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In life-threatening situations, such as a fire in a movie theater, we might expect people to put their own safety first and behave in ways that might unintentionally harm others. Media accounts of the injuries and deaths that occurred at a 1979 rock concert were consistent with this common-sense explanation. However, as Norris Johnson' s research revealed, concert goers did not "stampede" as the media contended. Instead, they actually tried to help one another. This article explores some of the forces behind unexpected human behavior. O n December 3, 1979, eleven young people were killed in a crush entering Riverfront Coliseum in Cincinnati, Ohio, for a concert by the British rock group, The Who. The incident was immediately labeled as a "stampede" by the local media, and commentators were quick to condemn the "mob psychology" which precipitated the seemingly selfish, ruthless behavior of participants. Crowd members were thought to have stormed over others in their rush for good seats within the arena, leading a national columnist (Royko, 1979) to refer to the crowd of young people as barbarians who "stomped 11 persons to death [after] having numbed their brains on weeds, chemicals, and

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