Collective intelligence is a shared or group intelligence that emerges from the collaboration and competition of many individuals. It is not a new concept, but with the development and progress of Web 2.0, it has multiplied the opportunities for people to work together and collectively use their intelligences.
In the article, “Concept of Collective Intelligence” by David Wechsler (1971), Gustave LeBon put forward the concept of the “popular mind” to explain the predictably irrational behaviour of crowds. He hypothesizes that when part of a crowd, an individual acts as if he is on automation, subject to the will of a leader and at the mercy of his unconscious drives. Further, LeBon argues that the intelligence of the crowd is always below the average of the population as a whole.
If LeBon is correct and the intelligence of a crowd is always below the average of the population, this has a number of interesting implications for using Web 2.0. For instance, as a member of a group or a blog, are you part of a crowd? What happens during an online discussion with a time limit and strong opposing opinions are expressed? Are students more likely to jump on the bullying bandwagon if they see their peers bullying and don’t want to be excluded?
By using the web to interact, discuss and build knowledge, people are generally able to put more thought and time into responses. A sentence can be written, edited and even deleted as the piece goes on. People have personalities, values and opinions and these continue to play a significant role online. However, just because someone says or argues a point online, does not mean that it is right or accurate or necessarily reflective of your own opinion and this is where the role of critical literacy comes in to play.
Kate, this post is a 'to the point perspective'. I totally agree with your last paragraph.
ReplyDeleteMore recent thinking on collective intelligence tends to argue that it will produce superior results to what any one individual can achieve alone. However, we need to distinguish between the 'wisdom of crowds' (which is dependent on diverse independent decisions being made, as in Google's search results) and more deliberative CI (where people consciously work together, as on a Wikipedia entry).
ReplyDeleteWhat LeBon is describing is more like the idea of mob rule/mob behaviour. There is an important critique of web culture here, though: firstly, groups of people CAN behave like mobs online, and secondly, there must always still be scope for original individual perspectives or insights, which may fall outside what is produced by CI but may nevertheless be very valuable.
I like the link you make with critical literacy, emphasising the need to apply it to the products of CI. I totally agree!
Thanks for the post, Mark. I should have looked at some more recent articles and also looked at some articles with respect to CI in an online environment.
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