scholarly journals Perceptions of the appropriate response to norm violation in 57 societies

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kimmo Eriksson ◽  
Pontus Strimling ◽  
Michele Gelfand ◽  
Junhui Wu ◽  
Jered Abernathy ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Behaviors ◽  
Cultural Variation ◽  
Negative Relation ◽  
Norm Violations ◽  
Norm Enforcement ◽  
Norm Violation ◽  
Social Ostracism

AbstractNorm enforcement may be important for resolving conflicts and promoting cooperation. However, little is known about how preferred responses to norm violations vary across cultures and across domains. In a preregistered study of 57 countries (using convenience samples of 22,863 students and non-students), we measured perceptions of the appropriateness of various responses to a violation of a cooperative norm and to atypical social behaviors. Our findings highlight both cultural universals and cultural variation. We find a universal negative relation between appropriateness ratings of norm violations and appropriateness ratings of responses in the form of confrontation, social ostracism and gossip. Moreover, we find the country variation in the appropriateness of sanctions to be consistent across different norm violations but not across different sanctions. Specifically, in those countries where use of physical confrontation and social ostracism is rated as less appropriate, gossip is rated as more appropriate.

Who Is Punished? Regional Intergovernmental Organizations and the Enforcement of Democratic Norms

2010 ◽  
Vol 64 (4) ◽  
pp. 593-625 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniela Donno
Keyword(s):  
Original Data ◽  
Intergovernmental Organizations ◽  
Credible Commitments ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Norm Violations ◽  
Norm Enforcement ◽  
Norm Violation ◽  
International Monitoring ◽  
Specific Factors ◽  
Democratic Norms

AbstractScholars have found an association between membership in regional intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) and democracy, and IGO enforcement is often credited as an important factor explaining this link. But empirical evidence reveals great variation in whether these organizations actually respond to violations of democratic norms, even in democratic regions. Why do IGOs punish some norm-violating countries but not others? What does this variation imply for theories about how IGO membership helps states make credible commitments? This article presents a theoretical framework for understanding variation in multilateral norm enforcement. It identifies two obstacles to enforcement—the presence of competing geopolitical interests and uncertainty about the nature and scope of norm violations—and it argues that international monitoring can help mitigate these obstacles by revealing and publicizing information that pressures reluctant member states to support enforcement. An original data set of democracy enforcement in Latin America and postcommunist countries is used to examine regional IGO enforcement in response to one prevalent type of democratic norm violation: electoral misconduct. I find that enforcement is less likely in countries of high geopolitical importance, but the presence of election observers increases the probability of enforcement, and the content of observers' reports influences the type of enforcement that is imposed. These findings suggest that the link between IGO membership, credible commitments, and democracy should be theorized and tested as a conditional relationship, depending on country- and incident-specific factors that influence the likelihood of enforcement.

scholarly journals Social norm enforcement in ethnically diverse communities

2018 ◽  
Vol 115 (11) ◽  
pp. 2722-2727 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fabian Winter ◽  
Nan Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Minorities ◽  
Ethnic Diversity ◽  
Social Norm ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Ethnically Diverse ◽  
Ethnic Discrimination ◽  
German Population ◽  
Minority Population ◽  
Norm Violations ◽  
Norm Enforcement

Recent waves of immigration to Western nations have fueled a debate over the consequences of ethnic diversity for social cohesion. One prominent argument in this debate holds that diversity is detrimental to trust and cooperation because individuals in heterogeneous communities face difficulties in enforcing social norms across ethnic lines. We examine this proposition in a field experiment involving real-life interactions among residents of multiethnic German neighborhoods. We find significant ethnic asymmetries in the pattern of norm enforcement: Members of the majority “native” German population are more active in sanctioning norm violations, while ethnic minorities are more likely to find themselves the target of sanctions. We interpret these results in light of prevailing status inequalities between ethnic minorities and the native majority. We further calculate that, as a result of ethnic discrimination, social control is likely to rise in communities with moderate minority population shares.

