Social loafing effect in psychology

Looking at Work 2023
Geoffrey W Sutton & Bing AI

The social loafing effect is a psychological concept based on the finding that a person expends less effort on a group task than when they work on a project alone.

The history of the social loafing effect attributed to Bibb Latané, dates to the work of max Ringelmann.

A quote from a meta-analytic review follows.

Social loafing is the tendency for individuals to expend less effort when working collectively than when working individually. A meta-analysis of 78 studies demonstrates that social loafing is robust and generalizes across tasks and S populations. A large number of variables were found to moderate social loafing. (Karau & Williams, 1993)

Reference

Karau, S. J., & Williams, K. D. (1993). Social loafing: A meta-analytic review and theoretical integration. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 65(4), 681–706. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.65.4.681