Explain How A Breaching Experiment Peep Into A Stranger's Phone
Breaching Experiment: Peep into a Stranger’s Phone
Jia Lu
Introduction
A folkway has three characteristics. First, it is a rule of behavior—what is acceptable by the society, what is not. Second, the rule is loosely enforced, and breaching does not entail serious repercussions. A person can be arrested if he breaks the law, for instance; but only eyeballed or laughed at if he breaches a folkway. Third, a folkway is rooted in social and cultural context. In most areas of China, for example, eating loudly exemplifies a person’s bad manner. Yet in Japan, one is expected to slurp loudly because the Japanese believe slurping enhances the flavor of the meal.
Methodology and Design
A popular tool used by sociologists to identify folkways in everyday life is the breaching experiment, first proposed by Harold Garfinkel in 1967 (Sandvig, 2011). According to Garfinkel, to test the strength of an unstated social rule, we can purposely break it and observe others’ reactions. Using this method, the folkway I will explore in this paper is the common but implicit understanding that one should not peep into others’ phones in public places.
With rapid advancement of smartphone technologies and ever bigger phone screens, there are now a plethora of things we …show more content…
Family definitely play a dominant role. As I reflect on how difficult I felt when peeping into a stranger’s phone, I think of the behavioral rules and social values I was taught from an early age. I think of the Confucius quote: “one should not impose on others what he himself does not desire.” and how it refrains me from acting defiantly. I could imagine without the proper functioning of social structures like family and school, many of the norms would not pass on to the next generation, and society would enter the state of
Jia Lu
Introduction
A folkway has three characteristics. First, it is a rule of behavior—what is acceptable by the society, what is not. Second, the rule is loosely enforced, and breaching does not entail serious repercussions. A person can be arrested if he breaks the law, for instance; but only eyeballed or laughed at if he breaches a folkway. Third, a folkway is rooted in social and cultural context. In most areas of China, for example, eating loudly exemplifies a person’s bad manner. Yet in Japan, one is expected to slurp loudly because the Japanese believe slurping enhances the flavor of the meal.
Methodology and Design
A popular tool used by sociologists to identify folkways in everyday life is the breaching experiment, first proposed by Harold Garfinkel in 1967 (Sandvig, 2011). According to Garfinkel, to test the strength of an unstated social rule, we can purposely break it and observe others’ reactions. Using this method, the folkway I will explore in this paper is the common but implicit understanding that one should not peep into others’ phones in public places.
With rapid advancement of smartphone technologies and ever bigger phone screens, there are now a plethora of things we …show more content…
Family definitely play a dominant role. As I reflect on how difficult I felt when peeping into a stranger’s phone, I think of the behavioral rules and social values I was taught from an early age. I think of the Confucius quote: “one should not impose on others what he himself does not desire.” and how it refrains me from acting defiantly. I could imagine without the proper functioning of social structures like family and school, many of the norms would not pass on to the next generation, and society would enter the state of