An Introduction to Social Psychology

Chapter 32: The Influence of Contacts Upon Individual and Collective Behavior

Luther Lee Bernard

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In the preceding six chapters of Part IV we have been concerned with the classification and analysis of group forms and the attitudes of people within these groups. In this and . the four subsequent chapters we shall discuss the influence of group contacts upon individual and collective behavior. This theme will be discussed generally in this chapter and applications of these processes to special problems of control will be taken up in the four, following chapters. Thus, Chapters XXXIII and XXXIV will consider the question of leadership and individual response to leadership. Chapters XXXV and XXXVI will give an introductory analysis of non-institutional and institutional controls and the question of social change in a controlled situation.

THE INDIVIDUAL AND THE GROUP —  Psychologocially the individual is human by virtue of belonging to a group. We cannot even conceive of a human being apart from groups. A person who had never known group contacts would have been deprived of parents from infancy. He would know no government and experience no personal ties. He would produce everything he consumed. He would speak a unique language, or rather none at all, for there would be no adequate relationships to condition in him language responses. Finally, this hypothetical person, like the animals, would have no self-consciousness, for self-consciousness arises only as the other pole to social consciousness, and this also would be wanting to him.

It is evident that an individual apart front a group would certainly be far less than human. Descriptions of individuals brought up with a minimum of human contacts make this clear. The very fact of being human implies ties with other human

(497) beings. Feral men do not walk or talk or think, or even perceive things, the way we do. This is what we would expect from our analysis in Part III where we saw that other personalities are indispensable in developing our own. But even after the human personality is adequately developed for functioning, the group has an important conditioning effect upon his responses. He is always a member of many groups, face-to-face and non-face-to-face, primary and derivative. But different types of group contacts produce different types of behavior. We will outline these differences very briefly.

I. INTELLECTUAL REACTIONS— Coöperative Contacts— We have already seen that the individual is likely to do abstract thinking in terms of verbal symbols, or even in the form of a conversation with either himself or a hypothetical companion. This is, as Cooley says, because "The impulse to communicate is not so much a result of thought as it is an inseparable part of it." In cases where our companions are imaginary, however, there is no necessity for "thinking a thing through," for the hypothetical person will certainly not be offended or mind greatly if we suddenly switch our train of thought from one thing to another without making it clear. And when we are thinking to ourselves, this is very likely to happen. Most of us when alone, with the exception of trained thinkers like Spencer, who could not stop thinking until he had solved the problem, dismiss an intellectual difficulty when it becomes too intense, if indeed we attempt to think about it at all. We are easily distracted, and extraneous stimuli can deflect the logical continuity of our thinking.

But when another person is actually present, we cannot be so flighty in our thinking. The necessity for communicating our thoughts overtly is a great stimulus to clarify our own ideas. We cannot jump dizzily from one idea to another according to the more or less random association of solitary thinking. The other individual holds us down to some sort of logical continuity and clarity. Furthermore, he adds a different viewpoint or additional data and thus fertilizes our own intellectual processes. In a friendly discussion, the give and take increase the efficiency of thinking far beyond its usual effectiveness. Many people think only under the stimulus of another person-

(498) -ality. Two heads are indeed better than one in solving intellectual problems. Intellectual team work is as significant as other types of coöperation.

The introduction of a third person does not add so much relatively to efficiency in thinking as does the second. We might say that the additional persons usher in a condition of diminishing returns in thinking. Each individual is under less necessity of thinking out every point advanced by the others, and he has less opportunity. He can relax more intellectually, for if he does not carry on, the others will, until the discussion again turns towards matters with which he is already familiar, or until he can "make a point." He does not have to parry the intellectual thrusts with so much acumen or receive them with so much understanding. Usually there is an alignment of two or more against one, or a larger group "lines up" on issues or takes sides. Thus one individual must carry the whole burden of his side whereas the other parties are sharing the other point of view. In cases of lining up by sides the intellectual fire is likely to become extremely desultory and the marshaling of ideas is likely to become lax and inefficient. Or the whole matter may degenerate into display of argumentative or forensic talents, or "showing off."

