Reacting to a context specific reprimand: A study of an Italian speech community

Disregarding no-smoking regulations in Italy seems to be an accepted practice even in environments such as hospitals. This paper presents the results of an investigation conducted in two hospitals in Northern Italy on how smokers react to being reprimanded for their offense. The spontaneously produced data analyzed for this study revealed several types of reactive behavior. Gender might have had some impact, among status equals, on the nature of the offenders’ verbal and non-verbal reactions to the reprimand. Not one single case of compliance was observed. There was some evidence, however, that, when the reprimander is in a position of authority, compliance might indeed occur regardless of social distance and gender.