Group Behavior and Influence

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CHAPTER 8

• Group Behavior and Influence

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Motivation in groups social loafing

• Social loafing
• When do we loaf the most? (task interest, value,
  choice knowledge of other group members size
  and gender composition of group cultural context
• Why do we loaf? (identifiability contributions
  not rewarded, needed, and/or too costly)
• Karau and Williams collective effort model
• Counteracting social loafing (increased
  accountability, task perceived as unique or
  challenging, group pride, external rewards,
  social compensation)

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Social loafing some ways to overcome it

• Factors that increase loafing
• Lack of identifiability
• No individual evaluation
• No individual or group
• standards of evaluation
• Task is easy, boring, or the
• same as others
• Individual contributions are
• not necessary
• No individual or group incentives
• Large group
• Unfamiliar group

• Factors that reduce loafing
• Individual identifiability
• Individual or group evaluation
• Individual or group standards
• of evaluation
• Task is difficult, interesting, or
• different from others
• Individual contributions are
• essential
• Individual or group incentives
• Small group
• Familiar group

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Motivation in groups social facilitation

• Social facilitation
• Arousal model if the dominant responses are
  correct, performance is enhanced if the dominant
  responses are incorrect, performance is impaired
• Evaluation model evaluation can create
  evaluation apprehension and also serve as source
  of distraction

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Brainstorming creativity in groups

• Four basic rules of brainstorming (feel free to
  express all ideas generate as many as possible
  build on other peoples ideas and dont
  criticize them)
• Factors that inhibit brainstorming
• Evaluative concern
• Free riding
• Blocking
• Social comparison
• Illusion of group productivity

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Brainstorming creativity in groups

• Improving group brainstorming
• Prior practice with brainstorming
• Nominal group technique
• Brainwriting
• Synectics (spectrum policy, metaphors, analogies,
  etc.)
• Electronic brainstorming stages of idea
  generation, organization, ranking, and ideas for
  implementation
• Use of small groups or pairs
• Use of certain personality types (low social
  anxiety)

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Better brainstorming some techniques

• First practice with group brainstorming
• Alternate individual and group brainstorming
• Use spectrum policy ? look at all sides of the
  issue
• Use small groups or pairs
• Create diverse groups with a variety of
  perspectives, talents, and knowledge bases
• Give the groups some goals for which to aim
• Use group brainstorming with less socially
  anxious individuals
• Use electronic brainstorming or brainwriting

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Group decision making

• Major pitfalls
• Disorganization (nonoptimal approach)
• Strength in numbers effect
• Group polarization
• Affected by normative and informational influence
• Momentum toward the already favored position
• Extremist versus mixed groups
• Self-selection bias favoring homogeneous groups

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Group decision making

• Information biases in groups
• Sampling bias
• Instruct members to mention only items that have
  not already been shared
• Have groups rank the various alternatives, rather
  than simply choosing the apparently best one
• Inform the group about the unique areas of
  expertise of particular group members
• Directive versus participative group leaders
• Repeating shared knowledge more than unshared
  knowledge during the group discussion (the
  common knowledge effect)

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Counteracting the common-knowledge effect and the
sampling bias

• Force group members to mention only unique
  information
• Rank alternatives
• Assign expertise
• Include confident experts
• Include directive leaders? (pros and cons)

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Group decision making

• Groupthink defective decision-making in groups
• Concurrence seeking group cohesiveness,
  isolation, lack of checks, pre-determined
  outcome, pressure for decision
• Symptoms of groupthink direct pressure, pressure
  to uniformity, self-censorship, mindguards,
  illusion of unanimity, misperception,
  rationalization
• Defective decision making poor information
  search, incomplete survey of alternatives and
  objectives, information processed in a biased
  fashion, failure to re-appraise, no contingency
  plan(s)

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The phenomenon of groupthink
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Groupthink some major symptoms

• Symptoms of Groupthink
• Illusion of invulnerability
• Collective rationalization
• Belief in the morality of the group
• Stereotyping of outgroups
• Direct pressure on dissenters
• Self-censorship
• Illusion of unanimity
• Mindguards

• Symptoms of defective
• decision-making
• Incomplete survey of alternatives
• Incomplete survey of objectives
• Failure to examine the risks of the favored
  alternative
• Poor information search
• Selective bias in processing available
  information
• Failure to reassess alternatives
• Failure to work out contingency plans

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Group decision making

• Groupthink defective decision-making in groups
• Avoiding groupthink rules for good
  decision-making (Table 8.5)
• Teamwork and groupthink problems of
  self-management (Table 8.6)
• Develop effective decision-making norms and
  practices
• Increase interaction with new or outside members
• Train self-leadership skills
• Select team members with a desire for independence

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Rules for good decision-making

• Set a good decision-making goal
• Organize the procedures for decision-making
• Do a systematic search for the information held
  by group members
• Make group members accountable for sharing the
  information needed to make a good decision
• Have a diversity of views and expertise
  represented in the group
• Use second-chance meetings to re-evaluate the
  decision