Two’s Company, Three’s a Crowd
The Real Life Experience
I was at a bicycle race the other day. Just adjacent to the course was a road that we were using to warm up on. A while into riding up and down the road i noticed a teammate of mine watching the race that had been going on. A short while later another one of my teammates stopped, and so i did too and began chatting with them. Within a minute, i looked behind me and everyone else who had been warming up had now stopped to look at what we were looking at. What they did not know wast that i had stopped to talk to people i knew. What they saw, were three people stopping to look at something, and so the twenty unrelated riders decided that they should too.
What was going on here? In two words: Social Proofing
Social proofing is nothing more than the phenomenon that occurs when groups of humans rely on the actions of the group to make decisions. It works under the assumption that “I don’t know, but they obviously do”. In other words, an individual may doubt their own actions, so they rely on the actions of the group to determine their own course of action.
The following study is a classic example of the power of social proofing.
Who Are They
Researchers Stanley Milgram, Leonard Bickman, Lawrence Berkowitz in 1969
What They Did
Milgram, Bickman & Berkowitz designed a very simple and clever study. They took a busy street corner in Manhattan and placed an individual there and told him to do nothing but stare at a particular spot on a tall building. They then noted how many passers by either stopped and gazed up with the experimenter or looked up as they passed by.
They ran the experiment a few times, each time increasing the number of people who initially were standing on the corner gazing. Each time noting the number of people who looked up or stopped and gazed with the experimenters.
What They Found
The data they collected was, perhaps expected, if not interesting. When the experiment took place with just one person gazing at a building, only 20% of passers by joined in gazing or looked up themselves. However, when as few as 5 people were gazing up at the building, 80% of passers by joined in gazing or looked up themselves
What Do We Make of This?
It’s clear that the urge to look up increased with the number of people who were also looking up. A classic case of social proofing: If those 5 people are looking at something, there must be something to look at. This is a response that seems to be wired into our brains. Remember the last time you were driving on a highway and had to look at the accident as you drove by? Or how about your recent desire to check out twitter–CNN is talking about it, and so are my friends, it must be great!
Social proofing exists for a reason. It is a short cut that can allow us to make decisions quickly based on the actions of others. If you think back to the horrific videos from the streets that were taken during 9/11 you might recall the crowds of people that were running away from Ground Zero. This is a legitimate example of how social proofing can save your life. Just keep in mind, though, that sometimes three guys looking at the race are just looking at the race.
Read More
The Drawing Power of Crowds (link to the study)
Random blog discussing the study
