Industrial and organization psychology

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Topic 7 – Group dynamics

MGMT341 – Industrial and Organizational Psychology

Summary of Topic 6

If psychology wants to be scientific, it must study entities that are observable

Concepts like ‘psyche’, ‘personality’, ‘mind’ or ‘self’ are ruled out from the onset

Two alternatives present themselves

Studying society instead of personality: psychologists have to become sociologists

Studying behaviour, without references to internal and unobservable causes, structures, states or events: psychologists have to become behaviourists

Anyone committed to personal responsibility will find either option unattractive, for both lead to considering human beings as products of their past and present environment, automatas unable to make choices

Social psychology

Another option must be sought after: rather than trying to study personality or society separately, one can study the relationship between the two

Many of the words used to make sense of human existence are relational words: power, authority, obedience, conformity, parent, husband, wife, teacher, student

This is the option favoured by those authors known as social psychologists

Important names: Lewin, Asch and Milgram in industrial psychology (this topic), Szasz in psychiatry (topic 9)

Topic 7: Agenda

The Hawthorne Studies

Gestalt theory

Force field analysis

Asch’s and Milgram’s experiments

Experimenting and deceiving

The Hawthorne Studies

In 1924, members of the US National Academy of Science started a series of experiments at the Hawthorne plant of Western Electric

In the spirit of Taylor, their intention was to study the effect of working conditions (notably lighting, working hours, rests and pay) on productivity

The experimental findings were unexpected and seemingly incomprehensible

Productivity increased whatever experimenters did, even under adverse working conditions

Monetary incentives had seemingly very little effect

The studies were abandoned, then resumed and continued until 1932 under the supervision of Elton Mayo of Harvard Business School

Video here

Interpreting the Hawthorne Studies

If managers welcomed the findings for obvious reasons (higher wages do not lead to higher productivity), psychologists were left puzzled

Mayo’s proposed answer (widely accepted to this day) was one made on social psychological lines

Social norms, group standards and shared beliefs more strongly influence individual output and work behavior than physical conditions and financial incentives do

In other words, workers value not the job in itself or its financial outcomes, but the relationships they entertain with fellow workers; in particular, the very fact of being observed and of being asked what matters in the work environment seems to be enough for workers to produce more

It was the Hawthorne Studies that spurred the interest in employee motivation

They triggered what is called the Human Relations movement (1930s-1940s), which displaced Scientific Management as the dominating management model

The Hawthorne Studies remain to date the most influential social experiment in Industrial Psychology

Kurt Lewin (1890-1947)

Lewin is often called the father of social psychology

Lewin was born in Prussia (in a place that is now part of Poland) but emigrated to the USA in 1933 and came to fame in that country

Although less popular today than he used to be, Lewin is remembered for coining the expressions ‘group dynamics’ and ‘action research’, as well as for inventing ‘force field’ analysis

Lewin was among the first to study organizational development and change management

Lewin also pioneered the study of organizational climate and culture: anyone studying these fields is indebted to Lewin’s ideas in one way or another

For all these reasons, Lewin’s work remains very important to industrial and management psychologists

Lewin came to psychology by way of Gestalt theory and remained a Gestaltist all his life; a few words on Gestalt theory is therefore required before Lewin’s ideas can be exposed

Gestalt theory

Gestalt theory originated in Germany in the last decade of the 19th century

Gestaltists hold that human beings perceive any given situation as an organised whole (Gestalt in German, plural Gestalten), which takes a meaning as such, distinct from the separate meanings of the parts that compose it

For Gestaltists, the whole is not greater than the sum of its part (this is a widely held but incorrect interpretation of the theory), but it is other than the sum of its parts: the whole has a significance that is independent of (cannot be reduced to) the significance of the parts

Importantly, the same Gestalt will take a different meaning for different people: not everyone perceives (interprets) a given situation in the same way

Gestaltists firmly reject the conviction, held in particular by behavorists, that perception is unitary (atomistic), i.e. made of separate, discrete elements

Behaviorists believe that individuals perceive and respond to distinct stimuli automatically and similarly if conditioned similarly

Gestaltists insist that individuals perceive and make sense of wholes before attending to distinct stimuli and that everyone will understand the same whole differently

