Roy 1959 - "Banana time" - Job satisfaction and informal interaction

Google Scholar Link

Roy, D. (1959). “ Banana time”: Job satisfaction and informal interaction. Human organization, 18(4), 158-168.

Summary

This paper is a qualitative study that makes use of participant observation. Blue collar workers at a menial factory job break their day into pieces using ritualized times and themes, thereby overcoming the monotonous nature of the work. Times included peach time (where one worker would share peaches with the others) and banana time (where one worker would steal the other’s banana and eat it – every day). The fact that the one worker continued to bring a banana every single day lends credence to the idea that the ritual was actually enjoyable. Themes ranged from serious (saving for a funeral) to the nonsensical (repeated chants). One frequent theme was that of kidding, of which specific patterns emerged. Eventually, kidding crossed a line, which resulted in an extended period of abatement of times and themes. Though the group eventually recovered, the theme that crossed a line (regarding a worker’s daughter marrying a professor) was never brought up again, thereby illustrating the costs of loss of psychological safety. These informal themes actually seemed to reflect informal social roles.

Application

Strangely, boredom might actually serve as the impetus for group coalescence. To me, there are interesting applications of this paper to the idea of professionalism (vs tomfoolery).