Imagine being stared at, judged, and whispered about while doing something you love. When someone is different or does something different we are often quick to judge. This is a result of society. Society has created norms that people must follow because if they do not follow the norms they will be considered deviant. A deviant person is one who breaks the norms society has created. Today most people want to fit into society’s demanding expectations by enforcing norms, for this reason if you break a norm you will stand out in society. Breaking a norm can range from small acts to large acts. I chose to go to Planet Fitness with a spray tan, my hair down and curled and with a full face of makeup on. Typically women go to the gym in running …show more content…
I first started walking backwards while I was on the treadmill. Walking backwards on the treadmill is not breaking a huge norm so I decided to facetime Francesca. This breaks Planet Fitness’ norms because phone conversations are only allowed in the lobby. I facetimed her without headphones on and with the volume all the way up in order for those around me to hear our conversation. When people run or walk on a treadmill they usually have headphones on. Francesca knew I was going to call her so we staged our conversation to have the typical conversation that adults think teens have; we talked about boys the whole time. Francesca talked extremely loud. Instantly those without headphones on turned their head toward me and gave me dirty looks. I began to feel nervous because they were older adults just trying to workout. I received many negative sanctions while on facetime. Most were non-verbal sanctions that consisted of dirty looks and disapproval until the woman next to me spoke to me. She asked me if I would mind taking my conversation to the lobby or putting in headphones. I was really surprised at how kind she was during the situation because I was the one being loud and rude. She politely asked me to quiet down which of course I did because she was so polite about it. She was the only one who said something to me everyone else just …show more content…
I expected to receive dirty looks, but I never expected the one woman to politely ask me to end the conversation. If I did not break the norm people would not have been judging me for my outfit and for my loud conversation. After I finished walking backwards on the treadmill I walked backwards to each stationary machine. Again I just received non-verbal negative sanctions from those around me. Most people just seemed confused as to why I was dressed nicely and walking backwards. If there was a machine that I wanted that was taken I politely asked if I could use it because I had somewhere to be in a few minutes. I only asked two older women because I was too scared to ask men and younger woman. The one older woman was a little annoyed and said she would be done soon. The other woman was very nice, she said of course and got right up. I did not expect the one woman to respond so pleasantly, I expected the agitated response that I received from the other
Social deviancy is the violation of social norms. A deviant is someone who rejects folkways and mores. Any action that violates the values or rules of a social group is deviant behavior. In order to actually be characterized as a deviant, the individual must be detected committing a deviant act and be stigmatized by society. A stigma is a mark of social disgrace, setting the deviant apart from the group. Criminality is healthy for society. Deviance affirms our cultural values and norms. Responding to deviance clarifies moral boundaries and brings people together. There will always be people who break society’s rules and that’s important.
I crawled in the store Walmart on a busy Sunday like if I was a baby or even a toddler. This I would consider to be a norm violation because normally a young teen is not seen walking and crawling like a little baby. Immediately I had many people including teenagers and adults looking at me as if I had a mental illness. There were various times when I would wobble like if I was learning how to walk and then I would fall. A worker at the store came over to see if I needed help, but the way she was speaking to me was very slow and sounded out most words. I denied help and continued to do my norm violation. To me it was absolutely astonishing how many time I got criticized. I did not get to hear all the criticism, but the ones I did hear were harsh. The comments went from just stating if I was dumb to stating that I was a “stupid retarded kid on drugs”. However, when I was doing this act I also seen a couple of little toddlers doing almost the same crawl and wobble but the difference was that many parents thought it was a “cute” act. While my walk and wobble was just despicable and unacceptable. I cannot deny that I never thought the same about a person committing a norm
The experiment to test the social norm of what clothes to wear in the gym consisted of five participants. The three confederates, Julie Curtis, Melissa Medici, and Payge Yerkes, were in the control group and wore gym shorts, t-shirts, and sneakers. The job of the control group was to watch the other gym patrons’ reactions to the experimenter’s attire. The experimental group consisted of Julie Crance, who wore a black top, black pants and brown heels; and Danielle Bonser, who wore a black dress and black wedges. Both experimenters wore their hair down, curled and wore a lot of makeup. Crance rode the bike, while Bonser worked on the elliptical for the duration of this experiment, which took place in the Kaplan gym at Mount Saint Mary College.
Societies are founded on various social norms. Norms can best be defined as a set of acceptable attitudes and practices by a given society. These norms however are found to vary from one society or cultural setting o the other. Deviance on the other hand is simply when one does something that goes against the set societal norms. Deviance is gauged on a scale of attitudes and behavior contradicting to acceptable social standards (Samuels, 2012).
