GROUPS AND INDIVIDUALS: THE CONSEQUENCES OF BELONGING

Group: A collection of people who are perceived to be bonded together

in a coherent unit to some degree.
Types of Groups:
Common bond group
Common Identity group
Common bond group: Groups that tend to involve face to face
interactions and in which the individuals members are bonded to each other.
Ex: The Player on a sports team, friendship group and work team
Common Identity group: Face to face interaction is often absent and
the members are linked together via category as a whole rather than each other.
In which we might not even know personally all or even most of the
other group members.
Ex: Our national, linguistic, university and gender group.
Both of these types of group membership can be important to people.
Depending on what psychological need is salient at any given moment, different types
of group membership come to mind.
When affiliation needs are activated, intimate common bond group
become accessible
Whereas when identity needs are activated, social categories in which
we share common identity with other members becomes accessible.



Entitativity
The extent to which group is perceived as being a coherent entity.
Entitativity can range from at the low end, a mere collection of
individuals who happen to be in the same place at the same time and who have little
or no connection with one another,
At the high end, where members of intimate groups such as families
share a name, a history and an identity with each other.


When do we perceive group as an entity?
Group high in Entitativity tend to have a fallowing characteristic:
Members interact with one another although not necessarily in a face
to face setting
The group is of consequences to its members
Members share the common goals
They are similar to one another in important ways
Conclusion: The higher groups are on these dimensions, the more they will be seen by
members and nonmembers alike as forming coherent entities.

Components of a Group

Before understanding the specific ways in which groups affect various
aspects of our behavior and thought, it is useful to consider several basic features
of groups.

Components of a Group:

Status: Hierarchies In group
Roles: Differentiation of Function within Groups
Norms: The rules of the game
Cohesiveness: The force that Binds

Status: Hierarchies In group
The individuals position or rank within the group.
People are often extremely sensitive to their status within a group
because it is linked to a wide range of desirable outcomes, everything from salary to
respect and difference from other group members. For this reason groups often use
status as a means of influencing the behavior of their members.
From evolutionary, psychologists attach considerable importance to
status attainment within a group. In many different species including our won group,
high status confers important advantages on those who possess it.
How people acquire High status:
Physical attributes: Such as Height, Physical attractiveness,
appearance, and other characteristics
Longevity or seniority in a group too can result in higher status.
Individuals behavior: People who are seen as prototypical are more
likely to be selected as a leader of a group
Some of the factors which decide the individual behavior are:
Culture
Attitude
Values
Authority
Persuasion
Once status within a group is obtained people with high status actually
behave differently than those with lower status.
Thus the differences in status are an important fact of life in most
groups and have implications for how we perceive ourselves and actually behave.
Roles:
Roles: The set of behaviours that individuals occupying specific
positions within a group are expected to perform.
Sometimes roles are assigned, for instance a group may select different
individuals to serve as its leaders, treasurer or secretary.
In other cases individuals gradually acquire certain roles without being
formally assigned to them.
To the extent that people internalize their social roles- those roles are
linked to key aspects of the self concept- they can have important implications for
psychological wellbeing. Indeed enacting a role well can lead people to feel that their
behavior reflects their authentic self.
Internalization process of the different roles where we come to identify
with and see ourselves in terms of accepting the norms, role and identification
ourselves with the role must take place before the reflection of our behavior.

Norms
Rules or expectations within a group concerning how its members
should or should not behave
Different norms can operate in different groups, and what happens
when we deviate from what is normatively expected of us. An important norm that
varies considerably across cultures but can also apply differentially to groups within a
culture is collectivism versus individualism
Collectivism: Groups in which the norm is to maintain harmony
among group members even if doing so might entail some personal costs.
Individualism: In such groups the norm is to value standing out from the group and being
different from other individuals variability is to expect and disagreement among members is
tolerant
The role of norms in a group
To help the group reach its objectives. As members share the same code of conduct the
group's norms dictate the responsibilities and obligations of each member. This combination
of choices,
decisions and behaviours generally fosters a harmonious functioning among group members.

