1. Introduction to Groups: Process losses

2. Agenda 1. Groups are valuable. a.Groups often do better than the individual in them. They allow people to handle projects that are too large or complex for a single individual. 2. The success of a group consists of three components: a.Getting the work done b.Supporting the needs of individual members c.Keeping the group as an unit functioning. 3. Much groups research adopts a functionalist perspective, trying to identify inputs & process that help groups succeed. 4. Groups often perform worse than optimal. Afflicted by "process losses", which prevent them from doing as well as they are capable of doing: a.Problems in coordination a. Brainstorming b. Shared information bias b.Problems in motivation a. Social loafing b. Group think

3. Criteria for Group Success 1. The success of a group consists of three components: a.Production: Getting the work done & meeting needs of stakeholders b.Member support: Supporting the needs of individual members c.Group maintenance: Keeping the group as an functioning unit and developing it with time and experience. 2. These components can be in tension What were the criteria for success in the rowing crews?

4. Functionalist Perspective Normative approach that seeks to identify the inputs to groups and the group processes cause groups to be more or less successful. –Groups are goal oriented –Both group behavior & performance can be evaluated –One can control group interactions to make them more appropriate for achieving group goals –Other factors (both internal & external) influence group performance through group interaction “Normative” means that there are better or worse ways to organize groups to achieve the goals for which they were formed.

5. Traditional Input-Process-Outcome Model of Group Effectiveness Forsyth, D. (2010). Group dynamics (5th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Pub Co. Input Process Output

6. The tension in group work Groups are valuable: Perform better than the individuals who comprise them But they rarely live up to their potential = Process losses. Knowledge Skills Attitudes Time Effort Potential Performance Process Losses Actual Performance

7. Problems in Groups I’ve Supervised in Industry & Academia Every year 1 or 2 groups struggle with problems of group dynamics –Conflict over goals –Conflict over assignments –Conflict over standards –Task conflict spill over into personal conflict –Uneven contributions & social loafing –Difficulty dealing with differences between members –Difficulties in coordination –Disappointment with what they have learned –Groups don’t deliver what the client wanted

8. What group problems have you had? Situations where you thought a group you were part of didn’t live up to expectations?

9. Not Being Listened To “As you are (or should) be aware, I have had difficulties dealing with the group dynamics existing in our project group. I’ve tried several strategies to be able to cope with them: exposing the problem to you, ignoring these difficulties and trying to make my point anyway,. … I’ve also tried to make my voice be heard and to speak up more as you told me to do, but even this has not worked. … I’m disappointed with myself for not being more assertive and authoritative and for not knowing how to deal with this situation better; I am disappointed with you for not being willing to listen and incorporate my ideas into the group and for not considering me as a real member of the group. As a result, I feel that our work so far is not representative of our qualities and skills. We have been able to produce very little as a group and this is even more upsetting that the personal feelings I have endured with this group.”

10. Social Loafing “George was a problem in our group, never contributed to any of our group meetings at all, he would just get his laptop out as soon as he sat down and then just surfed the web on it. We continually asked him to participate in the work, close his laptop, etc. but all he did was read website forums on [his hobby] and edit Wikipedia pages about it. At best he didn't contribute to the group and ignored us. At worst he would join the conversation underway and say something that required us to to break what we were talking about to go back and discuss with him about something that the group had already decided about 30 minutes ago on. We purposefully did not let him present to the class because we, as a group, have no idea what he even really knows about our project and we didn't think that he would be able to speak about it well. He contributed nothing to the project.

11. Personality Clashes A European member from a culture with a very direct way of speaking had a major role and others were upset and/or intimidated by his direct manner. A lot of fighting broke out. In this case, a consultant worked with the team and they learned how to work well enough together to pull together a nice project and the client was pleased.

12. Generally Dysfunctional Degenerated due to excessive lewd joking that some team members were upset by (it was an all male team), due to members failing to have any appreciation of one another's points of views, and due to widely varying work ethics among the five members. This team also had a fairly obnoxious sponsor group who disagreed amongst themselves and gave the team conflicting recommendations. The sponsor was also very negative about everything the team did. So, ill-will all around pulled team members apart.

13. Not Listening To the Client http://www.centgraf.net/metrovizl

14. Process losses Coordination Production blocking: members can not think of new ideas while listening to someone else Common knowledge effect: discussions focus on shared information Unequal participation: participation  expertise Coordination costs of –Scheduling –Developing consensus –Doing the work Motivational Social loafing: members expend less effort Conformity pressures & group think: members feel pressured to agree with other group members. Effects strongest with cohesive groups. Conflict: interpersonal conflict is disruptive In-group vs. Out-group bias: Mere group membership leads to in-group favoritism. Escalation of commitment: groups persist in following a course of action despite evidence against it

15. Coordination process loss: Brainstorming in interactive groups

16. Alex Osborne’s Rules for Brainstorming (1953) No criticism Defer criticism. Encourage the wild –Wild ideas may trigger more practical suggestions from others –It is easier to tone done crazy ideas than to be creative The more the better –The more ideas, the greater likelihood of one winner –It is easier to eliminate than to generate Build off of others –Combinations and improvements are welcome –How can you improve what others offered? –Can you get creativity from combinations? Osborne, A. F. (1953). Applied imagination: Principles and procedures of creative problem solving. Charles Scribener’s Sons, New York.

