Being a Deviant for a Day

1721 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Violate a social norm

I choose project 1a: Being a Deviant for a day because I was interested in the reaction of others post to my deviant action in attempting to violate a social norm. One social norm that I observed while I was grocery shopping one day was people automatically claim the items belong to them once it is placed in their basket. Even though technically it is not it still belongs to the store until purchased.

As planned, I violated a social norm by going into a grocery store to pick up a few groceries at local Super Target store. While picking them out, instead of selecting items from the shelves or the store main floor I got them from another customer’s shopping cart acting like nothing is out of the ordinary, shuffling through their shopping carts for things I like then carry on as normal.

Before, taking action I had looked around to see the people in the store and predicted who would be more angered by my deviant action by making assumptions based on their facial expressions or attitudes at scene. I expect this because I assume it is more based on behavioral aspects that influences people’s actions most. Therefore, I assumed if they were already having a bad day, they might react in an even more nasty way compared to someone who is jolly, who might even welcome me to pick out from their shopping carts. I also originally expected the reactions in a same-sex situation to occur immediately right after I grab things from people’s grocery cart and possibly see them react in a more negative way compared to a situation of the opposite sex where I expect them to react positively. Simply assuming that there may be some type of gender prejudice that people have about others. Primarily on gender roles of what is expected and not expected of ...

... middle of paper ...

...ting him to say “I think you have the wrong cart.” Here the situational influence of approaching a same-sex versus opposite sex scheme did not create a distinctive difference compared to the expected behavior I had about the person I was going to approach and the impact I made to obtained a varied reactions to my deviant violation.

According to the essay entitled How Expectation Affects Behavior which states and also concludes my gained knowledge of this project is that without the knowledge to be able to process and attain a cognitive framed structure to process future social information with those schemas serving as memory guides. Social norms are established as a rule, and it continues in force because people prefer to conform to the rule given and expect highly of others to conform even in a simple normal every day activity because people obey fairness norms.

Show More
Related

  • Australian Consumer Law Objective

    1575 Words  | 4 Pages

    This essay will examine key aspects of the recent implementation of the Australian Consumer Law (ACL) 2011, which is the largest overhaul in Consumer Law in Australia in the past twenty five years. The ACL replaces 20 existing State and Territory laws into one national law , the legislation was enacted in two main parts as Schedule 2 of the renamed Trade Practices Act 1974 (Cth) (TPA) - Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth) (CCA) . Aforementioned this essay it will outline the key benefits of the implementation of the act. Furthermore it will critique the Act, whilst exploring the objectives of the legislation.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Social Psychology In Heathers

    1490 Words  | 3 Pages

    The most basic concept in social psychology is conformity. Conformity is the idea that behaviour or a belief is changed in order to follow, or conform, to what is considered the “norm.” One of the oldest experiments to support this notion was conducted in 1935 by Muzafer Sherif (Song, Ma, Wu, Li, 2012 p. 1366). There are two different types of

    Read More

  • An Analysis Of A Social Experiment At Walgreens

    1060 Words  | 3 Pages

    I believe that it is important and sometimes necessary to question and subvert the folkways we all live by; however, social norms are not inherently harmful and subjugating. The reason we do not act odd in stores is that store owners fear shoplifting. In order to preserve their stock and, by extension, their livelihood, managers must watch customers and make sure they pose no harm. Now that I have acted as the subject of that suspicion, I understand and have a greater appreciation for the

    Read More

  • Deviant Behavior: Deviance: Positive, And Consequences

    1499 Words  | 3 Pages

    They tried to keep telling me the directions, even as I walked away. I expected from the people that know me to walk with me as I walked away, which they did. I figured strangers would just stop talking. The only sanction I received was a shocked/disgusted face from my boss’s son. I only felt somewhat rude. The one Walmart employee that followed me down the aisle made me feel the worse because she just looked at me like where am I going. I have never been to another country and I have not experienced very many other cultures. I would imagine that that the norms I violated would be the same in most cultures. I feel like the norms I violated were simple ones and are not odd or weird. I makes sense that you would let someone finish talking before you walk

    Read More

  • Breaking Experiment Essay

    2113 Words  | 5 Pages

    While trying to break the movie theater norm, it was difficult for me to pick movies with a different variety of people and movies that were a little older so less people would be attending them. I also had a little trouble when it came to answering the phone and waiting for the other person to talk first. The problem with this one was that I had to wait for people to actually call me, which doesn't happen that often in this day and age anymore. To conclude, these social norms forced people to be in uncomfortable situations and make a decision as to how they would react to it.

    Read More

  • Importance Of Insecurity In Step Not Taken By Amy Cuddy

    1039 Words  | 3 Pages

    Some expectations include, gender stereotyping, judging someone by their body or appearance etc. In the essay, Step Not Taken by Paul D’Angelo, a man who is in an elevator with another man who is crying. The majority of today’s society would ignore that man, because his reaction is unpredictable, and that is what the narrator did. He states, “ I stood in the hallway, a bundle of mixed emotions, wondering what to do” (D’Angelo, 14). This shows that the narrator is confused on whether he should help or not. The narrator felt insecure, because the crying person was a man, and usually a man can deal with his own issues. Humans are programmed in a way where they will help a crying woman but not a crying man. Isn’t that ironic? Aren’t we all humans? Later on, the narrator regrets not helping the crying man. He even states, “I should have thrown caution to the winds and done the right thing. Not the big-city thing. The human thing”(D’Angelo, 14). Thus, stating that he did the wrong thing by ignoring the crying man. The narrator says “The big-city thing.” That is very significant because in today’s world a majority would just ignore the crying man. In addition, the narrator feels guilt at the end of this essay due to his ignorance towards the crying man. He states, “That I was wrong, dreadfully wrong, not to step forward in his time of need”(D’Angelo, 15). This explains that sometimes one must go out of their comfort zone, and forget about feeling insecure about the future. If the narrator had given the man help without overthinking about his reaction, the crying man would have someone to relieve his stress with. In total, one must stop feeling insecure about the future or society’s expectations, and help the ones in

