Help yourself by helping others: The joint impact of group member organizational citizenship behaviors and group cohesiveness on group member objective task performance change

This paper examines how a group member's individual‐targeted citizenship behavior (OCBI) and organization‐targeted citizenship behavior (OCBO) interact with a salient group‐level contextual variable, group cohesiveness, to foster positive change for that group member, starting with job self‐efficacy change, and followed by objective task performance change. Over a span of 6 months, we engaged in multilevel, multisource, multistage data collection and surveyed 587 members in 83 work groups. Our results indicate that a group member's OCBI, in comparison with OCBO, is more positively related to his or her job self‐efficacy change. Group cohesiveness was found to attenuate the relationship between a group member's OCBI and job self‐efficacy change, and conversely, to accentuate the relationship between a group member's OCBO and job self‐efficacy change. Furthermore, a group member's job self‐efficacy change mediated the interactive effects of the group member's OCBI and group cohesiveness (as well as the group member's OCBO and group cohesiveness) on his or her objective task performance change.     

Determinants of evaluation of team performance

Abstract.— The purpose of this study was to examine factors affecting the evaluation of the achievement behavior of a group . Subjects were asked to play the role of team members who have to convey their feedback to the whole team right after the performance. 214 subjects (males and females, high and low achievers) evaluated the achievement behavior of a group, a sports team. They were given knowledge of the group's performance outcomes (5 outcomes from clear win to clear loss), of the group's ability (yes or no) and of the effort (yes or no) expended by the group members. These factors yielded the 20 situations judged by each subject. In addition, half of the subjects evaluated a team performing under conditions of high competition and half under conditions of low competition. The results revealed that effort and outcome form major determinants of achievement judgments, but effects of these determinants depend on the joint influences of effort, outcome and ability. Need for achievement level of subjects and the type of situation did not affect achievement judgments. Overall, females were more rewarding among themselves than males in their own groups.     

Self-assessment,self-enhancement,and task preference

If task choice depends on a person's interest in the accurate assessment of his or her abilities, task attractiveness should be positively related to the diagnosticities of all performance outcomes with regard to one's ability level. In contrast, the view that people are primarily interested in maximizing pride or mininizing shame would predict that task attractiveness is positively related to the diagnosticity of success but negatively related to the diagnosticity of failure. To test these predictions, subjects were presented with tasks that varied orthogonally in the extent to which success was diagnostic of high ability level and the extent to which failure was diagnostic of low ability level. Consistent with the self-assessment view, task attractiveness increased both with the diagnosticity of success and with the diagnosticity of failure. Furthermore, both effects were more pronounced for high achievement motive subjects than for low achievement motive subjects. This result lends support to the self-assessment view, which assumes that high achievement motive subjects are more interested in attaining the ability-relevant information contained in any performance outcome.     

Group processes and the therapist's subjectivity: interactive transference in analytical group psychotherapy

Interactions among the group therapist, the group members, and the group as a whole, especially enactments, are conditioned by the therapist's identity, defenses, and present relationships within his or her social networks. It follows from these considerations that difficulties in a group process stem from the group therapist's inability to understand well-enough what the group members are acting out and that they can be overcome only if the therapist extends the limits of his or her identity. Therefore, it has to be taken into account that the leader of a group is always a member of other groups whose dynamics in turn determine one's capability to understand the interactions in the group in which he or she is a therapist.     

Adolescent school performance following parental divorce: are there family factors that can enhance success?

Most research on the effects of divorce on children has focused on delineation of specific areas of child maladjustment. A more optimistic approach seeks to identify variables that may mediate negative effects of a stressor, such as parental divorce. The goal of this study was to examine the relationship between one area of child adjustment, school achievement, and family factors which may mediate the negative influence of divorce. The subjects were 71 early adolescents and their recently divorced mothers. The adolescents were divided into low, medium, and high grade achievement groups. Analyses of variance and subsequent Newman-Keuls tests revealed that adolescents with high grade point averages had mothers with a lower level of depression, a higher educational level, less conflict with their ex-spouse, and less intense levels of conflict between mother and adolescent than those in the low grade point average group. A discriminant analysis resulted in a two-variable equation which accounted for 33% of the variance between low and high grade achievers. The two variables were mother's report of conflict between her and her ex-spouse in front of the adolescent and the adolescent's report of the intensity of arguments between him/herself and mother. These results indicated that school performance following divorce is not uniform for all adolescents and that family factors may mediate scholastic achievement problems.     

