Social Norms In Today's Society

Today’s society is filled with many social classes and groups each containing their own social norms for the members of that group. Although these norms are apparent within the group, new individuals who join the group must learn and adapt to fit in. Because of this, being able to adapt to new social norms is important as every individual will encounter a situation where these norms differ significantly. Individuals are then faced with a decision to conform to the group’s norms by bending their own, or they can maintain their ideals which can result in stigmatization against them by the other group members. This leads to self-conflict within the individual, the outcome of which can be identity ambivalence. In the piece “Making it by Faking

The reason for this was because my friend joined a high-tier fraternity, and since I was good friends with him I spent a significant amount of time with the cool kids. But since I enjoy communicating with a diverse range of individuals, I spent a lot of time with the couch potatoes as well. This allowed me to experience the perspective of both sides of the group. When I was spent time with the cool kids, they would talk about how desperate the couch potatoes seemed to them. They mentioned how the couch potatoes would always try to be a part of the plans that they were making without an invitation, and how they were “losers unable to socialize”. To an extent, I understood where they were coming from, as it was the cool kid who always had party invitations and the couch potatoes would try to piggyback along with them. This wasn’t possible for the cool kids to allow because if they were to show up to a party hosted by either an athletic team or a high-tier fraternity/sorority then they would face stigmatization from the party hosts for “dragging the losers” to the high-tier party. This was a form of out-group subjugation utilized by the groups at top of the hierarchy. Just like the elementary school kids in Adler and Adler, these highly recognized groups would ridicule and reject outsiders to maintain group status. This led the out-group, such as the couch potatoes, to adopt ideas that they thought made the cool kids cool in hope of acceptance as a form of stigma management. This included wearing polo shirts like the fraternity brothers, excessive drinking during the weekend, or showing up to athletic events to get to know the cool kids. In this sense, they tried to make it by faking it, much like the students in Granfield’s study. They would even go as far as to spend less time with other couch potatoes to try and separate themselves from the rest, a technique called friendship