    Read More

  • Examples Of Breaking Social Norms

    727 Words  | 2 Pages

    Implicit social norms are introduced to us at a very early age, and exert a powerful influence on our behavior into adulthood. Our culture is ruled by social norms. In many situations, people’s perception of these norms has a big influence on their behavior. Implicit social norms are not openly stated, but found when disobeyed. Implicit rules are rules we conform to as a society, and generally these rules make living together more comfortable.

    Read More

  • Violating Social Norm Paper: Violaing Social Behavior

    1259 Words  | 3 Pages

    The social norm behavior violation that I engaged in was taking my dog, along with a stuffed animal dog on a walk around our neighborhood. I picked this particular social norm to violate because when walking my dog daily, many people ask to stop and pet my dog so I was curious how that would change if they saw me as well walking a stuffed animal. I also chose to violate this norm because every time I walk there are many people I encounter and I wanted to participate in something that involved many people to get a wide range of reactions.

    Read More

  • Breaching Social Norms

    706 Words  | 2 Pages

    In this day and age we like to say that we thrive on being ourselves and embracing our individuality, while this may be true in my social experiment I found that more often than not we tend to keep to ourselves and follow the social norms of day to day life. Social norms are behaviors and cues most everyone learns throughout their lives. These norms teach us what is and is not acceptable. To fully understand and analyze how norms serve to regulate behavior in our social world, I decided to breach a social norm of my own.

    Read More

  • Personal Journey: Embracing Vegetarianism

    701 Words  | 2 Pages

    I choose Renunciation project as my project. Renunciation means that our act of relinquishing, abandoning, repudiating, or sacrificing something, is an ambition. I know there are several links related to this topic that the Professor gave to us. I chose the “Diet For America” video by John Robins, and it is really a nice motivating video. I really love the word that John Robin said, “Our own lives really do make a difference just by being more conscious of the food that we eat.

    Read More

  • Counterfactual Thinking: Impact on Male and Female Reactions

    1722 Words  | 4 Pages

    According to Mills (2005), the relation between gender and impoliteness is important because it is the way that the participants view their gender identity and the way that they think others will judge them. In her study, Mills (2003) argues that women are more polite than men because they are expected to speak and act in a certain way in our society. On the other hand, she argues that men regard the world as a battlefield in which they tend to attack in order to achieve something or maintain their social status. Aydınoğlu (2013) conducted a study to find out if there were any gender differences when participants were presented with a scenario that showed impolite acts. In this study, participants were divided into two groups. Participants in the first group were given scenarios that showed impolite acts such as insults, threats and disapproval. In the second group, participants were given scenarios were impoliteness was showed in a form of sarcasm, teasing and complains. The results of this study concluded that men responded to impoliteness more offensively when they were shown acts of insults, threats and disapproval, while the women reflected more on the passive roles showed in the

    Read More

  • Social Norms in Society

    1041 Words  | 3 Pages

    The reactions of people when you break a social norm can vary quite drastically. Sometimes the reactions are quite large and other times they are rather subtle. The reactions typically vary based on what norm you break and how strong of a norm it is. In the case of invading people’s personal space, I did not receive and intense reactions. All of the reactions I received were subtle. Not ma...

    Read More

  • Examples Of Breaking Social Norms

    522 Words  | 2 Pages

    I chose to break a social norm by sitting/ laying on the floor of an aisle in a grocery store, engaging in deviant behavior, instead of shopping for groceries. Sitting on the floor of a grocery store is a case of deviant behavior because it goes against society by breaking the norm. Because the standard behavior of people in a grocery store is to walk and look around, with usually a basket or cart, shopping for desired items, the expected response of others would be feeling uncomfortable, awkward, and confused. Upon performing my act of social deviance, numerous people demonstrated the anticipated reaction. As people turned down the aisle, I occupied, conversations died down to whispers or stopped altogether. Of the people who questioned me on my

    Read More

  • Expectancy Violations Theory

    995 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Expectancy Violations Theory originated by Judee Burgoon explains a person’s response to unpredicted actions by their peers, and the numerous meanings that individuals attribute to the abuse or violation of their personal space. Burgoon defined personal space as the “invisible, variable volume of space surrounding an individual that defines that individual’s preferred distance from others” (Griffin, p. 85). Expectancy is what people predict (or expect) will occur, instead of what they wish.

    Read More

  • Will People Behave In A Particular Situation Is Largely Based On People's Expectancies?

    530 Words  | 2 Pages

    How will people behave in a particular situation is largely based on people’s expectancies, as proposed by Walter Mischel. According to Mischel, there are three types of expectancies, the behavior-outcome expectancy, the stimulus-outcome expectancy, and the self-efficacy expectancy. Behavior-outcome expectancy is people’s expectation on what will happen if they behave in a certain way. People will adjust their behavior based on their expectancies. For example, if one think that dress up nicely to lectures will increase his chances of making more friends, he will definitely dress up for every lectures he goes to. But if he think dressing up will make him looks pretentious and standing out in the crowd, he might try to avoid that and simply put on a T-shirt for classes. Therefore people behave based on what they expect the outcome of their behavior would be.

    Read More

More about Being a Deviant for a Day

Open Document