What does the work tell us about how people behave?

In my book, the people who live in the Society have to go by the rules/laws the leaders made. At the beginning Cassia follows the rules and thinks that the Society is making the best choices for everyone. I think that the author is trying to tell the readers that people will follow rules based off of what they've known their whole life like what Cassia is doing. In the front cover of the book it even says "between the only life she's known and a path no one dares to follow... between perfection and passion." Throughout the book she starts to develop deeper feelings though for Ky. This causes her to go against the Society and the life she is so used to. I thought that the author did this because if people are told to do something they usually don't do it and actually do the opposite of whatever they were told to do. This relates to how people behave because most people do that in real life too.