Psychological Elements of the Crowd Essays

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This is modeled by the fact that people being in groups, causes them to act and think differently than they would have if they had been alone. In her essay, Tavris uses many examples of this: In the case of Kitty Genovese or the late Rodney King who was beat to death by police officers. People have a tendency to act differently in groups, others suffer due to people not wanting to “rock the boat” or they do not want to “embarrass themselves or others if they are wrong” (19). Tavris offers a solution to the way people act in groups, “By understanding the impulse to diffuse responsibility, perhaps as individuals we will be more likely to act. By understanding the social pressures that reward group-think, loyalty and obedience, we can foster those that reward whistle blowing and moral courage. And, as a society, we can reinforce the belief that they also sing who stand and watch” (19). If civilization can solve the dilemma of people acting differently when they are in groups with others, the world could be a much improved place.

If you saw someone being attacked on the street, would you help? Many of us would quickly say yes we would help because to state the opposite would say that we are evil human beings. Much research has been done on why people choose to help and why others choose not to. The bystander effect states that the more bystanders present, the less likely it is for someone to help. Sometimes a bystander will assume that because no one else seems concerned, they shouldn't be (Senghas, 2007). Much of the research that has been done supports this definition of the bystander effect. There have also been recent situations where this

Over the course of my observations of McComas Gym’s weight room, it was easy to figure out what type of audience would be interested in my essay. Based off this audience, I developed a persona who represents the weight room community by combining many of the characteristics I observed in individuals in the weight room. My developed persona is an ideal representative of an “insider” to the weight room community, as well as a representative of my essay’s audience.

Social influences shape every person's practices, judgments, and beliefs. (Asch 306) In "Opinions and Social Pressure", Solomon Asch examines how individuals tend to conform to a group or majority. He does this by explaining the results of his experiment that he devised to observe to what extent conformity occurs. In her essay titled "Group Minds", Doris Lessing claims that as a society we have enough knowledge about conformity to do something about it, yet we choose not to. Although Doris Lessing and Solomon Asch both suggest that people desire independence yet yield to conformity, Asch's experiment adds specificity to Lessing's claims. Lessing speaks generally about groups and the effect they have on conformity, whereas Asch's experiment

stupid. Barry relates the story of driving through Tampa, when two people wearing furry pig suits say that they are trying to convert people to veganism. His mental response was not thoughts of meatless meals but of “these people are insane, I could go for some barbeque.” The author also shares his belief in the inefficacy of shouting in large groups. Occupy Wall Street was a prime example of this mentality. I do sympathize with many of their aims, because I am definitely one of the 99%. However, when they did a months-long protest in Philadelphia at City Hall, I went home the long way around because the protesters came across as dangerous and possibly unstable. As the late Terry Pratchett said, “The intelligence of that creature known as a crowd is the square root of the number of people in

Rebecca Saxe, an associate professor of cognitive neuroscience at MIT commented on the psychological trigger of mob mentality saying, "A group of people will often engage

As human beings, each person on earth possesses a desire to belong. In order to meet this need, one must find a way to fit in with a group. Yet somehow, once a group has been joined, humans tend to take on the ideas and opinions of the group without analyzing the situation for themselves. Doris Lessing, in her essay, “Group Minds”, proposes the idea that humans spend their whole life going along with the group because they fail to analyze the reasons behind their actions. While Lessing’s idea is valid, no one has yet successfully implemented her plan.

The term groupthink in this report is defined as, the social psychological phenomenon that results in groups during pressure situations. This social psychology theory is broken down into eight signs. Illusion of invulnerability, Collective rationalization, Belief in inherent morality, Stereotyped views of out-groups, Direct pressure on dissenters, Self-censorship, Illusion of unanimity, Self-appointed “mindguards”. According to research conducted by Irving Janis, there are three conditions to groupthink. The first, "high group cohesiveness" which is the direction for a group to be in unity while working towards a goal, or to satisfy the emotional needs of its members. Secondly, the structural faults such as insulation of the group, lack

When analyzing social patterns and behaviors, is there a significant difference between the psychology of an individual and groups? Collective and individual behavior is surprisingly similar, and depending on the circumstances, identical. In Charles Siebert essay “An Elephant Crackup,” he validates to readers, through social elephant narratives and herd mentality theory, that similarly to an individual elephant all elephants behave in similar ways. Furthermore, Sherry Turkle in selections from her work Alone Together accounts

By identifying with a group, collective emotions can be experienced even in solitude, as evidenced by the existence of two separate worlds. The use of “incommensurable” points to the dichotomy of society and the individual and highlights the fact that the social construct consists of individual components rather than a single entity. This is evidenced when a man speaks to the crowd and “His language becomes high-flown…the feelings he arouses return to him enlarged and amplified, reinforcing his own to the same degree” (212). The speaker expresses the collective sentiment and, much like a biological positive feedback loop, the emotions of the crowd resonate back to the speaker. Thus the speaker transcends his own identity as simply an individual and becomes an incarnate of the group. When emotions trickle down from society to the individual, they loop back and beget society.

There are many explanations for the origins of modern social psychology. It is therefore important to consider that social psychology cannot be traced back to one single source of origin (Burr, 2003). Hence, this is the reason why there are debates of what social psychology is. Allport (1985) described social psychology as the study an individual’s thoughts, feelings, and behaviours which are influenced by the actual, imagines, or implied presence of others. As seen from this definition there is a direct link between social science and the individual psychology (Sewell, 1989). Social psychology cannot be seen as a linear phenomenon. This is because social psychology has been derived from a combination of influences. The development of

What judgments do we make about others? Everyday we make judgments in our social interactions about why others act the way they do, which is known as

This research article was taken from the Association for Psychological Science (APS) Journal. This specific issue had a total of ten articles, and while they are covering different topics and studies, some of them do focus on similar ideas. Psychology is all about the study of the mind, and how it has different parts intended for unique functions. It seems like a good portion of the articles for this specific journal deal with emotions and how the body interprets them. One article deals with the stress of different generations, while another deals with an individual’s willpower against sugar. There is an article about self-esteem and how that varies during a lifetime, as well as an article on cooperation. The article that will be specifically discussed in this research paper also has to deal with how the body interprets things when it comes to a stressful situation, such as a crime. It looks at how reliable eyewitness testimony is after traumatic events, specifically in regards to lineups.

One of the facets of living within civilized society is that there are certain norms and social conventions that people must follow. Frequently, there is a large effort on the part of government, financial, and social institutions to keep people doing most of the same thing as others going to work, driving cars, buying homes, etc. Despite the fact that people engage in these efforts individually, the simple fact that they are all attempting to do the same thing, in much the same way, is indicative of the fact that they are engaged in collective behavior. THESIS: Those who are able to overcome collective behavior and allow for their individuality to determine their own outcomes exemplify the best of human nature.