Social conformity
Social conformity describes our tendency to want to blend in with the group. Muzafer Sherif helped jump-start research on social conformity in 1937 when he tested how participants in a group judged the direction of movement of a dot of light on a wall. Even though the light was actually stationary, participants tended to agree with what the group was saying, regardless of whether it was right or wrong. The influence of social conformity even extends to changes in our memory. In a study published in Science earlier this year, researchers from Israel and the United Kingdom found that participants’ initial memory of an event could become distorted since they tended to conform to the memory errors of their peers.
Bystander effect
The bystander effect occurs when we assume that others will take charge of the situation at hand; we shake off responsibility since we expect someone else to step up. It was first described in the case of Kitty Genovese, who was murdered in New York City in 1964. The murder took place as 38 of her neighbours heard her blood-curdling screams over the course of 35 minutes and didn’t call the police. As a result, Genovese died at the hands of a knife-wielding rapist steps from her apartment. What’s more, Columbia University psychologists Latané and Rodin found that only 40 per cent of bystanders came to the rescue of a woman in distress when they were in a group, compared to the 70 per cent who did so when alone.
Mob mentality
There is a darker side to thinking as a group. Zimbardo, the scientist in charge of the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment, cut his prison simulation study short because students in power began to exhibit brutish behaviours that dehumanized participants in subordinate roles. When mobs or riots happen, the term “mob mentality” is thrown around in the media. These situations are characterized by out-of-control groups of people who have lost their individual self-awareness.
Mass psychogenic illness (MPI)
When large numbers of individuals lose sight or control of their identity, this can lead to mass psychogenic illness. MPI occurs when a group of people exhibit ambiguous physical or psychological symptoms to a non-present ailment or environmental threat. For example, a whole school might believe there is gas leak and will exhibit symptoms of dizziness and nausea even when no leak is present. In 1518, hundreds of people danced themselves to death in Strasbourg, France. The cause? Possibly MPI.
The collective (un)conscious
The idea of collective consciousness originates from the 19th century sociologist Emile Durkheim’s belief that society has a collective or common conscience. Sometimes referred to as “hive mind,” this form of groupthink is commonly portrayed as a bunch of minds contributing objectives and opinions that come together and form one large abstract mentality. Some speculate that phenomena such as fads, trends, and memes are evidence of a collective consciousness. In contrast, the collective unconscious proposed by Carl Jung refers to the inherited ancestral memory in all human beings. It is completely separate from the individual, and its contents are symbolic fears, hopes, and dreams.
Human consciousness on a far-out scale
The French philosopher Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and Russian philosopher Vladimir Vernadsky proposed the “noosphere” as the sphere of human thought, an analogy to the geosphere and the biosphere. They proposed that it was a phase in the development of the Earth that corresponded to the emergence of cognition. Teilhard de Chardin was intrigued by the nature of consciousness and invented the Cosmic Law of Complexity/Consciousness: as anything becomes more complex, it becomes more conscious. This theory predicted that at the “Omega Point,” humanity will reach its apex, achieving maximum complexity and consciousness. Pretty out there, eh?
