Groups

Why we join…and why we leave

Group

• A collection of persons who are perceived to be bonded together in a coherent unit to some degree.

• Entiativity: the extent to which a group is perceived as a coherent entity (varies greatly from mere collections of people who happen to be in the same place at the same time with little connection to one another, to highly intimate groups like families/romantic partners).

Characteristics of groups high in entiativity

1) Members interact with one another often.2) The group is important to its members.3) Members share common goals and

outcomes.4) Members are similar in important ways.

Basic features of groups

• Roles: The set of behaviors that individuals occupying specific positions within a group are expected to perform.

• Status: An individual’s rank or status within the group.

• Norms: Rules within the group indicating how its members should or should not behave.

• Cohesiveness: All factors that cause members to remain in the group.

The Benefits of joining groups

• self-knowledge• status-boost depending whether individual’s

are seeking self-enhancement (boosting public image and feeling superior to others) or self-transcendence (the desire to help others, regardless of status concerns.

• Helps to accomplish social change

The costs of joining groups

• Restricts personal freedom.• Demands on time, energy and resources

(which must be met or may be expelled from group).

• Groups may adopt policies of which some members disapprove (remain silent or risk withdrawal).

Why do people leave groups?

• May believe the group or some subset of the group has changed sufficiently so that it can no longer be viewed as falling within the boundaries of an individual’s extended self-concept (which is to some degree redrawn to include other group members upon joining), thus can no longer be viewed as “we.”

• Example: Church of England 1992

Effects of the presence of others

• Social facilitation: effects on performance resulting from the presence of others.

• Drive theory of social facilitation: the mere presence of others is arousing and increases the tendency to perform dominant responses (the ones that are most likely to occur in a given situation, they may be correct or incorrect).

• Performance improves when highly skilled, but suffers when not highly skilled (ie-when learning).

Evaluation apprehension and Distraction-Conflict Theory

• Some research pointed to additional factors in social facilitation besides the mere presence of others—evaluation apprehension, or concern over being evaluated by others—and cognitive factors—not just heightened arousal.

• Distraction-conflict theory: social facilitation stems from the conflict produced when individuals attempt, simultaneously, to pay attention to other persons and to the task at hand (this theory applies to animals as well as humans).

Social Facilitation summary

• Social facilitation stems from cognitive factors—not just heightened arousal. Yes, the presence of others generates increased arousal, but it may do so because of the cognitive demands of paying attention both to an audience and to the task being performed rather than as a result of their mere physical presence; and it may influence task performance by inducing a narrowed attention focus.

Social Loafing

• Additive tasks are those which the group product is the sum or combination of the efforts of individual members, on such tasks some individuals work hard while others goof off, which is called Social Loafing: reductions in motivation and effort when individual’s work collectively in a group, compared with when they work alone or as independent coactors.

How to reduce social loafing

• Making the output or effort of each participant readily identifiable so people can’t sit back and let others do their work.

• Increasing group members’ commitment to successful task performance, pressures to work hard will offset temptations to engage in social loafing.

• Increase apparent importance or value of a task.• Ensure individual’s view their contributions to the

task as unique rather than as merely redundant.

Deindividuation

• A psychological state characterized by reduced self-awareness and reduced social identity, brought on by external conditions, such as being an anonymous member of a large crowd (a drift toward wild, unrestrained behavior).

• Being part of a large, anonymous crowd casts individuals adrift from their usual social ties. (England’s soccer fans).

Coordination in Groups

• Cooperation: behavior in which groups work together to attain shared goals. Three motives most important when determining cooperation:

• Reciprocity: basic rule of social life—individuals should treat others as these persons have treated them.– Reciprocal altruism: sharing resources increases the

chances of survival and passing genes to next generation.

Cooperation cont.

• Personal orientation toward such behavior: large individual differences exist in the tendency to cooperate. Orientations toward social dilemmas include 1) cooperative orientation, in which individual’s prefer to maximize outcomes received by all 2) individualistic orientation focuses on maximizing outcomes for the individual 3) competitive orientation focuses on defeating others.

Cooperation cont.

