Social Loafing: A Case Study

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Johnson and Johnson (1987) defined a group, as two or more individuals in face-to-face contact, were each member is aware of their membership within the group, aware of others who belong to the group and also aware of their optimistic interdependence as they endeavor to accomplish shared goals. This essay will present evidence to explain Jake’s behavior within the group by using Social Psychology with reference to the concept of social loafing.
Social Loafing is a term coined by Latane, Williams and Harking (1979), which refers to the decrease in an individual’s effort when working within a group compared to when they are working alone. They conducted research and found that when individuals were requested to work together in order to produce high noise levels, there was a 29% reduction in individual effort in groups that contained two people, 49% in groups that contained four people and, 60% groups that contained 6 people.(Latane, Williams, & Harkins, 1979). …show more content…

When viewed as weak contributors to the group this can affect the groups dynamic and cause problems within it sometimes resulting in resentment and conflict. For example, if only four of the six group members are contributing to a task it can result in a divided in the group. This divide is know as the “in group” and “out group’ and as a result causing emotional tension and less productivity (Latane, 1979). The larger the group the more likely it will be that social loafing will occur. Loafing can be instigated or reinforced by the nonexistence of an individual assessment caused by the environment (Price & Harrison, 2006). This transpires as working in a group environment results in a decrease of self-awareness (Mullen, 1983). For example when effort of sales are measured within a group, and individual is more likely to loaf than if they were measured

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