The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers to this website may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website.
Travel etiquette discussions can get pretty contentious, pretty fast, especially when it comes to airplane travel. Most people (at least anyone with common sense and a little courtesy) can agree that some behaviors are universally bad: getting trashed, getting into fights with flight crew and passengers, etc. But what about reclining your seat? Asking for a seat swap? Breaking out a tasty but pungent snack?
These are questions that a lot of travelers have mulled over, and a recent poll asked Americans where they stood on these etiquette issues. Unsurprisingly, the outcome of the poll itself has sparked a lot of conversation, and one travel pro was particularly excited to talk about it!
As a thrifty travel expert, @pointsbyj catches a lot of flights and has witnessed the full spectrum of passenger behavior, so naturally she wanted to see where people landed on airplane etiquette . Unsurprisingly, people were largely against the obvious no-nos, like getting super drunk or letting kids play in the aisles, but it's the more contentious entries that start to get interesting.
Related: Flight Attendant's Speech About Rude & Entitled Passengers Has People Applauding
"37% said it's ok to make a phone call!" said @pointsbyj, obviously taken aback (I was too - that's a really obnoxious habit for more than a third of respondents to sign off on). It gets even worse, as apparently 46% of respondents said it was cool to chat up a stranger for the whole entire flight. Hello, social anxiety!
A lot of @pointsbyj's followers seem perplexed by some of these answers as well.
"PUTTING SMALL ITEMS IN THE OVERHEAD BIN??? On a full flight, 52% acceptable??? Straight to jail. Under the seat," @twoweeniedogs exclaimed.
"A stranger on a plane should not speak to me unless absolutely necessary," said @ccatherine789.
"I need to know who they polled cause I don't trust any survey - feels like they are asking my grandpa," laughed @tab_ok.
Understand the Results of the Poll
Good question- who did they poll, and how? This airplane etiquette poll comes from YouGov, who claimed that they collected the results from 1,152 American adults this May using sample matching to try to reflect the demographics (gender, age, race, education, voting party, etc.) of the American public as a whole. In short, they're not just asking Grandpa!
Reading further, some of the reflected opinions again seem obvious, others not so much. For example, people were against passengers taking their shoes off or hogging both armrests- makes sense. Like @pointsbyj mentioned, people were also generally fine with passengers lying down if they had a row to themselves. But a majority of respondents (51%) were supportive of making seat swap requests , despite it being a very frequent source of awkward travel drama. Same with reclining your seat: 55% were in favor with only 26% explicitly against, and while I'm not anti-seat reclining in all circumstances, I expected that one to be more divisive. What gives?
Well, a lot of that comes down to travel frequency, as YouGov wrote that opinions varied widely based on how much respondents flew. For example, they noted that 26% of frequent flyers said it's acceptable to zone out during the safety demonstration , as opposed to only 16% of infrequent flyers. That tracks: obviously you should always pay attention to those demonstrations, but when you're used to hearing it all the time, you start to tune it out (I'm guilty of it myself).
Differences in etiquette standards between frequent flyers and occasional travelers probably contribute to a lot of air travel drama , and because not everyone has the money, time, or desire to fly frequently, that's not an easy hurdle to get around. Looks like we'll never be 100% on the same page for all travel etiquette "rules." However, I still think if people generally ascribe to the Golden Rule and give their fellow flyers the same grace they'd want to receive, people can still avoid a lot of faux pas regardless of how often they fly!
For more WanderWisdom updates, be sure to follow us on Google News !
Have you had a funny, interesting, or just highly memorable experience while traveling? We'd love for you to submit a video of your travels for a chance to be featured on WanderWisdom and our social channels! Click here to upload your clip and share your adventures with the world.
Most Popular
Comments / 0