Simulation Society Reflection

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Participation in the SIMSOC program permitted our class as a whole to experience the role of a citizen in a simulated society where each decision made by any individual in a region affects the whole society. Our society was divided into four regions, comprised of Red, Green, Yellow and Blue regions. Since there was no programmed outcome for the simulated society, the success or the failure of the society completely depended on every decision made by the participants (Gamson, 2000). Also SIMSOC enforces some rules and regulations upon its participants and the participants or citizens of the society are faced with some issues like abuse of power, justice, diversity, trust, and leadership as they negotiated their way through the simulated society …show more content…

Since day one of the simulated society, one of the individuals in our region underwent social loafing where she felt uninterested and did nothing and expected others to provide her with subsistence and whatever she needed to survive until there was a shift in one of the positions in our region. Once she took over the status as the head of that organization she very well conformed to the role and became an active participant of the simulation. Personally I also experienced this phenomenon once I got employed. I was employed by RETSIN and we solved anagrams to earn a living as well as to contribute to raise the national indicators. I conformed to the role of a RETSIN employee and looked forward to do my job every session of the simulated society. Starting with just one anagram per session we eventually went up to completing 4 anagrams per session since I felt a personal need to define my role in my region and to help sustain the national indicators. This concept is termed role conformance and often occurs when a person complies with or assume an influence because he or she wants to maintain and uphold or establish a convincing self- defining association with another person or group (McLeod, 2016). Another concept we as a region encountered is the norm of reciprocity. The norm of reciprocity simply states that if you help someone in any way, they are indebted to return the favor (Rhodes, 2010). This concept was exemplified in the society through the distribution of subsistence, travel tickets and employment to the lesser privileged regions and expecting them to return the favor by joining the political parties or through labor. Finally, the fundamental attribution error occurs when a person fails to notice situational factors and assume that a behavior or specific actions are due to an individual’s personality or character traits (Harman, 1999).