This is shown by a study of Swedish and global everyday norms, conducted at the Institute for Futures Studies and Mälardalen University.
"We are the strictest country in the entire study when it comes to talking during a movie," says researcher and mathematician Kimmo Eriksson at the Institute for Futures Studies, in a press release.
The study is based on responses from 25,422 people from 90 countries and is presented as one of the largest surveys of unwritten social rules ever conducted. Sweden stands out as a country with individually permissive norms – as long as it does not involve “behavior that is considered disruptive to others”, such as talking in the cinema.
“At the same time, we see that people around the world have become more sensitive to behaviors that do not take into account,” says Kimmo Eriksson.
Yet, everyday norms have become more permissive globally, according to the researchers, who compared them with a similar study from the early 2000s. Listening to music on headphones, reading the newspaper or eating in public is more acceptable today than it was 20 years ago.
“Everyday norms are largely global,” says the article’s other lead author, Pontus Strimling, sociologist and research director at the Institute for Futures Studies.