17. Process Loss in Brainstorming l Real, interacting groups (versus nominal ones) produce l Fewer ideas l Fewer good ideas l Lower average quality l Lower feasibility l Lit review: 18/22 studies show nominal groups surpass real groups (Diehl & Stoebe, 1987) l Fixes depend on causes Number of ”good” ideas produced by interacting and nominal 4-person groups discussing how to improve relationships among Germans & guest workers (Diehl & Stoebe, 1987)

18. Possible explanations ExplanationSolution

19. Possible explanations Explanation Conformity pressures Social loafing Production blocking Solution Anonymity Surveillance systems Simultaneous input

20. Disentangling causes Diehl & Stoebe (1989): 5 experiments to identify importance of causes –Evaluation apprehension: High (Your ideas on controversial topic recorded & judged) vs Low (no recording & judgment) –Social loafing: Personal (each person compared) vs Collective (group as a whole is compared) to a standard –Production blocking: High (Stoplights prevented subjects from producing ideas when another subject was producing) or Low (no lights) Production Blocking was the main problem –  Brainstorm at home & use group meeting to consolidate Other techniques to enhance brainstorming –Take a break – Brainstorm within categories – Division of labor

21. Coordination process loss: Common knowledge effects

22. Hidden profiles & shared information bias One reason groups succeed is that together members have more knowledge than any single member Yet groups –Over-discuss information held by all members –Under-discuss information held by a subset of members Often leads to worse decision-making than if group shared all their information

23. Sample Coordination Problem: Lack of Information Sharing Team members have some shared & unshared information about a candidate – all positive If they use all the information, the choice is clear. Pick candidate with most positive attributes But if they share only some of the information, choice may be wrong, depending on what is shared

24. Information sharing determines quality of group decision-making If they combine all the information, A dominates B But partial sharing can lead to wrong decision Stasser, G., & Titus, W. (1985). Pooling of unshared information in group decision making. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 48optional, 1467-1478.

25. Shared information More likely to be mentioned (d=2.03, k=33) Will be discussed more More likely to be remembered More influential in decision-making  By not talking enough about information held only by a subset of members, group is not taking advantage of one of a group’s primary asset Lu, L., Yuan, Y. C., & McLeod, P. L. (2012). Twenty-Five Years of Hidden Profiles in Group Decision Making A Meta-Analysis. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 16(1), 54-75.

26. Failure to discuss all the information leads to worse decisions Odds of a correct answer were 8x larger when all group members had all the information than when only a subset of members had some information

27. Moderators Hidden profiles led to less info sharing when: –Groups were larger –When there was more information overall –When more of the initial information was unique No effects: –Communication media Hidden profiles led to worse decisions when: –Groups were larger –When there was more information overall

28. How to fix the problem Doesn’t help Increase discussion Separate review & decision stages Increase team size Poll before discussion Helps Group interaction: –Explicitly ask for unshared info –Have recognized specialization (i.e. roles) –Build group trust Structure the decision –Consider alternative one at a time –Rank, not choose –Suspend initial judgments –Approach task as “problem to be solved” not “judgment”

29. Coordination reflected in participation rates Uneven distribution in groups Unevenness increases with group size

30. Example of coordination loss in Wikipedia

31. Generally articles with more editors have higher quality But coordinating large numbers of editors could be a process loss Stub Start C B Good Featured Wikipedia article quality Article quality X Number of Editors

32. Coordination types Explicit coordination –Direct communication among editors planning and discussing article  More process loss Implicit coordination –Division of labor and workgroup structure –Concentrating work in core group of editors –Development of group norms  Less process loss

33. Predicting changes in Wikipedia quality

34. Longitudinal Analysis: What leads to changes in quality

35. More Talk & Concentration Improve Article Quality Effect of number of editors disappear, when examining change in quality at average levels of talk & concentration

36. Longitudinal Analysis: What leads to changes in quality

37. Effects of communication depends on number of editors Direct communication is effective with small number of editors, but harmful with many editors

38. Longitudinal Analysis: What leads to changes in quality

39. Effects of Number of Editors Depends on Concentration Concentration helps overall –Helps most with when many editors contribute –Many editors without concentration harms quality

40. Motivational process loss: Social Loafing

41. Social Loafing RINGLEMANN’s Discovery (1913) A French agricultural engineer who conducted most of his research in late 1880’s. Device measured the exact mount of forced exerted on the rope 1, 2, 3, or 8 people pulling on rope Force didn’t increase linearly with the number of people

42. Social Loafing: RINGLEMANN (1913) Mean force pulled by individuals = 85.3 kg of force Eight people should produce (8*85.3kg) or 682.4 kg of force, but really produce less than half `Why?

