Breaking Social Norms: Experimenting with Greeting Strangers

The norm I violated was saying ‘hi’ to everyone. Why is it so weird for people to get creeped out when a stranger says ‘hi’ to them? What if the stranger is just trying to be friendly? Why have technological advancements decreased social interactions between individuals? From experience and research, this norm can vary between settings. For instance, it would not be as weird if you were just simply to say ‘hi’ to someone when crossing the street. However, it would be seen as really weird if you were to approach someone directly just for the purpose of saying ‘hi’ to them, especially when you didn’t necessarily know the person. Additionally, saying ‘hi’ to everyone, is much more common in a small town or area, when people are more likely to know each other and have a social norm of greeting one another. In contrast, in larger cities, people are more likely to be a rush, causing them to not have time to greet anyone. Overall, I would classify this norm as folkway, since it a traditional behavior used in our community and everyday life. In the next paragraph, I will go into further detail of how I exactly violated the norm of saying ‘hi’ to people, including people I have never interacted with before.

To go more into the details, I violated this particular norm in three different places, two being on-campus, and one being off-campus. More specifically, the three places were West Campus Library, the elevator at Rudder, and the new H-E-B located on Jones Crossing. To start off at West Campus Library, I decided to sit by the tables located near the entrance/exit of the library and say ‘hi’ to anyone who would walk past me. Next, I went to Rudder, and decided to stay in an elevator, saying ‘hi’ to anyone who would hop in. Lastly, at the H-E-B, I said ‘hi’ to everyone I walked past with my shopping cart. At these three different locations, I witnessed people feel awkward and get creeped out. In the next paragraphs, you will be able to assess the exact manners and ways people reacted when I violated this norm.

Let’s begin with West Campus Library. As I sat in one of the couches towards the front of the library, I noticed various behaviors as I said ‘hi’ to the people walking past me. The first behavior I noticed, was that people who ignored me seemed as if they had priorities and work to get done. It seemed as if those people seemed stressed, in a rush, and did not want to interact, especially with a stranger such as myself. The next behavior I noticed was with people who caught on to what I was doing. As people observed me saying ‘hi’ to anyone who walked past the area I was sitting in, I saw people looking at me funny, and whispering to their friends. It was obvious that they knew I was breaking some type of norm. Because of this, people who knew what I was doing and knew that if they had to walk past me, they would have to engage in some type of activity in order to avoid me. For instance, people would look down on their phone or engage with other conversations when leaving the library.

The next stop was an elevator at Rudder. This situation differed from the last, and people who were in the elevator, could not avoid the situation, until they got to the specific floor they were trying to reach. As seen in the previous situation, there were various reactions when I broke the norm. The first thing I noticed was that if there were various people in the elevator they would all look at each other when I started saying ‘hi’ to anyone who walked in, making me feel as if I was being judged. There were also a few people who would quickly say ‘hi’ back and then try to ignore me for the remainder of time in the elevator. The last behavior that stood out to me was when people seemed confused and asked if they knew me from somewhere. Since it is not usual for random people to be saying ‘hi’ to someone that they may not know, people are likely to think that the stranger saying ‘hi’ to them have mistaken them from someone else, or simply think that they know that person from a previous interaction.

The last location was H-E-B. Having this location be off-campus, I was able to get some different reactions to the previous two situations. More particularly, at this location, I was able to not only get reactions from college students, but also families. It was interesting to see that the younger people tended to respond a similar way as the college students from the previous situations. To go more into specifics, the younger people tended to give me strange looks. They would also smile, giggle, and look at me weirdly. However, it was common for the older people, such as parents, or those with families, to positively react. For example, when I said ‘hi’ to an older couple that walked past me in one of the aisles, they responded back to me, saying ‘hi’ and even asking about how my day was going.

Overall, I found it interesting to see the similar pattern of reactions between individuals, regardless of the location. Before preforming this norm violation, I expected for some people to ignore me, or think that I was weird. Yet, I also expected for various people to positively react by saying ‘hi’ back, or continuing the conversation going, just as the way the older people did at H-E-B. It surprised me to see that most of the reactions were not necessarily positive or successful, especially those from other college students. I was expecting that since college student are close in age, people would have at least said ‘hi’ back when another college student greeted them. However, a factor to this could have been that the locations were places that students are usually under stress, or in a rush. More specifically, at the library, students are most likely wanting to get their work done or get help with their assignments. While at Rudder, students are most likely rushing to attend a meeting. In conclusion what has become ‘normal’ for our society today is for people to mind their own business and talk to individuals they know.