our speech, and our actions.

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How Habitus Influences Behavior

1. Shapes how we see and act—without us noticing

Habitus works beneath the surface of awareness.

From a young age, we absorb patterns of behavior, ways of thinking, and emotional responses simply by being part of a social world.

These patterns become so familiar that they feel like common sense.

When making decisions, we rarely analyze every option—we tend to respond instinctively, guided by these deep-set habits.

2. Gives us a “feel” for how to behave in different situations

Just like a skilled athlete doesn’t need to think through every move during a game, people learn how to “read the room” and act accordingly.

This kind of practical sense—what Bourdieu called a “feel for the game”—allows us to navigate different environments smoothly.

Whether it’s knowing how to speak in a job interview or what tone to use with friends, our habitus helps us act in socially appropriate ways without deliberate planning.

3. Reflects our social background and life experiences

Habitus isn’t something we choose – it develops through the kinds of environments we grow up in.

A person raised in a working-class neighborhood might develop different instincts, tastes, and ways of speaking than someone from an elite private school.

These ingrained habits tend to match the expectations and norms of the social groups we belong to, often without us even realizing it.

4. Influences what we believe is possible or realistic

Our habitus doesn’t just shape how we act—it also shapes what we believe we can do.

People internalize a sense of where they “fit” in society, and this can set unconscious limits on their choices.

For example, someone from a background with limited educational access might never seriously consider applying to a prestigious university – not because they’re not capable, but because it simply doesn’t occur to them as a realistic option.

These beliefs about what’s possible are formed through repeated experience and social reinforcement.

5. Guides behavior flexibly—not like a strict rulebook

Habitus doesn’t function like a list of dos and don’ts.

Instead, it gives people a flexible sense of how to act based on past experience.

While it encourages consistency and regularity in our behavior, it also allows for creativity and improvisation.

This helps explain why people in the same social group might still behave differently in the same situation – because habitus provides a range of possible responses rather than a single script.

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Examples

Think of habitus like a language.

Everyone grows up speaking one language or another, just as everyone develops a habitus.

Language has grammar and structure, but within that, we form new sentences all the time.

We don’t have to stop and think about grammar rules – we just speak.

Similarly, habitus gives us an internal sense of how to behave in our social world, without needing to follow strict rules.

It shapes what feels appropriate or natural in different situations, while still allowing for creativity and choice

1. Education: Feeling at Home (or Not) in School

A child from a middle-class family may feel naturally comfortable raising their hand, speaking to teachers, or navigating university applications.

Their home life likely included books, structured routines, and encouragement to ask questions—all of which prepare them for academic environments.

In contrast, a working-class child might feel out of place or hesitate to speak up in class, not because they lack intelligence, but because their habitus hasn’t prepared them for that kind of interaction.

The education system tends to reward the behaviors and dispositions of the middle class, making success feel “natural” for some and difficult for others.

2. Taste and Lifestyle: Knowing What’s ‘In’

Someone raised in an upper-middle-class environment might prefer minimalist home décor, indie music, or organic food – not because these choices are objectively better, but because they’ve learned to associate them with refinement and “good taste.”

Meanwhile, someone from a different background may feel more at home with bold colors, commercial radio, or fast food.

These preferences aren’t just personal—they reflect class-based habitus that shapes what feels enjoyable, stylish, or appropriate.

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How Does One Obtain a Habitus? 

Much like how you picked up your native language—by hearing and using it in everyday life—you develop a habitus through constant exposure to the social world around you.

You likely didn’t need formal lessons to learn grammar rules; you absorbed them just by listening and participating in conversations.

In the same way, we absorb our sense of what feels right, wrong, normal, or possible simply by growing up in a particular social environment.

This process is largely unconscious.

No one needs to sit you down and tell you what kind of humor is acceptable, how loudly to speak, or what clothes are “cool” or “embarrassing” at school.

You pick it up through countless social cues, looks, reactions, and repeated experiences. Over time, this becomes second nature.

Because habitus is shaped by the world you grow up in, people from different environments develop different habitus.

Someone raised in a wealthy suburb will likely develop a very different sense of taste, behavior, and expectations than someone raised in a working-class rural town.

These differences might not always be visible, but they influence everything from speech and manners to career goals and confidence in certain spaces.

Often, the insights and instincts that come with your habitus are hard to explain to others—especially if their habitus is very different from yours.

For example, you might just know that a certain outfit would be mocked at school, but struggle to explain why. That’s because this kind of social knowledge isn’t something you consciously study—it’s something you feel.

As Bourdieu put it, we develop a “feel for the game.”

Habitus also shapes how we see ourselves in society. It influences the kinds of futures we imagine for ourselves and the choices we believe are open to us.

