with a large group from Nebraska to South Dakota to hunt pheasants. A South

Dakota hunting license was, say, $2 for South Dakota residents and $5 for

nonresidents. All the Nebraska residents, one by one, signed up for South Dakota

licenses with phony South Dakota addresses until it was my father’s turn. Then,

according to him, he barely prevented himself from doing what the others were

doing, which was some sort of criminal offense.

 

Not everyone so resists the social contagion of bad behavior. And, therefore, we

often get “Serpico Syndrome,” named to commemorate the state of a near-totally

corrupt New York police division joined by Frank Serpico. He was then nearly

murdered by gunfire because of his resistance to going along with the corruption

in the division. Such corruption was being driven by social proof plus

incentives, the combination that creates Serpico Syndrome. The Serpico story

should be taught more than it now is because the didactic power of its horror is

aimed at a very important evil, driven substantially by a very important force:

social proof.

 

In social proof, it is not only action by others that misleads but also their

inaction. In the presence of doubt, inaction by others becomes social proof that

inaction is the right course. Thus, the inaction of a great many bystanders led

to the death of Kitty Genovese in a famous incident much discussed in

introductory psychology courses.

 

In the ambit of social proof, the outside directors on a corporate board usually

display the near ultimate form of inaction. They fail to object to anything much