Scientific Definition
Influencing the beliefs and actions of a crowd through psychological techniques.
Plain-English Definition
Influencing the beliefs and actions of a crowd through psychological techniques.
Feynman Explanation
A crowd is a different organism than its members.
Core Principle
Influencing the beliefs and actions of a crowd through psychological techniques.
Mechanisms
Pending editorial review.
Influencing the beliefs and actions of a crowd through psychological techniques.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Communication that works 1:1 can backfire at scale.
Inputs (Triggers)
Pending editorial review.
Outputs (Behaviors)
Pending editorial review.
Behavioral Signature
A crowd is a different organism than its members.
Examples
- Town halls and all-hands have crowd dynamics distinct from 1:1s.
- Communication that works 1:1 can backfire at scale.
Pending editorial review.
Famous Experiments
Pending editorial review.
Design Principles
- Design large-group communication for crowd psychology, not individual rationality.
Measurement Approaches
Pending editorial review.
Evidence
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
The Perverse Incentive Lens™
How this behavior is exploited — and how to redesign around it.
- Design large-group communication for crowd psychology, not individual rationality.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Interactive Mini Network
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Knowledge Graph Neighbors
Auto-linked to the rest of the Human Behavior Taxonomy by family, domain, dimension, and shared keywords.
Groups sometimes behave as foolishly as the worst individuals.
A group decides on a course of action that nobody actually wants, because everyone assumes others prefer it.
Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
We attribute our own actions to situations but others' actions to their character.
We favor people who are similar to us or who like us.
Sacrificing for others without expecting a personal reward.
Masking the sponsors of a message to make it appear grassroots.
Disagreement grows more extreme as the parties think more about the issue.
Systematic errors in explaining the causes of behavior — yours or others'.
We accept vague, general statements as personally meaningful.
Adding the word 'because' (with any reason) increases compliance dramatically.
Behaviors spread through groups via observation and imitation.