If, on the other hand, all are equally stimulated, the struggle to get a hearing often becomes quite intense. All speak at once, and the tendency is for the group to become excited and emotional rather than to remain intellectual. Intense group discussion is usually lacking in intellectual generalship. But if the group becomes materially larger there results either the discussion group or the deliberative assembly, or possibly a mob. If the orderly type of group prevails, the discussion is likely to become a debate, and teams appear. At any rate, rules of order must be invoked to keep the atmosphere rational, for the tendency toward emotionality is greatly intensified. The debate is a well recognized form of the discussion group, usually with the addition of an audience. Thinking in such a group may be highly effective, but here we are dealing largely with the effects of an audience, and we may now turn to this topic.

Non-coöperative contacts: the effects of an audience— In case the other individuals are added, not coöperatively, but

( 499) as an audience, the effects of their presence may be somewhat different. When the others are our intellectual equals, whether they are sympathetic or critical listeners, the fact of their presence may stimulate us in much the same manner as though they actually participated in the thinking. We feel ourselves under the necessity of making a good showing before our friends or enemies and of meeting the arguments which we assume they would be likely to oppose to us if they were taking part in the discussion. On the other hand, an audience, even of one unfamiliar or unfriendly individual, may completely disorganize our thinking, and reduce us to an emotional state. This occurs in the case of the child who knows his lesson perfectly, but when he comes to recite it to his teacher, forgets it entirely, because of anticipated criticism. In a large audience, the result may be the same, and we call it "stage fright." In such cases the mere presence of so many unfamiliar faces causes us to assume that they will be critical or even unfriendly. The addition of a great many persons, however, may cause the individual personalities to drop out, and the emotional disturbance may thus, in the absence of any unfriendly demonstration, be minimized.

Experiments seem to indicate that as a rule the audience has a stimulating effect upon individuals, especially in familiar situations. The effect, moreover, is most marked in the case of slow thinkers or workers. Dress rehearsals are notoriously poor, even when the preparation is excellent, as actual performance later on before an audience demonstrates. It has often been said with more truth than is at first apparent that one of the chief functions of a class is to make the instructor think. We may even learn more by teaching than by being taught. The stimulating effect of the audience may operate even when the audience is not actually present, as in the case of the author in his study, the radio performer, the phonograph artist, the moving picture actor, the student preparing a lesson. In such cases the individual responds to his audience projectively. In any case, unless the behavior is reduced to ail emotional reaction, the audience is likely to improve the quality of the response, particularly if it is appreciative. The great achievements of great artists before adoring audiences are not

( 500) wholly subjective to the audiences. According to the theory of feeling set forth in Part II, it is precisely under such conditions of approval that the technic responses are least inhibited and performance is freest. This is a fact which all good teachers appreciate.

Effects of the presence of co-workers —  When others are added not as audience, nor yet as competitors or cooperators but as co-workers, the results are slightly different. In such cases, comparisons are made between the work of individuals done alone and that done in the presence of others. Results of tests as given by Allport and others seem to show an increase in speed and quantity of performance but a decrease in quality or accuracy. The presence of others stimulates motor responses but lowers the mental or logical efficiency of the individual, perhaps largely because the responses are speeded and because the rate of reaction is made too uniform. Also interrupting stimuli intrude and the worker does not have a chance to solve his problem in his own way. It is more difficult to think to ourselves in a group than when alone, but it is easier to do things overtly. The effect of others upon judgment is in the direction of moderation. Allport makes the following generalization from results of experiments: "There is a tendency toward moderation in judgments made in concert with others, the individual avoiding those extreme judgments at either end of the scale which he does not hesitate to make when judging alone . . . . To think and to judge with others is to submit one's self unconsciously to their standards. We may call this the attitude of social conformity."

Competitive contacts— Allport summarizes the results of tests on the effects of rivalry and competition. The effect of rivalry "is that of emotional reënforcement . . . . It improves the speed and quantity rather than the quality of the work in which it is operative. Rivalry, like social facilitation, varies with age, sex, and personality . . . . When rivalry produces a social increment in a group there is a tendency for the performances of the individuals to approach a common level."

