group dynamics and team cohesion

Question 1

what did shafer (1966) say about group dynamics?

Answer 1

• Groups are pervasive
  ○ Understand why a group is good or bad?
  ○ What makes individuals successful or not?
  
  • Highly influential
  • Sport offers (unique?) possibilities for research:
    ○ Natural v lab settings
    ○ Outcome orientation: co-operation, conflict, pressure
    § Body language
    ○ Objective performance measures

Question 2

how is togetherness the key to the psychology leadership?

Answer 2

• Bottom-up not top-down.
  ○ Autonomous in workplace
  ○ Play/perform better
  
  • Followership
    Leaders should take time to understand who they are working with.

Question 3

what is a group?

Answer 3

A collection of interacting individuals who have:
* A sense of shared purpose / common goal(s)
Mutual influence

Question 4

what is a team?

Answer 4

• “We-ness” - Collective sense of identity
  
  • Distinctive individual roles
  • Structured modes of
    communication
  • Norms – Social rules that
    guide members
    Task interdependence… teamwork

Question 5

what are Tuckman & Jenkins’ (1977) stages of group fromation?

Answer 5

forming: familiarisation, social comparisons, meet group members
storming: resistance to leadership, interpersonal, fighting, cliqwues fromed, need strong leader.
norming: conflicts resolved, solidarity, cooperation, sense of unity, common goals, economy of effort
performing: togetherness, team success, problem solving, roles are defined, test new ideas

Question 6

what is the defenition of croup cohesion?

Answer 6

“A dynamic process (constantly shifting and changing) that is reflected in the tendency for a group to stick together and remain united in pursuit of its instrumental objectives and/or for the satisfaction of member affective needs”
Carron, Brawley & Widmeyer (1998, p. 213)

Question 7

what is the conceptual model of cohesion (Carron, 1982)?

Answer 7

ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS:
Pay, HR, contracts, negotiations.
PERSONAL FACTORS:
Recruiting people that share the same reasons for wanting to be there- what is their motivation?
How people cope with diversity
Want cultural diversity
Don’t have to be from the same sport
LEADERSHIP FACTORS:
will impact the tohgetherness
style of leadership
athlete-coach relationship
TEAM FACTORS:
Communication of what is happening: selection etc.
Role clarity= ask what roles they want within the group- through role acceptance (given autonomy)
COHESION:
task and social cohesion
GROUPO OUTCOMES:
team stability
performance effetiveness
INDIVIDUAL COHESION:
behavioural and emotional consequences
perfromance effetiveness

Question 8

what are the characteristics of cohesion?

Answer 8

• Multidimensional: Numerous factors cause a group to stick together
• Dynamic: Can change over time (particularly with success and failure)
• Instrumental: Groups stick together for different reasons

Question 9

what is task cohesion?

Answer 9

The degree to which members of a group work together to achieve common goals

Question 10

what is social cohesion?

Answer 10

The degree to which members of a group like each other and enjoy one another’s company
○ Can manipulate social cohesion
○ Have to all want the same thing on court
* Attraction to group
* Group integration
* Whether you connect on court not off court
Off court connections are USEFUL but not VITAL

Question 11

what is the conceptual framework of group effectiveness?

Answer 11

*** Actual Productivity= Potential Productivity - Group Process Losses **
* Potential productivity
○ “Relevant resources”
○ Players’ abilities, knowledge and skills (mental + physical)
* Group process losses:
○ Faulty group processes
Motivation Losses Coordination Losses
* Minimising error
○ Increase productivity and ultimately their performance
○ Lack of avoidance
○ Increase in effort

Question 12

what is the Ringlemann effect?

Answer 12

• Tendency for individual members of a group to become increasingly less productive as the size of the group increases.
  Reduction in their potential with more group members

Question 13

what are the causes of social loafing?

Answer 13

• ‘Free rider’: perception that their effort is (relatively) unimportant for the outcome
  
  • ‘Minimising strategy’: motivated to get by doing as little as possible
    ○ Motivated to get by, by doing as little as possible
  • ‘Allocation strategy’: save best efforts for when most beneficial to self
    ○ Perform poorly in training but not in game
  • False (?) perception that increased effort won’t be recognised
  • Put less effort in because they think others will do it instead.
    ○ Or that their efforts are ignored.

Question 14

according to carron (1988) how do we couterbalance social loafing?

Answer 14

Emphasise the importance of individual contributions (identify + communicate)
Increase accountability
Hold individuals accountable for their actions- heart rate monitors.

Question 15

what is the group environment quedstionnaire- Widemeyer, Brawley & Carron (1985)?