R2P in Syria and Myanmar: Norm Violation and Advancement

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 211-233
Author(s):  
Jenna B. Russo
Keyword(s):  
Security Council ◽  
International Community ◽  
Member States ◽  
Norm Violations ◽  
Norm Violation ◽  
Theoretical Claim ◽  
The Creation

Attempts to intervene in the Syrian and Myanmar crises have been hampered by political deadlock, leading even supporters of R2P to question its continued salience. Yet, upon closer consideration, Member States and other members of the international community have, by and large, upheld their protection responsibilities, via the creation of innovative mechanisms that have been used to bypass Security Council deadlock. Not only have these mechanisms served to uphold R2P in these two cases, they have created alternate pathways to operationalise R2P, thus serving to further advance the norm. The theoretical claim put forth is that norm violations have served as an alternate vehicle for norm advancement, as flagrant norm violations committed by the Syrian and Myanmar governments, as well as by the Security Council, have reminded members of the international community of the costs of failing to protect.

Punishing the violators? Arms embargoes and economic sanctions as tools of norm enforcement

2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 96-120 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer L. Erickson
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
Economic Sanctions ◽  
Norm Violations ◽  
Norm Enforcement ◽  
Human Rights Abuse ◽  
Arms Embargo ◽  
Quantitative Analyses ◽  
Insight Into

AbstractThe persistence and strength of international norms are thought to depend partly on the willingness of actors to punish their violation, but norm enforcement is often inconsistent. This article investigates states’ use of economic sanctions in order to gain insight into the role of metanorms (norms about enforcing norms) in international politics and explain this inconsistency. The quantitative analyses examine patterns of economic sanctions and arms embargo practices across different security norms and reveal two central findings. First, international metanorms may accommodate important interstate relationships. Although severe human rights abuse, conflict, nuclear weapons development, and support for terrorist organisations tend to attract sanctions, they are infrequent in comparison with norm violations. Valued relationships between senders and targets seem to be an accepted limit to the pursuit of costly norm enforcement. Second, norm violations nevertheless remain rare, suggesting that factors other than the prospect of material punishment may encourage compliance. Indeed, by preserving interstate relationships, international metanorms may facilitate the engagement needed for socialisation and social pressures as alternative compliance mechanisms.

scholarly journals How preschoolers react to norm violations is associated with culture

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anja Gampe ◽  
Moritz M. Daum
Keyword(s):  
Social Norms ◽  
Cultural Values ◽  
Performance Orientation ◽  
Norm Violations ◽  
Norm Enforcement

Children from the age of three understand social norms as such, and enforce these norms in interactions with others. Differences in parental and institutional education across cultures make it likely that children receive divergent information about how to act in cases of norm violations. In the present study, we investigated whether cultural values are associated with the ways in which children react to norm violations. We tested 80 bicultural 3-year-old children with a norm enforcement paradigm and analyzed their reactions to norm violations. The reactions were correlated to the children’s parental cultural values using the GLOBE scales and these results show that parental culture was associated with children’s reactions to norm violations. The three strongest correlations were found for institutional collectivism, performance orientation and assertiveness.

scholarly journals Punishing the individual or the group for norm violation

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 139
Author(s):  
Marwa El Zein ◽  
Chloe Seikus ◽  
Lee De-Wit ◽  
Bahador Bahrami
Keyword(s):  
Ultimatum Game ◽  
Dictator Game ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Negative Consequences ◽  
Economic Games ◽  
Norm Violations ◽  
Norm Violation ◽  
Collective Structure ◽  
The Individual

Background: It has recently been proposed that a key motivation for joining groups is the protection from consequences of negative behaviours, such as norm violations. Here we empirically test this claim by investigating whether cooperative decisions and the punishment of associated fairness-based norm violations are different in individuals vs. collectives in economic games. Methods: In the ultimatum game, participants made or received offers that they could reject at a cost to their outcome, a form of social punishment. In the dictator game with third-party punishment, participants made offers to a receiver while being observed by a punisher, or could themselves punish unfair offers. Results: Participants made lower offers when making their decision as part of a group as compared to alone. This difference correlated with participants’ overall mean offers: those who were generally less generous were even less so in a group, suggesting that the collective structure was compatible with their intention. Participants were slower when punishing vs not punishing an unfair offer. Importantly here, they were slower when deciding whether to punish or not to punish groups as compared to individuals, only when the offer concerned them directly in second party punishment. Participants thus take more time to punish others, and to make their mind on whether to punish or not when facing a group of proposers. Conclusions: Together, these results show that people behave differently in a group, both in their willingness to share with others and in their punishment of norm violations. This could be explained by the fact that being in a collective structure allows to share responsibility with others, thereby protecting from negative consequences of norm violations.

