Social Factors of Crowd & Collective Behaviour (AQA GCSE Psychology)

Social loafing

• When someone is part of a crowd/group they may put less effort into a task than they would have done if they had performed the task alone

  • This is known as social loafing

• Similar to deindividuation, when someone is part of a crowd they can ‘hide’ i.e. their lack of effort may go unnoticed

• An early piece of research by Ringlemann (1913) found that:

  • People pulling on a rope exert less effort as more people join their team

  • An individual pulling alone will expend around 98% of their full pulling potential

  • Two people pulling equals 93% potential, dropping to 85% when three people pull

  • By the time 8 people have joined the team the individual’s effort is likely to have gone down to 49%

• The results of the above study can be summed up as the Ringlemann effect

• Ingham et al. (1974) investigated the Ringlemann effect:

  • The researchers were interested in whether the decrease in effort was due to loss of coordination or motivation

  • Ingham concluded that the effort decrease was due to loss of motivational 

  • Thus, the Ringlemann effect is an example of social loafing

• Latane et al. (1979) investigated social loafing as follows:

  • Participants were asked to clap and shout alone, with one other person, or in a group of six

  • The findings of this study support the Ringelmann effect

    • By the time six people were involved there was only 40% of the average individual effort shown

• Social loafing may occur for the following reasons:

  • Thinking 'No one else in the group is committed to this task so why should I be?'

  • Not wanting to be ‘used’ by the others

  • Assuming that others will cover up for your own lack of effort

  • Thinking ‘My own individual effort isn’t going to make that much difference’

• Interestingly, if people know that they are being watched, observed, monitored etc then their effort increases.

Social loafing diagram

How much effort would you put in? 100%? Or…less?...

Culture

• Culture refers to the products of socialisation within a specific society which may be centred around:

  • National characteristics

  • Ethnicity

  • Religious beliefs

  • Geographical characteristics

• Culture is manifest in two ways:

  • Outwardly e.g. through food, song, dance, rituals, traditions etc. 

  • Inwardly e.g. through beliefs, attitudes, superstitions etc.

• One very broad cultural dimension is individualism/collectivism:

  • Individualistic cultures

    • Are those in which ‘I’ and ‘me’ are emphasised

    • Favour independence, ambition, individual effort, uniqueness, autonomy

  • Collectivist cultures

    • Are those in which ‘we’ and ‘us’ are emphasised

    • Favour interdependence, duty, obligation, community, sharing, cooperation, family

• Examples of countries with an individualistic culture include:

  • The USA

  • The UK

  • Western European countries e.g. France, Italy, Germany

• Examples of countries with a collectivist culture include:

  • China

  • India

  • South East Asian countries e.g. Thailand, Vietnam, the Philippines

• Social loafing is less likely to happen in collectivist cultures as the emphasis is on ‘pulling together’ and ‘doing your bit’ for the group i.e. people are not focused on the self but on the group as a whole

• Earley (1989) found that:

  • Participants from the USA put in more effort on a task when they were being judged as an individual

  • The Chinese participants put in equal effort whether or not they were being judged individually 

Evaluation of social factors of crowd & collective behaviour

Strengths

• Understanding social loafing deindividuation has good application: 

  • It could be used to encourage greater employee productivity

  • It could be used in educational settings to promote progress and attainment

  • It could be used in sports to enhance team effort

• The cultural differences theory of social loafing has some validity

  • It may explain the success of emerging economies such as India and China i.e. people work hard for the good of the country

Weaknesses

• It is very difficult to [popover id="kgKNDAB-uI295r9s" label="operationalise"] and measure social loafing

• Social loafing may not always show cultural differences:

  • Clark & Baker (2011) conducted a five-year longitudinal study on attitudes towards group projects using a sample of Chinese and Western students

  • They found that

    • Chinese students were fully aware that they were not contributing equally in their groups and that it was not in their interests to do so

    • Thus, Chinese international students might operate a different set of cultural values than other people from collectivist cultures