Topic/Question:
What do people usually do when they are at the George Sherman Union’s food court? Is there a difference in behavior between those who study or eat alone and those who do that with friends?
Description:
My goal is to explore the atmosphere at the GSU food court. I want to learn whether being alone vs. being with someone or a group affect people’s eating or working habits at the GSU. I don’t usually eat my lunch at the GSU, but most of my group meetings for different courses are held at the GSU. To prepare for data collection, I chose a table at a usually busy section of the court. I chose the time to be 3 pm to make sure my observation wasn’t influenced by other factors (like busy lunch time for example.) There were a number
…show more content…
As a frequent visitor of the GSU (not the food court necessarily,) I was interested in knowing why the food court was always crowded and whether people’s behavior changes whether they were eating, working, alone or with friends. At first I was really excited to collect the data. The GSU is one of my favorite places on campus and it was interesting to sit there and observe people. The experience itself was okay at first, but then I saw one of my classmates at HS440 sit close by. Although she wasn’t part of the observation, I felt a little bit anxious as I thought that she must have seen me take notes; this made me a little bit self-conscious and more aware of my movement and typing sounds. After a while, I got to feel more comfortable as my classmate left. The observation process at first felt weird as I thought I was intruding on other people. But then again, after a while I got more comfortable which I believe had a positive effect on my notetaking as I began to look around more freely. I came in with the assumption that people who study alone at the GSU would be more distracted with everything around them. However, I did not notice such thing. As I mentioned in my findings, all students/people who were working (whether alone or with other people) displayed the same amount of attention to their
... the cafeteria over 100 seats are available, so the surrounding will actually help people to be more engaging to their friends. Also, there are many events was held in the building, such as ISU after dark and some very significant speeches were taken place inside the building. The most exciting event I have been through was the orientation. It was taken place in the “Sun Room”, where can be a hall of party and auditorium of a speech. Outside the room there are soft sofa available to students to seat down and read, and the beverage bar will not be far, so why not get a drink and seat for a novel.
For my report, I observed the customers at a Starbucks in downtown St. Petersburg. Each time I visited this establishment, there were consistent factors as well as unique ones during each observation. The morning crowd of people was vastly different than the evening crowd. I did however see many parallels with the morning and lunch time crowd. Each time I visited, There seemed to be an upbeat and fast paced environment.
The observation occurred in the LNC lunchroom during the second lunch of the day. I observed two groups of people in the lunchroom. The first group I observed being a group of all males seated to the right of me. The second group being a group of all females seated in the middle of the cafeteria. The method of observation I used was naturalistic observation. The naturalistic observation experience during the LNC lunch period provided further meaning about or local, national, and global community.
Yet, with personal experience in having worked in a cubicle setting and being a student, I often found myself looking forward to lunch as much to eat as to socialize with coworkers and friends. In a passage of her article, Widdicombe describes visiting Caltech and witnessing dinnertime, in which most “Skurves” were laying out dishes to get ready for dinner. However, a small minority of students sat surrounded by laptops and problem sets, nursing bottles of Soylent, ignoring the dinnertime commotion. Although they are being arguably more productive in their usage of time, they are missing out on socializing with their peers, an essential part of the college experience. In addition to nutritional value, meals offer an outlet for self-expression, bonding, and socializing that would be lost if everyone were to say- be carrying around a water bottle with a days supply of
Julie Guthman, the author of “The Food Police,” brings up the debate about the “epidemic of obesity” giving multiple examples of those who agree there is an epidemic of obesity; as well as those who disagree on the stance such as the author. Guthman brings the idea instead of pushing thin as the new beautiful to make suggestions to the food system so that everyone can benefit from making healthier choices and lives.
Some dining locations are open past 8:00 PM several nights of the week on-campus. However, many of these eating facilities are relatively unknown to a large portion of the underclassmen. Most are located under dorms and hidden from the student’s eyes. They are also incapable of holding a large amount of students simply because they don’t have the room.
Imagine that you walk into a cafeteria and you see children in line to buy lunch. The lunch is burnt and cold. You see the kids who bought lunch sit down and start asking people for food, they say no. At the end of the lunch period the kids lunch trays still have all the food on them. The children are starving and a lot of food was wasted. You don’t want that right? I believe that our school should get a new lunch menu because many students do not like the food served, there are not many options, and there are many problems with the food.
For my subgroup project, I decided to observe a group of teenage boys. Located at the intersection of Fullerton and central. The location seemed like any other McDonalds except the arrangement of the sits. They have a wide range of chairs and furniture located in the side of the entrance while the front part was wide. My subgroup was located in the side of the McDonalds near the restrooms. The methods I used were participant observation, informal interviewing, and formal interviewing. While I conducted my observations on Tuesdays and Thursdays. On October 8, 2013 from 3pm to 4:30pm, October 15 2013 from 3pm to 4:30pm, October 17 2013 from 3pm to 6pm and October 22 2013 from 3 to 6pm. My data collections used were participant observation, informal interviewing, formal interviewing, key consultants, and mapping.
