Social Loafing

Namely, Laziness, Social Awkwardness, and Intelligence. By the end of this essay, we will all have a deeper understanding of why no one enjoys being put in a group. Many people believe that

Social loafing – someone decides to take a free ride and let the group do the work

Social Comparison Theory: Other workers who are working on the same project with members who are dissatisfied with their jobs, such as “happy hour group,” would also likely become dissatisfied and begin to slack off. This negative working attitude is contagious when people look at co-workers and catch the attitudes of them. That is why the members who work on Department of Transportation Project, Colbork Project, and computer based analysis projects are

Throughout life there are many instances in which an individual has to work in a group to complete a task/project. The importance of group work is to have teamwork with each member of the group. Humans are driven to connect with each other and by working as a group ideas become much more enriched and the ideas or thoughts that each person ‘brings to the table’ each individual is able to add onto that idea or it can trigger one to think of something completely different.

Secondly, being an individual member of a larger crowd has been shown to inhibit helping behavior. Levine (1999) discuses this “audience inhibition and diffusion of responsibility” (p. 1135) in his analysis of bystander nonintervention. In three separate experiments by Latane and Darley (1969) these effects were demonstrated and it was determined that “[p]eople are less likely to take a socially responsible action if other people are present than if they are alone (p.259). They further state that due to the different types of situations tested that the same process must occur in real life as well (p.

As this newly formed team had to spend a portion of its time developing and maintaining the dynamics of a new team, rather than being productive and focused on the task is an example of the process loss concept of team challenges (McShane, Steen, & Tasa, 2015) This concept of process loss then escalated as joining a group late results in a longer time spent on understanding how these new members would transition well with the current ones (McShane, Steen, & Tasa, 2015). Combining with other groups also introduced the notion of social loafing which is defined as the process in which individuals are seemingly less motivated when working in teams and will exert less effort compared if they were working alone (McShane, Steen, & Tasa, 2015). This concept was especially apparent for the airplane activity as we now had a team that consisted of six members, making some members feel less valued compared to others. A decrease in value then resulted which was noticeable when some individuals would not participate and others not would not put much effort into this

The task of motivating individuals in a group setting requires an understanding of each member’s personality attribute. As such, experts successfully devised theories to help in assessing people’s personality traits. The essence of this evaluation is that many ostensibly discrepancies in a human behavior is orderly and steady because of basic differences in the ways individuals desire to use their perception and judgment. Hence, this paper details my personality

Piezon and Donaldson (2005) provide a list of recommendations to help reduce social loafing in online group settings. Discuss how you might implement some of these strategies to ensure your commitment to your group�s overall

Why is the social disorganization theory for the most part, relegated to specific areas in the society?

To differentiate interactive and independent effects, Dr. Brennan questioned if two people are superior in performance because of independent statistical beliefs or because of collaborative interaction. Through her Enumeration Visual experiment, she found that two people were indeed faster because of the collaborative social interaction that is present between them. She showcased graphs that

Social groups are very important. In the text book we learn about two different experiments. The Asch experiment includes a group of students asking to compare two cards and to choose something on the card that matches the second card. Many people in the experiment matched it correctly. Also there were people that would constantly match the wrong ones on purpose. The purpose of the experiment was to recognize if any of the participants of the experiment felt awkward during it. First of all they felt pressured to answer correctly. Often when you are in a group of people you don’t know you want to be as smart as you can.

Some people feel that their work isn’t valuable so they tend to free ride off others and act like their contributions won’t be sufficient to the cause. That is where the social striving comes in at when the group should work harder because they have someone lacking to do their part. A sucker is someone known to do all the work because others didn’t do their part and they get little to no credit for doing all the work. These are all the issues that are at hand when it comes to working in groups and is the main reasons why some people hate to do group work so the best thing to do when being in groups is unavoidable, is to make sure that all the group is participating and to make sure that a part is assigned to everyone. Another thing would be

I have worked in various settings such as at a summer camp or in a research lab where group dynamics are highly relevant. It is of interest to me to see how the social class of an individual can influence their behavior in a group atmosphere. In addition to the coding I am doing in Dr. Son Hing’s lab, I will also be engaged in an independent research project gender equity in the university setting. In addition, I am passionate about learning about mental health and the impact it can have on individuals.

Having tasks that are too difficult or are unfamiliar are likely to incite social loafing because they group member lacks the ability or courage to provide input. Robbins and Judge (2011) theorize that another cause of social loafing is an uneven equity. When two people are putting in different levels of input and receiving the same level of output the larger contributor will adjust their input to reduce cognitive dissonance. Another reason they believe is “dispersion of responsibility” group members cannot be held responsible because tasks and roles are not clearly assigned. (Robbins & Judge, 2011). In research by Worchel and others (1998) it was found that groups with friends or familiar members are far less likely to loaf when compared with groups made up of strangers (Worchel, Rothgerber, Day, Hart, & Butemeyer, 1998) Most people have been in a group made up of friends and colleges they are familiar with and seen that in these types of groups social loafing is drastically reduced.

“Group work is a form of voluntary association of members benefiting from cooperative learning that enhances the total output of the activity than when done individually”.