Breaking A Norm Essay

For this exercise, I chose to break the norm of walking on the right side of the hallway and using the right door while entering and exiting a building. This norm has been formed to keep order in crowded hallways and avoid running into other people while walking from place-to-place. This norm upholds the values of creating order in crowded spaces, as well as obeying people’s personal space and boundaries.

The best way to gather data for studying social norms through a symbolic interactionalism lens is through qualitative data. Observation will be they major tell in this experiment because ironically it would break more important more in society; not to act out or make a scene. Meaning that observation will show the subtle reactions the person may exhibit. After the experiment I would ask the participants to fill out a survey and participate in an interview; allowing me to gather more personal data about how the person felt, what they assumed I was doing, how the person wanted to act and or say and why they did or didn 't follow

Rules are a basic law that we must abide by. Schools in particular are a common place for rules to be followed by students. Each classroom has their own rules as well such as no texting in class or not being late. Society today is built around rules; we rely on rules as a form of societal conduct. Even if we like them or not, or abide by them or don’t, rules are everywhere. We can all think of a time where we have been somewhere, where rules were implied. Whether it’s at school, work, store, bank, anywhere really. These rules are sometimes directly implied or unspoken but followed. I can remember a specific time I had to abide by rules, my Medical Assisting class. Although being deeply frustrated in a strict nature of a classroom that seemed

Harold Gafinkel defined ethnomethodology as the study of how people use common sense understating to make sense of life. Ethnomethodology relies heavily on social norms and their obvious presence in a community. Garfinkel, while studying ethnomethodology, performed a series of breaching exercises in which he broke social norms. Similar to Garfinkel’s experiments, the breaking of using appropriate utensils called the observers to question my common sense and understanding of social conventions. The standard belief of what utensils should be used for eating a particular dish was destroyed when I used a fork to eat soup and a spoon to eat a salad. Therefore, the standard table manners were completely ignored in my misuse of the utensils. In addition to Garfinkel's concept of ethnomethodology, this breaking of a social norm experiment can be analyzed in terms of Erving Goffman’s impression management. Goffman says that people are very much concerned with two types of the presentation of self, verbal and nonverbal communication. Also, people try desperately to manage how they are presented in society in order to control what people think of them and their roles in certain social situations. In regard to my experiment, I tried to give the impression of normal behavior so I would not draw attention to myself. Giving off a very normal impression when breaking a social norm for an experiment is critical to receive unbiased and accurate results. Yet, the observers of my experiment got to see what I am like when I have no control over my impression management, so much so that I am purposefully breaking social norms to see the reactions. I was extremely vulnerable when I was breaking the social norm because I was opening myself up to criticism and embarrassment. It did prove to be a good test of my ability to give off a relatively normal impression when knowingly making a socially incorrect

Firstly, a norm is defined as rules that regulate social life, including explicit laws and implicit cultural standards. This relates to the particular experiment because the whole point was to break one of these norms and see the ripple effect it had on the people around me. Another term is attitude, which is defined as a relatively stable opinion containing beliefs and emotional feelings about a topic. This has to do with the experiment because My mother, who had the biggest reaction when I broke the norm, and I have different attitudes when it comes to proper etiquette and it is something that is apparent in our behaviors when out and my mother’s role in trying to make me conform to being proper when in public. Going off of that, conformity is defined as the tendency people have to act and think like members of the group. This has to do with the experiment, because all social norms are used as vessels to make people act and think the same, and if you break them you are looked down upon by

Social norms are the base templates which guide our behavior everyday. Social norms entail an expected behavior based off of those norms, and that we will conform to those expectations on a regular basis. These norms rise from our evolution of social dynamics. As the people in a society consistently interact with each other and other components of society, people begin to form a certain set of expectations on how the interactions and situations should proceed. As a large portion of society begins to conform to this standard, the certain behaviors that one would have in a particular situation will start to be considered as normative behaviors. The normative behaviors that people perform help solidify a social norm, and most individuals

The short story “Harrison Bergeron” by Kurt Vonnegut presents a story in which the heroic figure Harrison Bergeron freed himself from government restrictions yet ironically killed by the authority in the end. This story describes the abnormal development of human under excessive government regulations. Vonnegut presents this feature of the society by showing the love can be exhausted by the law, also the article also gives the meaning that control the law only can aggravate the society development. This essay will bring in-depth explanations on the tremendously negative impacts may be brought by excessive regulations.

Throughout our daily lives, we have many expectations. We are expected to act and behave in a certain manner as we carry out our day to day lives. These expectations will vary depending on the setting or occasion. The expectations may also vary culture to culture. Because of these expectations, social norms have been developed. Social Norms are unwritten rules about how to behave. They provide us with an expected idea of how to behave in a particular social group or culture. Behavior which fulfills these norms is called conformity, and most of the time roles and norms are powerful ways of understanding and predicting what people will do. (McLeod) We typically use these norms to predict what people will do in a certain situation. These norms

The problem that I came when trying to break a social norm is trying to find a reason to. In other words most social norms are there for a reason and especially when such a big number of people do just group together and don’t “think outside of the box” were stuck with them. In Under the Influence: How the Group Changes What We Think by Shirley S Wang she talks about how social norms get their power. Dr Berger states that “The more public and object or behavior is, the more likely it is to spread.” It can be something as small as the type of shoe someone wears but if more and more people are wearing them then more and more people will want them. Social norms are a necessity to our society for how they help everyone out and in our case would have made it more time

Here we discussed the similarities of two types of conformity; obedience and compliance. When compliant an individual will act in accordance with a request whilst secretly disagreeing. An individual under the influence of obedient behaviour would be acting in accordance with a direct instruction or command. As discussed both have their similarities and differences, for instance, conformity in its purest form as a herd mentality will conform irrationally just as social contagion theory suggests. Alternatively, a group or individual displaying cognitive dissonance finds an individual has conflicting attitudes, beliefs or behaviours therefore, rationalises the situation to bring about cognitive balance to their situation in an effort to be more comfortable with their choice. In other studies such as Milgrims distance study, this study revealed that group participants acted with the greatest obedience when their instructor was of a close proximity to the teacher as opposed to being in another room suggesting an emotional factor is involved. There is an inherent drive for conformity in every individual whether they are required to comply or be obedient; it is just a matter of what the situation at hand requires

Social learning theory is a theory related to classical and operant conditioning, which proposed by Albert Bandura in 1977. According to Albert Bandura, people are active agents in learning while they use cognition and social interaction in learning (Rogers, 2010). Albert Bandura considered that people are living in the environment, therefore, human behavior should be studied in social context rather than in laboratory (Bandura, 1977).

After six intense days of Phillip Zimbardo’s conforming to social roles experiment a graduate student who was only there to take notes and interview was so shocked by what she saw she demanded the experiment end straight away as it was degrading to watch and degrading for all who took part as Phillip Zimbardo and his team watched the situation descend into chaos she was only the voice that spoke up about how bad the experiment truly

In the articles “Making Allowance Count: Tips for Raising Children Who aren’t Spoiled,” by Richard Rende and “Why ‘Bribing’ Your Child with Treats doesn’t Work,” by Suzanne Gelb, both doctors explore the “coin reward system.” Each article is different from each other, though. Gelb discusses about not bribing a child with treats for getting chores done. Whereas Rende argues that giving an allowance to a child that does chores is detrimental to a child’s progression.

Culture is a belief system commonly shared in the society. Every human in a society share a common value and behavior distinct from other people, depending on where one was raised. That being said, I like to compare and contrast three divergent characteristics and describe which one I hail from.

Your class has listened to a radio discussion about how adults can be a good influence on younger people. You have made the notes below: