Collective behavior is a term in sociology that refers to how people act in crowds and other large, relatively unorganized groups. Collective behavior varies and may include fads, panics, and riots. It often arises in situations that stimulate people’s emotions. These situations include sporting events, protest demonstrations, and disasters such as floods and fires.
Collective behavior is often spontaneous and brief. It differs from the more predictable, longer-lasting actions of such organized groups as school classes, teams, and social clubs. Some types of collective behavior, however, grow out of organized groups. For example, an organized political party or social movement might use mass demonstrations as a device in seeking social change.
In 1896, Gustave Le Bon, a French social scientist, published a study of crowd behavior that would later be recognized as one of the first psychological investigations of collective behavior. The American sociologists Robert E. Park and Ernest W. Burgess introduced the term collective behavior in their book, Introduction to the Science of Sociology (1921).
Collective behavior occurs in so many forms that social scientists have reached few conclusions about its origins, development, and consequences. Some sociologists believe that the pace of modern life and the growth of mass communications have increased the amount of collective behavior.
