Within the sliver of psychology that focuses on riots and other demonstrations, there are a few main typologies that are most commonly used to identify the cause of a specific violent and destructive mass-participant event, which in turn is meant to help address whatever variables may have sparked that incident, while also gesturing at how to respond (and maybe prevent further violence and destruction), afterward.
One such categorization model differentiates riots into two main buckets: those that are stoked by dissatisfaction, and those that are the result of celebration.
Celebratory riots (like those that are triggered by a city’s soccer/football team winning a big match) will tend to have a different valence than a riot sparked by a police officer brutalizing an innocent civilian, and they will likewise be most successfully contained and ameliorated in different ways (energy that might lead to future celebratory riots might be funneled into more productive, happiness-outpouring activities before they turn to destruction, for instance, while protest riots might be assuaged by very publicly taking action to address whatever is at the center of the rioters’ discontent).
It’s also possible to categorize riots based on who participates in them.
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