By now, I am sure you would have heard of the long queues and violence that occurred due to the recent watch launch. The frenzy that happened due to the lack of a queue system - people fainting due to the long wait in the crowd, and lashing out as their efforts were not rewarded.
The process of waking up early in the morning, choosing a good spot to wait, spending hours and hours waiting for the shop to open, watching the store manager coordinate the queues, then losing your good spot and ending up behind people who may not have arrived as early as you did. Sounds familiar? Based on the many media reports, this sequence of events was experienced by many. However, there was one infamous person who shouted at the police officers on duty and took it a tad too far by asking them to shoot him.
In Singapore, queuing for things is definitely one of the most interesting phenomena that repeatedly occur. As a country, we have witnessed people queue for Hello Kitty plushies, electronics, clothes, tickets, and food. You name it, we have probably seen it. So, why do we queue? How does queuing affect one’s sense of fairness? In the following, we will be exploring the possible reasons as to why people react the way they do during these events.
Why we queue
Is it just the curiosity or fear of missing out that drives us to join indefinitely long queues? While that might be true for some, there are some concepts that social psychologists use to explain such phenomena.
Conformity. The act of adopting similar beliefs or behaviour to fit into a social group. When we see a large group of people in line, we may feel inclined to join the queue as well, as a way of fitting in. Of course, this does not suggest anything about our personality. Acts of conformity are more often attributed to the situation itself rather than to personality.
Peripheral route persuasion. Occurs when a message is evaluated based on surface-level characteristics rather than its content.
In this case, when we see a long line of people, we perceive the product to be attractive based on the long queues of people trying to get the watch, rather than the product’s functioning and value. This experience is commonly observed in our daily life. Imagine going to a new food centre, would you rather choose a food store that has a long queue or one with nobody at all?
Social desirability. The tendency for us to present ourselves in a favourable fashion.
As seen with the previous launches of the latest smartphone models, being the first few to get their hands on one of those ‘status icons’ is consistently perceived to be ‘rich’ and ‘fashionable’. Similarly, this time, with the hype of the newly launched Swatch x Omega watches being the talk of the town, many rush to join the queues to get their ‘symbol of status’. According to various accounts of the people in the queue, this particular collaboration was perceived as an opportunity to experience an alternative to the otherwise exclusive and luxurious watch by Omega. Hence, the exclusivity of Omega watches brought about an increase in perceived value of the watch. Additionally, the many reports published about the long queues do not help in reducing the queues. Rather, it reinforces the competitiveness of getting the product before others can do so. The novelty of the collaboration further drove the perceived value of the watch despite not being limited edition.
Psychology of queuing
While it may seem that we spent hours on end queuing, there are a few factors that influence our perception of the time we spent in queues. With the number of things we are able to do while waiting in line being largely limited, most of us opt to talk to our partners or scroll through social media to kill time, but in reality, we know that the time spent queuing could have been used to do many other things if not for the need to stand in line. The sheer knowledge of that brings us to feel more restless while in line.
Another major factor contributing to our feelings of restlessness is the amount of uncertainty as to how long we have to wait in line. Without an estimate of how much time we will be spending in line, we start bubbling in anxiety as time slows to a crawl. After queuing for hours on end, we tend to be more on the edge and sensitive about who gets to be ahead of us. Research suggests that we are afraid of losing our queue position because it entails that our waiting time increases, and we might potentially lose out on getting the product we were in line for. This could thus explain why many are left dissatisfied when others were allowed to queue ahead of them.
Why we rage
These acts of aggression are more likely to be a response to the situation rather than an issue with anger management. It could be the hot, sweaty and tiresome hours spent queueing, or the unpleasant feeling of having to be sandwiched between others equally restless - an intrusion into our private space. While these environmental factors could have contributed to the pent up frustration underlying the various acts of aggression, they still do not justify responding with aggression towards public personnel, do they?
The frustration-aggression theory suggests that we feel an urge to show aggression towards the object that causes the frustration. The frustration of not getting rewarded by the product we spent hours queuing for, morphs into anger, which then surfaces as aggression. Since it's probably not the brightest idea to cause damage to property, the aggression is displaced onto another object or person who is perceived to be less threatening - the innocent public personnel that are trying to do their job.
But again, this definitely is not the first nationwide sensational product that has yielded long lines of restless shoppers, so why does it seem like there are more cases of aggression displaced this time? This time, we can finally blame the pandemic. In a large crowd of individuals queuing hiding behind masks, our sense of anonymity is elevated, and we feel less self awareness and perceive less responsibility for our actions - a phenomenon known as de-individualisation. With de-individualisation, we feel less self-aware of our actions and experience a reduced perception of responsibility, therefore becoming more likely to act without thinking. Deindividualization is most likely to occur in large groups where individuals and when individuals have a sense of anonymity, very much like the Swatch x Omega situation.
Why did no one react?
How about the many bystanders who did not react to the acts of displaced aggression? Why did they choose to stay hidden rather than stand up against injustice toward public personnel? Being part of a large crowd diffuses our perceived responsibility to take action (or not take action). This phenomenon is known as the bystander effect, where people are less likely to offer help in emergency situations where there is a large number of bystanders.
In unfamiliar situations, we tend to look to others for social cues to determine how we should react. Since there was a large number of onlookers not reacting, we form a perception that we too, should not react to fit in and not overreact. However, what we do not realise is that others are also assessing our reactions to figure out how they should be reacting in the same situation!
Conclusion
Humans are undeniably social beings - we want to look good and fit in, but at the same time, we have emotions too. However, it is important to keep in mind that a single thought or action does not define who we are. With the ongoing war and pandemic, the looming uncertainty of possible economic impact and threats to safety, there are way too many problems to worry about than not getting a newly launched watch. As Minister Shanmmugan says “We don’t need to lose our minds over these situations. It's not life and death.” Let us take a moment to re-evaluate our priorities and put everything in perspective.
Interesting read
https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.63.5.806
https://www.verywellmind.com/the-bystander-effect-2795899
Co-author: Belinda Sng Qi Rong