Violate Social Norm

“Etiquette is all human social behavior. If you’re a hermit on a mountain, you don’t have to worry about etiquette; if somebody comes up the mountain, then you’ve got a problem…” This quote from American journalist, Judith Martin, illustrates the concept that the presence of others creates or inspires expectations. Social norms, or specific cultural expectations for how to behave in a given situation, are practiced throughout various societies and cultures across the planet. People relay on social norms to provide order and predictability in social situations. Social roles are the part people play as members of a social group. With each social role one plays, the behavior changes to fit the expectations both you and others have of that role. It is most common for people to conform to the guidelines provided by the roles we perform. When one does not conform to the social norms, it is considered abnormal behavior. For this assignment, I faced the challenge to disregard expectations of social roles and norms in society.

Have you ever wondered why we hold the doors for those behind us? How about the reason we use utensils when we eat? What about why we always stand facing the doors in the elevator? These are all examples of what are known as social norms. According to Dr. Ward social norms are “basic rules of society that help people know what is and is not appropriate to do in any situation.” These basic rules of society are usually unwritten and unspoken and many of us pick up on them over time. Although, some social norms are very common throughout many cultures, there is a lot of them that vary depending on which culture you are apart of. For example, here in America, a major social norm that we have is when eating, the polite thing to do is to use spoons and forks, instead of digging in with your hands. For instance, we would not eat spaghetti with our hands but we would use a fork. In some Thiland cultures it is considered rude to put most foods in your mouth with a fork. Then there is also some cultures such as Chile in which it is impolite to use your hands for anything, even foods such as french fries, they use forks while eating.

The title of this odd social experiment is Parental Permission. The title will make more sense once you become more familiar with the project. The aim of this project was to break an everyday social norm; a social norm is a set of rules or behaviors that are considered acceptable in society or among a group. As citizens of a society we all adhere to many social norms, a very common social norm is tipping a waiter or simply wearing clothes.

A norm is a behavior or unspoken rule that society has deemed as normal or acceptable. Those who do not follow the norms of a group may be shunned or looked at as different. The norm I will be violating for my project is asking people that I am unfamiliar with to do something simple for me. It is not common for a stranger to ask another stranger to do something that they are seemingly able to do. This norm acts as a mechanism of social control by keeping people from talking to those who are unfamiliar. It also puts forward the idea that we should be able to do all simple tasks ourselves. To break this norm, I am going to wear tennis shoes with one of the laces untied and ask strangers passing by to tie my shoe for me.

When looking at the American Society, it’s interesting how everything seems to just work and run a certain way. Society is built on a set of social norms that set standards for everyday living. A norm can be defined as a way of thought or action that is acceptable by the majority of society. Individuals might not be sure why exactly they do something, but if everyone else is doing it, then why not? The social norm we’ve decided to break this semester is the idea of only taking what belongs to you. We plan on going to different dining areas on the Northern Illinois campus, and joining tables with complete strangers. While starting a conversation, we will have one girl begin sharing food off of the stranger’s plate and seeing how they react to this unconventional social interaction. Many individuals would not share their food with their friends, let alone total

For my breaching social norm experiment I was determined to do something I would never do even if it was a dare, especially since my ability to interact with strangers is not the best. So, I decided to make people feel uncomfortable by holding their hand. What I would do is walk up to the person from behind and slowly make my way to their hand to make them feel even more uncomfortable. People normally hold hands with their significant other, or with someone they know like a friend or family member, so to be holding hands with a stranger is out of the ordinary and awkward.

I brainstormed and contemplated about what social norm I should break in order to achieve this assignment. I fathom the idea that some social norms and expectations would be quite difficult to accomplish. Surprisingly, without much thought I knew exactly what norm I wanted to break. I decided to break the well known concept that each gender must go to the restroom in their designated restroom area. I planned on starting the assignment by choosing a few public restrooms in which I would enter the men’s restroom. That particular behavior breaks a social norm because with most public restrooms; genders are separated by signs or names. Thus, there should be no reason why men or women end up going into the same restroom. I personally believe that

My social norm that I broke consisted of me going into the bathroom stall and talking to the person next to me. This social norm was particularly easily

