Navigating the normativity of behaviour settings: an observational case study.

Traditionally, sensitivity to situational norms is understood as deriving from internal cognitive states that represent the rules for appropriate conduct. On an alternative view, norms are 'out there', in the practices and situations themselves, without being duplicated in the head. However, what does normativity look like when it is performed by people engaging with a concrete situation? A 'behaviour setting' offers a window onto these dynamics. This article presents an observational case study of normative coordination within a behaviour setting. Immersed in a scientific laboratory setting, the observations show how the normative demands of the overall behaviour setting can give shape to various places of action, or 'synomorphs', which invite the participants' activities. Responding to the different needs of each synomorph, in turn, maintains the behaviour setting. What connects these two reciprocal timescales of activity are the situationally sensitive activities of the participants. We end with several examples that bring such sensitivity to the interdependence of the norms of a behaviour setting to the fore. This article is part of the theme issue 'People, places, things, and communities: expanding behaviour settings theory in the twenty-first century'.

Applying the Barker School concept of 'behaviour settings' to virtual contexts.

People are spending more and more time interacting with virtual objects and environments. We argue that Roger Barker's concept of a 'behaviour setting' can be usefully applied to such experiences with relatively little modification if we recognize subjective aspects of such experiences such as presence and immersion. We define virtual behaviour settings as virtual environments where the partly or fully digital milieu is synomorphic with and circumjacent to embodied behaviour, as opposed to the fragmented behaviour settings of much-mediated interaction. We present two tools that can help explain and predict the outcomes of virtual experiences-the behaviour setting canvas (BSC) and model-and demonstrate their utility through examples. We conclude that the behaviour setting concept is helpful in both designing virtual environments and understanding their impact, while virtual environments offer a powerful new methodological paradigm for studying behaviour settings. This article is part of the theme issue 'People, places, things, and communities: expanding behaviour settings theory in the twenty-first century'.