SOCPSY 2L03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Suggestibility, Libido, Wish Fulfillment
9 Feb 2018
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Le bon"s description fits well with our own psychology in the emphasis which it lays upon unconscious mental life. Crowds could be violent and cruel but sometimes they can act with a moral purpose. We often think of the individual genius who comes up with wonderful accomplishments but freud says that the group mind has its own genius that is independent of individual geniuses. Contrasts the notion of the group le bon was mentioning: le bon spoke of unorganized groups, freud mentioned other, more structured groups. William mcdougall and william trotter were the most significant social psychologists in freud"s day. Mcdougall says that primitive groups can be tempered through organization. Mcdougall emphasizes the importance of emotion and the loss of the limits of their individuality within a group: people lose their character, personality, people lose their character, personality. Mcdougall also believed that crowds were suggestible and were susceptible to contagion.
