PS270 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Cockroach, Deindividuation, Groupthink
Document Summary
Is this a group or not: 5 people waiting at the same corner for a bus, people attending a worship service, justin timberlake fan club, the students in a seminar class, a man, his brother and his sister. People perform simple, well-learned tasks better in the presence of others. But, for more difficult tasks, the presence of others can inhibit performance. In the presence of others, we perspire more, breathe faster, tense our muscle more and have higher blood pressure than when we are alone. Why are we aroused in the presence of others: evaluation apprehension, distraction, mere presence. The tendency for people to exert less effort when they pool their efforts toward a common goal than when they are individually accountable. People do not engage in social loafing when the task is challenging, appealing or involving, or when their group members are friends.
