What does it take to make you believe you are a member of a group? The tradition of the British pantomime usually has one section where the audience is asked to sing, divided into two groups, and encouraged to compete against each other to see who sings the loudest. The members of the audience invariably oblige by singing their hearts out. Each person believes they are a member of a team and acts to support that team. Ingroup favouritism can develop remarkably easily — for example, people are more likely to cooperate with someone if they believe they share a birthday with them (Miller et al. 1998).
Not all groups are as harmless as pantomime audiences and our sense of group membership can lead us to behave in some hostile ways towards people who we believe are not in our group. This sense of group membership can be exploited by those who want to sell us things or who want to encourage us to wage war against other nations.
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