Marathon runners feel the love

Last Monday marked the 112^th running of the Boston Marathon, a tradition that has turned the third Monday in April into state-wide holiday. Marathon Monday has become the defining social event of each spring semester at BC, as students fire up the barbecues and crack open the beers at an hour that, on any other day, would likely be deemed early enough to fully justify sleeping through class.

While the Superfans are often stigmatized as being a rowdy, drunken collection of loudmouths, on Monday they were—well, exactly that. The difference is that on Marathon Monday, there are no opponents. There is no twice-suspended quarterback to scream obscenities at, no goalie whose last name we can turn into a cleverly offensive pun. On Marathon Monday, the Superfans flock to the streets purely in support the 30,000 runners that set out to run, walk, or wheel through those 26.2 miles.

Following the marathon, a few runners I spoke to talked about what a big help it is to reach Boston College’s Main Gate and see the fans lining the sidewalk. Letters and articles in The Heights expressed similar sentiments—the raucous crowd is what helps get them past Heartbreak Hill, the course’s biggest obstacle. One student explained the sensation: “One of the greatest feelings in the world is having all the people cheering for you and pulling for you,” he said. “My race ends at 21 miles—the adrenaline rush I get coming through BC is unbelievable.”

So are these runners embellishing a bit, and just being overly gracious to the fans who treated them so well? Or is there actually some kind of phenomenon at work here? Social psychology suggests the latter.

In discussing group behavior, psychologist Bob Zajonc refers to the dominant response, which is a person’s most common response in a given situation. The dominant response of a Superfan who prefers Guinness to Smithwick’s is, of course, to go with Guinness.

Taking it a step further, Zajonc put forth the social facilitation theory, which states that the presence of others will make us even more likely to tend towards our dominant response (so long as the task is not too complex). Being in the company of others increases our arousal, in turn strengthening the tendency to tend towards the dominant response. According to this theory, that same Superfan will, when hanging out with his friends, be even more inclined to order the Guinness.

So when those marathon runners arrive at Heartbreak Hill and see thousands of their peers, it’s pretty safe to assume their levels of arousal get a boost. Thus, their ability to perform the task at hand—running towards that finish line—gets a boost as well. Yes, the student above was probably exaggerating a bit when he claimed his race “ended” at Mile 21. Social facilitation doesn’t make those last five miles a piece of cake, but it does, in some way, increase the ability to run them.

Source: The Heights, 4/24/08