Observation of Social Behavior in the National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art (NGA) houses some of the most prolific art in the world. Around four million people visit the NGA each year to gaze upon the collection of close to 130,000 items on display making it the sixth most popular art museum in the world (Lowe, 2013). The amount of foot traffic experienced by the museum provides the ideal setting to observe people as they move about the museum. The purpose of this paper is to observe human behavior in a social setting. A location in the west building of the NGA was selected for its vantage point to observe people as they transitioned through the museum. People were studied for a time of twenty-five minutes and observations were conducted to examine their demeanor, reactions, and interactions with other individuals. The twenty-five minute observation time established the behavior of individuals at the NGA. The second part of this observation was to break a social norm and observe the reaction of people when the norm was violated. This paper is a detailed account of observations made at the NGA and examines these interaction using sociological concepts. The NGA has three distinct areas, the west building, the east building, and the sculpture garden. The west building gallery 83 was used to observe people for twenty-five minutes. This particular gallery was used because of the artwork it contained. The room contains twenty one pieces by artist such as Van Gogh, Degas, and Gauguin. The notoriety of these artists made this a high traffic room. There are three doorways for people to use as either an entrance or an exit. The size of the room allowed for inconspicuous observations of the individuals viewing ... ... middle of paper ... ...ause it breaks the social norm. This is why people were initially startled with the interaction. In this case it could be considered a positive action of deviance. The results of forcing this interaction left the individuals interacted with smiling and visibly happier. Social controls can be either formal or informal and are what enforce the norms. Social controls indicate a museum is a quiet place and little interaction between people should take place there. However, as a result of the deviant action a positive sanction took place. Positive sanctions are a positive reaction to for following a social norm. This was an interesting and unexpected observation when breaking a social norm. The observations in this paper provided unique perspective as it relates to how culture and socialization dictate behavior in society Works Cited sdfasdf asdf sdfasdf sd f
Societal norms are ultimately the sociological expectations for our society. So, when people see somebody standing in the middle of a crowded public place doing nothing, they are going to take notice. I realized that while standing in the middle of the mall where many people
In the 1950s and 60s Harold Garfinkle developed a method for studying social interactions. He formed ethnomethodology, which is studying the methods of people. In other words, ethnomethodology is the study of social norms. (p. 139, Conley) Most of us follow social norms unconsciously. It can be difficult to go against a social norm. The purpose of the project was to conduct a breaching experiment against social normalities. For this experiment, I chose to go an entire day whispering every word I spoke. I chose to violate this norm because it is socially unacceptable to whisper in a normal conversation. Throughout this paper, I will explain the methods and the results of this breaching experiment
In the world we live in today, deviance happens to play an integral role in within the societies that scatter our globe, whether we like it or not. Deviance describes actions or behaviors that violate the social norms of our society. These behaviors can violate formally enacted rules, such as laws that are put into place by government, as well as the informal type of “guidelines” that various cultures have informally established and shaped for themselves. As one may come to understand, norms are essentially expectations that are standard to a certain culture. These norms gently guide people in a society in “what to do,” and “what not to do,” in compliance with their societies' norms. With this said, it is important to keep in mind that social norms differ from culture to culture. One act that may be considered deviant in a particular society, may be generally accepted in another. Three main sociological theories of deviance include the cultural transmission theory (also known as the differential association theory), the labeling theory, and the control theory.
To violate a social norm, i will be greeting strangers in a nontraditional way. This norm acts as a mechanism of social control by getting people to give an approved reaction to meeting strangers. It allows us to be friendly without getting too personal. Normally when we greet a stranger we say something along the lines of, “Hello, how are you?”, and the other person responds by saying something like, “Good, how about you?”. Instead I will respond by giving them some unusual greetings to break this social norm.
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
The objective of my experiment was to observe how people reacted to a violation in the social norms of elevator etiquette. Generally in elevators, people fill in starting from the back, face the elevator doors, and rarely make verbal contact with others. Unless the passengers of the elevator know each other, conversation is sparse and often limited to small-talk. As a result of this, my goal in the experiment was to introduce a foreign behavior to the elevator, something that nobody would expect while going about their day. Thus, I entered a situation where a certain set of expectations was in place, such as the informal rule that individuals should stand (rather than sit) in an elevator, and violated those unspoken rules without acting in
Deviance is any behavior, belief, or condition that violates significant social norms in the society or group in which it occurs (Kendall, 2012). Our experiment will study the behavioral deviance of a social norm. Sociologists use symbolic interactionism to study face-to-face interactions. We are expected to follow these certain unwritten rules of behavior telling us the way that we should act in certain situations. The social norm or folkway I chose to break was that of invading an individual’s personal space. See Figure 1.0 showing the proximity generally utilized by Americans, according to Edward T.Hall. Personal space is the region surrounding a person, approximately 18 inches, which they regard as psychologically theirs. People value their personal space, and feel discomfort, anger, or anxiety when their personal space is encroached (Personal space, n.d.). We walked around to find the best scenario and individuals to interject our teammate in purposefully invading their comfort zone.