To foster relationships among members and internal group cohesion.
Norms indicate what attitude members should adopt in various circumstances. They
may, for instance, help members settle a conflict by providing them with possible
resolutions to problems or misunderstandings. As a result, misunderstandings can be
avoided and harmonious relationships among members preserved.
To help members gain a better understanding of their experience. By
suggesting or prescribing acceptable and unacceptable attitudes or behaviours as well
as the roles and functions of each group member, norms enable members to better
understand the behaviours of their co-members. Norms also allow members to
identify those who do not respect the rules enforced in the group



Cohesiveness
All factors that cause group members to remain in the group.
Cohesive groups have several positive qualities that we all can recognize and agree upon.
Cohesive group have a sense of solidarity, they see themselves
as homogenous supportive of in group members, oriented towards achieving the goals, have
high in morale.
There is a feeling of friendship and loyalty among group members
The benefits of Joining a Group
People sometimes go through a lot to join a specific group.
Membership in many groups is by invitation only, and winning that invitation can be
difficult.
What accounts for this desire to join and remain a part of it.
We often gain self knowledge from belonging to various groups. Our
membership in them tells us what kind of person we are. Perhaps would like to be, so
group membership becomes central to our self concept.
The Group helps us to reach our goals. One Important goal is attaining prestige. When an
individual is accepted into a certain type of group-
a highly selective school an exclusive club a sports team etc it increases the self esteem of an
individual who is the part of the group.

Another important benefit of joining a group is that doing so often
helps us to accomplish goals we could not achieve alone i.e. social change.
Politicizes collective identity: Recognizing shared grievances and
engaging in a power struggle on behalf of ones devalued group.

COSTS OF GETTING INTO A GROUP:
Many groups erect high barriers to entry
They want only some people to join
They insist that those who are highly motivated should join the group
Steep initiation fees
Efforts to prove ones credentials as being suitable
Probationary period
Cognitive dissonance


The costs of Membership: why groups sometimes splinter
Joining group is a mixed blessing in life. While group can help us to
reach our goals, help to boost our status along the way,
and form an important part of who we are, they also impose certain
costs.
Restriction on personal freedom
Time
Resources
Mental Strain
Energy
Group sometimes adopt policies of which some members disapprove,
the dissenting members must remain silent.

Why group sometimes splinter:
Ideological change in core aspect-Subversion of group identity: The
belief that it is no longer the same group------
( Emotional distress when there is no chance of reversing this change)
or ( Reduced Entitativity and group identification)-group splinter
Ideology: The Philosophical and political values of a group. In other
words as far as they are concerned, other members of the group
are categorised together with the self to in effect become we. To the
extent that people do identify themselves and others as part
of the same category, then they may choose to withdraw from groups
that they no longer see as meeting the definition of the
weness they initially adopted.
schism: Splintering of a group into distinct factions following an ideological rift among
members








