Essay - Norms Experiment Introduction We Live Our Lives According to Rules....

Norms Experiment

Introduction

***** live our lives according to rules. Most of us are not even aware of this fact for the rules ***** ***** society - ***** norms and mores and cultural traditions - have surrounded us since our birth so that we ***** come to see them as inevitable and ***** inviolable. They are almost as necessary to our well-being as the air around *****, but they ***** at the same time as invisible as ***** air. Of course, like all general statements, this one can be amended ***** refined: Most of us living in the United States are aware ***** ***** ***** that there are laws prohibiting certain kinds of behavior. Laws are formal and almost always written forms of norms - which are both subjective models of behavior or belief ***** should be followed by members of a particular group as well as objective summaries of average (for a given *****) behaviors or *****s. Because of their **********, laws are *****ly known ***** understood by all of the ***** of a group: If an Americ***** murders someone *****n he or she will (in most cases) quickly understand that he or she has broken a norm of the ***** by being *****rresting and tried.

However, ***** ***** are not spelled out form*****y with specific sanctions as is true in the legal system: In the case of such typical, informally proscribed patterns of behavior and belief we may only be aware of social norms when we break them - either intentionally or not. A man who carries a purse, ********** ***** in 2003 wears an anti-war button, a woman who asks f***** equal pay for equal work - each of these ***** f*****d ***** he or she ***** broken one of the unspoken but powerful codes of ********** (or *****) for Americans in the early 21st century and will experience some form of negative sanction as a result. The strength of ***** ***** reaction will be commensurate with how important ***** norm is that is broken ***** the presence or absence of subcultural *****s. Wearing an *****ti*****war button is relatively acceptable on a college campus, absolutely acceptable in a Quaker meetinghouse, and might ***** in harm to ********** at an NRA meeting. Norms exist for ***** ***** a *****le, but in a society ********** large ***** as diverse as ***** United States, different groups will subscribe to different norms to a greater or lesser degree. Members of certain groups may even refuse entirely ***** acknowledge the importance of some norms at all (vegetarians refuse to acknowledge the American norm that dictates ***** meat is food) while still maintaining membership in the group. Because so many ***** ***** to govern the beliefs and behaviors of ***** members ***** a society, an individual may violate some of them at any ***** time *****out losing h***** or her standing in or identity with that *****.

This paper describes an intentional breaching of n*****ms of behavior for American adults and the reactions