Power of the Pack

Question 1

Group VS Collective

Answer 1

collective: people who participate in same activity at the same time, but aren’t having direct interactions

group: share identity, goals, over a period of time, have direct interactions

Question 2

Group Socialisation

Answer 2

learn how the group operates and functions together

explicit - mentoring, formal training, supervision

• undergone purposefully

implicit - observation, more natural

Question 3

Key Features of Groups

Answer 3

1. Roles
2. Norms
3. Cohesion

Question 5

Key features of groups - roles

Answer 5

• expected behaviour, formal or informal

function well when roles:

• alight with skills of individuals holding those roles
• are clear
• don’t conflict when a person’s other roles within the same group or a different group
• working parents don’t confuse work relationships with family for example

Question 6

Key features of groups - norms

Answer 6

• rules of conduct for the members of a group
• formal or informal
• groups can vary on how strictly they adhere to norms - some may encourage norm deviation when appropriate, whereas others might expect norms to be consistently upheld

Question 7

Key features of groups - cohesion

Answer 7

how closely group members share similar attitudes and adhere to norms

typically have members who

• are more committed to activities
• feel more positively about group members
• have more pride in being group member

more cohesion in group seems to have a reciprocal relationship with group performance

• may be based on how much people value the class
• interpersonal cohesion between one another as well

Question 8

Group Influence on Individual

Answer 8

social facilitation

two effects - presence of others enhances performance on easy tasks, hinders on harder tasks

Question 9

Zajonc’s explanation for social facilitation

Answer 9

presence of others increases arousal which can influence performance

1. presence of others increases arousal

• generally increased arousal, established across specieis

2. increased arousal increases the likelihood of the dominant response

• whichever reaction is most immediate/obvious

3. for an easy task, the dominant response is usually successful, so performance improves. for a hard task, the dominant response ma be incorrect, so performance declines

Question 10

Public speaking example of Zajonc’s explanation for social facilitation

Answer 10

person speaking is confident and well-rehearsed, accusing them to perform well and vice versa

Question 11

Zajonc - Cockroaches

Answer 11

• complete easy/hard mazes either by themselves or in pairs
• in pairs in easy maze, they were faster
• solos in hard maze were faster

Question 12

Social facilitation has been known to occur in number of situations

Answer 12

• driving tests
• electronic gambling
• visual search tasks

Question 13

Mere presence (explaining social facilitation)

Answer 13

the fact that others are around mean that it will occur

Question 14

Evaluation apprehension theory (explaining social facilitation)

Answer 14

facilitation only occurs when the people present might evaluate our performance

• making judgements

Question 15

distraction conflict theory (explaining social facilitation)

Answer 15

presence of others affects our performance only if they distract us from the task we are completing

Question 16

social loafing (explaining social facilitation)

Answer 16

group produced reduction in individual output on tasks where contributions are pooled

occurs in:

• simple (try harder when by self) /complex motor tasks
• team projects (overseeing safety protocols)
• cognitive tasks

Question 17

Collective Effort Model

Answer 17

individuals work hard on a group task when the outcome is personally valuable to them

social compensation: individual increases effort in group setting to counteract anticipated social loafing

Question 18

Preventing social loafing

Answer 18

• limiting scope of a project (put into smaller scale, easier to see who does what)
• keep group sizes small
• using peer evaluations (keeping people accountable)

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Question 19

social loafing and collectivist vs individualist culture

Answer 19

less common in collectivist cultures than individualistic

• likely due to greater tendency to be aware of connections and mutual reliance

Question 20

Deindividuation

Answer 20

loses sense of individuality in a group and experiences a reduction in normal constraints on deviant behaviour

e.g. sports fans

• connection among group loses sense of self, normally wouldn’t turn chaotic but after sports game may turn to instances of hooliganism

Question 21

accountability cues

Answer 21

factors that encourage people to shift attention away from self

Question 22

attentional cues

Answer 22

factors that encourage people to shift attention away from self

• online settings
• in costumes/wearing masks