Crowd Management

Social/Psychological Influences

Psychological behavioral factors are present in any crowd confrontation. These factors affect the crowd as well as law enforcement personnel. Knowledge and appreciation of social/psychological influences can help control forces that can effectively counter riot tactics, help with crowd dispersal, and help supervisors maintain control of their subordinates.

These behavioral factors not only affect a crowd, but they affect control forces as well.
NOTE: Show slide, “Crowd Behavioral Factors.”

1. Influences

   1. Anonymity

The feeling of being lost in the crowd. Members of the crowd feel they cannot be identified. Therefore, they lose responsibility for their actions.

2. Universality

The “everybody is doing it” feeling. Members feel the attitudes and emotions are being experienced and are shared by everyone in the group.

3. Inability to withdraw

Being afraid to express a view contrary to those in the majority.

4. Increased hostility (Convergence Theory)

When people are frustrated and believe they are being treated unfairly, confrontation is an outlet for their anger; however, conflict does not eliminate the problem and it often increases hatred between social groups. According to this theory, people merely reveal their true selves in a crowd--the crowd serving only as excuse or a trigger.

5. Social suggestion

The urge to do what others do is quite strong with the majority of people. Crowd people tend to follow the lead of others, particularly those designated as leaders. Those involved usually have a common denominator that brings them together to unify the group.

6. Emotionality

There exists in any crowd a high degree of emotional tension and excitement. Hostile emotions like anger and fear may drive the crowd to act out.

7. Irrationality

There are two aspects of this behavior in a crowd setting. The first is fear and panic. The second is frustration, which can result in violent behavior.

8. Homogeneity of mental state (group mind-set)

Here the members of the mob share a common attitude, opinion, dissatisfaction and frustration. Often referred to as a “group mind-set.”

9. Emotional contagion (Contagion Theory)

This is the most dramatic feature of collective behavior where excitement seems to be transmitted from one person to another. Emotional contagion provides the crowd with psychological unity and the point at which a crowd or assemblage becomes a mob.⁵

2. Tactics for countering these influences

Officers must use methods to reduce these influences upon the crowd. They will not stop all people from acting out, but it will reduce the number of those who will.

1. Dispersing the crowd as soon as possible to reduce the influences of the crowd on its members.

   1. Verbalizing the need for the crowd to disperse, using diplomacy and tact.

   2. Seeking cooperation and explaining what actions may be used to disperse the group if necessary.

   3. Allow a reasonable time for the crowd to disperse and “save-face”; pushing the crowd may lead to a confrontation.

   4. Control the number of officers on the scene. Too many officers present may lead to uncoordinated action being taken and/or may “push” the crowd into action. If additional officers are at the scene or needed in the event the situations turns into a confrontation, they should be positioned nearby but out of sight of the crowd.

   5. If the crowd’s actions should result in violence, then more forcible dispersal actions may be needed. We will cover those tactics later in this block of instruction.

2. The use of photography and video to take away anonymity.

3. Selective arrest and enforcement to reduce the feeling of universality. Note: arrest should be made selectively or at the direction of supervisors. This is necessary to maintain sufficient manpower levels at the scene.

4. Call people by name if they are known. Officers who are in contact with their communities through community policing efforts should know their residents.

5. Put them on notice of the law and possible violations, i.e., order to disperse, failure to disperse and unlawful assembly.

6. Have a dispersal/back-up team formed close by the scene but out of sight, so as to not inflame the situation until they are actually needed.

1. Role of the Rumor

The rumor is the characteristic mode of communication in a collective behavior setting. Rumors can be defined as communication through people caught up in an ambiguous situation trying to make meaningful sense of it by relying on their perceptions and intellect.

1. A rumor is a progressive distortion of an originally accurate statement.

2. Rumor plays a major part in crystallizing public opinion.

3. Some experts have said that no riot takes place without a build-up through rumor.

4. Animosity is gradually intensified preceding a riot by stories of aggressive acts on the part of the opposition.

5. Rumors often follow controversial encounters between a member of a minority group and a white police officer. These rumors are often more important than the incident.

Example: The Watts Riots of the 1960's began because of a rumor--"the police were beating a pregnant black woman." The facts were that an arrest had been made, but the arrestee was neither pregnant nor was she beaten. Subsequent confrontation between citizens and the police lead to further confrontations where the police either withdrew because they were not prepared to deal with the crowds, or they were made to appear helpless.

1. The role of the media must not be underplayed here. With today’s live coverage, rumors and police action or in-action will influence the situations much more quickly.

2. Rumors must be countered! When a rumor begins to surface, every effort must be made to communicate the truth. Effectively using community contacts, i.e., community advisor, community leaders, community policing efforts, and the press to get the facts out into the community can accomplish this.

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