Hostile contacts— If the other individuals added are antagonistic, the situation becomes emotional rather than intellectual, since the other individuals produce an interference in

( 501) behavior. There is no gain in the accuracy of behavior, there is usually a loss. A conflict of behavior patterns arises which inhibits or blocks the response and interferes with the technique. The effect upon personality is to make us more stubborn and set in our opinions. Experiments on the results of razzing show a loss in efficiency under the stimulus of a hostile environment. This is a fact very well known to the "rooters" of rival athletic teams, who sometimes use the method to the extent of completely demoralizing the weaker or less aggressive team. Some individuals, however, seem to thrive on opposition. They need the extra stimulus to put them in fighting trim. But their resulting efforts are more likely to be characterized by increased drive than by greater accuracy or insight. Ajax and Hercules fought with most energy, if somewhat blindly, when completely aroused. Other personalities, especially those who have been unfortunately repressed or dominated in childhood, are likely to collapse under opposition. Here, as in the case of the effects of rivalry, individual differences enter in.

II. EMOTIONAL REACTIONS— Effects of Isolation— The emotional results of isolation are perhaps greater than the intellectual, and more serious. We are accustomed to think of the solitary individual as more rational and less emotional than the individual in a group. This may sometimes be the case, but it is not necessarily so. Other personalities are the most fertile sources of stimulation, and therefore there is likely to be a great deal of neural interference or synthesis in the presence of others, and a consequent heightened emotional state. The result is somewhat the same if our contact with the other personalities is indirect or through symbolic media, such as books. But continued isolation is likely to produce equally in tense emotional reactions. Ross cites the results of solitary confinement on prisoners. At the end of one year of solitary confinement in Auburn prison in 1821, five prisoners were dead, "one had killed himself, another was mad, and the rest were melancholy." In another case at Montjoy "nearly one-half went mad before their release and many others died soon afterward." "Victims of long-enforced solitude generally become the prey of melancholia, delusions, and hallucinations. They

( 502) cease to have emotions, shrink from the sight of others, and perhaps return voluntarily to their cell as to a grateful shelter." Even the normal individual who is cut off from contacts becomes "queer," "uncouth," "self-centered," "morbid," when not definitely pathological. Dementia praecox is described by some psychiatrists as a "shutting in" of the personality. It requires the stimulating effect of the presence of others to bring out the full force of the positive personality traits. The wisdom of the hermit has perhaps been overestimated. Certainly his outlook has traditionally been a recessive, not an aggressive, one. He would solve problems by retiring from them, not by grappling with them.

Isolation need not, of course, be physical. In many cases it is psychic only. It is axiomatic that one may be more alone in a city than in the country. G. Stanley Hall said that the saddest thing in his life was his isolation. Great men are usually isolated, for there are few who can understand them adequately. But even in these cases, they are likely to find emotional compensation through their symbolic contacts with the great men of history. On the other hand, people often voluntarily seek isolation by withdrawing from too stimulating contacts in order that they may preserve their strength and maintain their emotional balance, or to regain them when temporarily depleted.

Coöperative or sympathetic contacts— The individual who is full of emotion— joy or sorrow or worry, for example — feels better if he can unload it or share it with others. We often speak of "unburdening ourselves," and it is axiomatic that "confession is good for the soul." Some psychologists claim that the chief therapeutic value of psychoanalysis results from the fact that the neurotic individual gains a sympathetic listener in the psychoanalyst. The theory of transference seems to bear this out. The necessity for communicating emotional attitudes seems to be even greater than for intellectual responses. In the case of the joyous emotions, those which involve neural synthesis and incrementation, this may be due to the fact that inner activity is becoming so intense that unless overt activity can be substituted, blocking will occur. Or it may represent the seeking of further stimulation and reën-

( 503) -forcement from the individual who shares our emotion. In the case of the unpleasant emotions, confessing or unburdening our souls objectifies the conflict and thus makes it easier for us to handle it. We may feel relieved, on the other hand, when we communicate our secret sins because of the sympathy, real or anticipated, of the other individual. Whatever the reason, it is a fact that most people experience a fundamental need for emotional communication.

Even when the emotional attitude is not intense, and where no intellectual problem is involved, the desire for emotional response is frequently great. People like to sit and gossip or chat regarding inconsequential matters merely for the sake of the warmth of human contacts. We like to describe our adventures, or feats and exploits. It is a method of preserving and enhancing our self-feeling. On the playground, at the party, on the bathing beach, or in the parade and in "Peacock Alley" it finds cruder expression in deliberate showing off. The intense and persistent addiction to fashion and strutting generally discloses the strong predilection of young and old, and particularly of youth who are brought into close assimilative relationships with members of the opposite sex, to exploit their personalities and physical extensions of them to the utmost. Age and culture ordinarily tone down the strutting habit, but they almost never eliminate it. This type of contact is characteristic of the informal club, social set, .clique, ring, gang, etc., which exist largely to serve this special function.

