This refers to a social phenomenon wherein individuals who are members of a group refuse to take personal responsibility for their actions. Instead, each individual assumes that other members of the group are responsible for group outcomes. Such diffusion of responsibility is often considered to be the result of lack of ownership among individual members of a group. Since no single person is held responsible for any group outcome, members of the group lack any significant positive or negative incentive to take responsibility for their actions. The concept has been used to explain the behaviour of mobs, crowds, and groups of people in general.
