Norms and behavior - summary of chapter 10 of Social Psychology by Smith, E, R (fourth edition)

Social psychology
Chapter 10
Norms and behavior

All human groups establish social norms.

Norms: effective guides for social behavior

Activating norms to guide behavior

Norms must be activated before they can guide behavior. They can be activated by direct reminders, environmental cues, or observations of other people’s behavior. When people see themselves purely in terms of group identity, their behavior is likely to be guided by group norms alone.

Norms can be made accessible by several means

- Direct reminders of norms

• Environments activate norms
• Groups activate norms
  Whatever makes the group more salient activates its norms.
• Deindividuation
  Deindividuation: the psychological state in which group or social identity completely dominates personal or individual identity so that group norms become maximally accessible.
  Group or social identity dominates personal or individual identity.
  Increases normative behavior.

Which norms guide behavior?

Both descriptive norms and injunctive norms influence behavior, and these norms may sometimes interact with each other in interesting ways. One type of normative information may me more important than another, depending on our motivation and ability to think carefully.

Descriptive norms as guides for behavior

What other people are doing (descriptive norms) frequently influences what we do.
Giving people more accurate views of what their reference groups are doing changes behavior.

Injunctive norms as guides for behavior

Injunctive norms (shared beliefs about what should be done) can also influence behavior.
We sometimes misperceive injunctive norms.

The interplay of descriptive and injunctive norms

When injunctive and descriptive norms mismatched, behavioral intentions were as low as they were when there was no support from either type of norm.
Endorsement of injunctive norms is more effective when it is seen as sincere rather than as mere lip service.
When people get information about just one type of norm, they assume that the other norm is in line. Using descriptive norms may be cognitively easier.
Injunctive norm information has stronger effects.

Why norms guide behavior so effectively

Norms are sometimes enforced by rewards and punishments. More often, however, people follow norms simply because they seem right. Following norms may also be in our genetic makeup.

Enforcement: Do it, or else

The most obvious reason is that groups sometimes use rewards and punishments to motivate people to adhere group standards.
Norm enforcement can occur through various means.

Private acceptance: it’s right and proper, so I do it

Behavior usually matches norms because most norms are privately accepted. And they thus seem to be both the right thing and the proper thing to do.

Norms for mastery and connectedness: reciprocity and commitment

Almost all societies endorse some form of these norms.

The norm of reciprocity

The norm of reciprocity: the shared view that people are obligated to return to others the goods, services, and concessions they offer to us.

Returning favors

The offer of some valued resource triggers the norm of reciprocity, which directs us to give something in return.
The power of the norm of reciprocity is so great that people even feel compelled to return those favors of a stranger who has been forced to help them out.
Even after paying back a favor, people are more likely to agree to another request.

Reciprocating concessions: the door-in-the-face technique

Door-in-the-face technique: a technique in which the influencer makes an initial request so large that it will be rejected, and follows it with a smaller request that looks like a concession, making it more likely that the other person will concede in turn.
Really effective.

The door-in-the-face technique will activate the norm of reciprocity when three conditions exist

• The initial request must be large enough that it is sure to be refused but no so large that it will breed resentment or suspicion.
• The target must be given the change to compromise by refusing the initial request and complying the second request
• The second request must be related to the first request and come from the same person, who must be seen as making a personal concession.

The sense that the other person is really giving something up makes the target of the request feel guilty. Agreeing to the second request gives the target an opportunity to repair the damaged sense of self.

The norm of social commitment

Norm of social commitment: the shared view that people are required to honor their agreements and obligations.

The low-ball technique

Low-ball technique: a technique in which the influencer secures agreement with a request by then increases the cost of honoring the commitment.

The norm of obedience: submitting to authority

Milgram’s studies of obedience

People obeyed orders to deliver shocks to an unwilling and clearly suffering victim. They obeyed these orders even though they were not forced to do it.

Attempting to explain obedience

The destructive obedience of Milgram’s participants was not due to hard-hearted unconcern about the victim or suspicion that the experiment was rigged. In fact, obedience in nonexperimental settings can be just as high, and authorities command as much obedience as they did 50 years ago in Milgram’s experiments.