When a number of people are sharing the same emotion the usual result is a crowd or mob. Thus the crowd and mob are the emotional analogues of the deliberative assembly or the discussion group. It is not only that crowds and mobs are emotional; but they are crowds and mobs because they are emotional. The stimulation works both ways.

Competitive contacts— All competition is emotional and it may be intellectual. Rallies, demonstrations, ceremonials, crowds, mobs, are often composed of individuals who are competing in emotional expression. Each tries to show greater patriotism, greater loyalty, greater enthusiasm, greater piety, than the others. Each strives to outdo the others. There is

( 504) a consequent excessive emotional stimulation. It is analogous to an auction. The most emotional individuals set the pace, and the others attempt to overtake or to outdo them. The emotions thus expressed act as a spur and stimulus and as a challenge to the rest to equal the mark. This competition may develop so far as to create a craze. A marked example of this sort of emotional competition occurred in the winter of 1923-24 when "Marathon" dancers all over the country strove to outdo one another by dancing for three days or more in a single effort.

Most games between competing teams involve emotional competition, but since the activity takes place overtly and completely without inhibition it is not so apparent at a distance. Yet the tenseness of muscles and fixity of expression of the players disclose to the practiced observer how great is the emotional strain. The team which is habitually defeated or the one which invariably wins develops strong emotional attitudes and self-feeling, positive and negative. In either case the emotional disturbance may be so intense that there is a temporary disorganization of personality or loss of morale.

Hostile contacts are particularly emotional. The emotions which are most common in such relationships are irritation, anger, hate, and fear. These may occasionally arise in any type of face-to-face group, but they are particularly likely to be manifest in crowds and mobs. Mobs are especially prone to the expression of the most malevolent of the primary emotions because hostility can so easily arise in such collective situations. The lynching mob is an excellent example of this type. The anger of a group of men, aroused to white heat by reciprocal stimulation and strong suggestion and directed towards some suspect, especially of another race or nationality (in which case suggestion ordinarily works readily because of strong previous conditioning), knows no bounds until its fury has spent itself. Only those who have witnessed such demonstrations can actually realize the strength of such hostile emotions.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF RADICALISM— Root has given an excellent picture of the mind of the radical or the one who finds himself out of agreement with the prevailing processes and

(505) ideas of society. Psychologically radicalism is unpleasant because it disrupts well-established habits. We saw in Chapter XI that interference with behavior systems produces unpleasant feeling tone. The status quo, which the radical attacks, is constituted of a vast system of customs and traditions, mores, folkways, etc. These are in the last analysis collective habits relatively uniform throughout the group. Thus the radical is attacking the habits of millions of men, and the reaction against him is proportionately strong when his attacks are recognized as such.

Root distinguishes two general types of radicals, the emotional and the intellectual or scientific. The emotional radical may be definitely psychopathic. In such a case he may have real gifts and ability, or he may be a fanatic, harnessing his drive to inconsequential and trivial movements. Many of the great leaders in religion and social reform apparently have been emotional radicals with psychopathic tendencies. In many cases, however, the emotional radical is naturally normal, but under the pressure of misfortune, failure, social disapproval, distress, or other hostile environmental conditions, he develops neurotic and hysterical symptoms. Few men possess the strength of character to undergo constant criticism and strong opposition from the public without developing compensating mechanisms. Under such pressure and the necessity of defending his position, the radical is likely to find himself pushed into a much more radical position than he at first contemplated. Thus Luther was driven into complete revolt and the Wesleys were forced to found a new denomination in opposition to the one they originally intended only to reform. Likewise, Ingersoll, who began with a protest against bigotry, was forced into "infidelity." How else can we explain the excesses of such social theorists as the philosophic anarchists than in terms of this development of a "defense mechanism," which looks for ever more exaggerated examples of social maladjustment to justify the attitude of protest" Finally they build up a radical "complex" which sets them over against society as it exists and thenceforward they become moral or emotional outlaws, against whom the emotions of every conservative or average man are turned. The

( 506) radical complex, as Root says, leads the radical "to see in every act of society, in every move of every antagonist, a deep ulterior purpose." He assigns motives where none exist. Possibly he shows marked paranoiac tendencies.

