| There is a substantial body of literature documenting the reduced effort often characteristic of individuals in group settings (social loafing), but a few studies have reported cases in which individuals have actually been observed to work harder collectively than individually (i.e., a motivation gain). According to Karau and Williams' (1993) Collective Effort Model (CEM), the key to finding a motivation gain lies in identifying group situations in which individuals' efforts are instrumental to the attainment of group outcomes that are especially valued. The CEM suggests that individuals who value collective outcomes should work harder on collective tasks than those who do not. One particular individual difference variable, Collectivism, refers to the phenomenon of not making distinctions between one's personal goals and the goals of some collective group. In their meta-analytic review of the social loafing literature, Karau and Williams (1993) reported that the social loafing effect is significantly reduced among individuals living in collectivistic cultures, as compared to that observed among people living in individualistic societies. While much of the research on collectivism is cross-cultural in nature, contemporary research has suggested that collectivism also has utility as an individual difference variable among people in a single culture. Along with examining collectivism, the present study aimed to manipulate instrumentality by assigning each member of a four-person group a different weight, or percentage, in terms of the importance of their individual performance in calculating the group's score. Thus, the present investigation used a 3 (Instrumentality: high, low, or coactive) x 2 (Collectivism: high or low) between-subjects design. As predicted, the social loafing effect was not found under conditions of high instrumentality, nor was it observed for participants with high Collectivism scores. Individuals scoring low in Collectivism, however, did work significantly harder coactively than when working collectively under conditions of low instrumentality (social loafing). The present study also demonstrated a gain in motivation, where individuals high in collectivism worked harder collectively than coactively when their inputs were presented as highly instrumental to group outcomes. Potential avenues of further research, as well as applications to organizational and other settings, are discussed. |
