This is an actual write up I did for a social psychology class. The assignment was to be a social deviant for a day. This was my experience.
Enjoy!
My typical appearance and behavior can be considered socially deviant, so it was hard to decide on an activity that would be especially noticeable to others as outside of any general social or my own “norm.” The limitations of my already deviant self, added to my fear of performance, led to my choosing a more passive deviance. I choose a behavior that had absolutely pissed me off at the beginning of the semester, one that I could easily pretend I didn’t even notice—I choose to use so much of an essential oil (lavender), I would bomb an entire classroom. As I did not want to instigate an asthma or allergy attack, I researched on the internet, the night before, to make sure that this would not have any negative consequences of a medical nature. This is why I chose a natural essential oil, over a perfume.
My expectations of this experiment were made by considering the way I believed I would react, should I come across someone else performing this behavior (self reference effect). I thought that I would hear audible questions and complaints from the other students in the classroom. I had expectations of people purposely stepping back and away from me. I expected directed questions about the smell coming from my person, or at least generalized “What is that smell?” questions from those around me. I really hoped that when I was in a crowd situation, the smell would be a repellant of all around and I would have a nice bubble of personal space. Some of this happened, but not to the degree I had anticipated or hoped for.
Let me just say that I hate this. I cannot stand perfume, artificial smells, or even natural smells that overpower everything else. I feel that strong smells of any kind are a kind of nose rape—an unwelcome assault of the olfactory sense. As I didn’t want to ruin my clothing or backpack, I put half a bottle of lavender essential oil on some napkins. I either put the napkins in my backpack or in my pocket, depending on where I went. I could not stand the smell of myself. It took over my car. It got worse and worse throughout the day, even though I thought the smell would dissipate and I would have to reapply throughout the day. My brain tried to reason with itself as to ways I could avoid participating in this experiment. Since the source of the smell was on a napkin, I could just “forget” it when I went in somewhere, right? Uggg.
At school, the first person I ran into was a “hippie” girl who held the door for me, as she was behind me in the hall, it was hard to look back and see her reaction as she followed what must have been a thick lavender wave coming from my person. The next place I went was my Neuroscience class. I put my backpack hanging on the desk hook, with the scent pocket open. My brain likes to think that the guys that sit behind me are always laughing at me, but the chatter and laughter seemed to be less than usual, so I cannot say if there was any effect on their senses. About halfway through the class, I started sneezing and my eyes were watering from being exposed to it for so long, already. I wanted to pack up and leave the lecture. By the end of class, my next door neighbor’s eyes were watering and he was sneezing genuinely, too (I cannot say with actual knowledge if it was due to the smell or his own allergies, but it had been raining for days and I doubt there was much pollen in the air).
The next place I went was the bench outside. I sat there and smoked a cigarette, while chatting, with two psychology students. I don’t know if they knew what was going on and refused to react (one is in this class, this semester) or if the wind was causing the smell to be carried away, too quickly for them to notice. Talking to the person in my Social Psychology class, the next day, referencing my experiment and not getting any reaction from her, makes me think the wind was just carrying the scent away.
As I was done with classes, I decided to try my situation out in the normal world places. I went to my bank and instead of using the ATM, I went inside to withdraw money. As I was getting out of my car, my head tried to convince me to leave the oil soaked napkin in the car. Out of respect for due process of the experiment, I forced myself to put it in my pocket (even I know when it is wise to NOT carry a backpack with a patch of the word Asshole, among other “antisocial” messages). Standing in line may have been the most uncomfortable and enjoyable thing I have done in a long time. The lady ahead of me kept inching forward and I kept creeping ever so slightly closer (within arm’s length social conventions). The guy who got in line behind me didn’t realize what he had gotten into, until he had stood there for a few seconds--once the line moved, he did not. He never made eye contact or look in my direction, though. I stood in the teller window for an extra bit of time to increase my exposure, while writing down my observances. Another customer came to the window; after a few seconds he was clearing his throat, while side-eye glancing in my direction.
Then, I went to Walmart and tried to infect the air of several people, by standing near them and looking at items on the shelves. However, Walmart is a funny place filled with lots of funny smells and lots of funny people who couldn’t give two shits (or can’t smell, either due to their own smells or those around *I start with external attribution first naturally…maybe I am making an internal attribution about Walmart by saying it is smelly, though?). Next, I tried to stop by my art studio, to “run into” people I know, but it was too early in the day for activities, so I succumbed to the desire of comfort and went home to wait until it was time for the other things I had planned that day. All of these stops between class and home were not anything I would normally do. They were things I had to find reason to do, just so I would have extra time around people for the purpose of this experiment. I was difficult to convince myself to do those things and I didn’t have the energy to do more, at that moment.
When I got home, I gave my boyfriend a hug. It took at least half a minute for him to pull away in disgust (he does not like odor of any kind, save that of yummy edibles). I kinda laughed it off and went into my own little office, which is just to the side of his office—the distance between us is about 12-15 ft, with a doorway (but no door) in between. Five minutes later he was whining and crying about how awful it was making both rooms smell. I had to break down and let him in on the research I was doing. He asked if I could either go away for the rest of the day, or put the oil covered napkins outside. I conceded to move to the dining room (which is a part of a larger space, so the smell was able to diffuse a bit more and not travel directly to his nose). Otherwise, I told him he had to deal with it, ‘cause if I had to suffer, he did too. I also informed him that it was going to go with us wherever we went that entire day. Finally, I had someone else letting me know the strength of the smell, though. I couldn’t tell if it was only affecting me, or if the smell was actually travelling into the nose of those around. It helped my desire to continue the experiment, knowing that the setup was working, but I still felt like I was going to have to cut my nose off.
We just started looking to buy a house, this week, and had made an appointment with my friend, who is a realtor. This was a great opportunity to test the misery I am putting myself through. I made sure to have as much proximity to her as possible—gave her a hug, stood in a tiny little enclosed space, and walked ahead of her throughout the house. She didn’t say a thing, nor did her face. Nothing. When we left, my boyfriend commented on how funny he thought it was that she didn’t seem to notice. Either she was experiencing a nasal infection, or my friends are weird (please note my use of an external attribution, first in the sentence—it was not in that order when it came to my mind, though I would like to think of it that way).
To Be Continued...
Find out what happened during the rest of the day and what psychological mechanisms I attributed to the actions of myself and reactions around.