Defenders of the established order, in their duel with the emotional radical, are at a great advantage, for they can seize upon the pathological exaggerations of the emotional radical, and with apparent calm and rationality which is in decided contrast to the excitability of the radical, win public confidence and approval. They can afford to make more gracious appeals. Conservatism is esthetically more attractive and pleasant, for it supplements established habits rather than interferes with them.

Root points out another interesting fact about the emotional radical, namely, his superiority-inferiority complex. He believes himself to be superior to his opponents, and yet his position and his status are inferior. The results are, "first, an aggressive and egotistical intellectual assertiveness which invites opposition," and, "an attitude toward tradition that is sweeping and illogical. Anything old is bad, anything new is good."

The philosophic or scientific radical is far more important, although the popular mind rarely realizes it. Root lists as the most profoundly radical critical tools, those of scientific doubt, the concept of cause and effect, the highly detached, impersonal attitude, the concept of degrees of truth, the pragmatic attitude, the discounting of ideas relating to the ego and the emotions, and creative thinking. The intellectual radical may be a great asset to social progress. In fact, so hard and fast does custom become that it is not possible to revise collective social adjustments effectively without some degree of critical intellectual analysis of our social system, and such analysis is the essential characteristic of intellectual radicalism.

COLLECTIVE BEHAVIOR under contact stimulation is more or less analogous to individual behavior under similar conditions. Collective behavior is, of course, the individual behavior of a number of persons responding with greater or less uniformity to the same or similar stimuli. We shall consider this collective or multiple behavior under two general headings, that

( 507) of conflict and cooperation. Collective conflict itself implies coöperation. It is not possible for groups to engage in conflict with one another unless there is solidarity of individuals within. The individual tends to identify himself very closely with the groups to which he belongs. This is really another way of stating the fact, earlier emphasized, to the effect that the self-consciousness of the individual extends even to objects and people apart from himself. Thus the boy whose school wins a game feels superior to the boy whose team loses; the person from a large city feels superior to the person from a small town; the degenerate branches of distinguished families sometimes have more family pride than the more deserving ones. The grief of the Southerner over the "lost cause," the migration of the "German '48ers" to America to escape the shame and disappointment of the failure of their revolution, the regret of Jesus that Jerusalem would not hearken to his message, are examples which may illustrate the negative aspect of the same principle. The identification of feeling among members of a family or of a persecuted or unconventional religious sect, political faction, class, or race may be particularly strong. This is because the interests of the members are so closely similar within the group organization and so much in conflict with people outside that if one member suffers the others do also. In such cases one may be objective, rational and moral about all matters not affecting his group, but utterly without conscience or sense of obligation towards persons outside of his own group, when they are in conflict with his own fellows.

CONFLICT is both individual and collective. In fact, we may speak of three types of conflict altogether: ( 1 ) that within the individual's own personality, (2) that between individuals in the same or in different groups, and (3) that between groups.

Conflict within the individual personality arises from two sources. On the one hand the conflict may be between two or more organic drives and acquired dispositions integrated around these, or between acquired sets or values on a largely intellectual basis. The internal conflict is likely to be much stronger in the former case than in the latter, as was indicated in Chapter XIII. The several types of interests within the

( 508) individual are frequently in conflict one with another for the dominance of the organism. This inner conflict of interests of course may also reflect itself in the conflict of the groups of which the individuals are members. But, on the other hand, conflicts between groups also reflect themselves within the individuals within rival face-to-face or indirect contact groups. Conflicts of loyalties to different interests or personalities and aggregations arise in this way because the same people are so often members of different associations, institutions, societies, publics.

Conflicts between individuals within the same group are Usually the result of competition among them to profit in unequal degrees from the benefits of the group. Less frequently they are the result of the rivalry of different individuals attempting to outdo each other in making contributions to the group welfare. More frequently this conflict may be of the character of rivalry in self-improvement. Not infrequently there is conflict between members of groups as a result of an effort to mold the policies of the group in such ways as to represent more effectively the rival interests of the competing members. Sometimes, also, the conflicting loyalty of one party in the conflict owed to another group enters into the situation and gives direction or character to the struggle of personalities. Thus frequently the divided loyalties of immigrants in a new country render it impossible for them to coöperate fully with individuals of their adopted country in times of crises. At other times, or when the interests of the mother country are not involved, coöperation rather than conflict may be the regular procedure.

