I always write about my observations that Trinidadians and Tobagonians (Monkey Islanders according to my co-author) have little regard for basic rules, regulations and the law.
It’s enough to frustrate any sane person, because as often pointed out by myself and others, these are the same people who travel abroad and queue for buses, the cinema, etc; pick up their litter, speak politely at the hospitals and doctors’ offices, etc.
If they have to work abroad, they forget ‘Trinidadian’ time, they forget poor customer service, and they behave as the natives do (in the majority).
Now, why am I mentioning this? Well, I’ve been trying to rationalise why on earth this behaviour can’t happen in Trinidad & Tobago. One explanation is the broken window theory. Basically, this says that if you fix the little things, big things won’t develop as much.
This has critics as well as supporters. But today I read an article that seems to support it.
Imagine you park your bike in a bike shed. A sign says: no graffiti. On your return, you find a leaflet stuck to the handlebars. What do you do with it? Chuck it in the street, or bin it elsewhere?
That depends, says Ramsey Raafat from University College London, who describes a set of curious experiments in Holland.
"When the riders or owners returned to their bike, 33% of the people chucked the flyer, littered, broke a norm.
"But when there was a slight manipulation, everything's the same - we have our bike shed, bikes, prominent 'no graffiti' sign - but now there's graffiti in the area, so a norm has been violated. Now interestingly in this situation, a whopping 69% of the riders when they returned chucked the flyer. And so in this instance when one norm's violated - the graffiti violation - there's a massive effect on another norm of littering."
Is that a surprise? We've always known that behaviour is sometimes easily influenced. How else, you might have found occasion to ask, does the nice lad from the nice family next door become a lout in a mob, lurching, swearing, singing offensively down the road? Because his frame of moral reference temporarily stops at those around him. He sees no-one else.
For a final, bizarre illustration of where our immediate social influences may lead us, Ramsey Raafat cites another experiment in group-think.
"Now stealing - if one was to steal, that's a powerful norm violation. We learn at a very early age not to steal. So how do they do this? This is very elegant. They had a post-box and sticking out of it was an envelope with a five-euro note attached. Now in the control condition - no litter and no graffiti - only 13% of people stole, took the envelope.
"However when there was graffiti or litter surrounding the post-box, a whopping 25% or 27% of people stole. That's more than a doubling of norm violation. And, again, it's a powerful effect of how when one norm is broken, we become more likely to break another, or essentially the spreading of disorder."
Indeed, this is not farfetched. We see dotish people (including prisoner transport personnel) breaking the road traffic laws everyday. From ‘breaking’ red lights, driving on the PBR, on the shoulder… you name it, it happens with impunity.
Of course, then there is a major problem with the dunceys… they don’t care to implement the laws so little things can’t get fixed. People litter, spit, pee, etc. Drive like idiots. Steal, commit petty larceny and graduate to bigger criminal enterprises. Once upon a time, the only ‘gangs’ were pan men. Now? No further explanation needed.
Yes indeed, it is only when we suffer the little things that bigger indignities are heaped upon our heads.
6 Comments:
Well, Jumbie you are discovering or re-discovering human nature - everyday.
As I said we are Confused and primitive to the core. And I should add to all that, that part of our animalistic behaviour is to behave like the herd does, and to follow the herd. Those like me and you who dare to confront head-on, our primitiveness are marginalised - because we drift from the 'herd'.
Oh yes, make no mistake all who read these words will say that "I doh behave like dat, talk fuh yuhself!" or WTTE - in true Monkey Islander style.
As part of the 'herd' phenomenon, what the rest of the herd does is seen as a 'norm' and what the 'norm' is become what is right. So what is Right is not determined to some great extent (in average everyday activities) by cognitive consideration and self-reflection. It's largely determined by what the herd does.