Examples of Gestalten

The life-space

Lewin’s major theoretical construct and basis for his force field theory is his concept of ‘life-space’ (also called ‘psychological field’)

The life-space is the combination of all the factors that determines behaviour at any time

That is, behaviour is a function of the life-space; in symbolic terms, B = f(LS)

In line with the Gestaltist view, a person’s life-space is not the physical, objective environment E but the product of the interaction of the person P with E

Not only two different persons will perceive the same situation differently, but also the same person placed in the same situation several times will perceive it differently each time

B = f(LS) can therefore be re-written as B = f(P, E) since le life-space is a function of P and E

B = f(P, E) is known as Lewin’s equation

The equation encapsulates in (pseudo) mathematical form the idea that personal and environmental determinants combine to cause individuals to do what they do

The equation is meant to provide a general and flexible theoretical basis for all psychology

Regions and paths

The person P is somewhere in his/her life-space; this life-space is…

enclosed by an external boundary beyond which are the features of the physical environment with which P does not interact (that is, of which P is not conscious)

made of regions, delineated by their own boundaries, some of which contain sub-regions

P can pass from one region to another (cross a boundary) when these are neighbouring

The succession of regions through which P passes is a path; the path perceived by P as the one to follow is the ‘distinguished pass’

Boundaries are more or less difficult to pass; when multiple paths exist, one can be identified as more favourable than another: the more favourable path is that which involves less psychological distance

Tensions

A state of tension exists in the person whenever a psychological intention exists

This tension is released when the intention is fulfilled

A tension for which there is a recognised path makes P move on that path, or at least makes P think about doing this

For Lewin, thinking is an activity

If a tension exists in P but if P does not distinguish a path in the life-space to release it, then the region in which P is acquires a negative valence (push) devoid of clear direction

P then wants to leave the region without knowing where to go, becomes restless and starts to behave aimlessly

Force field analysis

Lewin’s model is attractive because seemingly very rich and flexible, while also remaining in many ways consistent with everyday experience

It does seem to be the case, for instance, that we experience internal tensions when we desire something and that those tensions are released when the desired thing is acquired or that its quest is abandoned

It is also the case that the same situation is perceived differently by different people, or by the same person at different times depending on psychological states and that perception drives behaviour

Force field analysis has remained an influential framework in social science and has been widely applied notably in community psychology, organizational development and change management

Force field theory describes the individual as constantly in a state of tension, pushing or pulling him/her into behaviour

Distant features of the life-space influence the behaviour of the individual, like the gravitational pull of the Moon influences many events on Earth without anyone noticing

Lewinian experiments

Lewin’s theory has lent support to a considerable number of ingenious experiments, some of them leading to striking results (or at least were interpreted as such)

One reason for this outcome is that Lewin’s theory translates ordinary language and situations into equations and other seemingly scientific jargon describing behaviour as the result of forces operating in a psychological field

Experiments conceived upon Lewinian theoretical bases start from a framing of subjects’ (conscious) perception of their life-space by the experimenters

In other words, Lewinian experimenters have by definition a broader perception of the situation than their subjects; this broader perception provides them with an impression of greater psychological maturity

Among all the experiments inspired by Lewin’s theory, two in particular have become extremely famous and established group dynamics as a branch of social psychology

They are widely quoted in management textbooks and deserve to be studied closely

Solomon Asch’s experiment

In 1951, Asch (1907-1996), himself a Gestaltist accepting Lewin’s theory, devised a series of experiments in which subjects were asked to compare the lengths of lines

Alone, subjects provided the correct answers almost 100% of the time

In groups in which everyone else provided on cue (but unbeknown to the subjects) a wrong answer, about 75% of subjects conformed at least once and 37% conformed every time (video with actual footage of the experiment here)

The closer the lengths of the lines to be compared, the greater the proportion of people conforming (providing an answer going against factual evidence); although there must be difference in length beyond which people will not conform, Asch did not investigate it

Asch’s experiment has been replicated in many settings and with groups of various sizes; although there are great individual differences, average results have remained comparable

They are widely used to support such concepts as ‘group pressure’, ‘groupthink’ and ‘social influence’ (concepts not used by Asch), mean to shape behaviour inexorably, i.e., against people’s intentions (determinism)

Asch’s conformity study

Question: which line is of the same length as line X?

