A Critical Examination of the Social Contagion Image of Collective Behavior: the Case of the Enfield Monster

Abstract

This paper makes an initial statement regarding the conceptual and empirical utility of the social contagion image as posited by Blumer and Klapp. Their position is then criticized on the basis of its assumption that unverified and unusual sensory experiences, mobilization processes, and mass preoccupations are equivalent and undifferentiated products of social contagion. Further, the social contagion approach is unable to adequately account for differential participation in these collective behavior events. Most of these problems stem from the assumed discontinuity between collective and institutional behavior embodied in the social contagion perspective. An alternative approach is posited which suggests that communication processes, availability of the population for participation, and institutional demands provide a more adequate explanation of differential participation with respect to unusual sensory experiences, mobilization, and mass preoccupation. A case study of a monster sighting in a rural community is presented and examined from this alternate perspective.