Effects of interaction pattern on family harmony and well-being: Test of interpersonal theory, Relational-Models theory, and Confucian ethics

Two studies, involving 242 and 245 families, respectively, were conducted to explore the effects of family interaction on family harmony and well-being. Hypotheses were drawn from interpersonal theory, Relational-Models theory, and Confucian ethics. Each of the four members in a family, including father, mother, son, and daughter, completed a questionnaire designed to assess their behaviors toward each of the other three members. Six categories of interpersonal behavior were measured, including love, directing, domineering, hostility, submission, and respect. Both studies found that family affective interaction pattern following the Communal Sharing model contributed to family harmony and well-being. For each family relationship, the existence of particular forms of status differential (Authority Ranking) was beneficial, and several factors, such as role expectation and complementarity, moderated the effects of the status differential of a particular relationship. In general, positive effects were associated with interaction patterns which were consistent with Confucian ethics.     

礼之用,和为贵?和谐管理理论视角下团队亲社会违规氛围对团队绩效的影响

当前关于亲社会违规行为的研究主要集中于个体层面,但实践和理论都表明我们有探究团队亲社会违规氛围的必要性。为此,本研究聚焦于团队亲社会违规氛围这一概念,以和谐管理理论为基础,分别引入团队和谐作为中介变量和团队互依性作为调节变量,探讨团队亲社会违规氛围对团队绩效的影响机制和作用边界。本文以74个团队和334名团队成员为研究对象,通过对三阶段所获取的数据进行分析,结果显示:(1)团队互依性对团队亲社会违规氛围与团队和谐的关系具有调节作用:当团队互依性高时,团队亲社会违规氛围对团队和谐的负向影响更强;(2)团队和谐对团队绩效具有显著的正向影响;(3)团队互依性调节了团队亲社会违规氛围通过团队和谐对团队绩效的间接效应:当团队互依性水平较高时,团队亲社会违规氛围通过团队和谐对团队绩效的负向效应会被增强。本研究证实了团队亲社会违规氛围对团队绩效的作用机制与边界条件,拓宽了亲社会违规行为和团队和谐的相关研究。     

员工跨界行为的作用机制：网络中心性和集体主义的作用

员工跨界行为正在成为团队领域的热点课题, 但目前为止尚缺乏在中国情境下关于员工跨界行为作用机制的系统研究。本研究通过对来自61个团队的领导及其292名员工的两波纵向数据进行跨层分析, 将文化和社会网络理论整合入跨界行为领域, 在控制了个体层次的员工年龄、教育程度、性别、本团队工作时间和个人的集体主义导向, 以及团队层次的团队规模后, 发现员工跨界行为有助于提升其团队内部网络中心性的地位, 并进而促进其任务绩效, 团队集体主义氛围在员工跨界行为和网络中心性的关系中到显著的调节作用。     

Ernst troeltsch and the philosophical history of natural law

J. G. Fichte (1762–1814) articulates and defends a conception of autonomy as rational self-identification. This paper reconstructs this conception and examines various difficulties recognized by Fichte during the earliest phases of his career (1780s–1790s), with the heterogeneity of natural drives and freedom as the principal threat. Theoretically, this heterogeneity is overcome for Fichte by his deduction of the compound nature of humanity as a condition of rational agency. But, from the standpoint of the deliberating agent herself, this deduction is not sufficient. The harmony of nature and freedom is, for Fichte, a desideratum of practical rationality, and so must be addressed as such. Fichte's argument at this point is that a further perspective on oneself must be at least implicit in the moral outlook of a deliberating agent in order for this harmony to be attained on a practical level. This is because the harmony that is achieved at the deliberative level is occasional, temporary, and fundamentally uncertain. The required perspective turns out to be religious faith, the idea that the ‘infinite task’ of morality is eternally realized in divine reason, or that there is a ‘moral world order’ in which nature and freedom are reconciled.     

Empowering Leadership and Effective Collaboration in Geographically Dispersed Teams

Our research integrates theoretical perspectives related to distributed leadership in geographically dispersed teams with empowering leadership theory to build a multilevel model of virtual collaboration and performance in dispersed teams. We test the model with procurement teams in a major multinational corporation. Our results show a significant cross‐level effect of empowering team leadership, such that under conditions of high empowering team leadership, a team member's virtual teamwork situational judgment (VT‐SJ) is positively and significantly associated with his or her virtual collaboration behaviors and also indirectly with his or her individual performance in the team. At the team level, our findings also suggest that the impact of empowering leadership on team members’ aggregate virtual collaboration, and indirectly on team performance, increases at higher levels of team dispersion. These findings shed important light on the role of team leadership in fostering effective collaboration and performance of geographically dispersed virtual teams.     