SOCIAL FACILIATION: Performing in the presence of others
SOCIAL FACILIATION: It is the tendency for people to do better on
simple tasks when in the presence of other people. This implies that whenever people
are being watched by others, they will do well on things that they are already good at
doing. Individual's behavior is affected by the real, imagined or implied presence of
others.
How does the presence of audience distract us?
Some have suggested that the presence of others either as an audience
or as a co-actor, can be distracting and for this reason it can produce
cognitive overload. Because performers must divide their attention
between the task and the audience such increased cognitive load can result
in a tendency to restrict ones attention so as to focus only on essential
cues or stimuli while screening out nonessential ones. Several findings
offer support for this view, known as DISTRACTION CONFLICT-
THEORY
DISTRACTION CONFLICT- THEORY: The suggestion that when
a person is performing a task the mere presence of others creates a
conflict between concentrating on the task and concentrating on the
other people. This conflict increases arousal,
which leads to social facilitation
Conclusion: Recent findings offer support for the view that several
kinds of audience produce narrowed attention focus among people
performing a task. Both the arousal and cognitive views of social
facilitation can help explain why social facilitation occurs among people.
SOCIAL LOAFING
Social Loafing: Social loafing describes the tendency of individuals to
put forth less effort when they are part of a group. Because all members
of the group are pooling their effort to achieve a common goal, each
member of the group contributes less than they would if they
were individually responsible.
Occurs when an individual is less productive (exerts less effort)
working in a group than he is working independently.
Most likely to occur in large teams where individual output is difficult
to measure
When task is boring
When objective is not important
When team doesn't value membership
People expect each other to loaf. Whether consciously or
unconsciously people say to themselves: everyone else is going to slack off
a bit so I'll slack off a bit as well because it's not fair if I do more work
than the others
Anonymity. When groups are larger the individuals become more
anonymous. Imagine you're doing something on your own:
if it goes well you get all the glory, if it goes wrong you get all the
blame. In a group both blame and glory is spread,
so there's less carrot and less stick.
Techniques to reduce Social Loafing:
Creating some form of performance measurement for each individual,
that way they will be motivated to do well,
as it will be indicated to their peers and managers
Add some creativity to the task so that it is not boring, when something
is fun people are more motivated to do it
Make the importance of the task known, explicitly state its impact and
consequences
Increase team cohesion through team building activity (just a
suggestion)
Decreasing the 'sucker effect: Sucker effect refers to the tendency for
individuals to contribute less to a group endeavour
when they expect that others will think negatively of someone who
works too hard or contributes too much...
Reducing or eliminating this perception is another key to a productive
group.
Task importance. Studies have shown that when people think the task
is important they do less loafing

COORDINATION IN GROUP: Cooperation or conflict?

Cooperation: Behavior in which groups work together to attain shared goals.
Helping that is mutual and both sides benefit is common in group working together to attain
shared goals. By cooperating,
people can attain goals they could never hope to reach by themselves. Surprisingly though
cooperation does not always develop in groups,
sometimes people belonging to a group may perceive their personal interests as incompatible
and instead of coordinating their efforts they
may work against each other, often producing negative results for both sides. This is known
as conflict.



Conflict: Its nature, causes and effects
Conflict: A process in which individuals or groups perceive that others have taken or will
soon take actions incompatible with their
own interests.

Conflict is a common part of social life and can be extremely costly to both sides

Causes:
Faulty attribution.

Attribution: The process through which we seek to identify the causes of others and gain
knowledge about their stable traits or dispositions.

One factor that plays a role in this respect is what has been termed faulty attribution, defined
as errors concerning the causes of others
behavior.

Faulty communication: The fact that individuals sometimes
communicate with others in a way that angers or annoys hem.

Third social cause of conflict involves the tendency to perceive our
own views as objective and as reflecting reality but those of
other as biased by their ideology. As a result of this tendency, we
magnify defences between our views and those of others and also
exaggerate conflicts of interest between us.
Finally conflict within a group may stem from poor initial performance
by the group. Poor performances and negative feedback
about this performance may be threatening to group members and this
in turn can lead them to blame each other for these poor
results.

Resolving Conflicts: Some techniques
Bargaining (Negotiation): A process in which opposing sides exchange
offers, counteroffers and concessions either directly or
through representatives. If the process of bargaining is successful, a
solution is acceptable to both sides is attained, and the conflict
is resolved.
Super ordinate goals: People perceive members of their own group
(us) as quite different from and usually better than, people
belonging to other groups (them). These tendencies to magnify
differences between ones own group and others and to disparage
outsiders are powerful and often play a role in the occurrences and
persistence of conflicts. Fortunately they can be encountered
through the induction of Super ordinate goals
Goals that both sides to a conflict seek and that tie their interests together rather than driving
their apart.