They occur more frequently in cities than in smaller communities. In the crowd and the public every moment may be said to be "psychological."
Crisis may be said to be the normal condition on the exchanges. What are called financial crises are merely an extension of this critical condition to the larger business community. Financial panics which sometimes follow upon financial crises are a precipitate of this critical condition.
The fascinating thing about the study of crises, as of crowds, is that so far as they are in fact due to psychological causes, that is, so far as they are the result of the mobility of the communities in which they occur, they can be controlled. The evidence for this is the fact that they can be manipulated, and there is abundant evidence of manipulation in the transactions of the stock market. The evidence for the manipulation of crowds is less accessible. Labor organizations have, however, known how to develop a pretty definite technique for the instigation and control of strikes. The Salvation Army has worked out a book of tactics which is very largely devoted to the handling of street crowds; and professional revivalists, like Billy Sunday, have an elaborate technique for conducting their revivals.
- Under the title of collective psychology much has been written in recent years in regard to crowds and kindred phenomena of social life. Most that has been written thus far has been based upon general observation, and almost no systematic methods exist for the study of this type of social organization. The practical methods which practical men like the political boss, the labor agitator, the stock-exchange speculator, and others have worked out for the control and manipulation of the public and the crowd furnish a body of materials from which it is possible to make a more detailed, a more intimate study of what may be called, in order to distinguish it from that of more highly organized groups, collective behavior.
- In addition to these and other materials already indicated, there are the histories of notable mass movements, the great labor strikes, the financial panics, religious revivals, etc.
- A study might be made also of the sensations and emotional reactions of individuals who participate in these mass movements. What is the mental condition of individuals under the influence of revivals, of panics, etc.? Is there a sense of loss of control, and of loss of personal responsibility?