Exploring the within-person coupling of sleep and cognition in older African Americans

This study examined the within-person relationship between sleep and cognitive functioning. Fifty community-dwelling African Americans (age range = 50-80 years) were asked to report their sleep duration and quality the previous evening and to complete cognitive measures over 8 occasions within a 2-3 week period. A within-person daily change in sleep duration was significantly associated with worse global cognitive performance. The greater an individual deviated away from his or her average sleep duration on a particular day, the more likely his or her performance would decline. These results demonstrate that the sleep-cognition relationship can be observed at a within-person level of analysis.     

The depth of a group's personality resources: Impacts on group process and group performance

The present study examines the productivity of task groups in relation to the personality resources of its members and its two dimensions of group process: task focus and shared exchange. It is hypothesized that the depth of a group's personality resources impacts upon productivity both directly through the application of its member's personality resources to successful group outputs, and indirectly through the mediating agency of group process variables that also contribute separately to successful group outputs. To test these hypotheses, the performance of 43 groups in a 3-month social psychology class was measured across three course assignments. This averaged performance score was related to the groups' process scores and to their total levels of personality resources measured by a comprehensive personality inventory administered at the beginning of the groups' life. Using multiple regression, we found that a group's performance was predicted by total member intellect, openness (negatively), and emotional stability (negatively). Blocked regression revealed that group intellect exercised a direct effect upon group performance, but that the effects of group openness and group emotional stability on performance were mediated through the group's two group processes of task focus and shared exchange. It is hoped that this demonstration of a two-step approach to studying the impact of group member's personality through its direct effects on group performance and its indirect effect on performance-linked aspects of group process will be extended to other types of personality measures, and to other types of groups addressing different tasks in other cultural settings.     

The Effect of Intra- and Intergroup Leadership on Group Goal Attainment in a North-South Gaming Simulation

This research investigated the role of leadership functions in a context of intergroup negotiation by using a simulation game of inter-regional conflict and cooperation (SIRC²). As a part of their social psychology course, 151 undergraduate students participated. It was hypothesized that there are four leadership factors in an intergroup context: in-group performance, in-group maintenance, out-group negotiation performance, and out-group relation maintenance. According to a factor analysis, however, the functions of in-group performance and out-group performance merged into the same category and could not be differentiated independently. Moreover, this research provided evidence that opportunities for intergroup communication and the amount of resources available to each group can facilitate these leadership functions. This study also found links between leadership functions and group outcomes. In a group with members who were homogeneous and facing common survival problems, the in-group/out-group performance function facilitated the achievement of the group goal. On the other hand, in a group with members with different roles, and who were self-sufficient for survival, the in-group maintenance function facilitated the achievement of the group goal. Moreover, in the intergroup context, the out-group relationship maintenance function was also important for group goal attainment. These results were interpreted using the path–goal theory and Fiedler's contingency theory.     

HOW SUPERVISORS INFLUENCE PERFORMANCE: A MULTILEVEL STUDY OF COACHING AND GROUP MANAGEMENT IN TECHNOLOGY-MEDIATED SERVICES

This multilevel study examines the role of supervisors in improving employee performance through the use of coaching and group management practices. It examines the individual and synergistic effects of these management practices. The research subjects are call center agents in highly standardized jobs, and the organizational context is one in which calls, or task assignments, are randomly distributed via automated technology, providing a quasi-experimental approach in a real-world context. Results show that the amount of coaching that an employee received each month predicted objective performance improvements over time. Moreover, workers exhibited higher performance where their supervisor emphasized group assignments and group incentives and where technology was more automated. Finally, the positive relationship between coaching and performance was stronger where supervisors made greater use of group incentives, where technology was less automated, and where technological changes were less frequent. Implications and potential limitations of the present study are discussed.     

