SOCPSY 1Z03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Floyd Henry Allport, Substantial Similarity, Homophily

• School: McMaster University
• Department: Social Psychology
• Course: SOCPSY 1Z03
• Professor: Paul Glavin

Document Summary

Lecture 10 groups: cohesion, performance and conformity. A group is a social unit that consists of two or more persons and has the following attributes: membership. Interaction among members: goals shared by members, shared norms. A group"s (cid:272)ohesio(cid:374) is the e(cid:454)te(cid:374)t to (cid:449)hi(cid:272)h its (cid:373)e(cid:373)(cid:271)ers desire to re(cid:373)ai(cid:374) i(cid:374) it, a(cid:374)d resist leaving it: social cohesion. People stay in the group because they like one another, enjoy social interaction. Homophily: tendency for individuals to associate with similar others: task cohesion. Stay in the group because they are heavily involved in the task the group is involved in. Group goal = an outcome viewed by group members as desirable and important to attain. As number of members increase, the average contribution of each member decreases. When you are engaged in a task with a lot of people. Hard to electively get everyone to act in unison. Complicate to coordinate many people: social loafing.