Black Friday definitely is one of the most crazy day of US in a year. Every year over Thanksgiving weekend, nearly 136 million Americans are expected to shop with their life. Each year, nearly 51 billion dollar were spent on this crazy day. So why do people do this?
“The Influence of Others"
An Study from Auburn University Study found that the experience of shopping actually can be enhanced if there’s a large group of crowd around you. We will think a objectively like bad idea becomes a “good idea" because there are people around us. It said in the research:
“On the other hand, a few studies, including Li, Kim, and Lee (2009) and Wu and Luan (2007), found that perceived human crowding positively impacts shoppers’ emotions. Such inconsistent results may indicate that there is an intervening variable that affects the relationship between perceived human crowding and emotional responses.In the same vein, Machleit, Eroglu, and Mantel (2000) suggested that human crowding does not necessarily result in negative emotions or decrease satisfaction at certain retail formats (e.g.,discount stores), implying that individual or situational factors may influence how human crowding is perceived and evaluated.A retail situation that creates competition, such as Black Friday (i.e., the day after Thanksgiving),can impact consumers’ emotional and behavioral reactions by playing as a main driver of consumption decisions (Nichols, 2010). Competitive retail environments draw traffic to the retail floor through attractive store offerings (e.g., merchandise, service, or promotions). Moreover, when store offerings are limited, the store can promote a sense of competition among the shoppers, thus driving them to act more urgently to acquire scarce offerings (Byun & Sternquist, 2008)." (Byun and Mann 285)
The studies basically said that a crowd public can set a positive idea of “Shopping". So people started to fallow a same idea of “Go Shopping on Black Friday". In a nutshell, it created a feel of you are being in a community.
Why “Black Friday" is a good example of Herd Mentality?
From a objective view, it is not a good idea to shop on Black Friday, because you really might get yourself hurt. It is not really worth it to get your head chuck off because you really want a 20%off on a Xbox, or get punch in the face because someone else want to take your TV. However, people still shop on Black Friday, just because everyone else also do so. It really show how crazy people can do just to getting inside a group.
Reflection
This study is really surprising. The study really show how mad it can be when people get together. We start to not making our own decision, and only consider what the group think. It is not a bad thing but it will start get crazy when it is out of control.
The reason why it is difficult for people to speak out as a individuals is because showing their real thought will cause conflict, and people avoid to have conflict inside a group; so we often hide our real thought and fallow what the others do. Furthermore, they don’t want to be banned from theirs group. When a person is banned from a group, he or she will become a targeted, and attacked by all the other groups.
Reference
Sang-Eun, Byun and Manveer, Mann. “The Influence of Others: The Impact of Perceived Human Crowding onPerceived Competition, Emotions and Hedonic Shopping Values." Clothing & Textile, vol. 29, no. 4, 2001, pp. 284-287
Tran, Tony. “4 Examples of herd mentality (and what to do about it)." I will Teach You, N/D, Dec. 4, 2018 https://www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com/blog/herd-mentality/
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