Collective behavior originates spontaneously, is relatively unorganized,

fairly unpredictable, plan less in its course of development and

depends upon inter-stimulation among participants
Relatively unorganized patterns of social interaction in human groups
A crowd is temporary collection of people reacting to a specific stimuli
(a crowd is temporary)
Its members rarely know each other
Most forms of crowd behavior are unstructured with no rules, no
tradition, no formal controls, no designated leaders, no established
patterns for the members to follow
CONTAGION THEORY
Crowd behavior is irrational and uncritical response to the
psychological temptations of the crowd situation
Elitist view crowd behavior as childish, impulsive and irresponsible
FACTORS OF CONTAGION THEORY
ANONYMITY: the greater the anonymous crowd the greater the
possibility of extreme action
The anonymity removes the sense of individuality for the members
They do not feel as being singled out from the crowd
Members seldom confess any guilty feeling after and atrocity
IMPERSONALITY: when groups interact with others , this takes a very
little amount of personal feelings or relation with other groups
Some peaceful passersby are attacked by the violent crowd members
If the opponent group is enemy then any member from that group can
be a victim
If it becomes personal then the group loses its nature
SUGGESTIBILITY: Since crowd behavior is unstructured with no
established leaders for members to carry out
The unpredictability of the crowd make it suggestible as they act upon
the suggestion made in an authoritative manner
STRESS: People under stress, fatigue, fear, anxiety, insecurity and
anger become a part of riots, social movements etc.
INTERACTIONAL AMPLIFICATION: It is the process through which
the members of the crowd stimulate and respond to one another and
thereby increase their emotional intensity and responsiveness
CONVERGENCE THEORY
Crowd behavior arises from the gathering of people who share
common interests, needs, impulses, dislikes and purposes.
For example, a motorcycle rally attracts a quite different crowd like
who are single, young, outsiders etc.

Crowd behavior can be rational and goal directed

EMERGENT NORM THEORY
During a crowd behavior a norm arises that governs the behavior
(determinants)
1. Society structure encourages or discourages a collective behavior,
(more common in modern societies)
2. Structural strain and fear of injustice prompt many extreme actions
3. Existence of a belief among the members that identifies a source of
threat, route of escape
4. Police brutality on a particular segment may result in riot
5. Leadership mobilizes the action and activity
6. It can be interrupted by leadership, police, government policies or
other social controls
LIMITATIONS OF CROWD BEHAVIOR
In a crowd situation people do things what they actually do not do but
they do it as most of the members would like to do it
People tear and break things in a riot without any guilty feeling about it to
fulfill their frustrated wish
Homogeneous audience like youth are most responsive (convergence
theory)
Those who do not like it are placed at edges where core of the crowd has
like minded members
Shouting at the ideas of a speaker whose ideas seem wicked to the crowd
and when the crowds leader is silenced then extreme reaction is shown
by trampling justice into dust
At a crowd any one can become a leader by shouting out suggestions and
commands and can direct the aggression of the crowd to take action
against the enemy
The leader sometimes develops an impassionate reminder of the problem
of the people to bring out an extreme action
The leader suggests the action to release the tension by directing the
crowd
He justifies the suggested action by stimulating the crowd from one
objective to another
Sometimes external control like cold thunder weather, police and troops
involvement may curtail a riot
FORMS OF CROWD BEHAVIOR
AUDIENCE: An audience is a crowd with interest centered on stimuli
outside themselves (the stimuli is mainly one way, like tv, radio)
RIOT: A riot is the action of a violently aggressive and destructive crowd

 Like Hindu Muslim riots in Subcontinent

Race, religion or nationality no matter what crowd behavior remains the
same
Without effective police discouragement the frustrated group start action
against the enemy group which also strikes back starting the riot
PANIC: Panic is an emotional state of desperate and uncontrollable fear
With little escape outlet the action is uncontrollable but with no escape
reaction is calm accepting the fate
MASS BEHAVIOR: mass behavior is the unorganized, unstructured,
uncoordinated, individually chosen behavior of masses
mass is different from a crowd the people watching match in a stadium
are audience whereas those watching at t.v are the mass
RUMOR: A rumor is a rapidly spreading report
unsubstantiated/unconfirmed by fact
They might spread through mass media or by word of mouth They can
ruin reputations, discredit a cause and flourish under social strain
FAD OR FASHION: A fad is short lived variation in speech, decoration or
behavior
It originates with the desire to look different and maintain status and dies
out after sometime
Fashions are similar to fads but change less rapidly and tend to be cyclic ,
they are common in societies with a class system
MASS HYSTERIA: It is some form of irrational, uncontrollable behavior
which spreads among people
Like belief about flying objects from the space
It sometimes becomes physical illness epidemics
DISASTER BEHAVIOR: It is the kind of behavior originated after an
occurrence of a disaster
Disaster studies are useful in showing officials what to expect when
disaster hits and how to mobilize their resources
Traumatized people and children like skill development
NORMS
Culture defines the way things should be done we say it is
normative, it defines the standards of conduct
Term NORM has two meanings,
STATISTICAL NORM: the way things actually are, as they actually exist
(real culture), how people actually act
CULTURAL NORM: the way things are expected to exist (ideal culture),
how people are expected to act
Folkways

