Does group efficacy increase group identification? Resolving their paradoxical relationship

Although group identification and group efficacy are both important predictors of collective action against collective disadvantage, there is mixed evidence for their (causal) relationship. Meta-analytic and correlational evidence suggests an overall positive relationship that has been interpreted as consistent with the idea that group identification leads to group efficacy. However, experimental evidence has not supported this causal relationship. To resolve this paradox, we show in an experiment that it is group efficacy that leads to increased group identification because group efficacy puts individuals' identity into action. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.     

Why study group therapy?

Group therapy training is highly valuable for the overall professional practice of psychotherapy. Learning to be a group therapist means learning about shame, resistance, fears of engulfment and abandonment, maintaining a self in relation to others, promoting empathic connection, strong affects in the moment, multiple experiences of the same interaction or event, and group dynamics. These concepts are highly relevant to all clinical work and other aspects of professional life. Training in group therapy should place greater emphasis on its broader applicability.     

DEC users’ group report

DEC users discussed ways to improve communications among users, including the initiation of a newsletter. Also, new products of special interest to psychologists were described by the DEC representative present at the meeting.     

Individualism–collectivism and group creativity

Current research in organizational behavior suggests that organizations should adopt collectivistic values because they promote cooperation and productivity, while individualistic values should be avoided because they incite destructive conflict and opportunism. In this paper, we highlight one possible benefit of individualistic values that has not previously been considered. Because individualistic values can encourage uniqueness, such values might be useful when creativity is a desired outcome. Although we hypothesize that individualistic groups should be more creative than collectivistic groups, we also consider an important competing hypothesis: given that collectivistic groups are more responsive to norms, they might be more creative than individualistic groups when given explicit instructions to be creative. The results did not support this competing hypothesis and instead show that individualistic groups instructed to be creative are more creative than collectivistic groups given the same instructions. These results suggest that individualistic values may be beneficial, especially when creativity is a salient goal.     

A geriatric “growth group”

This paper describes a growth group for an unusually well-educated, productive group of normal geriatric (averaging almost 80 years of age) women. Findings from a three year follow-up are also reported.     

Does shared group identification lead to group creativity? Group regulatory focus as a moderator

Regarding the effect of identification on creativity in groups, two theoretical views compete. One view emphasizing group‐welfare motives underlying identification proposes a positive identification–creativity relationship in groups because members sharing high group identification are motivated to engage in behaviors that they believe are optimal for their group, including those that depart from the group's status quo, thus resulting in enhanced group creativity. The other view highlighting affiliative motives underlying identification, in contrast, posits a negative identification–creativity relationship in groups because highly identified members are motivated to engage in behaviors that certify their belongingness in the group, that is, behaviors that conform to the existing group norms and status quo, which constrains the group's potential for creativity. This study aims to reconcile these competing perspectives by invoking regulatory focus theory. Drawing on the notion that group identification effects rely on the content of group identity that the identification is based on, the authors suggest that group regulatory focus, as a critical group identity content, moderates the identification–creativity relationship in groups; the relationship is positive when the group's regulatory focus is highly promotion‐oriented, whereas it is negative when the group's regulatory focus is highly prevention‐oriented. Analyzing data from 65 workgroups in a cosmetics company in Korea, the authors show evidence that the identification–creativity relationship is positive in groups with a high promotion focus. The prediction regarding the prevention–focus moderation effect is not supported. The implications of the findings for both theory and practice are discussed.     

1980 DEC users’ group report

The 1980 meeting of users/owners of Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) computer equipment is discussed.     

Is group agency a social phenomenon?

Synthese - It is generally assumed that group agency must be a social phenomenon because it involves interactions among many human beings. This assumption overlooks the real metaphysical nature of...     

Self,in‐group,and out‐group evaluation: bond or breach?

A number of studies have looked at causes of in‐group bias, but few studies have actually investigated whether the two components of in‐group bias, i.e. in‐group and out‐group evaluation, are related to each other and whether they have similar or different predictors. In the Fiji Islands, self‐, in‐group, and out‐group evaluations were obtained using within‐subject correlations from a sample of 336 indigenous and Indian Fijians. Self‐evaluation was positively related to in‐group evaluation, and both were positively related to out‐group evaluation, supporting a spillover model. After controlling for background variables and the other evaluation variables, regression analyses showed that in‐group identification was positively related to in‐group evaluation, and social distance and political ethnocentrism were negatively related to out‐group evaluation. Additionally, ethnicity interacted with collective self‐esteem in determining both in‐group favouritism and out‐group derogation. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Peer group processes and adolescent health-related behaviour: More than ‘peer group pressure’?

