group cognition 2 - wisdom of crowds, social reasoning, and collective intelligence

Question 1

conditions for wisdom of crowds (2)

Answer 1

works when there is:

uncorrelated errors
no systematic bias

Question 2

when averaging works (3)

Answer 2

uncorrelated errors = independent estimates
no systematic bias
no coordination between group members

Question 3

uncorrelated errors

Answer 3

true value is in the middle of all individuals estimations - true value is around the mean

participants sample the true value with noise (spread high and low of actual answer)

Question 4

correlated errors

Answer 4

most estimates go one way e.g. all higher than true value

there is noise (spread of scores) AND bias

so if a mean is taken it’ll be wrong/further from true value

Question 5

cause of correlated errors (3)

Answer 5

• limited info
• shared (individual) biases
• group conformity

these reduce the wisdom of crowds effect

Question 6

2 things that can effect group cognition

Answer 6

groupthink

diversity

Question 7

polarisation in group decision making

Answer 7

attitudes expressed in the group move away from average of individuals opinions

moves towards more extreme position

Question 8

groupthink

Answer 8

highly cohesive groups = premature consensus seeking

leads to poor decision making and polarisation in group decision making

due to:

• overconfidence
• blindness to errors
• conformity

Question 9

example of groupthink - space shuttle challenger

Answer 9

challenger shuttle was very delayed and then launched January 1986 in freezing conditions - then crashed

some engineers were concerned about the seals in the cold

issues with NASAs organisational culture and decision making processes were key to the accident

Question 10

criticisms of groupthink (4)

Answer 10

• not a distinct phenomenon
• doesn’t add anything to group reasoning literature - thwarted understanding of group reasoning
• does not happen –> lacks empirical evidence for all constructs associated with groupthink
• focus on negative outcomes of group decisions, restricts understanding of group decision making process

BUT is useful for focusing attention on flaws of group decision making

Question 11

groupthink and the bay of pigs

Answer 11

JFK and Castro

failed invasion on cuba

not well thought through, therefore failed

JFK afterwards said “ how could we have been so stupid”

origin of idea of groupthink

Question 12

diversity as an antidote to bias - wisdom of crowds in the real world

Answer 12

more diverse editing teams = higher quality wikipedia articles

spend longer in more complex discussion

Question 13

social accounts of reason - interactionist account

Answer 13

reason evolved to produce and evaluate arguments, not for individuals to solve problems (individualist account)

Question 14

Wason’s task in small groups - individual vs group result

Answer 14

individually = 80% fail

• bias against getting the right answer
• simple aggregation should compound this effect

result = 80% group succeed
conversion from majority failure to majority success - “truth wins”

Question 15

why are groups better than individuals in Wason’s task

Answer 15

argumentative theory of reasoning

transcripts of task shows an exchange of arguments

confirmation bias is an individual failing, but is a collective strength

Question 16

argumentative theory of reasoning

Answer 16

groups reason through:

exchange of arguments

• groups typically co-constructed a structure of arguments qualitatively more sophisticated than that generated by most individuals

arguments change people’s problem representation

Question 17

define collective intelligence

Answer 17

the ability of a group to perform a wide variety of tasks

Question 18

collective intelligence and general intelligence

Answer 18

collective intelligence (c) = the ability of a group to perform a wide variety of tasks

general intelligence (g) = performance of an individual across variety of tasks, common statistical factor of g

people who do well on one task tend to do well on most others, despite variations in tasks

studied initially to see if g of group members predicts c

Question 19

is collective intelligence (c) correlated with the average (g) of a group

Answer 19

c is only moderately related to the average or maximum individual intelligence of group members

takes more than a group of smart individuals to make a smart group

Question 20

what is collective intelligence (c) correlated with (4)

Answer 20

• average social sensitivity of group members
• the equality in distribution of conversational turn-taking
• the proportion of females in the group
  diversity within the group (can hinder or help depending on the task
• cognitive diversity (e.g., thinking styles)

Creative innovative tasks= diversity assists; efficacy important= diversity not helpful

Question 21

group cognition study - different tasks in groups - 4 tasks

Answer 21

68 groups completed task online OR face to face

a social task:
- Baron-Cohen eyes study (2001)

a “choosing” intelligence task:
- e.g. soduku, done either online (communication in group via text) or face-to-face

a Raven’s advanced progressive matrices test:
- which pattern fits next in a sequence
- starts easy and gets harder

a generating task:
- another intelligence task
- given an object and have to come up with examples of what you could make with it e.g. brick = house, tower, wall etc.

Question 22

results of the four group cognition tasks - 2 main results

Answer 22

found one dominant collective intelligence factor - not multiple

social intelligence - online and offline average score predicted average collective intelligence - correlation
–> social sensitivity is important to group functioning

Question 23

is communication or knowledge/intelligence more important in group decision making

Answer 23

both can be equally as important in collective intelligence of a group

Question 24

predictors of group intelligence (3)

Answer 24

• average social sensitivity
• amount of communication
• distribution of communication

strongly suggests coordination problem of group work often overweighs the intellectual challenges