An unwritten law is one that people would frown upon. Although this law is neither illegal nor enforced, one would see a person breaking it, they are technically doing nothing wrong. Such examples of these laws include walking backward, walking on the left side of the hall, and the one I will be examining, facing the “wrong way” in an elevator. There is plenty more one can figure out but listed are only a few of the more common ones people could use to catch a hint.
When people enter an elevator they tend to turn around and face the doors and await their floor to arrive. There are the few people who stand at the sides, face each other and carry on a conversation, but do people normally just walk in and stand face to face with the plain back wall? I set out to decrypt how people of different races, genders, and seniority within a territory-which will be described later- act in this given circumstance.
People of different genders sometimes act differently or treat others differently because of their portrayal of being sincere and kind. A female for example tends to be more emotional than a male meaning they tend to contain more of the kindness and helping features. A male on the other hand is mainly portrayed as an intimidating human who people and things tend to avoid. Thus, from my observations of facing the wrong way in an elevator in hopes of obtaining some sort of response from other riders jumped right out to my hypothesis which was more vocal response from a female in comparison to a male. A female nurse and a male nurse entered together and ceased their conversation upon entering the elevator and observing my back to them. The moment the doors closed and we started our ascent; the short colored nurse put her hand on my shoulder and asked me if I “need help?” or if I “know where I am going?” This was exactly the sort of response needed to help conclusions form; this allowed me to know precisely her thoughts and not just attempt to draw conclusions from body language. From my observations I conclude that people are mainly influenced from media to act differently around others. A question in one's math class is more likely to be answered by the geek than the jock in the movies because the jock only cares about sports and the geek, school. In real life though, the geeks are sometimes jocks themselves and gain reputation in both places.
This also falls under the category of seniority that I classify as a person who inhabits the territory in which others venture onto. Since a hospital territory is used in this case, its workers fall under my category of seniority. A person who knows the environment better tends to assert themselves more to let people know they have more seniority than that person and they are on their turf. The nurse was merely letting me know I was in her quarters. This is not true one hundred percent of the time as a male nurse was preoccupied in his work and merely glanced at me, smiled, but did not let me know I was trespassing into his vicinities. The way people treat others reflect highly on that person. Janitors are looked down upon by all people only because they work around garbage. When a janitor arrived on my elevator to find me facing away from him, he was overtaken by a look of nervousness. He did not keep his eyes off me until he left. Instead of facing the doors and waiting for it them to open spreading he proceeded to face the middle to ensure he could constantly watch every movement I had made.
The race difference between the two people, unwritten law breaker and observer, also plays a role in the interactions of them. A white family of the same social class and place in the seniority tree of the hospital treated my actions as if I was doing something weird but did not make a big fuss about it. The awkward glances and smirks of the gentleman were minor in comparison to the preoccupied mother playing with her baby girl. The mother looked at me as if I was just another person riding the elevator with them. One wants to conclude that a person on the exact same playing field as me would treat me like a regular person no matter my actions of breaking the unwritten laws. But this is wrong. My results are merely conclusions of a small sample size. The people who entered the elevator with me are at the hospital for a certain reason which cannot be examined. If one was to travel to another country where people were raised differently and therefore treat others differently, the results and conclusions would be different. One could also not determine a concrete saying that people of this race, this gender, this social class, and this level of seniority of the territory would act this way in America.
According to research, people who work with the elderly are more depressed than people who work in machine shops. From this one would not gain full insight to a certain behavior occurring between a person from each company even if they are exactly the same in social class, gender, family life, etc because of the emotional content they contain. One can generalize, which is an observational assumption that will allow other people to work off of the same idea to possibly draw similar or even different conclusions if they were to replicate the experiment exactly.
People breaking the unwritten rules are not criminals. They may be deemed weird, but why? They are just performing the same actions as anyone else but in a slightly different manner. Do not give the benefit of the doubt that they contain some mental illness. Go along with your life and treat them like a normal person, which is what they are. Try for yourself some of the unwritten laws and you too will be affected at the outcomes that correspond. I met a new friend and brightened up their day with my humor and sense of creativity.
