Question

Julie says she does not eat sugar because it is unhealthy. However, when she's at a friend's birthday party, she has a piece of cake. She claims she does this to be sociable. Her explanation is an example of:

a) Self-justification.
b) The inoculation effect.
c) A self-fulfilling prophecy.
d) The boomerang effect.

Answer 1

Julie's choice to consume sugar while at a birthday party, despite her usual health stance against it, can be seen as applying different social frames to fit the normative expectations of the event, rather than an example of the inoculation or boomerang effect.

Step-by-step explanation:

Julie's behavior at the birthday party, where she adapts her personal rule against eating sugar in order to be sociable, demonstrates her ability to navigate different social frames. Sociologists like Goffman and others have explored the concept of frames to understand how individuals adjust their behavior according to different social events and the expected norms associated with those events. For example, appropriate behaviors at a formal restaurant differ vastly from those at a casual pizza party, highlighting how social contexts dictate our actions.

Julie's decision to eat cake, despite normally abstaining from sugar for health reasons, is a pragmatic adoption of a different social frame, one that emphasizes social harmony over strict personal health guidelines. This form of behavior adaptation resembles neither the inoculation effect nor the boomerang effect. Instead, it's an example of the flexibility with which individuals apply social norms to foster comfortable interpersonal relations, even if it means temporarily suspending one's usual practices.