Crowd psychology

Crowd psychology (also mob psychology) is a branch of social psychology that deals with the ways in which the psychology of a crowd is different from the psychology of the individual persons who are the crowd. The field of crowd psychology enquires into the behaviors and thought processes of both the individual members of the crowd and the crowd as a collective social entity. The behavior of a crowd is much influenced by deindividuation, a person's loss of responsibility, and the person's impression of the universality of behavior, both of which conditions increase in magnitude with size of the crowd. Notable theorists in crowd psychology include Gustave Le Bon, Gabriel Tarde, and Sigmund Freud. The first debate in crowd psychology began in Rome, at the first International Congress of Criminal Anthropology, on 16 November 1885. The Congress was dominated by Cesare Lombroso and fellow Italians, who emphasized the biological determinates of the psychology of a crowd. "Lombroso detailed before the first congress his theories of the physical anomalies of criminals and his classification of criminals as 'born criminals', or criminals by occasion and mattoids. Enrico Ferri expressed his view of crime as degeneration more profound than insanity, for in most insane persons the primitive moral sense has survived the wreck of their intelligence. Along similar lines were the remarks of Benedickt, Sergi and Marro." A weak response was offered by the French, who put forward an environmental theory of human psychology. "M. Anguilli called attention to the importance of the influence of the social environment upon crime. Professor Alexandre Lacassagne thought that the atavistic and degenerative theories as held by the Italian school were exaggerations and false interpretations of the facts, and that the important factor was the social environment." In Paris during 10–17 August 1889, the Italian school received a stronger rebuke of their biological theories during the 2nd International Congress of Criminal Anthropology.