 Folkways are simply the customary, normal, habitual ways a group

does things
Shaking hands, eating with knives and forks, wearing neckties on some
occasions and sport shirts on others, driving on the right hand, eating
toast for breakfast
New generations absorb folkways by deliberate teaching but mainly by
observing and taking part in them
MORES
Some folkways are important than others
The strong ideas of right and wrong which require certain acts and
forbid others
Violation of mores may bring disaster upon them
Eating with fork or hand is acceptable but adultery (faithless) is not
Like eating pork is forbidden whereas cow in some cultures, wearing
clothes
Some mores forbidden in one culture may not be so in another
Mores are BELIEFS of rights and wrongs according to ones belief and
become absolute sometimes
Violating them becomes intolerable
Mores depend on genuine cause and effect relationship like
condemnation of murders ensures individual and group survival to
protect the WELFARE
INSTITUTIONS
Organized cluster of folkways and mores dealing with highly important
activities are embodied in the social institutions of the society
RELIGION, EDUCATION, FAMILY, ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL
Institutions include behavior norms, values and ideals and system of
social relationships
LAWS
Mores have a strong tendency for them to become laws
People obey mores to do the right while some try to violate they are
made to conform by laws through threat of legal punishment
The non conformist are punished
Some laws if not in accordance to mores become impossible to be
enforced
VALUES
Values are ideas whether experiences are important or unimportant
One may not debate whether classic music is right or wrong one may
enjoy it by attaching to personal experience while some get bored
Physically fit people will exercise regularly and watch their food habits

Values thus guide personal judgment and behavior

Values change from time to time
Value disagreements are endless in complex societies
Value shift may cause change in folkways and mores
An act is considered legitimate (morally acceptable) if in harmony with
expected values
personality
Def; Personality is the totality of behavior of an individual with a given
tendency system interacting with a sequence of situations
A given tendency indicates that the person has the characteristic ways of
acting and acts the same day and the after day
When characteristic resemble we try to relate them with the ones showing
similar behavior
1. BIOLOGICAL INHERITANCE: PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT:
CULTURE: GROUP EXPERIENCE: SOCIAL ISOLATES; HARLOWS
EXPERIMENT( Monkey experiment)

Reference group ,unique experience

group
Is any number of people who share consciousness of membership
together and of interaction
Share some common characteristics
When two or more people are in a state of interaction it is called a
group
5 ESSENTIALS OF A GROUP
There should be at least two persons for constituting a group
There should be communication among the individuals (physical
contact may not be necessary)
Interacting persons should share common interests among themselves
The activities of the group are regulated by some structure like human
relationships
There should be interdependence among the members
aggregation or collectivity
If two or more persons are waiting for a bus they are not termed as a
group until they come into some sort of conversation
They are called aggregation or collectivity rather than a group
Until something calls for their attention collectively they become a
group called audience
Stages of movemnets

1. THE UNREST STAGE: Of growing confusion and discontent

2. THE EXCITEMENT STAGE: When discontent is focused,Causes of
discontent are identified,Proposal of action are debated
3. FORMALIZATION STAGE: When leaders emerge,Programs and tactics
are developed
4. INSTITUTIONALIZATION: Organizations or bureaucracy taken over and
crystalizes the entire movement,Often end the active life of the
movement
5. DISSOLUTION STAGE: When movement becomes an permanent
organization Or fades away, to be revived at some other date
Kind of social movements
EXPRESSIVE: when people instead of changing reality adapt the reality
UTOPIAN: Attempt to create perfect society a model to be copied by
others
REFORM: Improve society rather than changing its structure
REVOLUTIONARY: Sudden sweeping usually changing the entire social
system, as revolutionist believe that reforms are impossible under the
previous structure
RESISTANCE: Obstruct a change like movement to restrict legal
abortion, anti feminist movements
pressure group
A pressure group can be understood as an association of persons with
a common economic interest who try to influence governmental
decisions.
These pressure groups also known as interest groups pursue their
political goals through lobbying- the process by which individuals and
groups communicate with public officials in order to influence decisions
of government.
Types of pressure group
Primary pressure groups are organizations which involve themselves in
political activities designed to influence public policy
Secondary pressure groups engage mainly in non-political activity and
involve themselves in actual political processes only rarely.
Membership of sectional pressure groups is confined to those who are
personally involved in the sector of activity which the pressure groups
represent traders, auto drivers etc.
Role is a behavior expected of one who holds a particular status

 Status It is the rank of a person in a group, or of a group in relation to

other groups
ROLE TAKING EXPERIMENT BY ZIMBARDO (Fake prison )
Xenocentrism
It is the belief that our own ideas, products and styles are inferior to
those which originate anywhere else
The word Xenocentrism means preference from the foreign
ethnocentrism
Ethnocentrism refers to the view of things in which ones own group is
the center of everything and all others are scaled and rated with
reference to it
THEORY OF PERSONALITY

1.
2.
3.

LOOKING GLASS THEORY

Our perception as how we look to others
Our perception of their judgment
Our feelings about that judgment
DRAMATURGICAL APPROACH
LABELLING THEORY