Social Psychological Effects in Groups

A group and its impact on social psychology

A group is made up of two or more people who are connected in some way and can interact or influence one another by sharing ideas or opinions. Because group behavior influences social psychology, teams have various social psychological impacts. Social loafing, group thinking, and dangerous shift are some of the outcomes of group behavior.

Social loafing and its consequences

When people combine their efforts to achieve a group product, they exhibit a drop in effort and motivation known as social loafing. People utilize less energy when working on a task collaboratively, as opposed to individual effort on the job.For example, a group assignment will be completed quicker than an individual one due to the combined effort of its members to complete the work given. A consequence that can arise in social loafing is some cases of free-riders where some individuals in a group may tend to be less productive than the others by taking advantage of the combined effort.

Risky shift and its effects

Risky shift arises when individuals change decisions or opinions to be more acute and risky when working in a group as compared to individual involvement. It is an aspect of group polarization whereby it results in a group's decision being bolder and more adventurous and riskier compared to those made from an individual perspective. For example, risky shift may occur when a team is involved in making risky decisions in a situation such as gambling where influential members are likely to influence the conservative ones, hence the outcome of the final gambling decision. A disadvantage of risk shifting is that it may lead to group failure since all opinions and occurrences are not considered which makes the group have insufficient choices from all members.