The bandwagon effect refers to the general human tendency to form beliefs based on trendy opinions. , Photo credit: JA Premkumar
PChidambara Rahasya by Unachandra Tejaswi is a popular Kannada novel. It begins with a scene of some small town boys deciding on the inevitability of a large scale revolution. Obviously, the purpose of the revolution is to end the innumerable evils spread in their society. The amusing reality, however, emerges later in the scene.
The repeated failures of the boys to woo the girls in the town had disheartened them so much that they began to look to the idea of revolution as a true panacea. The search for a girlfriend had mysteriously turned into the fervor of a social revolution!
A similar thought goes about the motives of “keyboard warriors” who write angry comments on social media sites. These arm-chair “revolutionaries” usually associate themselves with a political group or an ideology. The alliance, however, is the result of any studied understanding of ideology; This is simply due to what cognitive science calls the bandwagon effect.
The bandwagon effect refers to the general human tendency to form beliefs based on trendy opinions. The human mind has a natural inclination for modern ideas because being on the side of large groups gives it a sense of belonging and security. The loneliness and fear subside, at least momentarily.
Once the bandwagon effect operates and trust is built, “likes” and “shares” on social media sites only reinforce them. Apart from fostering lazy habits of mind, the illusory camaraderie generated by these “likes” and “shares” acts as a balm for discouraged hearts. The keyboard warrior is thus left with hardly any incentive to quash facts that contradict his beliefs. Why care about being intellectually active if intellectual laziness also brings emotional comfort?
Four centuries ago, Francis Bacon warned against falling prey to this lazy habit of the human mind. Trendy opinions, he called “idols of the market”.
The worshiper of such idols is in fact a victim of words that “emphasize the obvious and overpower the understanding, and lead everyone into confusion, and lead people into innumerable empty controversies and idle speculations.” Huh”.
There is a time-honored solution to the problems of loneliness and frustration that our keyboard warriors can employ: the great company of classics and imaginative literature. The loneliness is dispelled when the imaginative work pleasantly disentangles the reader from his or her own little egocentric world and sets him or her in the vast realm of a wider humanity. The despair fades away as it slowly transforms the reader’s perspective by providing a deeper understanding of life and its common realities.
As Harold Bloom wrote, “Imaginative literature is otherness, and thus the removal of loneliness. We read not only because we cannot know enough people, but because friendship is so tenuous, so few or It is likely to disappear, overcome by space, time, unfulfilled sympathies and all the miseries of familial and obsessive life.
Will our angry warriors listen?
krishnagl@iisc.ac.in