Answer 15

Individual v Group
Task and social cohesion
Reliable, valid measure
* diagnostic
* Standard been around for many years
* Idea of identity
○ Ask individual attraction to group SOCIAL (Q1, 3, 5, 7, 9)
○ Ask individual attraction to group TASK (Q2, 4, 6, 8)
○ Ask group INTERGRATION SOCIAL (Q11, 13, 15, 17)
Ask group INTERGRATION TASK (Q10, 12, 14, 16, 18)
* The higher the score, the more strongly you feel about that particular aspect of group cohesion
* A coach could then compare scores for each member of the team

Question 16

what did Widmeyer et al (1990a) find about the antecedent team/squad sizes?

Answer 16

3-on-3 competitive recreational basketball
* N = 144 (84 males, 60 females)
* Team size: 3, 6, or 9
Found:
1. Social cohesion highest for 6
2. ATG-Task decreased from 3 to 6 to 9
Performance best for 6, worst for 9

Question 17

what is the antecedent of role clarity and acceptance?

Answer 17

Predict how well a group will perform.
Roles help give individuals a purpose.
* Formal roles
○ Dictated by the nature and structure of the
organisation
○ Specific team and tactical roles
* Informal roles
Evolve from group dynamics or interactions
* Strongly related to Task Cohesion (GI-T) in team sports (Brawley et al., 1987)
Cohesiveness predicted role clarity and acceptance in ice hockey teams (Dawe & Carron, 1990)

Question 18

what is the antecedent of team stability?

Answer 18

• Teams that have low turnover are more effective
  ○ Baseball league position r = -.55 (Theberge & Loy, 1976)
  
  • Should you sack the manager?
    ○ When should we sack them?
    ○ When we have stability, that will predict cohesion:
    § High turnover breeds instability, takes a chunk off our togetherness.
    § Have to start again.
    PSYCHOLOGICAL BOUNCE.
  • Storming stage starts again as athletes compete for positions within the team.
    Autonomy, freedom, expression can be vital for “super” elite level.

Question 19

what is the cohesion-performance relationship?

Answer 19

• Curvilinear (cyclical)
  ○ Cohesion will predict performance but performance will also predict cohesion- at a task level
  If they become successful, they naturally develop togetherness
  CARRON ET AL (2002)
  
  • Meta-analysis of 46 studies in sport 164 effect sizes
    ○ N = 9988 athletes
    ○ N = 1044 teams
  • Found: Overall relationship between cohesion and performance in sport was “moderate to large” ES = 0.66
  • Really building processes and identity- not be created by putting a team in a difficult situation (e.g.: Australian outback)

Question 20

according to carron et al (1997, 2002) what are the 4 steps to improve tea,m cohesion?

Answer 20

1. Increase team distinctiveness / identity
2. Increase social cohesiveness
3. Clarify team goals
4. Improve team communication

Question 21

how can we enhance group cohesion according to senécal et al (2008)?

Answer 21

• Building Cohesion with Team Goal Setting
  ○ Team goal setting intervention
  ○ N = 86 high school basketball players
  Effect on team cohesion (GEQ)
  
  • “helped us play better as a team” (68%)
  • “more focused on common goals” (42%)
    “enabled us to work together to reach goals” (27%)

Question 22

what did Tajfel & Turner (1979) discuss about identity?

Answer 22

personal identity= “i” and “me”
social identity= “we” and “us”
* What groups are important to them
* Don’t always focus on the “I” or the “me”.
* Social context plays a role in how we behave in a group setting.
The journey from ME to WE

Question 23

explaine the importance of SiL and Resilience?

Answer 23

• Social identity maps
  
  • Wiggly lines= less compatible
  • Straight lines= most compatible
  • Under stress is important to understand groups we have
    ○ Ways to share stress
  • Healthy/ nourishing life should have 5-6 positive group memberships
    ○ Too low or too high will impact our resilience.

Question 24

how was PDMS used in prefessional football?

Answer 24

• Context: Many new and foreign players, lack of togetherness, and effective communication (e.g., understanding and cohesion)
  
  • The night before a league-cup semi-final match players were asked to deliver a (prepared) 5min speech in answer to the following questions:
  • Question 1: Tell the group why you play football, and what you think you bring to the team.
  • Question 2: Describe a personal story that will help your teammates understand you better, that you would want them to know about you, and that illustrates something that defines who you are.
  • Your story can be related to any event that has taken place in your personal or sporting life, for example, what sacrifices you have made to follow your soccer career. Try and convince your teammates that they would want you in the team alongside them when we play in the important cup game the next day.
  • Demonstrating vulnerability.
    Building togetherness.

Question 25

what were the results from using PDMS is preofessional football?

Answer 25

• No significant changes in GEQ or Communication Scale. However,….
  
  • Interview data from all the 21 players after the intervention revealed:
  • Players felt the intervention was worthwhile and benefitted the team by enhancing closeness (cohesion), understanding of teammates, and communication.
  • All of these aspects were maintained in a 4-week follow-up.
  • The team narrowly lost the game on a penalty shoot-out but performed above their expectations.
    Successfully won cup competition the following year and senior players reported in the press it was partly down to their understanding, honesty, and cohesion.