How to Coach Yourself and Others How to Influence, Persuade and Motivate | Page 246

names, while in other cases the children were allowed to remain
anonymous. The experimenter would then leave the room, as though they
had to go get something. Unseen observers took careful note of how the
children responded: When alone, 7.5 percent took more than one piece of
candy; when in groups, 20.8 percent took more than one piece! It was also
interesting to observe that the children who remained anonymous stole
more candy than did the children who gave out their names. Deindividuation prompted many of the trick-or-treaters to go against what
was socially acceptable and steal more candy.
[16]M. Gansberg, "37 Who Saw Murder Didn't Call the Police," New York Times,
March 27, 1964, p. 1.
[17]B. Latane and J. Rodin, "A Lady in Distress: Inhibiting Effects of Friends
and Strangers on Bystander Intervention," Journal of Experimental Social
Psychology (1969):189–202.
[18]L. Festinger, A. Pepitone, and T. Newcomb, "Some Consequences of
Deindividuation in a Group," Journal of Abnormal Social Psychology (1952):
382– 389.
[19]E. Diener, "Deindividuation: The Absence of Self-Awareness and SelfRegulation in Group Members," in The Psychology of Group Influence, P. B.
Paulus, editor (Hillsdale, N.J.: Erlbaum, 1980), pp. 209–242.
[20]E. Diener, S. C. Fraser, A. L. Beaman, and R. T. Kelem, "Effects of
Deindividuation Variables on Stealing Among Halloween Trick-or-Treaters,"
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (1976): 178–183.

Social Validation and Conformity or Groupthink
Anytime we find ourselves part of a group, we feel some susceptibility to
peer pressure and/or the opinion