Stanley Milgram’s experiment

Milgram (1933-1984) was a student of Asch

While Asch studied the way the judgment of subjects could be influenced, Milgram inquired into how their behaviour could be shaped

In 1974, Milgram devised what is perhaps the most famous psychological experiment of all times, known as the ‘obedience studies’

Full video here; excerpts there

About two third of subjects gave shocks to the maximum intensity (thus would normally kill the ‘learner’); these results have been replicated many times with many different subjects

Other experiments

Many other experiments investigating peer or group pressure have been conducted on Asch’s and Milgram’s model (and more generally on Lewinian bases)

Perhaps the best known are

The Stanford prison experiment

The elevator experiment

Marketers who rely on the concept of ‘group pressure’ to explain (or to claim they can influence) consumers’ buying decisions follow a line opened by Lewin, Asch and Milgran

Sociologists and OB authors relying on ‘peer pressure’ or ‘group culture’ to explain seemingly irrational behavior of individuals are equally indebted to Lewin by way of Asch or Milgram

Group pressure?

Asch found that planting a honest partner (someone providing the correct answer all or most of the time) in the group reduced conformance to almost zero

This shows that what was really tested in the experiment is not the subjects’ abilities but their perception of the situation in which they find themselves

Although there was no direct incentive to conform, there was no incentive not to conform either: one can presume that conforming was a reasonable way for the subjects to cope simply and effectively with a situation that was bizarre and understandably stressful

If this is the case, there is no need to explain the subjects’ behaviour in terms of an inescapable ‘group pressure’; their behaviour was reasonable given the circumstances

In other words, what was really tested was the experimenters’ ability to create a situation in which subjects behaved as the experimenters wanted them to behave, that is, conformed

In any case, if the subjects yielded to ‘group pressure’, then the same can be said of the experimenters: they yielded to the pressure to publish, i.e. to organize experiments that could serve as basis to produce material for publication

Interpreting Milgram’s experiment

Like Asch’s, Milgram’s results were interpreted as supporting the existence of social pressure to which individuals yield

Milgram himself thought that his results showed that people are ready to submit to a malevolent authority and that a dictator would have no problem convincing Americans to kill each other

This conclusion, however, is much debatable

The experimenter repeatedly accepts full responsibility for whatever happens

Rather than being malevolent, the researcher looks benevolent since he is visibly endowed with the prestige of a scientific researcher

Most people believe that people working at university (and scientists more generally) have noble intentions

Experimenting and deceiving

As Asch’s, Milgram’s experiment was a test of the ability of experimenters to create in the laboratory a situation in which people behave as the experimenters want them to behave

In particular, in both cases, the experimenters lied to their subjects in their presentation of the object of the study: the subjects were framed (deceived)

Not only virtually any behaviour can be induced in this way, but also and more importantly, the results of such experiments cannot be transposed outside of the laboratory into real, everyday life

If the subjects had known the real purports of Asch’s and Milgram’s studies (test conformity and obedience), it is extremely likely that they would have behaved very differently

In each case, subjects interpreted their situation as best as they could, sought clues to help them and in then end behaved in ways they believed were expected of them

Re-interpreted in this light, subjects’ behaviour as observed during the experiments is rather normal, in any case not extraordinary

Conclusion

Group dynamics’ studies have produced results that have been widely interpreted as supporting the theoretical (and unobservable as such) concepts of ‘social forces’ and ‘group pressure’, advanced as causes of behaviour

This interpretation is much debatable, however; what is purported as evidence of reactive behaviour caused by social forces can be re-analysed, taking the wider context into account, as deliberate (and reasonable) action

In that case, ‘group pressure’ is not synonym for ‘cause’, but for ‘reason’; this is another example of equivocation in psychology (social psychology in this instance)

In any case, there is no reason whatsoever to believe that subjects of experiments are submitted to forces or pressure they could not control while holding the experimenters to be free of these same force or pressure

If there is such thing as ‘group pressure’, then it applies to everyone, psychologists included

MGMT341

Questions?