Experts analyze the shopping mentality this holiday season and the prognosis is much different than simple greed-driven trolls. The basic emotion of survival is now being given some greater weight in what turns otherwise good shoppers bad.
As people sit back and opine over the holidays and just how the world would be better served "if" they employed certain practices, or not, during this time of year, certain tragedies seem to gather a bit more glitz than the sparkling star that sits atop the tree. Groupthink, or possibly better known as temporarily de-individualization, is surfacing as the common thread for what appears to be greed.
In an article on
azstarnet.com, recent events of shopping hysteria have been explained by experts as more than a simple lust over an alluring deal. In fact, both psychologists and sociologists are naming "fear" as a major culprit in what seems to be benign shoppers turned crazy.
Because humans are fueled by fear, and fear of possible and unknown outcomes serve as the impetus for behavioural changes in otherwise kind humans, it is plausible to see that fear relates to crazed shopping behaviour.
Mary Kirby-Diaz, professor of sociology at Farmingdale State College, stated in the Arizona article that:
average Americans need a space "bubble" of 27 inches
However, when people get in a crowded space such as a line waiting to get into a store or a concert, that bubble is basically eradicated and along with the bubble goes one's identity. Individuals morph with a much larger entity: the crowd. One is no longer driven by rational thinking but instead, fear.
That fear fuels further anger in some who feel they may be denied something if they don't get to where they are going. Denied a good view, a prime seat or during the holiday season, a big sale.
As Kirby-Diaz stated in the article, "If there's desire for something they want very deeply and they don't think they're going to get it, there's anger." People get up at 2 am to get in line, give up their personal identity and succumb to the crowd mentality. Paired with fatigue and the anticipation of what it is they want, the fear of being denied and a lot of fear of the unknown, it is the perfect mix of fuel looking for the right flame if not kept in check.
A simple action such as line-cutting could serve to set a crowd of 2,000 into an all out chaotic event.
What would otherwise be a group of intelligent and rational individuals turns to groupthink, or mob mentality, and according to Dr. John Kane, vice president for behavioral health services at the North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System, "As a result, they may do things and participate in things that they would not do on a regular basis."
The drive that leads people to abandon their otherwise "normal" behaviours may be innocent in that they were looking for a deal on a product that they had already planned on purchasing or have limited funds and a lot of people on their list for whom they are buying gifts. That innocence, however, can take a 180 degree turn as they succumb to "herd" behaviour.
Herd behaviour has caused stock market crashes and mass tramplings at soccer games where
hundreds of innocent lives have been lost due to this same root cause: fear and anger.
In a society where we race to read, or write about the latest technology available and the hottest gift ideas on the market while focusing on the trying economical times and the downward spiral of the banks, Wallstreet and the lending market, isn't it safe to say that the impending doom set forth by our own mainstream media plays into this fear?
