Social Loafing

What is Social Loafing?

Social Loafing is something everyone has experienced. Most likely if you do not like group work this is one of the main reasons why. “Social loading describes the tendency of individuals to put forth less effort when they are part of a group. Because all members of the group are pooling their effort to achieve a common goal each member of the group contributes less than they would if they were individually responsible” (Cherry). This challenges the common belief that group work will be more productive. In 1913 a researcher named Ringelmann designed an experiment involving rope pulling to test the effect of social loafing. His experiment found that when an individual was put in a group his or her effort was less. This effect continued to increase as the group size increased. Originally, there was a debate over if the loss was from Social Loafing or Coordination Loss. It was not until another experiment was conducted that tricked participants into thinking they were working with a group did Social Loafing become confirmed.

There have also been studies that show the opposite effect known as Social Facilitation. Originally Social Facilitation research began with Zajon, in his research he believed the presence of others would increase the effort of others and would generally arouse performances therefore, increasing the out of the individual. He theorized there are several necessary aspects such as simple or familiar tasks. However, if a task is complicated or unfamiliar increased group size would hamper productivity by increasing social loafing (Zajonc, 1965). This shows that Social Loafing is more than group size but that there are other factors that contribute to the reduced individual performance.

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