Collective Effervescence as Self-Organization and Enaction
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.25365/jso-2025-8732Keywords:
Collective Effervescence, Embodied Cognition, Emergence, Enaction, Collective EmotionAbstract
Collective effervescence is a group experience of intense collective affect. It includes feelings of being “swept away” and “becoming one with the crowd” and often a sensation of “awe” or being in touch with the sacred. Empirical research demonstrates that collective effervescence is connected to several short- and long-term psychological and physical benefits. The growing field of 4E cognition (enactive, embodied, embedded, and extended) takes cognition to be inherently social and affective. Yet surprisingly, despite the social, embodied, dynamic, and affective nature of collective effervescence, there is currently no 4E account of collective effervescence. I integrate the empirical literature on collective effervescence into 4E cognition. I argue, that whenever there are high degrees of self-organizing bodily activity in a human crowd under the proper boundary conditions, there is collective effervescence. Collective effervescence is the experience of undergoing high degrees of self-organization in a crowd. Taking a 4E dynamic systems approach to collective effervescence demystifies the phenomenon and opens it up for potential use in public policy and therapy.
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