Lecture 4 - Group Processes

Question 1

What is a group?

Answer 1

“A group is two or more individuals in face-to-face interaction, each aware of his or her membership in the group, each aware of the others who belong to the group, and each aware of their positive interdependence as they strive to achieve mutual goals”.
(Johnson & Johnson, 1987, p.8)

Question 2

Why should we study groups?

Answer 2

“If we take care of the individual, psychologically speaking, the groups will take care of themselves” (Allport, 1924, p.9)

If we study individuals, we will know about groups, because a group is just a collection of individuals?

Question 3

Who came up with different types of groups?

Answer 3

Lickel et al. (2000)

Groups can be lots of different things

Question 4

What are strong interpersonal relationships?

Answer 4

Families

Small groups of close friends

Question 5

What are groups formed to fulfil task(s)?

Answer 5

Committees

Work groups

Together for a particular purpose

Question 6

What are groups based on large social categories?

Answer 6

E.g. women, Americans

Question 7

What are groups based on weak social relationships?

Answer 7

E.g. people who enjoy Taylor Swift’s music, people from the same local area

Question 8

What are transitory groups?

Answer 8

E.g. people waiting at the bus stop; people in the queue at the bank

Question 9

What are minimal groups?

Answer 9

Tajfel et al. (1971, replicated by Allen & Wilder, 1975)

‘Minimal groups’; split randomly into two-groups

People allocated more money to their ‘own’ group than the other group, and the effect could not be explained by:

Self-interest (as they didn’t get a share)

Existing friendships (as allocation was random)

Demonstrates how easily bias (and groups), i.e. in-group favouritism, can develop

Question 10

What did early work show about social facilitation?

Answer 10

Triplett (1898) was the first to ask these sorts of questions

Observed track cyclists and found performances were faster when:

Timed alone

Timed and racing alongside other cyclists

Hypothesised that the presence of the audience, particularly in a competition, ‘energised’ performance on motor tasks (made them do better)

Triplett tested his hypothesis using a ‘fishing line’ apparatus and found that children performed better when racing against each other than when alone

Question 11

What term did Allport (1920) coin?

Answer 11

‘Social facilitation’

He suggested a more generalised effect called ‘Mere Presence’

Question 12

What is mere presence?

Answer 12

Mere presence is defined as an “entirely passive and unresponsive audience that is only physically present” (Hogg & Vaughan, 2014, p.275)

Improvement in performance due to the mere presence of others as co-actors or passive audience

Question 13

Is the mere presence effect unique to humans?

Answer 13

Not just humans: Kangaroos, monkeys and horses eat more and run faster when other members of their species are doing the same thing (e.g., Dindo, et al., 2009; Pays, et al., 2009)

Question 14

What is social inhibition?

Answer 14

However, shortly after the discovery, some studies showed how the presence of others can impair performance for both humans and animals (see review by Bond & Titus, 1983), known as social inhibition

Question 15

What did Schmitt et al. (1986) find about social inhibition?

Answer 15

Complex task (e.g. typing name backwards), done more slowly in the presence of other people than alone

Question 16

What did Middlemist et al. (1976) find about social inhibition?

Answer 16

Men take longer to urinate when someone is standing immediately beside them at a urinal than alone

Question 17

Describe Zajonc’s (1965) Drive Theory

Answer 17

Argued mere presence of others creates an increase in arousal and energises ‘dominant response’:

‘Dominant response’ is that what is typically done in that situation i.e., a well-learnt/habitual response

When people are anxious, they tend to do better on easy tasks (already good at) and worse on difficult ones (that they normally struggle at)

If the dominant response is correct (easy), then performance will be facilitated

If the dominant response is incorrect (difficult), then performance will be inhibited

Question 18

What is social facilitation?

Answer 18

“An improvement in the performance of well-learnt/easy tasks and a deterioration in the performance of poorly-learnt/difficult tasks in the mere presence of members of the same species” (Hogg & Vaughan, 2014, p. 275)

It does seem plausible in some ways – joggers appear to run faster with others

However, some situations with others come in competitive contexts e.g., a race with other runners, where there is an audience watching/judging their every move. What happens?

