ABSTRACT
Tf he phenomenon of behavioral contagion or behavior matching has in-trigued many thinkers (Bandura, 1977; James, 1890; Koffka, 1925; Le Bon, 1935/1982; McDougall, 1908; Piaget, 1946; Scheflen, 1964; Smith, 1759/1966; Tarde, 1903). The reason that so many theorists have published about behavior matching may indeed be, as Le Bon observed, that this phenomenon is so easy to witness. It is simply hard to ignore. Many people will have observed that they take over postures or gestures of others, for instance while watching a game on television. Although our own movements aren't as smooth and impressive as the ones made by Dennis Bergkamp or Ken Griffey Jr., many of us do
Address correspondence to: Ap Dijksterhuis, Department of Social Psychology, University of Nijmegen. PO Box 9104, 6500 HE, Nijmegen, The Netherlands. E-mail: dijksterhuis@psych.kun.nl
tend to mimic the behavior of our sports heroes to at least some extent. Other examples that are easy to observe are the temporary changes in our accents (especially when speaking a second language) as a result of the different accents of the people we are interacting with. I very well remember the first day in the office after my return from a two-month stay in Scotland. I read aloud an English letter to a colleague who became more and more amused as I read. As it was hard to see how the contents of the letter could be the reason behind his increasingly good mood-it was a rejection letter-I asked him why he was laughing. "You're talking Scottish!" he replied.
