Shopping with Mr. Smith; A Deaf Man

Madison Tilley

Professor Overstreet

Human Socialization

 March 19, 2013

Shopping with Mr. Smith; A Deaf Man

For my assignment I chose to go on an imaginary shopping date with a man that I know from my work, Kroger. I have been with the Kroger Company a long time and have been in several different positions that included a cashier then a customer care supervisor. When working these positions there was a regular customer that would come in all the time to shop and buy lottery tickets. As a cashier he would come through my register line and seemed friendly enough but never answered any of my questions like, “Hi, How are you? Or Did you find everything alright?”. I found out he was deaf when I was a supervisor and he came in with his friend that mentioned he was deaf when I tried speaking with him as well when he  wrote everything down on a piece of paper. When thinking about what disability that I could research for this assignment I found that being deaf is one of  the hardest disabilities to adapt to because the person has to change his or her life around dramatically. I think the biggest factor would be not being able to communicate with the people around you.

                I wanted to do something a little different with this assignment so I chose to go on an imaginary shopping exhibition with this regular customer at Kroger, let’s call him Mr. Smith since I don’t know his name.

1.       Adaptability: At Kroger the scenery never changes except the displays for holidays and the like. The store is laid out for the exact same behaviors and you can’t change or accommodate for other behaviors.  In Mr. Smith’s case I think consistency can work for his disability since he often comes in alone and can’t communicate very well with the hearing other than writing things down. It works out well that we know what behavior he is going to participate in i.e. shopping.

2.       Comfort: I would assume for Mr. Smith that our Kroger is comfortable and familiar to him. Since he comes in all the time he knows where everything is and is recognized by the employees. Whatever he can’t find he goes up to the service desk and writes a note to ask where it is. Also he is an avid lottery player and all the supervisors at the desk know his ticket choices and have them ready for him before he ‘asks’. The environment at the service counter is comfortable because there is paper available there if Mr. Smith wanted to write a note to the supervisors and well as a glass case with the lottery scratch-offs that he could just point to.

3.       Sensory Stimulation: The store is a little drab but it can catch the eye with all the fancy displays and after listening to all the boring grocery store music I wouldn’t mind not hearing that for a while.  I would say overall the sensory stimulation is low because we are a small store that doesn’t get a ton of business. However on heavy business days the sensory stimulation would be very high due to the amount of people in the store. Because of Mr. Smith’s disability he would have to compensate with his other senses but probably mostly his sight. I imagine it’s hard to navigate through the store when it is crowded only using sight.

4.       Activity:  Like mentioned before we are a small store and only occasionally we get really busy.  The intensity of the behavior would be minimal. Mr. Smith does tend to come later in the evening when we are very slow and the activity is limited to the employees who work on the front end cleaning. This time insures the store would be easy to get around because of the lack of people and the least amount of activity.

5.       Sociality: I believe that our store encourages a great deal of employee to customer interaction especially on the front end and the check out registers. The front end is where every customer funnels into eventually. Considering there are only four self scan stations, compared to the typical eight that you see in larger stores like Wal-Mart our environment forces interaction during the check out.  In Mr. Smith’s case sociality is a big factor with the customer service counter since he goes to the desk to buy his tickets every shopping trip. Again this emphasizes the employee to customer interaction; the service desk exists for that very reason.

6.       Legibility:  Legibility is a big environment determinate for Mr. Smith. The store is properly labeled and has signs everywhere! There are signs for the different departments as well as the aisles are labeled and had a brief list of items that can be found down them. The registers are labeled as well as the customer service desk and even a directory is available and easy to access. Finding your way around is easy and can considerable ease the burden on Mr. Smith when limited to sight.

7.       Control: Kroger is not an environment where an individual could customize and control. Since it’s a public space and customers come and go all the time there is no control for an individual. Most of the time that is expected from such a public place and even people with disabilities cannot manipulate the setting to their needs.

8.       Privacy: Since Kroger is a public shopping center it is not private at all and it is very apparent when a person comes in to shop with a disability. When there are many people in the store it could make the shopping experience taxing. Due to this lack of privacy a person with a disability could feel uncomfortable and gawked at, especially with little kids who don’t understand. Mr. Smith may feel this way and could affect what time he comes in.

I wanted to end this assignment with a brief YouTube video of an interview with a deaf person, Jackie Roth.  As I mentioned earlier that being deaf changes the lifestyle dramatically compared to the hearing. This short video clip is from a documentary about the deaf and how she lives in ‘both worlds’. Although the video does not go into great lengths about the environment she does mention on when she used to go out in public with her deaf parents to restaurants and the like they would tell her to sign under the table so no one would notice. I really like this video because it gives me a better look into the world of the deaf.

I really liked doing this assignment because I have to look into how the environment effects everyone not only those with disability, although it effects them a considerably more. I have learned a lot about what Mr. Smith has to go through just to do his shopping and it has inspired me to learn a little bit of ASL so maybe the next come he comes in I can communicate more effectively with him.

Disclaimer: Pictures are from Google not from my place of employment