<p>This exploratory study examined the relationship between public speaking anxiety levels indicated by scores on the Personal Report of Confidence as a Speaker questionnaire (PRCS: Paul, 1966) and evaluation probability on a wide domain of evaluation items reflected by scores on the Audience Attention Allocation questionnaire (devised for the purpose of this study). A large student sample (n=220) completed the PRCS as well as the AAA questionnaire. The AAA assessed the perceived allocation of the attentional resources of the audience members during a speech by asking respondents to rate how probable it is that a speaker is evaluated on a set of domains. The results of regression analyses indicated that AAA scores, Gender, and Study year were significant predictors of PRCS scores accounting for 8.5% of the variance. More interestingly, the nature of results obtained was contrary to the hypothesis of the study. It was in fact revealed that subjects scoring low on the AAA questionnaire, indicating less likelihood that audience members make evaluations about the speaker on a variety of items, tended to have higher anxiety scores. The results are discussed in terms of defense mechanisms and response bias.</p>

The concept of empowering leadership has attracted the attention of both academics and practitioners because of its important role in enhancing employee performance. Although empirical evidence clearly demonstrates that empowering leadership can have a significant effect on positive managerial outcomes, there is a paucity of research on its antecedents and processes through which it influences work outcomes. Thus, this study suggests a comprehensive conceptual model of empowering leadership, mainly focusing on the trickle-down effects of across levels of hierarchy. Specifically, based on theories of social learning and social exchange, this study examines the influence of empowering leadership of second-level leaders on subordinates’ various work outcomes through first-level leaders’ empowering leadership to help identify mediating process that may underlie relationships between second-level leaders and subordinates’ outcomes. Additionally, in order to explore the social learning of empowering leadership in detail, this study focuses on the antecedents and processes of empowering leadership learning. Data were obtained from subordinate–supervisor dyads from the South Korean Army. The results of this study showed mediating effects of first-level leaders’ empowering leadership on the relationship between second-level leaders’ empowering leadership and subordinates’ task performance, organizational citizenship behaviors, and social loafing. These results support the trickle-down effects of empowering leadership on subordinates’ outcomes. Moreover, LLX mediates the relationship between second-level leaders’ empowering leadership and the first-level leaders’ empowering leadership, and this result supports the social learning of empowering leadership. Exchange ideology also moderated the social learning of empowering leadership, such that the relationship was stronger when exchange ideology was low rather than high. The results of this study have both theoretical and practical implications. Theoretically, this study provides empirical evidence to help determine whether second-level leaders’ empowering leadership facilitates first-level leaders’ empowering leadership. This study contributes to the literature by further examining the antecedents of empowering leadership by showing how relational, individual, and situational factors influence empowering leadership. This study also explains how empowering leadership can spread across multiple downward linkages by supporting the existence of “trickle-down effects” of empowering leadership. Practically, this study helps understand the importance of high-level leaders’ empowering leadership to facilitate their low-level leaders’ empowering leadership. This study also suggests the importance of relational, individual, and contextual factors to facilitate the social learning of empowering leadership. In conclusion, empowering leadership has a synergistic effect across leadership levels; therefore, top managers and high-level leaders should focus on training empowering leadership of field managers and leading by example to create a more empowering environment. However, this study has limitations, such as the use of cross-sectional analyses and perceptual data. Future research may seek to use longitudinal and objective measures.

Syftet med den här kvalitativa studien var att undersöka, beskriva och analysera hur högstadieelever upplever att bedömning påverkar samarbete vid grupparbete. Studien har ett socialpsykologiskt perspektiv och för att kunna undersöka elevers upplevelser användes fokusgrupper. Deltagarna var högstadieelever (N=54) och datainsamlingen utfördes i 12 fokusgrupper på tre skolor i två städer. Resultatet illustrerar hur elevers upplevelse av att bli bedömda vid grupparbete kan leda till ett destruktivt samarbete med bedömningsstress och ojämställdhet men även till ett konstruktivt samarbete med gemenskapande och bedömningstillfredsställelse. Eleverna föredrog lärarbedömning framför kamratbedömning och ansåg att lärarbedömning hade störst påverkan på samarbetet vid grupparbete. I diskussionen problematiseras resultatet med hjälp av Social interdependence theory, begreppen social loafing, social facilitation samt genus. Studien bidrar till ökade kunskaper kring hur elever upplever att bedömning vid grupparbete kan leda till ett destruktivt samarbete som kan liknas vid ett samarbete i grupp men även till ett konstruktivt samarbete som kan ses som ett samarbete som grupp.

