THE NATURE OF CONFORMITY AS A SOCIAL CONSTRUCT IN SHIRLEY JACKSON’S THE LOTTERY AND URSULA K. LE GUIN’S THE ONES WHO WALK AWAY FROM OMELAS

Abstract

This paper discusses the psychological and social nature of conformity and its portrayal in the literature, namely in Shirley Jackson's The Lottery and Ursula K. Le Guin's The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas. The paper examines the influence of social pressure, tradition, and collective norms on individuals' moral judgments and behaviors, including situations where individuals act in ways that are unethical despite being aware of their moral wrongfulness. The study follows a qualitative research design, which is grounded in social psychological theories of conformity such as those found in the works of Asch, Kelman and Cialdini, and utilizes close textual analysis and thematic interpretation. It looks at the relationship between normative and informational conformity in fictional societies, and how it affects characters' willingness to accept, comply or resist oppressive systems. Results indicate conformity is not simply a learned reaction; it is a socially constructed entity that is upheld by ritual, fear of rejection, and common beliefs. The analysis shows that conformity is enacted in The Lottery in the form of ritualized violence that is accepted as tradition and in Omelas as rationalized collective happiness based on individual suffering. The two stories depict people who do what they are expected to do, or they walk away without saying a word because social pressure has influenced their moral decision. In both stories, people do what they expect to do or they walk away, silently, because social pressure has influenced their moral decision.

Keywords: Conformity, Social Psychology, Normative Influence, Informational Influence, Shirley Jackson, The Lottery, Ursula K. Le Guin, The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas, Group Pressure, Moral Judgment, Social Norms, Resistance, Kelman Theory, Asch Conformity Experiments, Ritualized Violence, Dystopian Literature, Ethical Dissonance.