Question

Summarize group influence through social facilitation, social loafing, deindividuation, and group decision-making & provide a brief example for each.

Answer 1

Answer- A group generally belongs to two or more than two people who share their ideas with each other through interaction and influence one another. They consider one another as 'us'. We can explain group influence with the help of the following points-

1- Social facilitation- Social facilitation explains the reasons how are we affected by the presence of other people. It is normally a tendency which encourages people to perform better in front of others rather than they are alone.In social facilitation the ratio of difficult tasks are generally low. The humans are greatly affected by the concept of social facilitation as they are always concerned about others' views.

Social facilitation tells us that people like to do a simple task in a better way when others are watching them. For example when your teacher asks you to perform some easy task in the class room like put everything at a proper place, you would do it with great efforts when people were watching you during your task. But when there were no one in the class, you would not be so attentive towards your work.

2- Social loafing- Social loafing refers that individuals put less efforts in a group task while they pay more attention when they work individually.Sometimes the output of a group task is less due to the tendency of social loafing. Individuals believe that their contribution in a group task will not be evaluated so they do not put proper efforts.

For example during a training or meeting, some workers of any organization are not so active and put less efforts. They give very few suggestions for the welfare of the organisation. But on the other hand when these employees are given other tasks to perform individually they do these tasks excellently.

3-Deindividuation- Sometimes people lose self sense in a group. Social facilitation makes people to perform better in the group. Social loafing leads to irresponsibility in a group task. When the social arousal becaomes high and and meets with diffused responsibility, people lose their understanding of individuality. This deindividuation makes a person responsible towards the immediate situation of his group either it is positive or negative. People do not think about themselves and unconsciouly according to the demand of the group. They are unaware about what they are doing is right or wrong.

For example when people are a part of a mob and they are protesting about any issue, they lose their sense of doing right or wrong. They perform unethical activities because they are influenced by the other people present over there. They behave according to the group without using their own mind.

4- Group decision making- Group decision making is a process in which all members of the group participate, discuss and analyze any situation and provide solution for it collectively. The nature , size, structure and purpose of a group affects this decision making capacity. In group decision making, normally two to seven participants are involved. The decision that is taken in a group is based on majority. Sometimes it becomes the reason of conflict between group members when their views are different from each other about a particular problem.

For example a group of people who has shifted to a new place and does not know to the citizens of that place well may do not trust them. It may be because they think that they are superior than them.