Title: Helping or Hovering: Examining Social Loafing and the Free-Rider Effect in Youth’s Transition Readiness Author: Mekyala Williams, East Tennessee State University Co-author(s): Kiana Johnson, MS, PhD Department of Pediatrics Quillen College of Medicine East Tennessee State University Lindsay Ellis Lee, PhD Department of Pediatrics Quillen College of Medicine East Tennessee State University Introduction Transition readiness in youth has been hard to study because parents and providers have served as managers rather than coaches hindering the process. Social loafing is a phenomenon that explains why people are more prone to exert less effort in group settings. We decided to observe the prevalence of social loafing in youth we examined if students knew how to perform specific transition readiness skills but allowed their support systems to do the task for them. This would be measured in opposition to them performing the tasks themselves since they do have the necessary skillset. The present study aims to validate the 4 domain subscales (i.e., managing medications, keeping appointments, tracking health issues, and talking with providers) found in the revised 20-item Transition Readiness Assessment Questionnaire (TRAQ). Additionally, the study will evaluate youth reliance on familial support systems for healthcare through the lens of the social loafing phenomenon. Methods To obtain demographic information, participants were asked on the survey to report their sex, age, ethnicity, and race (i.e., White, Black or African American, Asian, Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, Hispanic/Latino, American Indian, or Alaska Native, or other). Once all the surveys were completed, participants were categorized into white and non-white. We surveyed 161 youth from two different schools in South Central Appalachia about their transition readiness using anchors from the TRAQ with revised response categories. The response categories were whether they know how to do the specific task or not and whether youth perform the task themselves or if someone else does the task for them. Using confirmatory factor analysis, the revised 20-item version of the TRAQ will validate with the present sample. All statistical analyses will be conducted in R. Anticipatory Results and Conclusions Preliminary results based on the 161 participants found that youth can perform these tasks but very frequently allow someone else to do them. Out of the 20 items listed on the TRAQ, the endorsement rate of social loafing response varied between 10% and 52%. Fifteen out of the 20 items had a 30% response rate for social loafing. For the transition to adulthood to be successful for youth, they have to learn to accept different roles and responsibilities without the help of anyone else. This emphasizes the importance of shifting parents and providers to a coaching role rather than a managing role. Doing so will help enhance the youths’ ability and independence as they get older. This can also be applied to healthcare settings as using a coaching approach will minimize social loafing and allow more competence in managing their health.

