Psychology of Crowds

Psychology of Crowds by Gustave le Bon

In this clear and vivid book, Gustave Le Bon throws light on the unconscious irrational workings of group thought and mass emotion as he places crowd ideology in opposition to free-thinking and independent minded individuals. He also shows how the behaviour of an individual changes when she/he is part of a crowd.

Le Bon was an eminent psychologist and sociologist. The ideas Le Bon explores in Psychology of Crowds are extremely relevant to today's society and were of pivotal importance in the early years of group psychology: Sigmund Freud's Massenpsychologie und Ich-Analyse (1921); (English translation Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego, 1922) was based on Le Bon's work.

Editing

The orginal of this work, La Psychologie des Foules, was first translated anonymously into English possibly by a group of French students. Sparkling Books has corrected errors and anomalies in the original translation by reference to the Alcan edition. We have shortened a few passages but maintained the original footnotes and have added some footnotes of our own.

Contents

This book is divided into three sections:

Book One - The Mind of Crowds

General characteristics of crowds and the psychological law of their mental unity

The sentiments and morality of crowds

The ideas, reasoning power, and imagination of crowds

The religious nature of crowd convictions

Book Two - The Opinions and Beliefs of Crowds

Indirect factors of the opinions and beliefs of crowds

Direct factors of the opinions of crowds

The leaders of crowds and their means of persuasion

Fixed beliefs and changeable opinions of crowds

Book Three - The Classification and Description of the Different Kinds of Crowds

The classification of crowds

Crowds committing crimes

Criminal juries

Electoral assemblies

Crowd psychology, also known as mob psychology, is a branch of social psychology. Social psychologists have developed several theories for explaining the ways in which the psychology of a crowd differs from and interacts with that of the individuals within it. Crowd behavior is heavily influenced by the loss of responsibility of the individual and the impression of universality of behavior, both of which increase with crowd size.

Other formats

This book is available in hardcover - order ISBN 9781907230080 from any bookshop. It is also available as an epb/kindle e-book from e-book stores - ISBN 9781907230554