Ringelmann effect in psychology

The Ringelmann effect in psychology is a finding that people in a group are less productive when the size of the group increases.

The effect is named for French agricultural engineer, Maximilien Ringelmann. 

Read more

Ingham, A. G., Levinger, G., Graves, J., & Peckham, V. (1974). The Ringelmann effect: Studies of group size and group performance. Journal of experimental social psychology, 10 (4), 371-384.

 

Geoffrey W. Sutton, PhD is Emeritus Professor of Psychology. He retired from a clinical practice and was credentialed in clinical neuropsychology and psychopharmacology. His website is  www.suttong.com

 

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Dr. Sutton’s posts are for educational purposes only. See a licensed mental health provider for diagnoses, treatment, and consultation.

Conservation of Resources Theory

Human Resources 2023
Geoffrey W. Sutton & Bing AI

Here's a summary of Conservation of Resources Theory from Sung Doo Kim and colleagues in the Journal of Occupational Health Psychology.

According to the theory, individuals seek to obtain, retain, protect, and foster valued resources and minimize any threats of resource loss. Those valued resources can be classified as objects (e.g., money), conditions (e.g., supportive work environment), energy-related (e.g., knowledge), and personal (e.g., self-efficacy). Threats to resource loss occur when individuals are exposed to challenging work and life demands for an extended period of time with no opportunity to gain new resources, which can result in resource depletion and burnout (Hobfoll & Shirom, 1993; Wright & Cropanzano, 1998).

(Kim et al., 2015)

References

Hobfoll, S. E. (2011). Conservation of resource caravans and engaged settings. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology, 84, 116 –122. doi:10.1111/j.2044-8325.2010.02016.x

Kim, S. D., Hollensbe, E. C., Schwoerer, C. E., & Halbesleben, J. R. B. (2015). Dynamics of a wellness program: A conservation of resources perspective. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, 20(1), 62–71. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0037675

Wright, T. A., & Cropanzano, R. (1998). Emotional exhaustion as a predictor of job performance and voluntary turnover. Journal of Applied Psychology, 83, 486 – 493. doi:10.1037/0021-9010.83.3.486

Peter Principle

The Peter Observation

 

Have you ever noticed someone at work who was promoted above their level of competence?

 

Years ago, Lawrence J. Peter published the Peter Principle. It was a best seller for weeks.

 

Here’s the short story:

 

“In a Hierarchy Every Employee Tends to Rise to His Level of Incompetence.”

 

So, how true is it? Is there really a Peter Principle—or at least a Peter Observation?

 

Forbes summarized a recent study supporting the idea.

 

“Consistent with the Peter Principle, we find that promotion decisions place more weight on current performance than would be justified if firms only tried to promote the best potential managers,” the researchers concluded. “The most productive worker is not always the best candidate for manager, and yet firms are significantly more likely to promote top frontline sales workers into managerial positions. As a result, the performance of a new manager’s subordinates declines relatively more after the managerial position is filled by someone who was a strong salesperson prior to promotion.”

The Book

The Peter Principle by Lawrence J. Peter

 

Read more at this Forbes link

 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/roddwagner/2018/04/10/new-evidence-the-peter-principle-is-real-and-what-to-do-about-it/?sh=e04c9b91809c

 

Psychology of Flow

 Flow is a positive psychology concept described by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi as a pleasant mental state experienced when performing intense but enjoyable activities requiring full deployment of a person's skills or abilities. Flow is a peak experience involving high levels of concentration during which a person loses an awareness of things around them as well as self-consciousness.

See Csikszentmihalyi's book titled Flow for more details (Link to UK Book).

Several measures have been developed to assess flow. Lonczak summarised these at this link: https://positivepsychology.com/how-to-measure-flow-scales-questionnaires/

Csikszentmihalyi has a TED talk on Flow. It is not exciting but he does present the concept and provides stories to illustrate people in a state of flow.

In his talk, Csikszentmihalyi illustrates flow with a diagram. The picture at the top of this post is a rendition of that illustration.

Cite this post

Sutton, G.W. (2021, January 13). Flow. Psychology Concepts and Theories. Retrieved from https://suttonpsychology.blogspot.com/2021/01/psychology-of-flow.html

Note: Csikszentmihalyi died 20 October 2021 at age 87 in California. Obituary link.

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Psychology of Faultlines

Faultlines is a construct described by Dora Lau and J. Keith Murnighan of Northwestern University (1998). They applied the term to understanding divisions within subgroups of organizations, which may be differentiated on the basis of attributes. The concept of faultlines is derived from geology.

Following is their definition.

"Group faultlines are hypothetical dividing lines that may split a group into subgroups based on one or more attributes. (Lau & Murnighan, 1998, p. 328)."

 In their seminal article, the authors provide examples of faultlines.  Demographic faultlines may include age, race, sex, and values. Occupational roles and conservative vs. liberal values may also divide group members into subgroups.

Group faultlines may have different degrees of strength. Strength develops from three factors:

  1. The number of attributes a group recognizes
  2. The alignment of the group's attributes
  3. The number of homogeneous subgroups

The authors explain that group faultlines can be stronger when the number of attributes are highly correlated.

Different subgroups can develop based on issues that activate different characteristics.

The geological analogy
1. The various characteristics of people in groups are like various layers in the earth's crust.
2. Faultlines become evident when external forces exert pressure
3. Strong faultlines can crack, which reveals the strength of the attributes

Group diversity can lead to increased or decreased creativity and innovation depending on the type of diversity present in a group. Diversity can lead to conflict

My Comments

The concept of faultlines as a metaphor may be useful in the analysis of factors that divide people in many spheres of life like politics and religion in addition to work and educational settings.

Leaders do well to recognize the external forces that can trigger those attributes leading to splitting subgroups from each other or from the main group. Some politicians and religious leaders are adept at exerting pressure that creates splits in which key characteristics of a population align in favor of their candidacy or ideology.

Reference

Lau, D. C., & Murnighan, J. K. (1998) Demographic diversity and faultlines: The compositional dy-namics of organizational groups. Academy of Management Review, 23, 325–40.