Human beings are social beings; this implies that they have a tendency to behave in certain manners within different contexts as they interact with each other. The social attributes could be executed consciously or subconsciously. The behavior of human beings is tied to two key elements, the individual’s personality and the contextual environment. This is uniquely demonstrated in the analysis of the behavior of people in the context of work training; the presenter’s mannerisms as well as the recipient’s manners and the way the two interact. The behavior is then related with established social interaction theories
A two hour meeting was held at a day care centre with 35 employees in attendance. This is where I work and we are all female employees. The employees ranged from new inexperienced staff to old veterans in the field. The two hour long session was meant to offer training on conduction of cardiopulmonary resuscitation and to get certification for first aid. After the training, the employees were to take an examination to qualify for certification. The speaker for the training had a monotone and was very bland. Through the presentation the younger inexperienced staff paid keen attention while the old staff barely paid any attention.
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During the presentation, the speaker played a 45 minute long video during which the old staff began to converse among themselves. At the end of the presentation, the staff were asked to perform a cardiopulmonary resuscitation on a mannequin. The old staff that did not pay any attention during the training easily sailed through. The younger staff struggled to execute the task. The meeting was rather interesting, arousing my interest as an observer. Key concepts of human behavior became evident in my understanding of the sociological mannerism of human beings.
Key questions to better understand the varying manner in which the audience responded include asking why to every behavior exhibited. The questioning is an element of social inquiry that helps scholars and researchers understand society better (Wood, 2013). The behavior of the audience depended on two factors. The environment which was mainly defined by the presenter and how he carried out his presentation. The second determinant of behavior was the individual. This is evidenced by the fact that in spite of having a single presenter, the audience members had varied response. The young and inexperienced paid attention while the old seemed unbothered.
Structural functionalism is a theory that posits that the society is a complex systems that has different parts that work together to bring about stability as well as solidarity (Carter & Fuller, 2015). The society is made up of norms that define how people ought to behave in certain contexts. Besides the norms, the theory supposes there are institutions, traditions, and customs. When people behave outside the defined rules set up by these parts of society the instability and lack of solidarity kicks in. In our case above, the speaking in between the video and lack of concentration as the speaker was teaching are examples of lack of solidarity and instability.
The lack of instability and solidarity could be due to several reasons. There could be factors that introduce conflict or act as stressors, and thus, fuel the defiant antisocial behavior. In the above context, the manner of the presentation is a possible social stressor. Social stressors are the stresses that stem from relationships with others (Juth & Dickerson, 2013). The presenter uses a monotone through his presentation, which is a poor public speaking skill. Besides this, the speaker plays a 45 minute long video which is extremely long for a two hour session of training. These stressors probably explain the reason as to why the senior employees behaved as they did. The fact that the concept being taught was not new to them, they knew they had nothing to lose by not concentrating. The new employees was strong were determined to learn in spite of the stressors. Hence, explaining why they paid attention.
How people interpret situations has a bearing on the conscious decisions they make in a given context. This is the interactionism theory that states society is a collection of the everyday decisions we make in life as individuals and not simply a broad collective society. Human beings do not just react to social happenings; instead, they live through life as actors who react to the actions of other actors. The boredom in the presentation room is simply a reaction to the poor presentation skills. It is thus, a conscious decision that is made by each of the audience members on how they conduct themselves. The decision being conscious explains why new employers remained attentive amid the shambolic presentation approach. Therefore, the young staff interprets the meeting as one that is critical for them. Hence, it was imperative that they pay attention; the seniors interpret it as unhelpful and chose to be distracted.
Merton’s role theory states that through life we are always acting out a defined activity or role. This implies that within every social context there are duties, responsibilities and expectations with which we hold each other. In a meeting setup, there is the expectation that the audience will be attentive while the speaker will be engaging (Wood, 2013). Any flouting of the roles results in dysfunction. Rewards or punishments are tied to the execution of ones expected role. In the scenario above, both parties flouted their bits in terms of expected role, the speaker failed to deliver as a good speaker while the audience did not play its role as a good audience.
Sociological inquiry enables one to empirically profile social behaviour; giving the observer a lens through which to view and interpret mannerisms as exhibited by the society. The various concepts of sociology are perfected illustrated in the case scenario herein.
References
Juth V. & Dickerson S. (2013). Social Stress. In Gellman M.D.,Turner J.R, Encyclopaedia Of Behavioral Medicne . Springer,New York.
Carter, M. J., & Fuller, C. (2015). Symbolic interactionism. Sociopedia . isa, 1, 1-17.
Wood, B. E. (2013). What is a social enquiry? Crafting questions that lead to deeper knowledge about society and citizenship particippation. Research Information for Teachers , 20-28.