Effects of task interdependence on the relationship between helping behavior and group performance

The authors examine whether task interdependence moderates the relationship between the helping form of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) and group performance. In a laboratory study, 62 groups with 3 members each completed a card-sequencing activity in which the level of task interdependence among group members was manipulated. Independent evaluators assessed helping by viewing videotapes of the groups' interactions during the sequencing activities. Performance was measured as a combined function of group speed and accuracy. Two prior field studies reported contradictory results regarding the impact of helping on group performance. Results from this study suggest that task interdependence may explain these results, and that the relationship between helping and group performance depends on the level of task interdependence required of group members.     

Comparison of group cohesion,class participation,and exam performance in live and online classes

Though class participation and group cohesion have shown some potential to promote student performance in conventional classrooms, their efficacy has not yet been demonstrated in an online-class setting. Group cohesion, defined as member attraction to and self-identification with a group, is thought to promote positive interdependence and the success of the group’s members. The current study sought to determine if group cohesion is significantly affected by the change of course setting from a live classroom to an asynchronous online-hybrid class in which students met in person only for course exams and otherwise interacted with each other through an online discussion board. Because peer interaction appears vital for the development of cohesion, we examined the relationship between participation in class discussion and students’ self-reported group cohesion and exam performance. With one exception, course requirements and materials were identical between the two class sections: students in the online-hybrid course completed homework assignments, whereas students in the live section were simply encouraged to do the same. Despite the advantage conferred by mandatory homework assignments, the findings heavily favored the conventional live classroom with respect to exam performance and self-reported group cohesion. Participation in class discussion was high in both class sections. The results indicated that both student performance and group cohesion were significantly lower in the hybrid classes.     

群体共情对群际关系的影响：基于社会冲突解决的视角

摘要：群体共情是指群体成员内化和间接体验另一群体成员的认知和情绪情感的过程。群体共情与个体共情不同,表现在身份感、共情偏好和文化影响的差异等方面。群体共情对群际关系具有促进作用,有助于减少群际冲突,促进群际亲社会行为。共情动机和文化框架转换是分析群体共情对群际关系促进机制的两个视角。未来研究可以探索群体共情与个体共情神经机制的差异,建立群体共情对群际关系影响的综合模型,探索群体共情在群际关系改善中的作用机制。     

The Effects of Social Identity on the Self-Set Goals and Task Performance of High and Low Self-Esteem Individuals

Social identification with co-workers was examined as a moderator of the frequently inscrutable link between worker self-esteem and goal setting. Weak or strong social identity was created in groups comprised of either high or low self-esteem persons. As expected, strengthening social identity increased perceived similarity to ingroup members regardless of self-esteem. Furthermore, only high self-esteem individuals with a strong social identity set higher goals for themselves, and achieved better performance, compared to high esteem/weak identity individuals or low self-esteem persons in either social identity condition. Increments in the goals and performance of high self-esteem individuals were associated with perceived similarity to ingroup members, and performance was attributed to personal ability. In contrast, the goals and performance of low self-esteem individuals were associated with certainty of goal achievement, and performance was attributed to perceptions of task difficulty. Asymmetrical effects of social identification are discussed in relation to group member personalities.     

Case Report—Loyalty, Legacy, and Ledger: Contextual Therapy in a Patient with a Family History of Ovarian Cancer

A client's emotional experiences and reactions to those experiences are influenced by his/her family of origin and direct or indirect interactions with various family members. Contextual therapists propose that a client's satisfaction with a relationship depends on the equity of his/her emotional interactions with family members. When relationships are inequitable, trust between individuals disintegrates. In order to reestablish trust in a relationship, a balance of interests must be restored. If not, imbalances may be passed down to future generations. A case of a woman with a family history of ovarian cancer is reviewed with the principles of contextual therapy in mind. In her family, several legacies have resulted in unbalanced relationships between family members that lead to difficulty in establishing trust within the genetic counseling session.     

Two personalities, one relationship: both partners' personality traits shape the quality of their relationship

This research tested 6 models of the independent and interactive effects of stable personality traits on each partner's reports of relationship satisfaction and quality. Both members of 360 couples (N = 720) completed the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire and were interviewed about their relationship. Findings show that a woman's relationship happiness is predicted by her partner's low Negative Emotionality, high Positive Emotionality, and high Constraint, whereas a man's relationship happiness is predicted only by his partner's low Negative Emotionality. Findings also show evidence of additive but not interactive effects: Each partner's personality contributed independently to relationship outcomes but not in a synergistic way. These results are discussed in relation to models that seek to integrate research on individual differences in personality traits with research on interpersonal processes in intimate relationships.