Collective Behaviour

[dimpy.handa]

collective behaviour Potentially a very wide-ranging field of study which deals with the ways in which collective behaviours emerge as responses to problematic circumstances and situations. At one extreme this can mean the study of co-ordinated and organized social movements; at the other, it refers to the seemingly spontaneous eruption of common behavioural patterns, as for example in episodes of mass hysteria. Between these are responses to natural disasters, riots, lynchings, crazes, fads, fashions, rumours, booms, panics, and even rebellions or revolutions.

 

[dimpy.handa]

Aside from the intrinsic interest of understanding why large groups of people behave the way they do, there are practical reasons why the study of collective behavior is important.Better architectural design and crowd management might have avoided this tragedy. How to redesign buildings and manage crowds are two types of knowledge that can result from the study of collective behavior. Understanding how people behave in riots, what sets them off, and how they can be rapidly concluded is also knowledge that can result from the study of collective behavior. Additionally, understanding how humans react during natural disasters and ensure that the damage that occurs is entirely a result of the disaster and not the human response to it.