Social loafing is a phenomenon where individuals exert less effort in a group than when working alone. Social loafing has been widely examined through experimental studies, primarily conducted on face-to-face teams. The recent COVID-19 pandemic changed the working patterns around the world, increasing the amount of remote work in our society. This shift in working patterns resurfaces social loafing as an important area of research. Understanding the relationships between social loafing and its factors is important for increasing individual team members' efforts. This bachelor’s thesis aims to fill knowledge gaps by investigating the relationships between social loafing and the key factors explaining it. This research draws upon social identity and media richness theory to explain the relationships between individuals and groups and the role of communication mediums. Based on previous literature, we developed hypotheses concerning the effects of team size, cohesion, anonymity, and virtuality on social loafing. The findings reveal a significant correlation between team size, cohesion, and social loafing. Anonymity and virtuality showed no statistical significance with social loafing. Overall, the findings contribute to our understanding of key factors influencing social loafing. Future research is needed to explore the impact of these factors as well as additional factors that may contribute to the phenomenon that this study did not acknowledge. / Social medåkning är ett fenomen som karaktäriseras av att individer lägger ner mindre ansträngning när de arbetar i grupp än när de arbetar på egen hand. Social medåkning har studerats noggrant genom experimentella studier, främst på grupper som träffas fysiskt. Den senaste Covid-19-pandemin tiden förändrade arbetsmönstren runt i världen, vilket ökade mängden distansarbete i samhället. Distansarbete kan vara i sin tur att leda till social loafing genom att minska motivation och engagemang. Det är viktigt att förstå relationerna mellan social medåkning och dess faktorer för att öka prestationen hos gruppmedlemmar. Forskningen bygger på teorierna om “social identity” och “media richness” för att förklara relationerna mellan individer och grupper samt rollen hos kommunikationsmedier. Vi har utvecklat hypoteser om effekterna av gruppstorlek, sammanhållning, anonymitet och virtualitet baserade på tidigare litteratur. Detta kandidatarbete syftar till att undersöka relationerna mellan social medåkning och dess faktorer såsom gruppstorlek, sammanhållning, anonymitet och virtualitet för att förbättra prestationen i grupparbete. Resultaten visade på en signifikant korrelation mellan gruppstorlek, sammanhållning och social medåkning. Dessutom finns en signifikant korrelation mellan anonymitet och sammanhållning. Sammanfattningsvis bidrar forskningen till en ökad förståelse för de viktigaste faktorerna som påverkar social medåkning. Resultaten betonade vikten av gruppstorlek och sammanhållning, vilket pekar på att anonymitet och virtualitet kan ha begränsad effekt. Framtida forskning bör utforska inverkan av dessa faktorer samt ytterligare faktorer som kan bidra till fenomenet som denna studie ännu inte har uppmärksammat.

Social loafing is a growing concern for modern organizations. With advancement in computer technology, virtual tools are used more frequently to communicate, which may allow social loafing to occur in new and unfamiliar forms. The intent of this thesis is to examine social loafing through the use of virtual tools, and to analyze whether collective orientation has a moderating influence on the relationship between social loafing and virtuality. 30 teams, each containing four participants, were randomly assigned to a condition of virtuality (i.e., instant messaging or videoconferencing). Participants then completed a computer simulation task in which social loafing, collective orientation of the team, and team performance were measured.

This dissertation explores the complex relationship between servant leadership and social loafing within organizational settings. Drawing upon the collective effort model, social exchange theory, and trait activation theory, this research explores how servant leadership impacts social loafing. Employing a two-wave online survey methodology with full-time workers in the USA, this study examines the direct effects of servant leadership on social loafing and investigates the mediating roles of perceived insider status, civility, and psychological empowerment. Furthermore, it assesses how individual differences—such as honesty-humility, psychological entitlement, and exchange ideology—moderate these relationships.Initial findings reveal a complex relationship between servant leadership and social loafing, with certain components of servant leadership directly influencing social loafing in both positive and negative directions. Specifically, emotional healing and ethical behavior factors of servant leadership were found to reduce social loafing, whereas putting subordinates first appears to unexpectedly increase social loafing. In addition, with the inclusion of social desirability, task interdependence, and task visibility as control variables, we see a marked decrease in the direct relationship between servant leadership and social loafing. Importantly, servant leadership does act as an indirect negative influence on social loafing through the mediating mechanisms of psychological empowerment, perceived insider status, and perceived leader civility. However, there were no detectable moderation effects from our interaction variables of psychological entitlement, honesty/humility, and exchange ideology. The research contributes to the broader literature on leadership and motivation by highlighting the conditional effects of servant leadership on individual motivation within groups, offering valuable insights for organizational leaders aiming to foster a culture of high engagement and minimal social loafing. Through a comprehensive analysis, this dissertation provides a deeper understanding of how servant leadership can be effectively leveraged to combat social loafing, emphasizing the importance of aligning leadership approaches with individual employee characteristics and group dynamics.

