Breaching Experiment

This may be a group or individual assignment (however, papers must be submitted individually...aka write your own paper).

A breaching experiment seeks to examine peoples' reactions to violations of commonly accepted social rules or norms. For this exercise, you and your group members should set out to break a "taken for granted" rule of social life, with the goal of making that rule observable. Do your experiment at least three times in various settings with different people.

Ideas: Facing the wrong way in an (occupied) elevator; talking too close to your partner in conversation; speaking too loudly in conversation; pressing for clarifying information when people ask polite questions such as "how are you?"; shopping from other people's baskets at the grocery store; asking strangers to tie your shoe.

Be creative and have fun! (Disclaimer: Do not try doing something that would potentially endanger you or others, and avoid any illegal or potentially dangerous activities.)

In a three to four page paper (double-spaced, 12 pt. font) discuss the following:

? What was the social norm you were trying to test or breach?

? What did you expect to find?

? How did you do the experiment?

? What did you actually find? Report on your own experiences, and then report on how you perceived your partners.

? What do your experimental results tell you about the nature of the social rule you are trying to study?

? Did you find anything surprising or funny?

? How did people's reactions to the breach differ? Be as systematic as you can about this. Are there differences by race or gender or class or age? How about social setting or time of day?

If you do not have variability across these dimensions (and you could not possibly get sufficient variability across more than a few), think about how your limited research framework may affect your results.

? Based on your own experience, what do you think can be learned by breaching experiments?