During the social norm violation experiment, my partner and I found that by violating simple social norms people can react either calmly or highly confused. The social norm we chose to violate was asking for someone else’s seat in class and at lunch. My partner and I believed that most of the participants would react either confused or just give up their seat to be nice. To follow through with the experiment, my partner went up to ten different students while either in lunch or in class and politely asked to switch seats. I observed the whole situation, I watched the difference in each person’s body language, tone, attitude, and their answer. Most of the time, whenever my partner asked a student for their seat, they looked at her confused at

It was my first time in the second floor OR and I was placed there alone. I went to found Ronny and told him that it is my first time in the OR. He told me that when I go into the OR I must always have a surgical bouffant on. We went to a room in the OR where he gave me a walkie-talkie, this always the front desk to contact me when there is a patient pick-up. He said that it must be on channel one at all times and that the volume should not be loud enough to disturb other that I can hear loud and clear. As I understood him a nurse for help called him for something. As I was waiting for a patient pick-up Ronnie was walking out of the OR telling me that he will be back as soon as possible. As soon as he left there was a call for a patient pick-up.

We arrived at Clearview at 2231 Hrs. and took the patient to room 14. I went back outside and began to put our unit back together when Supervisor Carlock approached me and in a very agitated voice said: “WHY DID YOU PULL OFF?” Surprised, I said “What are you talking about?” He said loudly, “I TOLD YOU TO STOP AND YOU DIDN’T!” I replied, “Jeff was telling me not to stop because we had a pulse back.” He said “I DON’T CARE WHAT JEFF SAID, I’M YOUR SUPERVISOR AND I TOLD YOU TO STOP!” I said “Dennis, I think you’re talking to the wrong person, you need to be talking to Jeff, I was doing what he told me to do.” He replied “WHO’S YOUR SUPERVISOR, WHO’S YOUR SUPERVISOR, I AM, NOT JEFF, YOU DO WHAT I SAY!” I said ”yes, you are the supervisor, but at that moment I was doing what the Paramedic in charge of patient care was telling me to do, and what I felt was best for the Pt., since we had a 41 Y/O patient who had a pulse.” He said “I DON’T CARE, YOU DO WHAT I SAY!

In Emergency Medical Technician school, you learn that when a patient is in critical condition they will feel an impending sense of doom before there body goes into complete shock. After this drastic change in behavior I sensed that his condition was about to get much worse. As he began to scream his evergreen eyes found mine. Our eyes were locked, and that’s when I watched them disappear like a sunset into the back of his head. Sometimes I can’t help but wonder if it was my eyes that were the last thing he saw on Earth. Then he seized. All I remember thinking was that I had to get out of the

In my Aboriginal and Indigenous week, I went to Aramac for Indigenous Cardiac Outreach program (ICOP). I work with the cardiac team from Brisbane, which consist of cardiologists, cardiographer, and electrocardiographer. I did mainly an ECG in female patients and my second patient for that day is an elderly aboriginal female who came in with another female nurse. I did the ECG on the patient and print out her ECG, and then I went outside of the room to show the results to the electrocardiographer. Without me realizing it, I left the room door open while the patient was still lying on the bed and have no tops on her. The nurse told at me to close the door in an angry tone, which really makes me scared. I felt really bad at that time and quickly

The social norm that I chose to violate was initiating conversation and talking to strangers on public transportation. By doing this I deviated from the unspoken rule which says that you should not talk to strangers and that you should not interact with others on public transportation because of the possibility of them harming or assaulting you. From doing this activity, I learned that power dynamics exist in every situation and that by violating a social norm I, as a young woman, put myself in a vulnerable position.

One of the control rooms had people in them and I saw nurses preparing in the operating room, so I went in and was told that there would be a case occurring soon. While waiting for the patient to come into the operating room I was talking with one of the staff members and the guy he was training, and funny enough, the guy in training was a biomedical engineering major too. He was also telling me how if you go into any field in engineering you can find a career path that you are interested in because of how broad and diverse each engineering field is. After talking for a bit the patient came in the room and the doctor started operating, everyone had headsets so I could not hear what they were saying but what I was watching on the screen was nothing I have seen before but it was very interesting (and