43. Distinguishing Coordination Problems from Motivation Nominal or co-acting groups. Subjects think they are in the presence of a group, but in fact acting alone  motivation Real (or collective) groups need to shout at the same time  coordination

44. Social Loafing: Working in a group decreases effort Social loafing occurs in both interacting and nominal groups Across many performance outcomes –Physical –Intellectual –Quantity –Quality

45. When is social loafing reduced?

46. Loafing reduced in cohesive groups Brainstorm uses of a knife. Place ideas into –Separate boxes (coactive) –Common box (collective) Group cohesion –High Cohesion: Prior pleasant interaction –Control: No conversation –Low Cohesion: Prior argumentative interaction. Social loafing occurs –In no history control group –In low cohesion group –Eliminated in high cohesion group Karau, S. J., & Hart, J. W. (1998). Group Cohesiveness and Social Loafing: Effects of a Social Interaction Manipulation on Individual Motivation Within Groups. Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice, 2(3), 185-191.

47. People even work harder in a cohesive group when they think teammate has low ability Subject performs a brainstorming task Vary individual vs. collective work Individual: Put ideas in separate boxes Collective: Put ideas in common box Vary group cohesion Friends vs strangers Vary perceived ability of others in groups Low: “I’m lousy at this type of task” High: Irrelevant comments or “I’m generally good at this type of task” Social loafing results: With low-ability partners, social loafing occurs in non-cohesive groups, but reduced in cohesive groups With high-ability partners, social compensation occurs in cohesive groups, but not in non- cohesive groups Karau, S. J., & Williams, K. D. (1997). The effects of group cohesiveness on social loafing and social compensation. Group Dynamics, 1(2), 156-168.

48. Karau & Williams Meta-Analysis Meta-Analysis –Way to systematically combine evidence from many studies by averaging effect sizes –Effect size = power of variable of interest in standard deviations units Karau & Williams result –163 effect sizes –123 of 163 studies show evidence of social loafing People working harder in coactive conditions than collective conditions –Mean effect size =.44 standard deviations (moderate)

49. Analyze average effect size & test for heterogeneity

50. Illustrating Average Effect Size Difference of.44 standard deviation units btw effort when individuals are working independently (co- acting) versus pooling output (collective) –Small to moderate effect size –66% of people in collective group would exert less effort than averager person in the co-acting group –Comparable to difference in height between 14 year old & 17 year old girl or the difference in reading or math tests of 4 th graders vs 5 th graders or reading differences between 12 th grade girls vs boys.44d Co-actingCollective

51. Test for moderator variables

52. Factors that mitigate social loafing Social loafing reduced if Individual's output is visible Task is attractive Group is attractive Expect others to perform poorly Own contribution is unique Task is simple Task has specific, challenging goals Among women Among people from collectivist cultures Karau, S. J., & Williams, K. D. (1993). Social loafing: A meta-analytic review and theoretical integration. Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, 65(4), 681-706.

53. Stylized facts vs causal theory

54. Expectancy-Value Theory (Vroom) Individuals will work hard in groups to the extent they believe: – effort will lead to better performance – better performance will be recognized and rewarded – the rewards are valuable

55. Quasi-economic model Individuals work hard to the extent that doing so increases personal payoffs You study hard (effort)  –If you enjoy the topic (intrinsic motivation) –You have a test (individual performance)  –You ace the test (individual outcome)  –You are proud & get praise from parents (evaluation of outcome) Utility model of individual motivation individual effort individual performance individual outcome motivation individual utility Valance of outcome x

56. Collective Effort Model (Karau & Williams) Being in a group –Changes probability of group performance –Changes probability of individual outcome –Changes valence of the outcome Number of others Own competence Own unique skills Group’s incompetence Liking for group members Identification with group History of interaction with group Personal importance of goal Identifiably Divisibility of outcome Fairness of reward distribution individual effort individual performance individual outcome motivation group performance group outcome individual utility Valance of outcome x

57. Scenario You are member of a 6-person team to select a Wikipedia article & improve it to good article status How do you guard against social loafing?

58. Ways to reduce social loafing Assign fewer people to work on tasks (“understaffing”) Assign individual responsibilities Make individual performance visible Define clear, stretch goals Make the tasks intrinsically interesting Make the group enjoyable to work in