Soc 319
Sociological Approaches to Social Psychology
Tuesday April 21, 009: Collective Behavior and Social Movements (cont’d)
& Altruism
1. Theories of collective behavior.
- Contagion theory: Proposes that people are more likely to engage in anti-social behavior in a crowd, because they are anonymous, have a reduced sense of personal responsibility, and feel invulnerable. Emotions are spread across persons in the crowd as a virus or “contagion” spreads. People imitate the behaviors of one another. This perspective developed out of the early studies of crowds by LeBon (1895). He argued that emotion in a crowd produces unity among its members and gives directions to the crowd’s behavior. LeBon conied the term “mental unity of the crowd” which has since been referred to as “crowd mentality.” This unanimity is supposed to lead participants to think, feel, and act in ways that are different than if each member were alone.
b. Convergence theory: counters that the crowd does not lead to conformity among individual participants. Rather, those who choose to participate in such an event already are like-minded. Moreover, participants often know each other, so behavior is not necessarily anonymous.
c. Emergent norm theory. Patterns of behavior emerge within the crowd. Crowds develop their own definition of the situation and establish norms for behavior that fit the social context and occasion. Pre-existing norms may not be applicable, and may be revised or reinvented for the distinctive context. This perspective views individuals as active agents, rather than passive recipients of the crowd mentality.
B. Social movements.
1. Definitions: Social movement is a collective action that expresses a high level of concern about some issue. Its participants feel strongly enough to act, and they may act in a variety of ways – protesting, volunteering, giving money, etc.
2. There is a direct link between social movements and social change, though the causal order cannot be easily established. (Do social movements trigger social and political changes, or do ongoing social and political changes empower individuals to engage in an active and organized social movement?)
3. The success of a movement depends on resource mobility (i.e. resource mobilization theory). Resources typically include: money, labor, contact with media, and credibility. A movement must be known to large numbers of persons (and must be credible) in order to effect change. As such, the media plays a powerful role in transmitting images of the movement, and in transmitting the demands and goals of the movement to a wider audience. The internet and You tube have been effective ways to “diffuse” information about protests- even small ones – to relatively large audiences.
4. Stages of a social movement
a. Preliminary stage: Individuals become aware of a threat or problem. The scale may be large (e.g., women throughout the U.S. are worried about the erosion of reproductive rights) or small (e.g., parents in one small town become aware that a tainted water supply is making their children sick).
b. Coalescence stage: People begin to organize their efforts and start to make the threat known to the public.
c. Institutional stage: Individuals begin to develop an organizational structure, including a clear-cut plan of action, an allocation of tasks among participants, and in some cases partnering with other organization or groups (e.g., NOW and NARAL may join forces; a small community group may get the backing of Greenpeace, etc.)
6. What factors shape whether one participates in a social movement?
a. strength of attitude. Recall from attitude-behavior literature that attitudes predict behavior when the attitude is strongly held and is salient to the actor.
b. situational constraints. The linkage between attitudes and behavior is weakest when situational constraints are high. Thus, lack of time, money or access may prevent people from participating in a movement, even if their attitudes are consistent with the aims of the movement.
c. Risks vs. benefits: High-risk/cost activism raises barriers to mobilizing participants. According to rational choice and expectancy value theories, the decision to participate is based on an assessment of the potential costs and rewards associated with participation. The rational decision is not to participate when perceived low success is outweighed by potentially great cost (e.g., violence, loss of job, etc.).
d. “Social network” theory proposes that people may get involved because of relationships they have with others who already belong to the movement. Social ties provide access to information and an entrée into the groups’ activities.
e. “Mass society” theory proposes that social movements attract socially isolated people who are looking for a purpose and social integration.
