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SHRIEKING SIRENS: SCHEMATA, SCRIPTS, AND SOCIAL NORMS. HOW CHANGE OCCURS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 December 2018

Cristina Bicchieri  and
Peter McNally
Cristina Bicchieri
Affiliation:
Philosophy and Psychology, University of Pennsylvania
Peter McNally
Affiliation:
Philosophy, Politics, and Economics, University of Pennsylvania
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Abstract:

This essay investigates the relationships among scripts, schemata, and social norms. The authors examine how social norms are triggered by particular schemata and are grounded in scripts. Just as schemata are embedded in a network, so too are social norms, and they can be primed through spreading activation. Moreover, the expectations that allow a social norm’s existence are inherently grounded in particular scripts and schemata. Using interventions that have targeted gender norms, open defecation, female genital cutting, and other collective issues as examples, the authors argue that ignoring the cognitive underpinnings of a social norm can hamper the effectiveness of behavioral interventions.

Keywords

social normsscriptsschematabehavioral changesemantic networks
Type
Research Article
Information
Social Philosophy and Policy , Volume 35 , Issue 1 , Summer 2018 , pp. 23 - 53
Copyright
Copyright © Social Philosophy and Policy Foundation 2018 

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Footnotes

*

We are grateful to Barbara Mellers, Jon Baron, and Robert Seyfarth for their helpful suggestions and comments on this essay. We are also grateful to Jayson Dorsett for his helpful assistance in reviewing relevant literature.

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91 Ibid, 27.

92 Ibid.

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107 Bicchieri, Norms in the Wild.

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118 Ibid.

119 Ibid.

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125 Trujillo and Paluck, “Experimental Effects of a Televised Soap Opera.”

126 Brown, “Sociocultural Influence of Predevelopment Soap Operas”; Arvind Singhal and Everett Rogers, “The Hum Log Story” (1989).

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130 Ibid., 1068.

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134 Ibid.

135 Bicchieri, Norms in the Wild.