| 3. | Psychology.| a. | approximately average in any psychological trait, as intelligence, personality, or emotional adjustment. |
| b. | free from any mental disorder; sane.
My definition of normal in terms applicability to sociology is Normal: any action or characteristic or belief that is considered acceptable to society as a whole. Common actions and beliefs are the base of the social construction of reality. Ideas and beliefs as to what is considered food. In many cultures dogs are often times seen as meals rather than man's best friend. In our culture dogs are not considered to be food, but why then in parts of Asia is dog considered a specialty. Do the dogs there taste better? Is the meat of the dogs there better for you than the meat of dogs here? No, dog is dog no matter where it is. What changes are the beliefs of those eating the dogs. It is not the taste of dog that keeps people from eating it, it is the belief that dogs are friends not food. A great fictional example of this is in the movie finding nemo. There are a group of sharks that decided that they were going to give up their life of killing fish and start living with them. The sharks bodies had no problem eating fish, in fact they are built to do it, but their beliefs made them view the act as disgusting, their beliefs not there bodies http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_MQdMKuY5A . Applying that same concept to the real world and you get vegetarians. The vast majority of vegetarians never thought meat was disgusting as a child. This belief of theirs came about when they discovered where meat came from. When some people find out that the burger they got from Burger King is made from cows just like the ones at the farm on the side of the highway they are on, then they find it disgusting. Other people can have the same experience and think nothing of it. The vast majority of the population fall in the second group of people can come to terms with the idea that they are eating something that was once alive. The reason they can (my self included) is because of their social construction of reality. Meat eaters have come to the conclusion that yes all though this burger was once part of a living animal it taste good and gives me energy, it is meat in their minds, not a leg, or a back, or even a rib cage, it is meat. Vegetarians view meat as a part of an animal, identifiable. Identity is what allows us to attach emotion to an object. Because meat is identifiable to vegetarians they find it impossible to eat. Which is also the reason the majority of people would never become cannibals. Identity has a lot to do with the social construction of reality and human behavior. A example that everyone knows but rarely thinks of is hostages. What is on a hostage's head when they are on camera? Think about it a black bag. Why would the hostage takers bother to put a bag over a hostages head. Are they trying to keep them from escaping? To a degree yes, but that is not the main reason. The main reason is to keep the hostage takers from identifying with the hostage, reverse Stockholm syndrome in a way. Over the years criminal masterminds and world leaders have learned that if a hostage taker gets to know a hostage they are less likely to kill them. That is why police always wade out hostage situations, the longer the people are hostage, the more time they spend with the hostage taker, the more the hostage taker gets to know them, the harder it is for the hostage taker to kill the hostage if the time comes. That is where the black bag comes in. By covering the face and making it hard to talk the hostage taker doesn't get to know the hostage well, which makes it less difficult for the hostage taker to kill the hostage if the time comes. But now getting back to the social construction of reality. Beliefs are what gives every society its foundation. Beliefs are what cause our actions, are ideas, and our lives. Every thing is constructed upon our foundation of beliefs, and based on what are beliefs are determines how far our society will go to thrive, and are beliefs are what will eventually make our society fall.
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