Conflict between members of competing groups arises easily when the groups are rivals. Frequently, however, the fact of membership in rival groups shields the members in some degree from conflicting relationships as individuals. Their groups undertake to carry on the conflict without subjecting the members to the strain individually. But such isolation of the individual in conflicting groups is more likely to occur in indirect contact groups than in face-to-face groups, and in highly organized than in loosely organized groups. In loosely organized face-to-face groups in which there is a good deal

( 509) of feeling of solidarity, individuals frequently bear the brunt of the conflict. They are like pickets or advance guards who sustain the first shock of the enemy's fire and then perhaps fall back for the protection and support of their main bodies. Where conflict between members of rival groups is planted in earnest over group issues it is likely to be extremely bitter. In such cases it is reënforced by all of the ardor of loyalty to the group which arises from that identification with the fortunes of the group mentioned above, and it is also reënforced by the participation of other members of the rival groups, until finally it may become a general struggle between the two rival groups as wholes. This sort of struggle is well illustrated by the blood feuds of primitive people and of the Kentucky mountaineers. In these feuds the struggle is at first between two individuals, but it soon expands to involve the whole of the kin on both sides and it usually grows intense in proportion to the numbers involved.

THE CONFLICT OF GROUPS, like that of individuals, arises over interests. Long established interests of individuals nearly always manifest themselves by group cleavages, and in our highly derivative social organization these cleavages come to be more and more between indirect contact groups. Some of these conflicts we will now examine.

Rivalry and competition— Local or face-to-face groups still have their conflicts, especially in the field of rivalry, which sometimes become malicious rather than emulative. Athletic contests and business competition offer the most common examples of local group rivalries. Occupational and cultural groups, clubs, teams, etc., also frequently engage in rivalry. Where rivalry is with regard to excellence in skill of production, as in boys' and girls' agricultural and home economics clubs, or in art, literary, and educational achievement, it has a most valuable stimulating effect. It increases morale and stimulates to a further analysis of the technique and its improvement. The West Virginia community scoring plan is a good example of the effect which a dev ice for increasing friendly rivalry in local group excellence may have upon the self and social consciousness of individuals in a group. The management of industrial concerns also frequently seeks to

(510) arouse company pride in their employés and to stimulate rivalry with reference to other firms as a method of securing better and more willing service. Occasionally a city or a whole state may adopt a similar program with good results. But it is ordinarily easier to stimulate a smaller group, such as a school, an athletic team, or a debating society to such emulative rivalry than a whole city or state, because suggestion works more concretely in the face-to-face group and it is easier for an individual to visualize his own function in a small compact group than in a large dispersed one.

As Ross has shown with excellent discrimination, rivalry and competition, when kept on a constructive plane, offer most excellent incentives to achievement. But they may also be very destructive when they have as their major or only objectives exploitation rather than the creation of values. It is very easy for competition or struggle for one's just share of wealth, honor, privilege, or what not, to pass the bounds of justice and conventionality and become positively immoral or criminal. There is almost universal disapproval of the person who is grasping or uses unfair methods or downright deception and violence in taking a disproportionate share of any good, material or immaterial. And there is almost equally universal approval of those who engage in creative rivalry and competition and thus leave the world richer for their striving. These attitudes apply to groups as well as to individuals, although we are more prone to condone an exploiting attitude in groups than in individuals and perhaps less ready to reward their efforts through constructive rivalry. This is because they are less concrete than individuals, and it is correspondingly difficult to assess praise or blame.

The conflict o f derivative groups is much more frequently of an exploitive character. The relations of associations, societies, institutions, and publics are still more frequently negative than positive. This is probably because they are so universally organized around highly conscious derivative interests. This is particularly true of associations, which have come into existence for the specific purpose of promoting some particular collective interest or concern. Consequently, they are frequently fighting as well as constructive or creative groups.

( 511) Business and political associations illustrate this principle of strenuous competition quite well, as any student of economics or of politics well knows. Societies, because they are ordinarily more loosely organized, are less highly competitive. Their struggle is more likely to take the form of mild rivalry, although at times, as in the case of nationalities, art societies, or even philanthropic agencies, their competition may become sufficiently acrimonious. But in such cases we really have to do with associations as well as with the rather indefinite category of societies. Although conflicts are prone to arise out of the struggle of associations, especially economic associations, for control over markets or other national and international advantages, such struggles are very likely in the end to involve whole societies. This, sort of competition is one of the most fruitful sources of modern warfare on an imperialistic basis.