Children and adolescents are generally more susceptible to herd influences. Nature seemed to have orchestrated this vulnerability as I see it. So youngsters are more likely to do as their parents or significant others do, and behaviour patterns are more likely to etch deeply. This is what I refer to as 'unconscious programming' - and some believe it is only computers that can be programmed. Not true. Our habits are our programmes. We are just like software. The earlier and more deeply we are programmed the harder it is to erase those programmes. And the more 'unconscious' the programming e.g. by social and familial events/influences the harder to re-programme. So those in parental positions beware.
But the influences of the 'herd', I postulate, also come from sociological, religious, philosophical and global angles. Most of us are hardly aware of these influences that etch on us. T&T is seeing the effects of these influences concentrated in problems in managing its youth. However, overall adults are unknowingly affected.
You mention breaking red lights on PBR. Contrast that with driver behaviour in Vancouver,say, where breaking red lights is the exception, where drivers stop their cars to offer pedestrians an opportunity to cross the road. And contrast that with Amsterdam where a zebra (pedestrian crossing) means nothing, and where you'd be mowed down with contempt!
See also Bending the rules.
It's easy to point a finger, though. Harder it is, for each one of us is to look into the mirror!
Jumbie...you are so dead on with this post.
If you can obey the laws in other countries -- why not your own?
simple case of 'monkey see monkey do'
but how sure were the experiment's researchers that the people who kept the flyer not interested in its contents?
on driving etiquette... i theorize that many... if not most of the drivers that flout laws were not accustomed to utilizing this form of transportation themselves... they were accustomed to travelling by TAXI and historically these have been the biggest violators of the most simple traffic laws... when you were accustomed to being driven in a certain manner and then buy yuh liscence i dont expect any different/better from them...
coming back to NOW... with the current crop of leaders openly flouting the LAW... what should one then expect from the populace?
bandi...
but how sure were the experiment's researchers that the people who kept the flyer not interested in its contents? (^_^)
I don't think that 36% difference were less interested in reading the flyer after graffiti was introduced into the picture.
but how sure were the experiment's researchers that the people who kept the flyer not interested in its contents? (^_^)
I don't think that 36% difference were less interested in reading the flyer after graffiti was introduced into the picture.
Well, Jumbie you are discovering or re-discovering human nature - everyday.
As I said we are Confused and primitive to the core. And I should add to all that, that part of our animalistic behaviour is to behave like the herd does, and to follow the herd. Those like me and you who dare to confront head-on, our primitiveness are marginalised - because we drift from the 'herd'.
Oh yes, make no mistake all who read these words will say that "I doh behave like dat, talk fuh yuhself!" or WTTE - in true Monkey Islander style.
As part of the 'herd' phenomenon, what the rest of the herd does is seen as a 'norm' and what the 'norm' is become what is right. So what is Right is not determined to some great extent (in average everyday activities) by cognitive consideration and self-reflection. It's largely determined by what the herd does.
Children and adolescents are generally more susceptible to herd influences. Nature seemed to have orchestrated this vulnerability as I see it. So youngsters are more likely to do as their parents or significant others do, and behaviour patterns are more likely to etch deeply. This is what I refer to as 'unconscious programming' - and some believe it is only computers that can be programmed. Not true. Our habits are our programmes. We are just like software. The earlier and more deeply we are programmed the harder it is to erase those programmes. And the more 'unconscious' the programming e.g. by social and familial events/influences the harder to re-programme. So those in parental positions beware.
But the influences of the 'herd', I postulate, also come from sociological, religious, philosophical and global angles. Most of us are hardly aware of these influences that etch on us. T&T is seeing the effects of these influences concentrated in problems in managing its youth. However, overall adults are unknowingly affected.
You mention breaking red lights on PBR. Contrast that with driver behaviour in Vancouver,say, where breaking red lights is the exception, where drivers stop their cars to offer pedestrians an opportunity to cross the road. And contrast that with Amsterdam where a zebra (pedestrian crossing) means nothing, and where you'd be mowed down with contempt!
See also Bending the rules.
It's easy to point a finger, though. Harder it is, for each one of us is to look into the mirror!
Post a Comment