"First, a social institution arises out of and as a result of repeated groupings of interacting human individuals in response to elemental needs or drives (sex, hunger,fear, etc.). Second, common reciprocating attitude sand conventionalized behavior patterns develop out of the process of interaction (affection, loyalty, co6peration, domination,subordination, etc.). Third, cultural objects (traits) that embody symbolic values in material substances,are invented or fabricated and become the cue stimuli to behavior conditioned to them (the idol, cross, ring, flag, etc. are charged with emotional and sentimental meaning). Fourth, cultural objects (traits) that embody utilitarian values in material substances, are invented or fabricated and become the means of satisfying creature wants for warmth, shelter, etc. (buildings, furniture, etc.). Fifth, preserved in oral or written language, externally stored and handed down from one generation to the next, there is description and specification of the patterns of inter-relationship among these elemental drives, attitudes, symbolic culture traits, and utilitarian culture traits.These five traits just enumerated are all capable of objective treatment and some have been quantitatively measured (the attitudes).4 They appear in combination and are always inter-dependent in a functional sense. Taking the family as an illustration of the institutional complex, it may be conceived in the words of Burgess5 "as a unity of interacting persons;" and by this he means that the unity of interacting personalities is a living, changing, growing thing. But this dynamic aspect of the institutional complex does not deprive it of the attribute of structure, a term which " . . . .may properly be applied to the fabric of relations and prescribed positions with which societal functions are permanently connected." '
References:
Chapin, F. S. "A New Definition of Social Institutions." Social Forces 6.3 (1928): 375-77. Hein Online. Web. 19 Apr. 2014.