Question 19

Which theory did Cottrell (1972) come up with?

Answer 19

Evaluation apprehension theory

Question 20

What is evaluation apprehension?

Answer 20

We learn about social reward/punishment contingencies (e.g., approval and disapproval) based on others’ evaluation

Perception of an ‘evaluating’ audience creates arousal, not mere presence

Social facilitation is an acquired effect based on perceived evaluations of others

Question 21

How did Cottrell et al. (1968) support the evaluation apprehension hypothesis?

Answer 21

3 audience conditions

(1) Blindfolded (cannot see participant)

(2) Merely present (passive and uninterested)

(3) Attentive audience

Tasks were well learned (i.e. easy)

Social facilitation was found when the audience was perceived to be evaluative (attentive); wanting to perform well for their audience worked in their favour (2 vs 3 should not differ if ‘mere presence’)

Question 22

How did Markus (1978) find contradictory evidence?

Answer 22

Time taken to dress in familiar clothes (easy task, own clothes)/unfamiliar clothes (difficult task, lab coat and unfamiliar shoes) as a function of social presence

3 conditions:

(1) alone

(2) in the presence of an inattentive audience

(3) in the presence of an attentive audience

Attentive audience speeded up performance in easy task

Inattentive and attentive not much different in difficult task (performed more slowly)

Question 23

How does Schmitt et al.’s (1986) study not support an evaluation apprehension hypothesis?

Answer 23

Asked participants to type either their name or a code backwards on a computer

Mere presence of others made people perform the simple task quicker and the difficult task slower

However, adding in an evaluation apprehension condition made little difference to the typing speed

Found no difference in typing speed

Question 24

What do the conflicting evidence suggest about evaluation apprehension?

Answer 24

It seems that evaluation apprehension is sometimes helpful but sometimes unnecessary for social facilitation

Question 25

What is distraction-conflict theory?

Answer 25

People become distracted, focusing (“drive”) on what others are doing (i.e., evaluating them), and perform worse

Question 26

How did Sanders et al. (1978) support distraction-conflict theory?

Answer 26

Had participants’ complete an easy or difficult digit task, but: (1) Alone (2) Someone doing the same task or someone doing a different task People performed worse when someone did the same thing as them (i.e. more distraction) Not just others – Sanders (1981) showed that bursts of light could similarly affect social facilitation

Question 27

Does it matter what is evaluating you?

Answer 27

Siemon (2023) examined whether using AI-based idea evaluation led to evaluation apprehension Finnish participant presented an idea to either Alan or Phillip Participants express less evaluation apprehension when presenting their idea to Alan (AI) than Phillip The results show that when humans are involved in evaluating an idea, people tend to feel concerned

Question 28

What is social loafing?

Answer 28

Social loafing (loss of motivation termed ‘social loafing’ (Latane et al., 1979) à “Reduction in individual effort when working on a collective task compared with working either alone”)

Question 29

What did Ringlemann (1913, 1927) find?

Answer 29

Men pulling on a rope attached to a dynamometer exerted less force than the number of people in the group

Question 30

What are some potential reasons for the Ringlemann effect?

Answer 30

Coordination loss: as group size inhibits movement, distraction, and jostling Motivation loss: participants did not try as hard; less motivated

Question 31

What did Ingham et al. (1974) show?

Answer 31

Investigated this with ‘real groups’ and ‘pseudo groups’ pulling on a rope; participant blind-folded Real group = groups of varying size (greater performance loss - coordination losses on top of motivational losses) Pseudo-group = only one true participant, rest were confederates who did not pull at all (still pulled with less force - motivational losses)

Question 32

How did Latane et al. (1979) support theories about social loafing?

Answer 32

Supported this through clapping, shouting, and cheering tasks Recorded amount of cheering/clapping noise made per person [blind folded] reduced by: 29% in 2-person groups 49% in 4-person groups 60% in 6-person groups

Question 33

Why do people loaf?

