Behaviour in Groups Flashcards
Group
A any collection of individuals that share common characteristics or interests, either temporarily or on a continuing basis.
Ingroup
Members of a group with whom there is shared interest or identity. Ingroups can be based on a myriad of dimensions including race, nationality, political affiliation, sports team, university, etc.
Outgroup
Members of groups with whom there are divergent interests or identities.
Stereotype
Cognitive component of person perception. Stereotypes reflect beliefs about social groups. They can be positive, negative, or neutral in their evaluations. They can be accurate, exaggerated, or completely false.
Prejudice
Affective component of person perception. Prejudice reflects a negative attitude about a group and is usually based on negative beliefs (stereotypes).
Discrimination
Behavioural component of person perception. Discrimination reflects differential treatment of individuals based on their group membership. Usually, the treatment towards outgroup members is unfair or negative.
Bystander effect
As the number of bystander inreases, the liklihood that anybody will help decreases
Diffusion of Responsibility: explains the bystander effect
People have a threshold, when exceeded. Motivates them to take action in the event of an emergency
If threshold is not crossed ; no helping occurs
One person will assumes 100% of the responsibility to act, when the number of people increase, the numbers gets smaller per person ; making it unlikely for someone to exceed threshold
Not everyone’s threshold is identical; higher vs lower thresholds among people
Social loafing
eduction of effort invested when performing a task within a group
The larger the group, the greater the social loafing; lower effort invested by individual members
Social loafing can occur in any kind of group activity where group members work towards a common goal and the individual contributions of individuals is concealed or anonymous
How to reduce social loafing
Task importance: leaders should try to emphasize task importance since group members are less likely to scial loaf when they perceive the task as essential, or that failure could result in undesirable consequences
Group Cohesion: Leads should cultivate positive interpersonal relationships between the group members since members who like and respect each other are less likely to social loaf than members who simply tolerate or even dislike each other
Collectivistic orientation: leaders should encourage collectivistic orientations towards the group rather than individualism since members who prioritize group over individual interests tend to engage in less social loafing
Specialization: enhances productivity; reduce social loafing; segmenting a large task into smaller components and assigning different workers to each subtask, not only do individual contributions become observable, but also workers completing later subtasks become dependent on the efforts of workers completing earlier subtasks
Social facilitation
the presence of others can enhance our performance on simple or well-practice tasks
Difference and similarities between social loafing and social facilitation
Like social loafing: Occurs when performing a task with other co-actors (others performing the same task)
Unlike social loafing: facilitation occur in the presence of observers who are not involved in the activity
Ex. Cyclists bike faster when biking together
social loafing results in decreased effrot whereas social facilitation can increase or decrease performance depending on ease and familiarity with the task
Arousal Primes dominant response in social facilitation
Arousal primes Dominant responses: which are those that are easy or well practiced making them more likely to occur
When the desired response in a social context calls for a dominant response, then performance is faciliated because the desired response is already primed
When the desired response is not the same as the dominant response, then priming actually inhibits the desired response and compromises performance
If the response is complex and unfamiliar (ex. First karate class) - the desired response is not dominant, and the increase in physiological arousal intereferes with your ability to execute the response correctly
This is why performance decreases in the presence of others tather than remaining at the same level
Minimal group paradigm
people sort themselves into groups based on some arbitrary criterion
Reciprocal Altruism/ Direct Social Exchange
when you pay a small cost to give someone a large benefit, doing so will also guarantee that they will help you in the same way
Introduced by Toshio Yamagishi
This is an evolved psychological mechanism
Cheating: someone who accepts large benefits from others but who refuses to pay any cost to return favours
Ingroup members are those we are expected to cooperate with and who are expected to cooperate with us
Outgroup members are expected to withhold cooperation
Prisoners dilemma
used to investigate cooperation between ingroup and outgroup members
Must decide whether you wish to cooperate with or defect agasint another player who must simultaneously make the same choice for you
Game theory: Utility: rational actors always act to maximize their outcomes
Cooperating is the most typical decision (even when it is anonymous)
Participants were more likely to cooperate with ingroup members and far more likely to defect outgroup members
Stems from expectations and responsibilites of group membership or else face santioning by the group