• Communication: at times communication between group members focuses on threats, which reduce cooperation. Yet cooperation between group members can lead to increased cooperation provided certain conditions are met (beneficial effects occur if group members make personal commitments to cooperate and if they are backed up by strong, personal norms to honor them.

Conflict: Its nature, causes and effects

• When an individual or group perceives that others will take actions that are incompatible with their interests. Key elements include:– opposing interests between individuals or groups– Recognition of such cooperation– The belief by each side that the other will act to

interfere with these interests– Actions that produce such interference

Major causes of conflict

• Involves more than opposing interests as often conflicts do not arise when both sides have incompatible interests; sometimes it does, simply because groups believe they exist, even if they do not.

• Social factors like faulty attributions• Faulty communication (destructive criticism)• Perceiving our views as objective/realistic and

others’ as biased by their ideology (status quo bias)

Causes of Conflict cont.

• Personality types, type A individuals more involved in conflict

• Poor initial performance by group may lead to conflict. Negative feedback may lead others to blame each other (not themselves) for poor results.

• Conflict does not always stem from opposing interests, but social factors—grudges/resentment, desire for revenge, inaccurate perceptions, poor communication etc.

Resolving Conflicts• Bargaining (negotiation): process in which

opposing sides exchange offers, counteroffers, and concessions, either directly or through representatives.– Begin with an extreme initial offer favorable to the

side proposing it– The ‘big-lie’ technique convincing the other side that

one’s break-even point is much higher so that they offer more

– Convincing the other side that you have an ‘out’– *try to reach integrative agreements that offer greater

joint benefits than simple compromise (splitting).

Tactics questionable from ethical standpoint

• Attacking an opponent’s network—manipulating or interfering with an opponent’s network of support and information

• False promises• Misrepresentation• Inappropriate information gathering

Superordinate goals

• Goals that both sides of a conflict seek and that tie their interests together rather than drive them apart. When opposing sides can be made to see that they share overarching goals, conflict is often reduced and may be replaced by overt cooperation.

Basic rules for judging Fairness

• Distributive justice: a individual’s judgments about whether they are receiving a fair share of available rewards—a share proportionate to their contributions to the group or any social relationship.

• Procedural justice: judgments concerning the fairness of procedures used to distribute available rewards among group members.(consistency of procedures, accuracy, opportunity for

corrections, bias suppression, ethicality)

Judging Fairness cont.

• Transactional justice: refers to the extent to which persons who distribute rewards explain or justify their decisions and show considerateness and courtesy to those who receive the rewards.

Tactics for dealing with injustice

• If perceived unfairness centers on rewards, people may reduce their contributions or demand larger rewards, if these are not delivered, may leave group.

• When unfairness centers on procedures (procedural justice) or lack of courteous treatment by the people who determine reward divisions (transactional justice), individuals may turn to more covert techniques to even the score.

Decision making by groups

• Decision making process involves combining and integrating available information in order to choose one out of several possible courses of action.– Do groups make better decisions than individuals? – What accounts for the fact that groups sometimes

make truly disastrous decisions?

Social decision schemes

• Rules relating the initial distribution of member views to final group decisions:– Majority-wins rule– Truth-wins rule: the correct solution will ultimately

be accepted as more group members recognize its correctness

– First-shift rule: tend to adopt a decision consistent with the first shift in opinion shown by any member.

– Unanimity (legal system)

Dangers of group decision-making

• Group polarization: the tendency of group members to shift toward more extreme positions than those they initially held as a result of group discussion.– Groupthink: the tendency of the members of

highly cohesive groups to assume that their decisions can’t be wrong, that all members must support the groups’ decisions strongly, and that information contrary should be ignored.

Dangers of group decisions cont.

• Biased processing of information in groups: groups are not always motivated to maximize accuracy and search for evidence that supports their case.

• Failure to share information unique to each member: do not always pool resources, decisions reflect shared information.

Improving Group Decisions

• Devil’s advocate technique: a technique for improving the quality of group decisions in which one group member is assigned the task of disagreeing with and criticizing whatever plan or decision is under consideration.

• Authentic dissent: a technique for improving the quality of group decisions in which one or more group members actively disagree with the group’s initial preference without being assigned this role.