Garfinkel: Breaking Social Norms

For my second experiential learning assignment, I decided to break a social norm while going out to eat with my family at a restaurant: granted this is something I have a habit of doing but the reaction I got from my dining mates was particularly interesting this time. To give a little bit of background of the setting I was in at the time, I was with my mother, younger brother, and my mother’s friend at a restaurant in DC for my birthday dinner. The restaurant was crowded, but not many people were paying attention to what we were doing. The behavior I decided to break was dipping my fingers in the container caramel was in and then proceeded lick my fingers after doing so. I choose to break this social norm because one, the caramel sauce was really good, and two I was testing to see if my mother would say anything: normally on my birthday she lets me get away with

Introduction: 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.

Recently I completed this homework assignment by wearing a sports jacket and kaki pants to a business professional event where the preferred dress is to wear a suit. I know that this may not be one of the most daring social norms to break such as being loud in the library or walking through the drive through but that is the social norm that I chose to break.

Charles Dudley Warner once said, “We are half ruined by conformity, but we should be wholly ruined without it”. In today’s society, many tend to question their role in civilization, and what contribution it radiates throughout the world. Society as a whole has both its positives and negatives, but overall, many recognize that society and its expectations creates many constraints, forcing people to conform to a reality that has thus been created for them. Whether these conformities are considered “in the right” is essentially up to the person themselves, and whether they continue to follow through with these actions that place them under such a notional societal umbrella. Ultimately, people will do what is necessary to feel that they have a

The expectations that are set for Jazz by the town are easy to connect to human nature and conformity. In 1951, Solomon Asch conducted experiments that explained that most people will alter their true beliefs in order to conform to a crowd. When given an easy test with obvious answers, most people changed their answers to match the rest of the crowd (which were purposely incorrect). Metaphorically, Jazz fears that he will change his obvious answer into something incorrect.

For example, in today’s day and age it is consider forbidden for women to dress themselves in apparel that is short or skinny, because it is perceived as inappropriate. Young girls are taught to cover up every square inch of their body, because showing even the tiniest amount of skin can be seen as distracting. Teenagers are expected to not apply too much makeup because that can come across as looking fake, but, at the same time, are supposed to wear enough makeup so that they don’t come across as looking ill or immature for their age. And, if they slip up or decide one day to not follow these strict guidelines of society, they forever will be called names, made fun of, and ostracized from their peers. In fear of these unjust consequences happening to them, today’s young men and women are forced to abide by the strict norms that have been placed before them.

Ulrich, R. (2016). In Search of Our Achilles Heel. Behavior Analysis and Social Action, 6(2),

Being part of a group can create what one calls “mob mentality”. When in a group setting, there is a loss of individuality and self-awareness. (example is a group of teens on a train is more likely to vandalize and be rowdy than an individual teen.) for example Hindus not eating beef or Muslims not eating pork is a confirming behavior. Conforming behaviors can be termed as norms as they are considered the expected or accepted behaviors.

I finally broke things off with him. It wasn’t all bad till I did that. I would get 10 million call or texts from him. He was always trying to see me or wondering where I was and doing. Well I found out he was stalking me on social media.

Although, breaking the norms doesn’t always have negative consequences. For example, I made a fantastic new friend! Without me dressing as if a blizzard was about to happen any minute, I probably would not have had the opportunity to talk to him. I am proud of myself for committing a social norm violation. If I were to do this again I believe the second time would be easier to break out of societal norms.

Another example of conformity in today's society is bathing. I guess it is showing good hygiene, but if a person does not shower every day that doesn't make them weird. If you don't want to bathe every day, do not. “I’m antisocial they say. I don’t mix.

Conformity In 1963, Stanley Miligran and Philip Zimbardo conducted a social experiment in which two people were partnered up, one the teacher, one the learner. Their goal was to see how far the learner would go in obeying the teachers’ commands. This was an important experiment in the world because it shows how easy it is for evil people to use their power for corruption, even in giving innocent people orders. Miligran was inspired to do this experiment while reviewing the holocaust.

The main argument of this article is to show the reader the stuggle of working at a restaurant owned by a large corporation. When many people go to restaurants, they don't normally think about the servers or think about how dificult their lives really were. All of Barbara Ehrenreich's coworkers made very low income, with the richest one making only $10 an hour, and many of them live in motels and trailers. Not only do they live in horrible conditions, but their managers treat them horribly; they will get yelled at for simply sitting down or eating a snack away from all the customers.

People don’t want to be the odd one out and they certainly don’t want to be judged for it. This experiment showed how social pressure from a group could get a person to conform. All in all, the results of the elevator experiment show that conformity can be influenced by an individual’s innate desire to be like everyone

You can ignore it once, twice or more than that. But eventually you’ll have to face the situation. You never think of the bridges of hope when you hurt that person on a loop. It could be a no, or just a simple yes too that might break every connection. It doesn’t just happen.