This paper argues that ‘peer group pressure’ conveys an individualistic and hence inadequate account of the group processes involved in adolescents' adoption of health-related behaviours such as smoking and drinking. We describe traditional analyses of adolescent peer processes, illustrate how these contain a series of individualistic assumptions about peer interactions/social influence processes, and describe how these structure the analysis of adolescent health-related behaviour and health education interventions. We highlight the inadequacies of these analyses, outline an alternative and draw out its implications for health education.     

Women or feminists? Assessing women's group consciousness

Sex Roles - Social psychological research often relies on measures of group identification in assessing levels of group consciousness. However, for women, the relationship between gender...     

Whatever happened to the group in social psychology?

For a decade following World War II social psychologists tended to view the individual as an element in a larger system. Research on small groups prospered, and attitudes and social perceptions were conceived to be antecedents and consequences of group activity. But by the 1960's social psychology had become much more individualistic. Interest in the group as a system had waned and research was generally focused on intraindividual events or processes that mediate responses to social situations. We now appear to be passing through a period of transition during which both the content and methodology of past research are being re-evaluated, and from which new trends are likely to emerge.Possible explanations of the changing orientation of social psychology are discussed, and predictions are advanced concerning future developments. It is suggested that social psychologists are responsive to the mood of the times, and that recent social and political unheavals presage a revival of the collectivistic approach.     

How do group meetings make a community Therapeutic?

Summary Following an abrupt shift from a therapeutic community with emphasis on group meetings to a hierarchical medical model on a mental hospital floor, disturbed patients required extensive individual nursing care. This increased work load for the nursing staff resulted in admissions having to be limited to the rare cases who needed little or no nursing care. As patients were discharged, the vacancy rate went up to approximately 20% for a week and remained high for another two weeks. Nursing staff-patient relations deteriorated.Subsequently, it was possible to resume the emphasis on the groups of a therapeutic community and to observe the contrast. The experience showed how groups can effect and support a therapeutic community. It clarified some of the mechanisms by which groups positively affected disturbed patients. Some mechanisms by which the staff, community, and group meetings favorably influenced the nursing staff-patient relationship and intrastaff communications became clear also.     

Building blocks of bias: Gender composition predicts male and female group members’ evaluations of each other and the group

The present research examined how a group's gender composition influences intragroup evaluations. Group members evaluated fellow group members and the group as a whole following a shared task. As predicted, no performance differences were found as a function of gender composition, but judgments of individuals’ task contributions, the group's effectiveness, and desire to work with one's group again measured at a 10-week follow-up were increasingly negative as the proportion of women in the group increased. Negative judgments were consistently directed at male and female group members as indicated by no gender of target effects, demonstrating that men, simply by working alongside women, can be detrimentally affected by negative stereotypes about women. Implications for gender diversity in the workplace are discussed.     

Individual and group psychology — Are they opposed?

It is regrettable that classical psychoanalysis has failed to pursue Freud's early interest in group psychology. In this paper, the inseparability of individual and group psychology are affirmed and the concept of identification is employed to illustrate this unity. In the absence of a satisfactory global theory of group psychology, we must rely on the contemporary knowledge of specific concepts and mini-models. The human need for finding self-esteem and coherence through group ties is increasingly recognized in the field of community mental health.This paper is based on a lecture presented at the Washington Square Institute for Psychotherapy and Mental Health in 1977.     

Derogating black sheep: Individual or group protection?

What motivates people to derogate unfavorable ingroup members more harshly than comparably unfavorable outgroup members? Researchers investigating the black sheep effect maintain that this differential derogation is a means of group protection. In contrast, we argue that derogating unfavorable ingroup members may be an individual protection strategy whereby target devaluation distances an unfavorable other from the self as a means of limiting the threat of being associatively miscast. Participants read an article describing an unfavorable ingroup or outgroup target, and then received two means of responding to the target: target devaluation and group disidentification. Importantly, group disidentification was considered to be a uniquely individualistic distancing strategy. We found that both response options substituted for one another, depending on the order of presentation. Substitutability, we argue, suggests that the primary motive behind ingroup derogation in our study was distance augmentation, an individual protection strategy.     

Systems-centered® group psychotherapy: putting theory into practice

Systems-centered therapy (SCT) is derived from a theory of living human systems and practiced in individual and group therapy. Excerpts from an inpatient group illustrate how SCT norms, particularly functional subgrouping and the hierarchy of defense modification, are introduced within the first few minutes of an SCT group. The importance of modifying roles is also discussed, as is the significance of system hierarchy, isomorphy, and energy as applied in the practice of SCT.