7. Underlying causes of collective behavior and social movements.
a. Strain. Societies are typically “balanced”, where there’s an emphasis on both achieving goals and having means to achieve those goals. However, imbalances often trigger movements. The core ideas here are similar to those of Merton’s strain theory.
b. Relative deprivation. Relative deprivation occurs when individuals recognize that they have less than another – blacks versus whites, women versus men, etc. People make a comparison between what they have and what others have. (e.g., a child who receives a $5 weekly allowance will be satisfied. However if his/her sibling gets an increase to $10/week, then relative deprivation will ensue.). Relative deprivation is distinct from absolute deprivation.
i. Perceptions of deprivation often have a temporal component. When individuals’ expectations are raised, and their hopes and expectations rise more quickly than their actual rewards, then levels of discontent and perceived deprivation increase. For instance, women and Blacks had far more rights in the 1970s than in prior generations, yet the movements of the 1960s raised their hopes for complete equality, so anything less was viewed as disappointing and an indicator of deprivation.
c. Grievances. When resources are scarce and one group has discontent with the existing distribution of resources, collective behavior may ensue.
I. Helping & Altruism
A. Helping
1. Helping/pro-social behavior is generally defined as any behavior carried out with the intention of benefiting another person. However, the helper either consciously or unconsciously engages in the pro-social behavior because s/he will be rewarded. The key point that differentiates helping from altruism is that helping may involve a selfish motivation. There is no such motive present in altruism.
a. Examples of helping behavior are numerous, (although it is often difficult to determine one’s intent from simply observing behavior). Perhaps you’re walking through campus with friends or a date, and you give a $5 to a homeless person. Are you concerned about the poor person’s well-being? Or are you simply trying to impress your friends (thus a reward to you would be social approval)? Or do you want to receive the positive feeling that often occurs after helping someone?
2. These examples clearly illustrate the central themes of reinforcement theory. Recall that this theory says that our behavior is guided by external events. We will perform a behavior that is rewarded, and will discontinue one that will be punished (we might not even begin a behavior that we believe might be punished, as the theory of imitation predicts). Research and theory on helping behavior emphasizes that in order for helping to occur, individuals must perceive that the rewards to themselves outweigh the costs.
3. Some adherents of reinforcement theory argue that pure altruism does not exist, because all acts of helping reap some rewards to the helper – whether a positive feeling about one’s self, positive reinforcement from others, or enhancing one’s self-concept as a “giving person”
B. Why Do We Help?
1. Sociobiology/evolutionary arguments
a. Recall that sociobiology or evolutionary theories of human behavior argue that all human behavior is directed toward the perpetuation of one’s species, and one’s own genes. From this perspective, it is easy to understand why we would help our biological family members, particularly our own children. If we adhere this to theory, we would argue that parents will behave more altruistically to healthy children than unhealthy children, because the healthy are more likely to survive and give birth to future offspring. Few studies have been done which support this hypothesis, however.
2. Normative explanations. Sociologists argue that most members of society abide by norms, or subtle yet pervasive guidelines of “right” and “wrong.” Three specific norms apply to helping behavior:
a. Norm of social responsibility. This norm prescribes that we should help others who depend on us.
b. Norm of reciprocity. This norm says that we should help those who help us, and we should not hurt those who help us.
c. Personal norm: feeling of moral obligation to help a specific person in specific situation, based on one’s own values. (e.g., individuals have particular preferences about who they would or would not like to help, such as those who they like, respect, or feel similar to).
d. Norm of non-involvement (?): Norm that individuals should not involve themselves in the private actions of others. (e.g. not intervening into a domestic dispute, because family relations are “private matters”)
C. Theoretical Perspectives
1. Social Exchange Theory. This theory says that our behavior is guided by external events. We will perform a behavior that is rewarded, and will discontinue one that will be punished (we might not even begin a behavior that we believe might be punished, as the theory of imitation predicts). Research and theory on helping behavior emphasizes that in order for helping to occur, individuals must perceive that the rewards to themselves outweigh the costs. This conceptual model has been highly influential, and many specific models of helping behavior are derived from the cost-benefit model.
2. Empathy-altruism model (Batson 1981). This model holds that helping behavior occurs when individuals experience empathy for the person in need. Individuals may vicariously experience emotions that are similar to the person in need. Helping will occur out of a desire to lessen this negative emotional state.