Page 45 - Social Norms Survey

have moved to these areas from the Kingston Metropolitan Area (KMA).

The mixed gender group was characterised by tension and sparring. Two examples are

given: very few women spoke at first but when the facilitator asked, “What can someone
say or do to a young man to get them upset or mad?” after all the men had spoken, the

facilitator asked an “empress” to say something. One responded: “Money.” This response
immediately led to taunting among the men about women loving money: “That’s all

they think about,” etc., although eventually it moved on to a more serious discussion.
When a similar question was asked in relation to what someone might say to get a young

woman upset, a man immediately responded: “Hey, big pussy gal!” to much laughter.
So for the purposes of the material needed for this research, it was not as useful as it

perhaps could have been, had the participants been given a more carefully designed
set of questions, fewer in number and perhaps more directly querying the social norms to

allow for the inevitable diversions during the discussion. The participants could also have
been asked at the beginning to respect each voice, and to make their own ground rules

so that the discussion would elicit their important but sometimes differing interpretations
of the topics—especially the man/woman differences. Mixed gender groups can clearly

be valuable but they may have to be designed differently, even where there is a strong
facilitator, as was the case here. This requires more interrogation.

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