Irving Janis

Jacqueline Gavrielova Professor Bernstein SSY 250 02/22/2016 Groupthink: Research Paper The concept of groupthink was brought on by social psychologist Irving Janis in 1972. Groupthink is when a group is required to make a decision, and under that pressure, unifies to make one that can appear as unanimous of that group. The fact that there is a necessity to come up with a solution or an organized decision makes it so some members of the group will simply go along with the view of the majority. The

changing. To this day the voice of many remains unheard and unspoken as people are expected to conform to the standards of society. The idea of “Group Think” requires an exact mold for the members to shape to, but in reality Developed in 1972 by Irving Janis, “Group Think”, a psychological phenomenon, affects the choices of thousands of people unknowingly and deleteriously. The fallout of a group and its tragic aftermath due to the effects of “Group Think” is shown in The Crucible, a play written by

Groupthink The Challenger space shuttle explosion. The Bay of Pigs invasion. The Korean War debacle (Janis 1-28). These are examples of situations where group communication failed. Group communication involves a shared identity among three or more people, a considerable amount of interaction among these people, and a high level of interdependence between everyone involved (Trenholm 196-97). It is essential to understand group dynamics for a variety of reasons. Everyone participates in groups throughout

Outline Janis’ concept of ‘goupthink’. Why, and in what circumstances, is it such a problem for organizations? PLAN homogeneity of Members’ social background and ideology etc Low self-esteem induced by recent failures, excessive difficulties on current decision-making tasks that lower each member’s sense of self-efficacy) and moral dilemmas (lack of feasible alternatives except ones that violate ethical norms) Hogg – Group Cohesion Social categorization produces prototype-based depersonalization

Groupthink is a theory of social interaction involved with methods of group decision-making, originally developed by Irving Janis, a social psychologist, in 1972 (Communication Theory). Groupthink was initially described by Janis as the thought processes of people engaged in group decision-making with a deep desire to conform to ‘in-group members’ーrequiring extreme loyalty to group values and the exclusion of those deemed part of an ‘out-group’. In situations when groupthink occurs, the need for

that it can even have on the economy. To understand the effect that groupthink has on investors, and therefore the economy, we must first comprehend what groupthink encompasses. Groupthink was a term devised in 1972 by psychologist Irving Janis. According to Janis, groupthink ensues when a group makes flawed choices because group pressures lead to a deterioration of “mental efficiency, reality testing, and oral judgement.” Essentially what this means is that our decision making can be severely

they are firing. This is because the Officers get caught up in the moment. This is observed quite frequently in new officers, but has happened in veteran officers as well. So the mindset of officers in a situation such as this can be observed in Irving Janis’s article about “Bystander Effect” or “Abilene Paradox” type I. by the belief in the inherent Morality of the group”. Often tensions are high in an agitated event, where guns are the means of dealing with a hostel or life threatening situations

capacity of the Cuban military and all around faulty intelligence. In fact, many of these issues were never even addressed, while the plan was being discussed. Many of these issues were based on faulty intelligence, which was never questioned. Irving Janis, wrote a book called Group Think, which examined these fiascos like these along with many others. The premise was simple, why do groups of what we consider very smart

This paper looks at the concept of Groupthink from a summarization perspective, touching on the symptoms and remedies with a few examples. What is Groupthink The concept of Groupthink was researched by Irving Janis, and this concept can be described as a situation where the seeking of a collective group agreement, supersedes an individual action to state alternatives, critique a position, or express an opinion that is unpopular to the group. The weakening of mental effectiveness, reality competence

critical analysis in the service of reaching a decision” (Fiest et al., 2016, p. 536- 537). Likewise, it is discussed by Irving Janis (1971) in Groupthink, an article published in Psychology Today magazine, who was the first to propose its existence as a phenomena. Basing his theory on the thorough analysis of historical examples of poor decision such as the Bay of Pigs invasion, Janis concluded that groupthink arises when “the members of decision- making groups become motivated to avoid being too harsh