Collective motion of humans in mosh and circle pits at heavy metal concerts
Abstract
Human collective behavior can vary from calm to panicked depending on social context. Using videos publicly available online, we study the highly energized collective motion of attendees at heavy metal concerts. We find these extreme social gatherings generate similarly extreme behaviors: a disordered gaslike state called a mosh pit and an ordered vortexlike state called a circle pit. Both phenomena are reproduced in flocking simulations demonstrating that human collective behavior is consistent with the predictions of simplified models. © 2013 American Physical Society.
Date Published
Journal
Physical Review Letters
Volume
110
Issue
22
URL
https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-84878354924&doi=10.1103%2fPhysRevLett.110.228701&partnerID=40&md5=b61ad1bc1b9bbb79cabfb76988ddd601
DOI
10.1103/PhysRevLett.110.228701
Research Area
Group (Lab)
Itai Cohen Group
James Sethna Group