There are laws in place to prevent behavior that would typically result in injury or harm to another person, including violations of property rights. Those who enforce the laws have been given the right of a government to control behavior for the benefit of society as a whole. Let`s go back for a moment to our example of having multiple wives. It is illegal, a violation of the law, to have multiple women in American culture. It hasn`t always been like this, and it`s not true in every country, but in the United States it has been considered so taboo, morally and ethically reprehensible that there are laws that can punish people for marrying more than one person at a time. However, there may be people who don`t think it`s wrong, or certain groups, but regardless, it`s still illegal. This evolution observed in the raw data is illustrated in Fig. La Fig. 5 confirms where we reproduce Fig. 3, but for the measurement of misperception. As shown in Table 1 (second row of each subrange), these results are all statistically significant, based on DiD estimates of linear models, similar to (1), where misperception is used as the dependent variable. This effect on misperceptions, which reflects the effect on perceived social norms, is primarily motivated by the fact that personal norms themselves do not change (see supporting information, Figure S2).
We also note that the effect is not determined by the use of weights, through replication of the DiD estimate of the effect on perceived social norms using weighted data (see additional information, Table S7). These results suggest that the most plausible channel is that the law has changed the perception of the social norm without actually changing the norm itself. In fact, the law of the handshake, the dimension in which misperceptions were initially lowest, had virtually no effect on the perception of the social norm. This interpretation is also supported by analysis of the heterogeneity of the response of perceived social norms to lockdown in the UK. When interacting with the treatment effect with subjective perceptual variables in separate models, the only dimension of heterogeneity that appears to matter appears to be the quality of individuals` information about COVID-19 itself, measured as the discrepancy between their estimate of the number of COVID-19 cases and the actual number in their country. The larger this gap, the greater the perception of the social norm regarding curfews. These results are provided with the results of interactions with individual covariates in supporting information tables S8 and S9, which show that our results remain stable in controlling for these interactions. Our work takes a holistic approach beyond the scope of the literature above, as we examine the effects of law on the combination of personal and perceived norms, and in particular the impact on misperceptions.
This allows us to unravel the mechanisms proposed by [1]. In its factual sense, Kelsen proposes that “the law is an order of human behavior.” By drawing similarities between order, morality, and etiquette, Kelsen suggests that the very factual nature of law makes it an empirical phenomenon. Law is thus defined both as a social technique that forces those subject to it to a system of codes of conduct, while order is a vast system of norms derived and validated for the same reason. An individual can thus determine whether a norm belongs to a normative system by declaring that it derives its validity from the fundamental norm that constitutes the order. [10] In their normative sense, laws are defined as “what to do if something were to be done.” Kelsen suggests that the normative statement “it`s a rule” can only make sense in the context of regular behaviour combined with a thoughtful and critical attitude of the population. In this perspective, Kelsen ignores the specific “internal” dimension that determines the meaning of normative expressions that relate to human values and morality. [10] Norms can be internalized, which would make an individual conform without external rewards or punishments. There are four types of social norms that can help inform people about behaviors considered acceptable: folk tunes, customs, taboos, and laws.
In addition, social norms can vary depending on time, culture, location, and even subgroup. [1] Perhaps stricter than folk customs because they can lead to a violation of what we consider moral and ethical behavior. Customs are standards of morality, or right and wrong, and if you break one, it`s often considered offensive to most people in a culture. [3] Sometimes another violation may be illegal, but sometimes it may only be offensive. If an increase is not enshrined in law, it cannot be sanctioned by the criminal justice system. At other times, it can be both illegal and morally reprehensible. When this theory is placed in a legal context, an action is considered correct when an individual who is a virtuous moral agent performs an act that shows the essence of human excellence. In the application of virtuous legal norms, a theory of judgment centered on virtue shows the characteristics of judicial moderation, courage, temperament, intelligence, wisdom, and justice. These Excellencies can be reflected in a concern for justice in virtuous jurisprudence. [9] These are folk customs – two social norms that do not come with powerful consequences. Dealing with violations of legal norms through imprisonment and fines puts pressure on members of a society to comply and comply with accepted standards.
Experimental and empirical literature has examined how laws influence personal norms. A first wave of studies (e.g. [9], in a laboratory coordination game, [10-12], in the context of social dilemmas and [13], in the field) shows that laws influence behaviors that go beyond changing monetary incentives. Most of these studies argue that the results are consistent with the fact that laws change personal norms. A second wave of studies provides direct evidence of this effect of laws. [14] show that legal recognition of same-sex partnerships is associated with a significant improvement in personal standards towards sexual minorities. Using a vignette experiment [15], we show that laws influence whether people perceive certain behaviors as socially appropriate. However, very few articles examine how laws affect the perception of social norms, with the exception of [16, 17], which compares perceived social norms before and after intervention in a single country – without controlling for the possible confounding effects of time-varying factors. Finally, and most importantly for the study of crime and criminal justice, are our laws. Remember that a social norm is a commitment to society that can lead to sanctions for violations. Therefore, laws are social norms that have been officially enshrined at the state or federal level and laws can lead to formal penalties for violations such as fines, imprisonment or even death. Laws are a form of social control that describes the rules, habits, and customs that a society uses to enforce conformity to its standards.
The outcome variable yid refers to either one of the four perceived social norms or one of the four measures of misperceptions, as defined in the Robustness Analysis section. Control variables for vector x include, in particular, measures (current and lagged) of changes in COVID-19 deaths and confirmed cases in the country to date. We also include country-age-sex effects, rural education, income quintile and fixed effects of the day, and control of household composition. Finally, we account for individual correlation in unobserved heterogeneity both over time within and between individuals within countries by grouping standard errors at the country-sex level. In the main tables, we give only estimates of β parameters. For full results tables, see Additional Information, Table S5. Also note that we do not control for normative beliefs in our preferred regressions to perceived social norms, as they are likely endogenous to unobserved heterogeneity that produces differences in perceived social norms. The robustness check, available upon request from the authors, shows that the results are still valid when normative beliefs are controlled and, on the contrary, are stronger both statistically and in terms of magnitude.
We approach the first concern in two ways. First, as explained in the section`s data, our main source of identification is the discontinuity of government policy in the UK on March 23. As an alternative to difference estimates using the entire sampling period, we limit the analysis to the vicinity of the gap and focus exclusively on data observed on March 22 and March 24 (see Panel A). The results confirm that the March 23 announcement is the main source of deviations in our main specification.