Small group processes Flashcards
What are reasons why a group may exist?
Belonging, information, rewards, goals
What is group cohesiveness?
a sense of ‘team spirit’, perceiving things in common with other group members, attraction to the group as a whole; a group that is more cohesive is more likely to stay together
What is an example of collective influence within a group?
Social loafing and social facilitation
What is an example of collective influence between groups?
Group polarisation, minority influence
How can social facilitation help to improve group performance? (Triplett’s research)
Found that cyclists rode faster when they raced together than when they raced against a clock.
The mere presence of others improved speed and accuracy of simple motor task and performance
Social facilitation also occurs within animals e.g. chickens eat more grain
How can social facilitation hinder group performance?
Parakeets were found to learn mazes slower in the presence of others and humans were found to be slower at performing complex maths problems
What is the updated social facilitation theory (Zajnoc)?
Increased arousal enhances performance on easy, unambiguous tasks
Increased arousal promotes incorrect responses for complex, ambiguous tasks
What is social loafing and why is it a problem for collective settings?
Tendency for people to exert less effort when they pool efforts towards a common goal compared to when they are individually accountable. Responsibility can be diffused across group members leading to little in return for effort as there are none or less identifiable individual outputs.
How does social loafing differ across cultures?
Collectivist cultures exhibit less social loafing than those in individualistic cultures as there is a bigger loyalty to the group and the success of the group is as important as individual success so these measures are less likely to be influenced by social loafing.
What is group polarisation?
A principle that helps to explain both good and bad outcomes of small group dynamics as an ingroup discussion typically enhances group members’ initial learnings and average inclination of group members
Why is the accentuation effect an issue in the context of schools and colleges?
Over time, initial differences amongst students become accentuated; the gaps widen both educationally and socially causing a larger divide
What did Cehajic-Clancy et al (2024) find about conflict reconciliation in post war countries?
They found that context-level intergroup contact is the strongest predictor of reconciliation. Where you live is a better predictor than how frequently you interact with others for reconciliation- living in a place where conflicted members interact more leads to being more supportive with them
What is gang delinquency and how can it link to crime rate?
Sharing of attributes and hostilities about certain subgroups within the community, leading to possible amplification of their tendencies and incr power as a group
How can group polarisation be applied to identity on the internet?
Lack of visual cues and an increase in anoymity leads to raised group polarisation inc fake news, misinformation and conspiracy theories. Likelihood of info being repeated is high if it comes from a credible source or repeated by ingroup members. Online interactions on shared experiences and injustices tends to lead to the formation of novel group identities and emergence of anon online leaders during social movements
What are reasons for why groups polarise (adopt stances that are more exaggerated than those of an average member)?
Informational influence- during a discussion, results from accepting evidence from others that is considered to be a reliable and credible source, as well as accurate evidence about the truth
Normative influence- how members view themselves as well as other group members resulting from a desire to be accepted by in groups, conforming to expectations of others.
How does Festinger’s social comparison theory relate to social identity?
States that we are more persuaded by people in our reference groups
What are injunctive group norms?
Perception of the approval of behaviour by others e.g. perceived APPROVAL of drinking bhvr by family and friends associated w actual drinking bhvr
What are descriptive group norms?
Perception of the PREVALENCE of behaviour among others e.g. perception others are following COVID-19 health measures predicted compliance with these measures
How does collective self esteem influence how we view the in-group and the out-group?
We have to maximise the similarities with ingroup members and the differences with out group members, minimising differences within the in group and the similarities with the out group
How does minority influence affect social identity?
Minority group influence can be v powerful- snowball effect, Moscovici- aspects of MI are consistency, self confidence and defection, blue-green slides conc that minority consistency creates doubt and can help majority shift from biew
What strategies can a minority use to influence a majority?
Creating inconsistency, disagreement and conflict within the majority group members, leading them to separate and turn against each other, creating majority ambivalence
How does cognitive dissonance (Festinger) relate to social identity?
Arises when we are aware of two inconsistent cognitions that we have and pick a side as a result
Minority consistency -> majority ambivalence -> cognitive dissonance -> minority influence
How does consistency and persistence used by the minority group help to shift majority views?
Consistency and persistence convey self confidence; self confident behaviour from the minority tend to raise doubts among majority, by being firm and confident the minority may prompt majority to re-assess/consider
What is a lone defector within majority and minority influence?
Someone who initially agreed with the majority but then reconsidered and dissented, therefore creating the minority group- processes may be different as it will be much harder and more risky
