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Follow the Leader

Law students show pluralistic ignorance in action.  The Wikipedia entry for "pluralistic ignorance" is pretty good:  In social psychology, pluralistic ignorance is a process which involves several members of a group who think that they have different perceptions, beliefs, or attitudes from the rest of the group. While they do not endorse the group norm, the dissenting persons behave like the other group members, because they think that the behaviour of the other group members shows that the opinion of the group is unanimous. In other words, because everyone who disagrees behaves as if he or she agrees, all dissenting members think that the norm is endorsed by every group member but themselves. This in turn reinforces their willingness to conform to the group norm rather than express their disagreement...continue to full post

Full post as published by Crime & Federalism on August 20, 2008 (boomark / email).