Examples Of Social Norms

If you’ve ever encountered an American, you know that their marking characteristic is their tendency to engage in a full toothed smile, regardless of the situation (the main exception being the New York City subway, where you avoid eye contact and engagement at all costs). To us rather ethnocentric Americans, this is considered a social norm, and people who do not engage in this behavior are considered to be rather odd and questionable. However, outside of the Americanized world, the exact opposite is true. In many other countries, smiling is considered to be the cultural outlier, and remaining stone faced is the norm. This is due to variation in social norms, which we learn and conform to through the process of socialization, by which people

For example, my usual resting face is a slight smile, as opposed to expressionless or a scowl. When an American is visiting another country as a tourist, it is very easy to spot the American by their casual tendency to smile, which throws off many people who immigrate here. According to Khazan, this may be due to America’s historical reliance on immigration. (Khazan, 2017) With language barriers, communication can be difficult, and a warm smile is intended to help move communication move along more smoothly. The smile is supposed to invoke feelings of trust within the immigrant, although it could lead to the opposite affect due to difference in cultural values and socialization. Major agents of socialization that could be causing this American behavior are family and schools. The role of parents is to instill good behavior, decision making, and values within their child. One of these many values and/or behaviors is the tendency to be polite, especially to those whom you do not know. Growing up, I was taught that one way of being polite was saying good morning/afternoon/night paired with a kind smile. However, I believe that the school system is an even more active agent in this case. I believe this because it is possible for children to have immigrant parents, from Russia for example, who do not value smiling and still grow into a smiling American. Once you reach the age

I don’t actively make the decision to smile, but often find myself doing it anyway in hopes of appearing approachable and kind. However, with the research showing that countries with political instability having lower tendencies to smile, I wonder if the American smile has dulled in the past year and a half or so. The controversial Presidential election, paired with the growing importance of media, which that is not always reliable, that is consistently negative, I would not be surprised if research reports showed that Americans have been smiling less frequently with less vibrancy in the recent