I violated a social norm by refusing to “mirror” the nonverbal display of one of my best friends. Her name is Hailyn and we have been best friends since middle school. Because we go to the same church, I met her on Sunday and she told me that she needed to talk to me. She explained to me that she was asked out by a man that she has been dating for two weeks now. I already knew that she was dating this person and that she was interested in him. Yet, she was never in a committed relationship so she told me that she wants to go out on a few more dates with the person before deciding to actually go out with him. To violate the social norm, I responded to her without empathizing. I tried my best not to create any chameleon effect of any unconscious nodding or gasp. My responses were very simple and straight forward. When she told me that the man that she’s been dating, I literally told her, “good for you,” without any facial expressions. She seemed to be a bit disappointed by my reaction but she still went on and told me that she wants to date
Deviant behavior is sociologically defined as, when someone departs from the “norms”. Most of the time when someone says deviance they think against the law or acting out in a negative behavior. To sociologists it can be both positive and negative. While most crimes are deviant, they are not always. Norms can be classified into two categories, mores and folkways. Mores are informal rules that are not written; when mores are broken, they can have serious punishments and sanctions. Folkways are informal rules that are just expected to be followed, but have no real repercussions.
The gym is a place where a typical American college student goes to work out their bodies. Based on the fact that I personally could be considered a gym rat, a stereotypical name for someone who spends a lot of time in the work out area. This is partially by choice being on the swim team requires the strength training equipment that is available to our disposal in the gym. While I have been to the gym many times I haven’t really taken the time to take in the other people around me. Within this ethnographic exercise I will explore the college gym norms within Roger Williams University.
Breaking those norms made me feel 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 breaking the norm. I faced a couple of difficulties during my assignment when it came to violating the social norms.
There are many different things that influence our behavior from internal influences to social norms. Social norms are explicit rules that govern how we behave in our society. Social norms influence our behavior more than any of us realize, but we all notice when a norm has been broken. Breaking a social norm is not an easy task and often leads us feeling uncomfortable whether we broke the norm ourselves or witnessed someone else breaking it. Sometimes however, you just have to break a norm to see what happens our professor gave us an assignment that is really easy, but also difficult to do because we have to break a norm in from of people. We had two choices, choice number one, facing people while standing in an elevator, and the other choice
To conclude, breaking the norm inside the gym was mixed with positive and negative sanctions. I was given a displeasing gesture (negative; the look) and was rewarded with smiles and laughs (positive). I’m sure most of the members enjoyed it better than I did, simply because I was nervous, embarrassed, and almost busted my but a few times. I was rather pleased with the trainer’s reaction because he maintained control yet didn’t freak out towards my actions. I was over all satisfied with everyone’s reactions and glad that I’m not banned from the gym (I did tell my trainer after that it was a social experiment).
American literature often examines people and motives. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel, The Scarlet Letter, and in Arthur Miller’s dramatic classic, The Crucible, people and motives often depict patterns of Puritans struggling for life during a precarious time.
There are many things that influence our behavior from internal influences to social norms. Social norms are implicit or explicit rules that govern how we behave in society (Maluso, class notes). Social norms influence our behavior more than any of us realize but we all notice when a norm has been broken. Breaking a social norm is not an easy task and often leads us feeling uncomfortable whether we broke the norm ourselves or witnessed someone else breaking it. Sometimes however, you just have to break a norm to see what happens.
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
Deviance is defined as actions or behaviors that violate socials norms. In turn the concept of deviance is dependent on the social observation and perception. “By it’s very nature, the constructionism through which people define and interpret actions or appearances is always “social.” ”(Henry, 2009 , p. 6) One’s perception of a situation may be completely different from another depending on cultural and social factors. The way someone talks, walks, dresses, and holds themselves are all factors that attribute to how someone perceives another. In some cases what is socially or normally acceptable to one person is deviant in another’s eyes. For this reason there is a lot of gray area involving the topic of deviance because actions and behaviors are so diversely interpreted.
When an individual breaks the societal rules of conduct, they are said to be involved in deviant behaviors. However, due to the dynamism of the societies, what may be regarded as a deviant act in one society could be regarded as normal within another society. This brings out the issue that deviance may be viewed as relative to both time and location with regard to the differences in societies. Out of this understanding, deviance is viewed as the violation of social norms out of any acts, thoughts, or attitudes that the particular society regards as violation of its values or rules (Long Russ). A deviant conduct is against the definitions of the good and bad conduct as agreed upon by members of a social system. Such behaviors are in a negated direction and bear enough magnitude to surpass the acceptance and accommodation limit of the particular community.