scholarly journals Punishing the individual or the group for norm violation

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marwa El Zein ◽  
Chloe Seikus ◽  
Lee de-Wit ◽  
Bahador Bahrami
Keyword(s):  
Ultimatum Game ◽  
Dictator Game ◽  
Third Party ◽  
Negative Consequences ◽  
Economic Games ◽  
Norm Violations ◽  
Norm Violation ◽  
Collective Structure ◽  
Individual Decisions ◽  
The Individual

It has recently been proposed that a key motivation for joining groups is the protection from consequences of negative behaviours, such as norm violations. Here we empirically test this claim by investigating whether cooperative decisions and the punishment of associated fairness-based norm violations are different in individuals vs. collectives in economic games. In the ultimatum game, participants made or received offers that they could reject at a cost to their outcome, a form of social punishment. In the dictator game with third-party punishment, participants made offers to a receiver while being observed by a punisher, or could themselves punish unfair offers. Participants made lower offers when making a collective vs individual decisions. This difference correlated with participants’ overall mean offers: those who were generally less generous were even less so in a group, suggesting that the collective structure was compatible with their intention. Participants were slower when punishing vs not punishing an unfair offer. Importantly here, they were slower when deciding whether to punish groups as compared to individuals, only when the offer concerned them directly in second party punishment. Participants thus seem reluctant to punish others, and even more so when facing a group of proposers. Together, these results show that people behave differently in a group, both in their willingness to share with others and in their punishment of norm violations. This could be explained by the fact that being in a collective structure allows to share responsibility with others, thereby protecting from negative consequences of norm violations.

scholarly journals When norm violations are spontaneously detected: an electrocortical investigation

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (3) ◽  
pp. 319-327 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cristina E Salvador ◽  
Yan Mu ◽  
Michele J Gelfand ◽  
Shinobu Kitayama
Keyword(s):  
Social Relations ◽  
Social Norm ◽  
Fundamental Function ◽  
Norm Violations ◽  
Norm Violation ◽  
Social Coordination ◽  
Societal Norms ◽  
Priming Condition ◽  
The Social ◽  
Relational Priming

Abstract One fundamental function of social norms is to promote social coordination. Moreover, greater social coordination may be called for when tight norms govern social relations with others. Hence, the sensitivity to social norm violations may be jointly modulated by relational goals and a belief that the social context is tight (vs loose). We tested this analysis using an electrocortical marker of norm-violation detection (N400). Ninety-one young American adults were subliminally primed with either relational or neutral goals. Then they saw behaviors that were either norm-violating or normal. In the relational priming condition, the norm-violation N400 increased as a function of the perceived tightness of societal norms. In the control priming condition, however, the norm-violation N400 was weak regardless of perceived tightness. Thus, normative tightness was associated with increased neural processing of norm violations only when relational goals were activated. Implications for norm psychology are discussed.

scholarly journals How culture gets embrained: Cultural differences in event-related potentials of social norm violations

2015 ◽  
Vol 112 (50) ◽  
pp. 15348-15353 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yan Mu ◽  
Shinobu Kitayama ◽  
Shihui Han ◽  
Michele J. Gelfand
Keyword(s):  
Social Norms ◽  
Cultural Differences ◽  
Social Norm ◽  
Event Related Potentials ◽  
Event Related Potential ◽  
Fundamental Aspect ◽  
Norm Violations ◽  
Norm Violation ◽  
Violation Detection ◽  
Related Potentials

Humans are unique among all species in their ability to develop and enforce social norms, but there is wide variation in the strength of social norms across human societies. Despite this fundamental aspect of human nature, there has been surprisingly little research on how social norm violations are detected at the neurobiological level. Building on the emerging field of cultural neuroscience, we combine noninvasive electroencephalography (EEG) with a new social norm violation paradigm to examine the neural mechanisms underlying the detection of norm violations and how they vary across cultures. EEG recordings from Chinese and US participants (n = 50) showed consistent negative deflection of event-related potential around 400 ms (N400) over the central and parietal regions that served as a culture-general neural marker of detecting norm violations. The N400 at the frontal and temporal regions, however, was only observed among Chinese but not US participants, illustrating culture-specific neural substrates of the detection of norm violations. Further, the frontal N400 predicted a variety of behavioral and attitudinal measurements related to the strength of social norms that have been found at the national and state levels, including higher culture superiority and self-control but lower creativity. There were no cultural differences in the N400 induced by semantic violation, suggesting a unique cultural influence on social norm violation detection. In all, these findings provided the first evidence, to our knowledge, for the neurobiological foundations of social norm violation detection and its variation across cultures.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document