Psychology 2070A/B Lecture 10: lecture #10 - groups.docx

• School: Western University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: Psychology 2070A/B
• Professor: James M Olson

Document Summary

How our behaviour is affected by the presence of other people, group decisions, intergroup relations. For example the astronauts on a spacecraft: share a common identity the group has a name, a purpose, or a goal which is shared, have a group structure. Different roles - members perform different tasks in the group, and there are expectations for how the members should behave (e. g. , queen, princess) Status hierarchy - group members differ in power and influence over other members (e. g. , queen is the leader) Group cohesiveness exists - strength of the forces acting on members to remain in group (e. g. , attractiveness of group, severity of consequences if leave group) Extent to which the members want to remain a part of the group. How do groups affect individual performance: social facilitation: performance on individual tasks. Innate tendency, can involve evaluation apprehension (we are worried that others will evaluate us), can involve competitive motivation (we want to be the other people)