About this course: This is a course on social norms, the rules that glue societies together. It teaches how to diagnose social norms, and how to distinguish them from other social constructs, like customs or conventions. These distinctions are crucial for effective policy interventions aimed to create new, beneficial norms or eliminate harmful ones. The course teaches how to measure social norms and the expectations that support them, and how to decide whether they cause specific behaviors. The course is a joint Penn-UNICEF project, and it includes many examples of norms that sustain behaviors like child marriage, gender violence and sanitation practices. This is Part 1 of the Social Norms, Social Change series. In these lectures, I introduce all the basic concepts and definitions, such as social expectations and conditional preferences, that help us distinguish between different types of social practices like customs, descriptive norms and social norms. Expectations and preferences can be measured, and these lectures explain how to measure them. Measurement is crucial to understanding the nature of the practice you are facing, as well as whether an intervention was or was not successful, and why. In Part 2, we will put into practice all we have learned in Part 1. New! Please use this link for a 30% discount on the recommended book that accompanies this course! https://global.oup.com/academic/product/9780190622053/?cc=us&lang=en&promocode=AAFLYG6
Created by: University of Pennsylvania, Unicef
Taught by: Cristina Bicchieri, S. J. Patterson Harvie Professor of Social Thought and Comparative Ethics
Department of Philosophy
| Level | Beginner |
| Commitment | 4 weeks of study, 2-3 hours/week |
| Language | English |
| How To Pass | Pass all graded assignments to complete the course. |
| User Ratings |
Syllabus
WEEK 1
Interdependent & Independent Actions + Empirical Expectations
Welcome Social Norms, Social Change. This course aims to give you the tools to understand, measure, and change collective practices. This module focuses on two of the basic building blocks the theory of social norms is built on: the distinction between interdependent and independent behavior, and empirical expectations.
13 videos, 7 readings
- Video: Introduction to Interdependent and Independent Behavior
- Video: 1.1
- Video: 1.2
- Reading: What makes a behavior independent versus interdependent?
- Reading: What is a custom?
- Video: 1.3
- Reading: How do the concepts of interdependent and independent behavior apply in the wild?
- Video: 1.4
- Reading: What are social expectations?
- Video: 1.5
- Video: 1.6
- Discussion Prompt: Customs in practice
- Video: Introduction to Empirical Expectations
- Video: 2.1
- Reading: What are empirical expectations?
- Video: 2.2
- Video: 2.3
- Video: 2.4
- Reading: How do unilateral and multilateral expectations relate to imitation and coordination?
- Video: 2.5
- Reading: What is a descriptive norm?
- Discussion Prompt: Descriptive norms in practice
Graded: Quiz #1: Independent and Interdependent Behavior
Graded: Quiz #2: Empirical Expectations
WEEK 2
Normative Expectations + Personal Normative Beliefs
This module adds two more of the basic building blocks of the theory: normative expectations and personal normative beliefs. Although both are "normative" — that is, both have a component dealing with a "should" — there are important differences between normative expectations and personal normative beliefs.
9 videos, 6 readings
- Video: Introduction to Normative Expectations
- Video: 3.1
- Reading: What are Normative Expectations?
- Video: 3.2
- Reading: Sanctions
- Video: 3.3
- Reading: Reference Network Dependence
- Video: 3.4
- Discussion Prompt: Normative Expectations in Practice
- Video: Introduction to Personal Normative Beliefs
- Video: 4.1
- Reading: Non-Prudential Personal Normative Beliefs
- Video: 4.2
- Reading: Personal Normative Beliefs vs. Normative Expectations
- Video: 4.3
- Reading: Attitudes vs. Personal Normative Beliefs
- Discussion Prompt: Personal Normative Beliefs in Practice
Graded: Quiz 3: Normative Expectations
Graded: Quiz 4: Personal Normative Beliefs
WEEK 3
Conditional Preferences + Social Norms
In this module we cover two topics: conditional preferences and social norms. Conditional preferences are the final basic building block of the theory of social norms. After studying all these building blocks, we can finally assemble them to understand what it means for a collective practice to be a social norm.
11 videos, 4 readings
- Video: Introduction to Conditional Preferences
- Video: 5.1
- Video: 5.2
- Reading: What makes a preference a conditional preference?
- Video: 5.3
- Video: 5.4
- Discussion Prompt: Conditional preferences in practice
- Video: Introduction to Social Norms
- Video: 6.1
- Reading: What is a social norm?
- Video: 6.2
- Video: 6.3
- Reading: How do sanctions relate to social norms?
- Video: 6.4
- Video: 6.5
- Reading: How can we diagnose a collective practice?
- Discussion Prompt: Social norms in practice
Graded: Quiz 5: Conditional Preferences
Graded: Quiz 6: Social Norms
WEEK 4
Pluralistic Ignorance + Measuring Norms
This module covers two important topics: pluralistic ignorance and norm measurement. Sometimes individuals endorse their social norms, but sometimes they do not. Knowing when a norm is endorsed is crucial for intervention. But how do we know we are dealing with a social norm or whether it's endorsed? Measurement answers that question.
12 videos, 9 readings
- Video: Introduction to Pluralistic Ignorance
- Video: 7.1
- Reading: What is Pluralistic Ignorance?
- Video: 7.2
- Reading: Whether We are Facing Pluralistic Ignorance is an Empirical Question
- Video: 7.3
- Reading: Possibilities for Tackling Pluralistic Ignorance
- Discussion Prompt: Pluralistic Ignorance in Practice
- Video: Introduction to Measuring Norms
- Video: 8.1
- Reading: Measurement: From the Lab to the Field
- Video: 8.2
- Reading: Hypotheticals and Belief-Expectation Manipulation
- Video: 8.3
- Reading: Measuring Beliefs and Expectations
- Video: 8.4
- Reading: Measuring Social Conditionality of Preference
- Video: 8.5
- Reading: Limits of Traditional Surveys and Solutions
- Video: 8.6
- Reading: Vignettes
- Video: Closing
- Discussion Prompt: Measuring Norms in Practice
Graded: Quiz 7: Pluralistic Ignorance
Graded: Quiz 8A: Measuring Norms, Part 1
Graded: Quiz 8B: Measuring Norms, Part 2
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University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania (commonly referred to as Penn) is a private university, located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. A member of the Ivy League, Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, and considers itself to be the first university in the United States with both undergraduate and graduate studies.
Unicef
Ratings and Reviews
Good content and great that you have the opportunity to learn a lot in very short time (I was able to do the whole course in two days, which is great!). The only critique I have is that several of the questions in the quizzes are formulated quite unclearly, which makes you doubt questions you would probably not doubt otherwise.
This course was very interesting. It helped me understand about how to proceed in the intervention of some of the company employees behavior and expectations. Thank you.
Very god course especially for the Development practitioners.
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The course was difficult but it helped broaden my horizon on how to bring about positive change. Thank you!