We develop an internal sense of our position within the social structure, and that helps us decide—often without realizing it—what’s worth aiming for and what feels out of reach.

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Habitus and Inequality

Bourdieu argued that people develop different forms of habitus depending on their social environment.

Factors like class, race, gender, nationality, religion, and family upbringing all shape the internal dispositions we carry.

Each person’s habitus comes with its own set of learned behaviors, expectations, knowledge, and social skills – what feels “natural” is actually deeply socialized.

For instance, someone raised in an elite environment may develop skills in networking, negotiation, and polished communication – traits that are highly valued and useful in professional or affluent social spaces.

However, if that same person were suddenly placed in a low-income or high-risk environment, their usual behaviors might be ineffective or even counterproductive.

They might lack the informal survival skills needed to navigate danger, scarcity, or institutional barriers. To adapt, they would need to develop a new habitus.

Yet, learning a new habitus is not easy.

Returning to the language analogy, a native speaker has an intuitive feel for what “sounds right” in their language—even if they can’t explain the grammar.

A second-language learner, even with effort and exposure, may never fully develop that same intuitive fluency.

Similarly, someone trying to “move up” socially may struggle to embody the behaviors and instincts that feel second nature to people from a different social class.

While habitus can change, it tends to evolve slowly and often resists quick or radical transformation.

This creates barriers to social mobility. A person whose habitus is suited to a working-class neighborhood may find it challenging to develop the ease and confidence expected in elite professional settings.

It’s not just about learning new information—it’s about internalizing a whole new way of seeing and acting in the world.

One of the most powerful elements within the habitus is what Bourdieu called cultural capital.

Just as economic capital (like money or assets) can be invested and grown, cultural capital—like knowing how to behave in certain social spaces, having access to high-status knowledge, or understanding unspoken rules—can also give people an advantage in life.

For example, having $100,000 makes it easier to grow your wealth compared to someone starting with nothing. You can invest, start a business, or access financial networks.

The same is true of cultural capital: if you grow up in a family that teaches you how to navigate formal settings, appreciate fine art, or make small talk with influential people, you’re likely to find it easier to succeed in institutions like education or business.

Even when people have equal economic resources, those with cultural capital often get ahead more easily.

For instance, two people might have the same amount of money to invest, but the one who knows which firms to approach, how to speak the “language” of investing, and how to build relationships in that world will likely go further.

These skills are rarely taught explicitly—they are learned through long exposure to certain environments.

This is what makes cultural capital—and by extension, habitus—so powerful and so invisible.

These internalized advantages often go unnoticed, even by the people who benefit from them. As a result, they help legitimize inequality.

People assume that success comes from natural talent or hard work, when in fact, much of it depends on deeply ingrained social knowledge.

Take standardized tests like the SAT. They’re widely seen as objective measures of intelligence or merit. But students from wealthier families can afford tutoring and test prep.

That’s an obvious advantage. Less visible, though, is the cultural knowledge that the SAT is something worth preparing for in the first place—or that it plays a critical role in college admissions.

Students who grow up in college-educated families are more likely to absorb that knowledge without ever being told.

This kind of hidden awareness—of what matters, how to succeed, and what’s expected—is part of the habitus. And it plays a major role in shaping outcomes.

A good SAT score leads to better college options, which leads to better jobs and higher salaries.

In this way, habitus helps reproduce social inequality, even in systems that seem neutral or merit-based.

For Bourdieu, this was the power—and the danger—of habitus.

It helps explain why inequality persists even without explicit discrimination.

By embedding cultural advantages so deeply into our sense of what’s normal, natural, or desirable, habitus ensures that the playing field is never truly level.

References

Bourdieu, Pierre. (1977). Outline of a Theory of Practice (Vol. 16). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bourdieu, P. (1977). Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture. London: Sage

Bourdieu, P. (2011). The forms of capital. (1986). Cultural theory: An anthology, 1, 81-93.

Bourdieu, P. (2004). Structures and the habitus. Material culture: Critical concepts in the social sciences, 1(part 1), 116-77.

Gillespie, L. (2019, August 6). Pierre Bourdieu: Habitus. Critical Legal Thinking. Retrieved March 3, 2023, from https://criticallegalthinking.com/2019/08/06/pierre-bourdieu-habitus/ 

Lamaison, P. (n.d.). From rules to strategies: An interview with Pierre Bourdieu. Cultural Anthropology. Retrieved March 3, 2023, from https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1525/can.1986.1.1.02a00060

Power, E. M. (2015, April 27). An introduction to Pierre Bourdieu’s key theoretical concepts. Taylor & Francis. Retrieved March 3, 2023, from