Answer 33

Geen (1991) Output equity = when people learn others are not pulling their weight, they too can lose motivation and put less effort in Evaluation apprehension = individuals only believe their efforts are being judged when they perform alone; in groups, people are not accountable

Question 34

How can identifiability be used to reduce social loafing?

Answer 34

i.e. when people’s individual contributions to a task can be identified E.g. people shout louder in a group shouting task when they think every individual’s volume can be recorded (Williams et al., 1981)

Question 35

How can individual responsibility be used to reduce social loafing?

Answer 35

i.e. when people know they can make a unique contribution to a task E.g. in a group task, watching for dots on a screen: People worked harder if they thought they were solely responsible for watching a particular segment vs If they thought others were watching too, even when no one would know how many dots they personally had spotted (Harkins & Petty, 1982)

Question 36

Does social loafing replicate across different groups?

Answer 36

Social loafing appears to be robust across gender, culture and task, although the effect is smaller for subjects from Eastern cultures (Karau & Williams, 1993) The authors suggest that: “Individuals from Western cultures may attach greater importance to outcomes such […] other’s evaluation of one’s individual performance.” In contrast, “individuals from Eastern cultures may be more likely to attach at least moderate importance to outcomes such as group harmony, group success, and the satisfaction of other group members.”

Question 37

What is the collective effort model?

Answer 37

People will put effort into a group task when: (1) They believe their input will have an impact (2) Completing the task is likely to bring them something they value (e.g. concrete things like money, grades etc., and abstract things such as satisfaction and enjoyment)

Question 38

What is group decision-making?

Answer 38

Group behaviour can differ from the behaviour of solitary individuals Also, how groups arrive at decisions and deal with problems is no exception Does interaction with people in groups intensify our decisions? Do groups generally make ‘good’ or ‘bad’ decisions?

Question 39

What is group polarisation?

Answer 39

People often discuss topics with those who are similarly minded, which can strengthen their attitudes

Question 40

What did Moscovivi and Zavalloni (1969) find about group polarisation?

Answer 40

Found that group discussions enhanced French students (already) positive towards their president and enhanced their (already) negative attitudes towards Americans

Question 41

What did McCauley and Segal (1987) find about group polarisation?

Answer 41

As people come together to share their grievances, they are often in isolation from others – likely becoming more extreme over time, leading to actions (such as violence) that might not have happened on their own

Question 42

Which context makes group problem-solving useful according to McGlynn et al. (1995)?

Answer 42

When groups get together and critique each other’s ideas, they have been found to come up with better-quality ideas

Question 43

Which context makes group problem-solving useful according to Mullen et al. (1991)?

Answer 43

Also, more effective when small rather than large groups and if the experimenter is not present to monitor the process

Question 44

Which context is makes group problem-solving most useful according to Diehl and Stroebe (1987)?

Answer 44

However, if only simple group decisions occur, with no break-out from individuals, solitary efforts are typically better than the group’s

Question 45

What is key for making group problem solving useful according to Brown and Paulus (2002)?

Answer 45

Ensure a combination of group and individual brainstorming – pitch ideas to a relatively small group

Question 46

What is groupthink?

Answer 46

A disastrous political decision by U.S President JFK and a small group of advisors in 1961 (the Invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs) prompted theories of flawed group decision making Janis (1982) proposed the concept of ‘groupthink’: Where objections to poor group decisions are suppressed to maintain group harmony

Question 47

What are the conditions for groupthink?

Answer 47

Groupthink is a very specific phenomenon, thought to occur under particular conditions: (1) Stressful situation without a clear, correct solution (2) Cohesive group of like-minded people, cut off from external (moderating) influences. (3) Strong, vocal leader Janis (1971, 1982) Turner & Pratkanis (1998)

Question 48

What are the consequences of groupthink?

Answer 48

When groupthink is occurring, it is more likely that: The group does not carry out adequate research Alternative options are not considered; group members cascade around the same opinion (Glebovskiy, 2018) Risks are not adequately assessed Janis (1971, 1982)