Personality
- A dispositional explanation is one which focuses on the role of personality in behaviour
- Personality includes:
- Traits
- Characteristics
- Attributes
- Qualities
- Idiosyncrasies
- It is the traits etc. which set one person apart from everyone else i.e. everyone has a unique personality
- There is no absolute way that people respond to being in a crowd
- Some people will become quieter
- Others will become more excitable
- Locus of control (LOC) is a dispositional explanation of conformity (see the revision note on this here) which applies equally to crowd and collective behaviour
- People who have an internal LOC:
- Take responsibility for their actions
- Do not blame others/circumstances for what happens to them
- Are less likely to be swayed by group pressure
- People who have an external LOC:
- Do not take responsibility for their actions
- Are more inclined to blame others/circumstances for what happens to them
- Are more likely to go along with the group
- Chiu (2003) conducted research on whistleblowing:
- 306 Chinese managers and professionals comprised the sample
- Each participant was asked questions to determine their LOC (internal or external)
- Each participant was asked about their intention to whistleblow if circumstances required it
- The results showed that participants with an internal LOC were more likely to blow the whistle than participants with an external LOC
An internal LOC means that someone is more likely to speak out and go against the crowd.
Exam Tip
There is a lot of overlap between conformity and crowd behaviour so be careful not to blur the lines between these topics too much. For example, if you answer a question on crowd behaviour using Asch’s study as an example then this is unlikely to bring you top marks. The only exception to this combining of topics, theories and studies is on a SYNOPTIC question (worth 9 marks).