Rule Makers, Rule Breakers by Michelle Gelfand

In RULE MAKERS, RULE BREAKERS author Michelle Gelfand, an award-winning professor of psychology at the University of Maryland, builds on earlier work to explore ideas of cultural norms.  In a 2011 study, she and colleagues investigated the behaviors of some 7,000 people in more than 30 countries. In conjunction with other work, that led to her tightness vs. looseness system for classifying cultures.  For example, she argues that tightness is shown in Singapore’s strong social norms against littering or jaywalking whereas the United States would generally be much more permissive (looser) with respect to those actions.  She also writes accessibly about happiness and the quest to maximize societal well-being through a balance of tight-loose constraints. Another interesting discussion parallels recent headlines and focuses on the dilemma posed by the Internet: “we need to have loose mindsets to adapt to technology, yet we need tighter norms to regulate the destructive, normless, and fear-mongering behavior that it enables.”

RULE MAKERS, RULE BREAKERS is divided into three parts (labeled Foundations, Analysis, and Applications); plus, it contains extensive source notes (almost 40% of the text) which will contribute to its usefulness for our psychology, history and/or geography classes.