Chapter 7: Group Influence Flashcards
What is a group??
- two or more people who for longer than a few moments, interact with and influence one another and perceive one another as “us” in contrast to “them”
Co-actors?
- a group of people working simultaneously and individually on a non-competitive task
Social facilitation?
- original meaning: the tendency of people to perform simple or well-learned tasks better when others are present;
2) current meaning: the strengthening of dominant (prevalent likely) responses owing to the presence of others
Collective influence?
- social facilitation, social loafing and deindividualtion
Increased arousal does/does not enhance the performance on easy tasks for which the most likely -“dominant”- response is correct.
DOES YO
Social arousal facilitates dominant responses only when right?True/false?
- FALSE
- this occurs whether right or wrong
Social facilitation and social inhibition:
- Norman triplett published what?
one of the first studies in social psychology …1989. Studied social facilitation!
- study in 1898 …kids put line back on fish reel..competition occurred between them without asking them to compete.
- noticed that bicyclists times were faster when together than alone!
Social facilitation and social inhibition:
-Subsequent studies - social inhibition?
- other studies have shown that some tasks in the presence of others hinders performance. In the presence of others, cockroaches, parakeets and green finches learn mazes more slowly. This disruptive effect can be seen in people too. The presence of which diminishes efficiency at learning nonsense syllables, completing a maze and performing complex multiplication problems
Zajonc and Arousal?
- in the presence of others increases our arousal
- when the task at hand produces dominant response (normal response when alone), arousal leads to facilitation
- in the presence of others when doing easy tasks /already learned tasks, performance increases;however, when learning a new task if in the presence of others the number of wrong answers increases vs when alone.
Social facilitation and social inhibition:
- pool study?
- 71% shots made while not aware of being watched
- 81% shots made when they were aware of being watched
- *good pool players**
- 36% without knowing people were watching (not good players)
- 25% shots made when they knew ppl were watching (not good pool players)
What are possible factors in arousal?
- evaluation apprehension, driven by distraction and mere presence!
- *what you do well, you will be energized to do best in front of others
Possible factors in arousal:
- Evaluation apprehension?
- concern of how others are evaluating us
- the enhancement of dominant responses is strongest when people think they are being evaluated (ex: joggers jogged faster when a woman was facing them as they passed by vs turned away)
Possible factors in arousal:
-Evaluation apprehension-
L> helps explain what?
- people perform best when their co actor is slightly superior
- arousal lessens when a high status group is diluted by adding people who opinions don’t matter to us
- people who worry most about others’ evaluations are the ones most affected by their presence
- social facilitation effects are greatest when the others are unfamiliar and hard to keep an eye on.
Possible factors in arousal:
-Evaluation apprehension
L>bind fold study by Cottrell?
- pronunciation of nonsense syllables and well learned easy to pronounce syllables. In this mere presence condition, they blindfolded observers, supposedly in preparation for a perception experiment, In contrast to the effect of the watching audience, the mere presence of these blindfolded people did not boost well practised responses.
- increase was seen when blindfolds were off
Possible factors in arousal:
- driven by distraction?
L>Sanders, Baron and Moore (1878, 1986)?
- when ppl wonder how co actors are doing or how an audience is reacting they get distracted.
- arousal does not come from another person but from non human distractions , such as breasts etc.
- conflict between paying attention to others and paying attention to the task overload cognitive system, causing arousal.
Possible factors in arousal:
- Mere presence?
- mere presence of others produces some arousal even without evaluation apprehension or arousing distraction.
Social facilitation theory produces to predictions?
- basics of the theory ( presence of others is arousing and that in this social around enhances dominant responses) have been confirmed (2) the theory has brought new life to a long dormant field of research
What is social loafing?
- the tendency for people to exert less effort when they pool their efforts toward a common goal than when they are individually accountable.
- The group situation decreased evaluation apprehension, increased social loafing
Group members may actually be less motivated when performing what?
additive tasks
Social loafing: Do individuals exert less effort in a group?:
-Ingham et al (1974)?
- blindfolded participants who were assigned the first position in the apparatus and told to pull as hard as you can pulled 18 percent harder when they knew they were pulling alone than when they believed that behind them two to five people were also pulling.
When being observed increases evaluation concerns, ___ occurs; when being lost in a crowd decreases evaluation concerns, ___ occurs.
- social facilitation
- social loafing
Free riders?
- people who befit from the group but give little in return
People in a group loaf less when the task is ?
challenging, appealing or involving
Groups also loaf less when their members are ?
- friends or are identified with or indispensable to their group
- *cohesiveness intensifies effort
Social loafing is common when group members work without?
- individual accountability; so it would seem that many hands need not always make light work
Less social loafing occurs when a task is? (5)
- important
- challenging
- appealing
- involving
- group is cohesive
- *people may put forth even more effort in a group when the goal is important, reads are significant and team spirit exists.
