April 2020
Article
Current Directions in Psychological Science

Collective Emotions

By: Amit Goldenberg, David Garcia, Eran Halperin and James J. Gross

Format:Print

Abstract

When analyzing situations in which multiple people are experiencing emotions together—whether the emotions are positive or negative and whether the situations are online or offline—we are intuitively drawn to the emotions of each individual in the situation. However, this type of analysis often seems incomplete. In many of the cases in which people experience emotions together, there appear to be emergent macro-level affective processes that cannot be readily captured at the individual level. This paper examines these macro-level affective phenomena, termed collective emotions. We open with a general review of research on collective psychological processes. We then define collective emotions and discuss their key features. Next, we focus our attention on the emergent properties of collective emotions and map them using three dimensions: quality, magnitude, and time course. Finally, we discuss pressing open questions and future directions.

Keywords

Emotions; Social Psychology

Citation

Goldenberg, Amit, David Garcia, Eran Halperin, and James J. Gross. "Collective Emotions." Current Directions in Psychological Science 29, no. 2 (April 2020): 154–160.