The norm of obedience to authority

The norm of obedience to authority has a powerful effect on behavior in Milgram’s experiment and has a similar effect on behavior outside the lab. Authorities must be legitimate and accept responsibility. Conditions that increase the accessibility of the obedience norm or decrease attention to other norms increase obedience. Because legitimacy of authority derives from the group, people who identify more with the authority or the group the authority represents are more likely to follow the authority’s directives. Once obedience occurs, it can be maintained or escalated by gradual entrapment and the impact of justification processes.

The norm of obedience to authority: the shared view that people should obey those with legitimate authority.
Legitimacy derives from the group.
Authority derives from status, not from any particular person.

Obedience to authority is sometimes enforces.
Most often obedience is motivated by private feelings that legitimate authority should be obeyed.

Authority must be legitimate

To achieve obedience, an authority must convey that he or she is the person who should be obeyed.
A person’s physical presence usually gives lots of cues to authority.
Or uniform.

Authority must accept responsibility

When responsibility is displaced or diffused, people ignore the possibility that they could or should control their own behavior.

The norm of obedience must be activated

Social identification and obedience

People who identify more with the authority or the group the authority represents are more likely to follow the authorities directives.

Maintaining and escalating obedience

Once obedience begins, other processes help maintain or even escalate it.

• Gradual escalation of obedience reinforces the legitimacy of the authority and acceptance of the norm of obedience
• Dissonance processes help maintain obedience once it occurs. Increasing motivation to reduce arousal by providing justifications for behavior.

Normative trade-offs: the pluses and minuses of obedience

Like all norms, the obligation to obey authority figures can be used for good or evil purposes.

Resisting, rejecting, and rebelling against norms

Reactance

People can resist being manipulated by norms. People fight against threats to freedom of action when norms are not privately accepted or seen as appropriate.

Reactance: the motive to protect or restore a threatened sense of behavioral freedom.
When normative pressure is perceived to be inappropriate or illegitimate, reactance is triggered.
Reactance is less likely when the threat to our freedom is a ‘done deal’ veruss when we perceive it as potentially changeable.

Resisting and rejecting norms using systematic processing

One defense against normative pressure on behavior is to think things trough to make sure that any norm made accessible in the situation is actually applicable.

• Question how norms are being used
• Question claims about relationships
• Question others’ views of the situation

Using norms against norms

An effective defense is to use norms against norms: to break down an existing norm and forge or exploit an alternative consensus that makes a different course of behavior the appropriate one.

The strength of a norm lies in the consensus that it represents.
When people start to break away from a consensus, it becomes easier for others to do the same thing.
Forging a social identity is crucial among people trying to engage in resistance.

The best way to resist norms to to form new norms that can guide changed behavior.
Effective resistance is often facilitated by group identity and group norms.

Putting it all together: multiple guides for behavior

Both attitudes and norms influence behavior

Attitudes and norms typically work together to influence behavior, either by triggering behavior superficially or being combined to influence intentions to act, which in turn direct behavior. People’s perception of control over the behavior is also an important influence on intentions and thus on behavior.

The superficial route

Attitudes and norms can guide behavior simply and directly, especially when we do not give matters much systematic thought.
Accessible attitudes may affect our perceptions of attitude objects, and accessible norms may serve as decision heuristics. Together, the attitudes and norms can color our perceptions and influence our behavior in an immediate and automatic way.
Attitudes and norms are especially likely to affect behavior directly when the resources and motivation to process deeply are not available.

People possess implicit norms.

The thoughtful route

Sometimes norms combine with other factors in a much more deliberate way as we form our intentions to act and then try to follow through on these intentions.
Theory of planned behavior
Intentions are a function of multiple factors that can be thought about in the situation

• The individual’s attitude toward the behavior
• Social norms
• Their perceived control over behavior

When attitudes and norms conflict: accessibility determines behavior

Whether attitudes or norms have more influence on behavior depends on their relative accessibility for a particular behavior, in a particular situation, and for a particular person.