By using observation methods, a wide variety of behavior can be recorded. Picking through the garbage on the side of the road can reveal behaviors of fast-food customers, or sitting for only one hour in the university canteen to understand the gender differences in choosing a diet meal, or even watching the customer’s behavior from deciding which yogurt to be taken off its store shelves in the supermarket can also answer the question: Are the customers attracted by its appearance or flavor or price or brand or nutrition? The aim of this observation assignment is to evaluate and explain the different types of interactions between individuals and groups present, as well as the environment in which these interactions take place. The field observation was conducted at the Vietnamese fast-food restaurant named “We love Banhmi” in Budapest, and the role adopted, was that of observer as a non-participant. Group structures as well as overall activity, patterns of behavior, and the duration and timing of such behaviors and interactions were observed and recorded.
The first place I went to was called “Front Street Foods” located at the Union Station on Front Street. Front Street Foods is a wide-ranging culinary market that showcases Toronto’s best chefs, restaurants, bakers, food entrepreneurs, and the fresh edible items they create. The music I heard in the background was a remix of hit-music played by a DJ. I think this music was being played because it was a Friday night with Blue Jay’s home game. Therefore, people were very excited and welcoming the weekends with great foods on the street. The music definitely was an add-on from the atmosphere of the place. People were enjoying the beat and bass and some were even dancing on the street. The pedestrians, not only noticed the music, but the sounds and good vibes also attracted them to join the culinary market to enjoy the atmosphere. In my opinion, having a DJ that plays the excellent music in such “event/festival” is a great idea. The remix that were played certainly helped the vendors to be more profitable by attracting more consumers from the streets, and also accelerated the atmosphere to the next level.
For example, I recognize people who came there most of the time with their uniforms like medical employees. In addition, a group of police officers came to the coffee shop to buy coffee. The officers are both male and female and they made conversation in group and they were laughing each other on the back side entrance. I saw few people who sit alone at the table and they are busy on their phone. I think, they were watching movies or just checking their emails. On the other side, more people sit in groups who are 2-4 people and discussing about their homework. There were many people who left the coffee shop when they couldn’t find a sitting. Additionally, there were many groups of people who stood together in the self-service area, in conversation about games with coffee in their hands.
Procrastination; the action of delaying or postponing something. Some people put the pro in procrastination in college as it’s a habit whether it be from school work to daily necessities, as it happens to the best of us once or twice in life. It can become a bad habit and hard to break as people just seem to put things off. Others can plan their work out accordingly so the work load isn’t put off until the last minute. So why do we wait till the last moment to write the paper that is due the next day, pay that bill near the deadline, and finding yourself watching useless videos on You-Tube? Procrastination in college can be the main leading cause in stress problems, lowering GPA, distracting habitual actions, and low motivation and giving into
...there is the matter of leaving the cafeteria. Generally the entire table will leave as one group. Most of the group will probably finish eating at almost the same time. Those who finish first wait for the others out of politeness and courtesy. After everyone is through eating, someone will suggest that we leave and we will all take our trays up to the dishwashing counter and then leave. Near the tray drop-off counter, we are hit with hot, sticky air from the dishwashing. We quickly leave our trays and continue out of the cafeteria as a group. On our way out we talk to each other and friends that we see sitting at other tables. Often, students will plan out what they will do later in the day while talking to friends and finding out what is going on. Eventually, the group will split up and goodbyes are said. We go back to our rooms with a full stomach and a full mind.
According to Dufault (2013), the classes in most universities took 50-90 minutes long which is considerably longer than the attention span of an archetypal student. The attention of students widely differs from others and their attention quality relies on their emotion, the time of day and several other factors. It is believed that the attention span of students ends at the headmost 10-15 minutes of every lecture. But no corroboration was found to uphold the belief.
In America, many are not aware of the inequalities that exist in the Food Service. The food service sector has at least 125,951 companies and approximately 12 million employees with almost 7 million foreigners. This sector includes individually owned restaurants, mid-priced chains, quick service (fast food), hotels, and beverage establishments. Food service plays a major role in institutional establishments like schools, hospitals, prisons and meals on wheels. They cater to the tastes of their particular customers and are often leaders of food innovation. In the food service, we find: bartenders, wait staff, hosts, busboys, chefs, cooks, managers, and dishwashers .The food service workers perform a variety of customer service, food preparation and cleaning tasks, all that which are very important to keep a business running. More concerning , some of the major working conditions that foodservice workers face with daily is no health benefits and significantly low wages. These employees working in the food industry make it possible for millions of people to enjoy food in restaurants but are not being treated or appreciated fairly.