Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-07-05
GROUP PSYCHOLOGY
BY H. Addington Bru,e

ITEW recent publications on psychology
II have provoked so much discussion in
scientific circles as THE Group
Mind" book written by Professor William
| McDougall of Harvard University. And 'er-
| tainly few have been more calculated to ex-
| cite controversy.
| For in all seriousness Professor McDougall
puts forth and amplfies the theory that,
just as individual men and women have minds
BY which they govern their conduct, so when
these same men and women are united in
groups-and more particularly such groups ds
communities and nations-their conduct is
governed largely by the ideas and desires of
a group mind superior to the minds of the
individuals comprised in the group.
1T is maintained" to give Professor Nc
Dougall's own words, that society, when it
enjoys a long life and becomes highly organ
lied, acquires a structure and qualities
which are largely Independent of the quail
ties Of the individuals who enter into it's COM
position and take part for brief time in
it's life.
cit becomes an organized system of bodies
which has a life of it's own, tendencies of
it's own, power of molding all itcompo-
nent individuals, and power of perpetuating
itself as a self-identical system, subject only
to slow and gradual change"
He goes on, quoting approvingly Barker S
political Thought in England:
"An Oxford college is not a group of
buildings, though common speech gives that
But it is not a group of men in the sense
of a group Of bodies in propinquity; it is a
group of men in the sense of a group Of
minds. That group of minds, in virtue of
the common substance of uniting idea, is
itself a group mind"
Everybody, of course, recognizes that when
men act as groups-Whether the group be
merely mob intent on lynching a ma
ton united in defense against aggression
the characteristics of the individuals in the
group are profoundly modified. And every
body is aware that group sentiments and
ideals, as, for example, Anglo-Saxon ideals
of fair play, more or less affect individual
sentiments and Ideals
But in explanation of this, psychologists
in the past have not thought it necessary
to resort to the theory of separate and dis
tinct group mind.
Mob action they have explained is a prod
uct of the universal human tendency to imi-
tation. The same tendency, plus the forma-
tive influences of education and tradition,
has seemed to them sufficient to account for
the cohesive thinking, feeling, and doing of
communities and nations.
Besides which, while recognizing group
influences on individuals, psychologists have
recognized also the influence often most i'm
press1vely exercised on groups by individual
members of the group. The demeanor of
one brave man may suffice to check group
tendency to panic or convert the impending
defeat of an army into an unexpected tri-
umph.
And, so far as concerns group power "to
perpetuate itself as a self-identical system,
subject only to slow and gradual change" it
is unquestionable that by concerted action a
comparatively few individuals can within a
single generation radically alter even so
highly organized a group as an entire ma
ton. The EQUALIZATION of the kindly Ger
many of half century ago and the energi-
cation of inert Japan are cases much in point
So it is rot surprising that Professor Nc
Douglas conception of a self-perpetuating
veritable group mind should be sharply chaI-
lenged. It may we'll be, however, that out
of the resultant debate there will eventually
come a more exact knowledge both of group
and of individual psychology than we have
hitherto possessed.
Copyright, 1921, by The Associated
NeWspapers)