Search

Forms of meditation have been practiced in many cultures throughout the ages. Traditionally, meditation techniques have been used to cultivate self-realization or enlightenment, in which higher levels of human potential are said to be realized. Traditional meditation techniques as well as modern techniques of relaxation are often used today for more limited purposes—to combat stress and specific problems of physical and mental health. There is also growing interest, however, in the greater purpose of meditation to achieve higher states of human development.

Crowds are groups of people who are together for short periods of time. The study of crowd behavior examines the actions that people in a crowd perform and how these actions differ from the behavior of individuals acting alone. Crowd behavior became a focus of scholarly thought in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in reaction to social turmoil in western Europe. Italian criminologist Scipio Sighele was among the first to write about crowd behavior; French psychologist Gustave Le Bon , the founder of crowd psychology, formalized and popularized the concept with his book The Crowd, published in 1895. Le Bon’s ideas reached a wide audience and are said to have influenced German dictator Adolf Hitler and Italian dictator Benito Mussolini. Because crowds have performed many senseless and destructive acts, both historically and in modern times, understanding crowd behavior remains extremely important for psychologists.