The theory of deindividuation is complicated, and different researchers in the field have very diverse definitions of deindividuation. A few believed the deindividuated state is achieved when a person becomes anonymous and realises that he or she will not suffer the consequences of his or her anti-social behaviour. However, Diener and others believed that deindividuation is caused by the loss of self-awareness and self-regulation in a person. Gustave Le Bon (1960) created the theory of how a collective mind can take possession of the person. He observed how a person in a crowd could lose self-control and become a mindless puppet. The person, controlled by the crowd’s leader, is capable of performing any act, whether it is heroic or destructive.
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Le Bon’s analysis is still regarded as very important to social psychology, since he was one of the first to analyse the behaviour of crowds and other collectives. In fact, many people argue that Le Bon popularised the theory of crowd psychology by claiming that many notorious crowd leaders, such as Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, have used his theory. The
Beginning of Deindividuation Festinger, Pepitone, and Newcomb (1952) decided to try and test Le
Bon’s theory of the ‘crowd’ and in 1952 coined the term ‘deindividuation to describe Le Bonâ€They hypothesized that when a person goes into a state of deindividuation his or her normally reserved behaviours are expressed, and that people gravitated toward groups that enable them to practice such behaviours. Festinger et al. created an experiment to try to confirm their theory on deindividuation. They had all the participants sit and discuss a fictitious study that was read to them by the experimenter. This fictitious study found that 100% of their wide range of participants had aggressive and antagonistic feelings for one or both of their parents. The experimenters …show more content…
They stated that a person is not deindividuated until he or she engages in an undesirable or anti-social act and his or her attraction to the group that caused their deindividuation increases. Singer assumed that the more identifiable a person feels, the more likely the person would be to conform in the Asch situation. In 1951, researcher Solomon Asch explored social conformity restraints, creating an experiment to see how many confederates it took to have a subject conform. His results showed that with one confederate there was no influence, with two there was a slight influence, and with three confederates the tendency to conform was constant. Therefore, based on Asch’s findings, we can come to the conclusion that a person would most likely conform to the group if the person can identify with the group but is not identifiable from the group. In other words, if the person has a lot in common with other group members and is assured that he or she will not be linked to the deviation from the social norm and the consequences of the deviation, the person will conform to the
Le Bon’s analysis is still regarded as very important to social psychology, since he was one of the first to analyse the behaviour of crowds and other collectives. In fact, many people argue that Le Bon popularised the theory of crowd psychology by claiming that many notorious crowd leaders, such as Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, have used his theory. The
Beginning of Deindividuation Festinger, Pepitone, and Newcomb (1952) decided to try and test Le
Bon’s theory of the ‘crowd’ and in 1952 coined the term ‘deindividuation to describe Le Bonâ€They hypothesized that when a person goes into a state of deindividuation his or her normally reserved behaviours are expressed, and that people gravitated toward groups that enable them to practice such behaviours. Festinger et al. created an experiment to try to confirm their theory on deindividuation. They had all the participants sit and discuss a fictitious study that was read to them by the experimenter. This fictitious study found that 100% of their wide range of participants had aggressive and antagonistic feelings for one or both of their parents. The experimenters …show more content…
They stated that a person is not deindividuated until he or she engages in an undesirable or anti-social act and his or her attraction to the group that caused their deindividuation increases. Singer assumed that the more identifiable a person feels, the more likely the person would be to conform in the Asch situation. In 1951, researcher Solomon Asch explored social conformity restraints, creating an experiment to see how many confederates it took to have a subject conform. His results showed that with one confederate there was no influence, with two there was a slight influence, and with three confederates the tendency to conform was constant. Therefore, based on Asch’s findings, we can come to the conclusion that a person would most likely conform to the group if the person can identify with the group but is not identifiable from the group. In other words, if the person has a lot in common with other group members and is assured that he or she will not be linked to the deviation from the social norm and the consequences of the deviation, the person will conform to the