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Breaking A Social Norm Essay

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Breaking A Social Norm Essay
Norms are important rules and expectations set by a society. These rules and expectations are social standards expected from members of a society and are a valued standard on how individuals should act. Breaking or deviating from social standards is often looked down upon by most members of a society (Bobel, et al. 5). The norm I chose to break is treating a baby doll (Alegra) like she is a real baby. For this experiment, I enlisted my twin brother’s help to play the part of the baby’s daddy. The scenario for my experiment involved taking the baby (doll) Alegra with my brother and me to a restaurant for a nice family dinner. It is abnormal for adults to act as if baby dolls are real human babies. According to White, baby dolls that are treated …show more content…
So, my research to my surprise did not align with my hypothesis. First, nobody laughed at us. Second, only one person out right ignored us. This person was a teenage girl who encouraged her mother to sit somewhere far away from us. Whenever she passed us to refill her drink, she avoided us. A response I did not expect to receive was one of anger. One person’s anger appeared to be caused by his discomfort at the situation which caused him to leave the restaurant, but not before he told the cleaning lady that we were crazy. Another, reaction of anger was caused by immaturity. This reaction was from a teenage boy who after seeing us try to feed Alegra many times, said very loudly to his friends “stop f***ing trying to feed the baby she’s not real!" The two main reactions I received were empathetic engagement and discomfort caused by what I believe was discomfort caused by what we believe was concern for our mental stability. The cashier who rang us up, and the manager who helped me receive an age appropriate toy for Alegra both treated us with kindness. The cleaning lady at the restaurant was so nice, she came over and asked us questions about Alegra and even gave her a toy. As, we were talking the lady realized Alegra was not real, but she still continued to treat us with compassion and empathy. However, she continued to watch us very closely the entire time we were eating. There was also an older lady who
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