Items displayed in museums hold historical significance and are representative of society’s culture. Preserving valuable collections for education and enjoyment is a primary role of museums. While fulfilling this role, the architecture of the museum is also an important factor. Historical buildings are converted into museums and architects must consider the use of the space and the museum’s purpose during their initial design. Other museums are built with a clear purpose in mind. As museums are designed, many characteristics are determined. Display and storage spaces as well as visitor services impacts museum’s functionality. Based on the function of a museum, architectural requirements are different.
For my breaching experiment, I decided to break the social norm of looking at someone while engaged in conversation with them. Today, it is socially unacceptable and impolite to avoid looking at someone when talking to them. The background assumption for a typical conversation is that direct eye contact will be made more often than not; otherwise social norms are being violated. Avoiding eye contact during an exchange tends to dehumanize the person that is not receiving the eye contact. It is impolite and offensive, not looking at someone who is talking makes it seem as though the topic being discussed is unimportant. For my research experiment I would constantly talk to someone without initiating eye contact, or with my back facing toward the subject, not turning around or making eye contact until I had to ring up their order or make the drink for them. This research is important because it uncovers what happens when the social norm of
While breaking the three social norms there was one feeling that I felt was mutual throughout. Breaking those norms made me felt extremely out of place and rude. They made me feel that way because I knew what I was doing wasn 't socially right and people would get mad or be rude to me with their reactions. For the most part throughout my experiment, most people reacted the way I thought they would. You could tell that most people felt awkward or uncomfortable while I was breaking the norm. I faced a couple of difficulties through my assignment when it came to violating the social norms. While trying to break the movie theater norm, it was difficult for me to pick movies with 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
... Thus, there are strict boundaries that exist regarding personal space when a culture itself is strict in its views. Strict or relaxed, all human beings are part of the human race, the largest “community” consisting of every culture and every country. And in this human race, individuals thrive on interaction with others. However, this interaction is affected by one’s experiences in a community.
Before the analysis of taboo as explained in the previous section, it is of very vital importance for us to recall that there is a very solid relationship between taboo and a culture. Ralph Linton (1945) stated that culture completes the life of a society, most probably because it contains almost everything. Kroeber and Kluckhone (1952) further explained this statement, defining culture as a very complicated whole that include the fundamental parts of life such as knowledge, belief, art, moral, customs and any other habits shared within a particular society. Therefore, it is very fundamental for us to know that taboo itself is contributing as a part of culture.
Sociology defines deviance as a behavior that violates norms set by a society, the violation of which leads to social disapproval. Social deviance can range in severity from acts such as murder and incest to simple body modifications like tattoos, and even the smallest departure from the norm can be seen as deviance. Social deviance is also relative to the community in which it is seen, for example one society might consider driving on the right side of the road normal while it could be seen as deviant for others. So as a way to explore the topic of minor deviant behaviors, and public reaction to those behaviors, this paper will discuss the results of social experiments involving
...us random behavior that challenges the norm such as nose picking in public can break this predictability and stability and chock or perhaps even offend some people who are not used to expecting such a behavior. Sanctions whether by law or by verbal reprimand and labeling appear to be necessary in order to reduce and discourage deviant behavior in a society. However, one of the limitations of my experiment was the inability to explore the link between norms and ethnocentrism as well as cultural relativism, and this is because all the participants in my experiment came from the same cultural and ethnic background. Thus it would be interesting in the future to conduct other experiments where there would be a mixture of cultures. Furthermore, it would also be interesting to see the power of breaking norms in order to produce change and evolution in a particular society.
Before the analysis of taboo as explained in the previous section, it is a very vital importance for us to recall that there is a very intimate relationship between taboo and a culture. Ralph Linton (1945) stated that culture completes the life of a society, most probably because it contains almost everything. Kroeber and Kluckhone (1952) further explained this statement, defining culture as a very complicated whole that include the fundamental parts of life such as knowledge, belief, art, moral, customs and any other habits shared within a particular society. Therefore, it is very fundamental for us to know that taboo itself is contributing as a part of culture.