就一般心理學的研究而言，生理心理學（physiology psychology）主要是以動物為受試，著重在以個體為主的行為與神經機制的探討；而社會心理學（social psychology）則以人類為受試，偏重以團體互動為主的社會行為研究，兩者誠屬於不同研究取向的學門。本研究的主要動機是希望證實動物模式的確可以用來探討某些社會行為現象，並証實動物研究中應考量團體因素的影響效果。本研究以大白鼠為受試，分別採長期單獨飼養、配對飼養及四隻團體飼為養，用以操弄受試不同程度的團體互動經驗，以探討不同飼養方式對個體行為表現及對葯物效果的影響。此外，並藉由操作式制約行為探討社會助長的成響因，以及確立社會閒散現象的存在。研究結果證實不同的飼養方式的確會影響大白鼠的基本生理指標及固定比率操作式制約行為，致使行為表現呈現單獨飼養組大於配對飼養組，且配對飼養組大於團體飼養組的現象。另外，不同飼養方式與安非他命葯物間有顯著的交互作用效果。實驗中透過大白鼠操作式行為的探討，發現只有在團體飼養組才有社會助長現在的存在，驗證了社會助長現象的確與個體的成長背景有關。此外，研究中亦發現社會閒散現象的確存在於某些飼養方式及制約作業之中，證實動物模式中亦有社會閒散的現象。由上述結論建議可以使用動物模式進行某些社會行為的研究，除了探討其社會行為的成因外，亦可瞭解此社會行為是否具有其特定的生理機制；此外，從事有關神經化學、生理或葯理研究的學者，也應將社會因素或團體因素帶入動物行為研究的考量因素之中。

An important issue that managers are facing in today’s intensive business environment is how to compensate their employees to keep them motivated. The trend is to be rewarded for the individual performances, which has increased the usage of commission based salary systems. Previous research suggests that commission salary provokes internal competition, while it damages cooperation. However, the main issue in feminine and masculine societies is what motivates people, which indicates that the effects of commission based salary systems needed to be examined from a cultural perspective. Therefore, with the main aim was to enhance the understanding of this, the problem was addressed by the overreaching research question: How do commission based salary systems affect cooperation and internal competition in masculine and in feminine societies? To answer this, empirical data was acquired from Sweden and the United States. Sweden is recognized as the most feminine society, where social motives are dominating. The United States on the other hand, is recognized as a masculine society that encourages competition and where money is the main motivator. The empirical data derived from personal interviews with real estate agents that work with commission salary. Three case companies within each country were included in the study and three interviewees within each company participated. The findings showed that commission salary tends to increase the work effort, limit the cooperation, while it increases the internal competition. Nevertheless, the effects it has distinctively differs between the societies. In Sweden, the importance of group cohesion and interpersonal relationship results in a higher level of cooperation than in the United States. Despite that commission salary evokes internal competition, colleagues are colleagues above all in Sweden. In the United States however, cooperation mainly occurs when it serves the individual performances. Here, money and the own success are what matter the most and due to the competitive mindset, internal competition becomes significantly more intensive in the United States than in Sweden. In contrary to Sweden, commission salary can turn colleagues into competitors, for better or for worse. / Master thesis

In group work, the sucker-effect is a motivational loss in which effort is reduced due to feeling taken advantage of when other group members intentionally avoid work, known as free-riding. No previous studies on the sucker-effect have investigated moderating factors that can be attributed to the free-rider. The purpose of this study was to explore if agreeable behavior of a free-rider would moderate the sucker-effect, and if so, to what extent. Using an experimental design, students (n = 20) at Södertörn University served as participants. A systematic allocation toone of two conditions was used, the less agreeable and more agreeable. During the experiment a participant and a confederate worked in dyadson a disjunctive cooperative jigsaw puzzle task. The manipulation was the free-riding confederate's level of agreeableness. Self-rated effort andactual performance were measured. Using Mann-Whitney U-tests (α =.05, two-tailed), no significant differences were found in either of thedependent variables. In fact, by and large, no sucker-effect was observed at all. Other than manipulating the confederate's level of agreeableness, the design allowed for much more interaction in the dyads than previous studies on the sucker-effect have. It is discussed whether this interaction might have created an ingroup feeling, leading to the prevention of asucker-effect. In this study it thus seems that the free-rider's level of agreeableness does not moderate the sucker-effect. Also, meaningful interaction between group members might prevent a sucker-effect fromoccurring at all. However, due to the study's small sample size, theseresults are not definitive and should be taken with caution.