Institutions, like associations, are usually highly integrated. The fact that they ordinarily embody a vested interest with all of the emotional attachments which this fact implies, renders the conflict between institutions relatively strong, although usually more or less formal. The church and the state, the school and the church, business and politics, or business and ethics, practically always manifest some degree of antagonism, which is constantly becoming concrete and aggressive through the local or face-to-face group extensions of these institutions. Institutions usually attempt, with more or less success, to solve their conflict difficulties by subordinating rival institutions. Thus in any large society, such as a nationality, there is frequently a hierarchy of institutions, at the head of which ordinarily stands the state. Subsidiary institutions, like the church and the school, may be more or less coördinate.

Publics, in the sense of psychic organizations or public opinion, serve largely to define the limits of inter-institutional conflicts. Associations also develop public opinion within their membership, and sometimes outside of it, for purposes of propaganda. Societies ordinarily are integrated by public opinion. Institutions in the less tangible sense, as distinguished from associations, objectify themselves almost completely through public opinion and their projections of written materials or codes. Associations always have administrative

( 512) organizations, through which most of their competitive conflicts are carried on, but they also make copious appeals to public opinion, which they frequently attempt with more or less success to control. Publics, therefore, are strong factors in the conflicts of indirect contact groups. This conflict of publics may remain mild, or it may become intense and rancorous, as in the case of the contests of political parties, the feeling between denominational publics, or between fundamentalists and modernists, or even different nationalities and races. Conflicts between classes, religions, nationalities and races still frequently develop to the point of open violence and sometimes result even in warfare. The most effective remedy for such irrational conflicts, as already has been suggested, is more knowledge or the inculcation of science.

REVOLUTION is a special type of group conflict which arises between classes. It occurs when a dominant class controls the associations and institutions, and molds public opinion, in such a way that other classes are not able to benefit from them as largely as they feel they should.

Factional struggles— This control of associations or institutions may consist simply of the control of the patronage of these institutions. Most of the revolutions in Central America, for example, appear to have been the result of this sort of class discrimination. In such cases the revolutionary struggle is nearly always largely of the nature of a political uprising. Force instead of ballots is used, primarily because intimidation, bribery, patronage, etc., prevent a free exercise of the ballot. The objective in such a revolution is ordinarily the capture of the government, and consequently the patronage. This is revolution for the conquest of associations, and illustrates particularly well Martin's theory of revolutions, which maintains that revolutionary struggle is the result of the attempt of one group or crowd or class to replace another and that it changes little except the personnel of the associations and the patronage.

Institutional revolutions— There is, however, another tyre of revolution in which the objectives are much more fundamental and deep seated than in the case of conflict of classes over the control of associations, which may upon occasion de-

( 513) -generate into mere riots. These are the institutional revolutions, a type which has been emphasized in fact, if not in name, by Ellwood. Institutional revolutions vary in objectives from the concreteness and immediacy of struggles for governmental control, or mere political and industrial uprisings, on the one hand to the abstractness of struggle over principles on the other hand. As Martin and LeBon have demonstrated, all revolutions, whether of the associational or of the institutional type, justify themselves by an appeal to principles. Since such appeal is designed primarily to captivate public opinion, the appeal is likely to be the more fulsome the less sure the leaders are of the rightness of their cause in the eyes of the world. Some of the most hysterical appeals to principles have been made by mere political opportunists. But Martin and LeBon perhaps underestimate the objective sincerity of other types of institutional revolutionists, especially in the case of those more silent conflicts over the reorganization of relatively non-political and non-economic institutions like religion, if religious revolutions ever are detachable from economic and political motives. Such revolutions are caused primarily by the hardening of the custom and a sort of stasis in the codes of the institution. This sort of conservatism and blocking of progressive reorganization of the content and functions of institutions may occur either because the institutions are dominated by a privileged group within or by a privileged group without. Usually both causes operate, with the result that there is a sort of protective alliance between an economic or dynastic hierarchy which profits from the institutional stasis and the hierarchy of the institution itself. In such cases the objective of the revolutionists is to overthrow the hierarchies in order to make revision of their customs, creeds, and codes possible. Such revolutions are accomplished by silent methods where possible, but in other cases they may resort more or less to violence, especially in such cases as the French and American political revolutions of 1789 and 1776. But even in such types of revolution the struggle is largely economic, even if it is not of the crude nature of a factional fight for the control of the patronage.

