PSYCH-225 Lecture Notes - Lecture 16: Psych, Mass Suicide, Copycat Suicide
7 Jul 2020
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Document Summary
Normative social influence - desire to be accepted. Informational social influence - desire to be right. Often we use other people to help us determine reality. Humans are remarkable suggestable to the influence of other people. After a suicide has made front page news the number of people who die in that area increases by 1000% in airline crashes + car wrecks increase as well (1977) Specific effect: if the person who committed suicide did it alone there was an increase in single fatality car accident. If it were a murder suicide rate of multiple fatality suicides increased. Werther effect: imitative suicide, after you see a suicide it gets you thinking- people that might be distressed they might sabotage and commit suicide. Same idea as the high school copycat suicide. Jonestown: over 900 people took their own lives. There is a tendency for us to attribute this to crazy people, however it"s not.
