8. Group Processes

Question 1

A set of individuals who interact over time and have shared fate, goals, or identity. It also consists of people who have joint membership in a social category based on sex, race, or other attributes.

Answer 1

Group

Question 2

Refers to the forces exerted on a group that push its members closer together. Members tend to feel commitment to the group task, feel positively toward the other group members, feel group pride, and engage in many—and often intense—interactions in the group.

Answer 2

Group cohesiveness

Question 3

A process whereby the presence of others enhances performance on easy tasks but impairs performance on difficult tasks.

Answer 3

Social facilitation

Question 4

The proposition that this particular presence of others is sufficient to produce social facilitation effects (Zajonc).

Answer 4

Mere presence

Question 5

A theory that the presence of others will produce social facilitation effects only when those others are seen as potential evaluators.

Answer 5

Evaluation apprehension theory

Question 6

A theory that the presence of others will produce social facilitation effects only when others distract from the task and create attentional conflict.

Answer 6

Distraction-conflict theory

Question 7

A group-produced reduction in individual output on tasks where contributions are pooled. Basically, when others are there to pick up the slack, people slack off.

Answer 7

Social loafing

Question 8

The theory that individuals will exert effort on a collective task to the degree that they think their individual efforts will be important, relevant, and meaningful for achieving outcomes that they value. Individuals may even engage in social compensation by increasing their efforts on collective tasks to try to compensate for the anticipated social loafing or poor performance of other group members.

Answer 8

Collective effort model

Question 9

The loss of a person’s sense of individuality and the reduction of normal constraints against deviant behavior.

Answer 9

Deindividuation

Question 10

A model of group behavior that explains deindividuation effects as the result of a shift from personal identity to social identity.

Answer 10

Social identity model of deindividuation effects (SIDE)

Question 11

The reduction in group performance due to obstacles created by group processes, such as problems of coordination and motivation.

Answer 11

Process loss

Question 12

The increase in group performance so that the group outperforms the individuals who make up the group.

Answer 12

Process gain

Question 13

A technique developed by advertising executive, Alex Osborn (1950s), that attempts to increase the production of creative ideas by encouraging group members to speak freely without criticizing their own or others’ contributions.

Answer 13

Brainstorming

Question 14

Refers to the division into two sharply distinct opposites.

Answer 14

Polarization

Question 15

The exaggeration of initial tendencies in the thinking of group members through group discussion.

Answer 15

Group polarization

Question 16

A group decision-making style characterized by an excessive tendency among group members to seek concurrence (agreement or uniformity).

Answer 16

Groupthink

Question 17

The tendency for groups to spend more time discussing shared information (information already known by all or most group members) than unshared information (information known by only one or a few group members).

Answer 17

Biased sampling

Question 18

A shared system for remembering information that enables multiple people (group-based) to remember information together more efficiently than they could do so alone.

Answer 18

Transactive memory

Question 19

Specialized interactive computer programs that are used to guide group meetings, collaborative work, and decision-making processes.

Answer 19

Group support systems

Question 20

A situation in which a self-interested choice by everyone will create the worst outcome for everyone.

Answer 20

Social dilemma

Question 21

A type of dilemma in which one party must make either cooperative or competitive moves in relation to another party. The dilemma is typically designed so that the competitive move appears to be in one’s self-interest, but if both sides make this move, they both suffer more than if they had both cooperated.

Answer 21

Prisoner’s dilemma

Question 22

Social dilemmas involving how two or more people will share a limited resource.

Answer 22

Resource dilemmas

Question 23

A negotiated resolution to a conflict in which all parties obtain outcomes that are superior to what they would have obtained from an equal division of the contested resources.

Answer 23

Integrative agreement