Social revolutions— Yet another type of revolution is al-

(514) -most imperceptible in its operation. It is unplanned, and usually unnoticed until long after its effects have become quite marked. The commercial and industrial revolutions are typical of this form. The psychological aspects of this kind of revolution are to be noted in the changes in customs, traditions, mores, folkways, and other elements in the psycho-social environment produced by far-reaching technic and economic changes. We have already described the effect upon group organization of this type of revolution. Usually, as 0gburn has pointed out, the change in customs, traditions, and in the psycho-social environment generally, is slow, and there is a lag until the maladjustment becomes so acute as to force the readjustment. If the changes are rapid, the revolution may manifest itself in the conflict of the older and the younger generations. In such cases the old customs, traditions, etc., as embodied in the older members of society, have become obsolete for purposes of adjustment to new conditions. New psychosocial controls, however, have not as yet been perfected to take the place of the old, so that there is an apparent demoralization of society until the younger group evolves new and better fitting standards. This kind of revolution is really evolution, although it is more or less irregular in the form of its occurrence. It does not ordinarily involve violence, except occasionally where the struggle becomes by induction economic or political. However, this third form of revolution has more profound and far-reaching social effects than either of the other two types.

COOPERATION —  The tendency is for conflict to end in cooperation for self-defense. Thus the movies appoint a czar, baseball does the same, competing firms organize into trusts, and nations into a League of Nations. The normal collective attitude is not one of conflict, in spite of the emphasis given to social conflict by such social theorists as Gumplowicz, Ratzenhofer, Gobineau, and Novicow. Group conflict is inevitable, because individual interests clash and individuals tend to cooperate in groups. Thus group conflict is essentially an extension of coöperation through collective behavior or groups, and it must be explained on this basis. This fact also makes clear why there is ordinarily more conflict between derivative than

( 515) between primary groups, and between indirect contact than between direct contact groups. The local and direct contact groups are now learning to coöperate within the organization of indirect contact groups very much as individuals have learned earlier to coöperate within the primary and face-to-face groups. Families coöperate in the community, communities in the state, local church societies within the larger denomination, political clubs within the political party, etc. More and more the local units, like individuals, delegate their conflicts to the overhead organization just as they also increasingly empower them to promote a large share of their coöperative behavior or enterprise. This movement of conflicts toward the periphery of social organization is a part of the tendency, which we have already so frequently emphasized, for the control of social contacts to become more and more indirect and derivative. It grows out of the extension and multiplication of distance contacts in modern complex life. The overhead organizations, whose function it is primarily to organize and correlate the interests of their constituent organizations and individuals, are too busy promoting coöperation within to turn to cooperation to any considerable extent with their competitors. Before there can be any large degree of coöperation between indirect contact groups there must develop a community of interests between their members and a reënforcing public opinion. There is, of course, a tendency for such publics to become ever more extensive and inclusive.

Not all coöperation between groups is necessarily purposive, or even conscious coöperation. The modern economic system involves the coöperation of groups the world over. As soon as any group ceases to be self-sufficing, as soon as exchange relationships are established, or as soon as any division of labor takes place, coöperation of either a purposive or of a non-purposive type enters in. The institution of slavery in the South was a form of racial coöperation, although it was not voluntary on both sides. The racial heterogeneity within the national unity of the United States illustrates this type of cooperation. Historically, the hostile invasion and conquest of one group by another has resulted in social realignment and coöperation, perhaps enforced by the stronger group. Migra-

( 516) -tions of peoples in the past resulting in the cross fertilization of cultures also illustrate non-purposive cooperation. Each race gave to the other various elements in its culture which it might never have produced by itself. This process of adjustment is sometimes called accommodation.

Since this volume is concerned so largely with the integration of personality in individuals as the result of selection by social stimuli, on the one hand, and with the integration of collective behavior patterns, on the other hand, it is not necessary to discuss the social psychology of coöperation further at this point. The psychology of concrete coöperative organizations as such falls in the field of social organization.

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