Groupthink

Groupthink is a process in which a group of competent people to be true to reality or distant poorer decisions as possible, because each person involved adjusts its own opinion on the expected group opinion. This situation may arise in which the Group agrees to act or compromises which would reject every single group member under normal circumstances.

• 4.1 Responsibilities and decision in a hand
• 4.2 devil's advocate
• 4.3 Structural measures

Term

In psychology, the English term Groupthink is the German for " groupthink " also often used. This was (see doublethink ) coined in 1972 by psychologist Irving Janis in intentional similarity to neologisms like Doublethink in George Orwell's novel 1984. After Janis Groupthink is a " thinking mode used by people when striving for unanimity in a cohesive group is so dominant that it tends to put a realistic assessment of alternative courses of action except force."

Others say that the term Groupthink was a re-creation of William H. Whyte in 1952. From him the book The Organization Man comes. Indeed Whyte in this 1956 book describes the expulsion of a to for very good employee with the words: The management was unhappy about the decision But They argued did harmonious group thinking (this what the actual word They used) what the company 's prime aim, and If They had promoted the brilliant one it would have upset the whole chain of company interpersonal relationships. What else, THEY asked plaintively, could theyhave done?

Occurrence

In moderate form the thinking of all the people is influenced by adaptation to different groups: We all are guided to some extent on the ideas and values ​​of the family, circle of friends, the club, the company - to church, party and state. At the same time we are involved in the formation of this group thinking.

Groupthink within the meaning of Groupthink occurs, however, heaped on committees or large organizations in appearance, especially if the decision is foreclosed hit by external influences. In its extreme form groupthink is the total subjecting the individual to the thinking of a group to which the individual belongs or wants to belong. It may be a religious community, a party, or even any decision-making body. Critical, questioning thinking then no longer takes place.

Particularity

The danger of group thinking is its pronounced rigidity and irrationality. Where a group does not have functional mechanisms for adaptation of the common ideas of thought, they are elevated to dogma, which can still develop high attraction. The orientation on such an unrealistic dogma can lead in the worst case until the downfall of the group.

Well-known examples

Factors, symptoms and consequences

Factors that make the occurrence of groupthink likely are:

• A high level of group cohesion ( close relationship, similarity, cohesion).
• Structural defects in the structure of the group Foreclosure to the outside
• A very strong, dominant opinion leaders within
• Lack of objectivity on the part of the executive
• Poor or even lack of standards / processes to systematically weigh alternative courses of action.

Symptoms of groupthink include:

• The illusion of invulnerability, exaggerated optimism
• Belief in the morality of their own actions, stereotyping by outsiders, or opponents
• Glossing over bad decisions,
• Extreme conformity pressure ( adaptation to the group, retention of doubts, objections or criticism ) and stigmatization of " deviants "
• To protect the Group against pressure deviating ( as negative or even hostile respected ) views
• Information about the group and the flow of information by ' outside ' to censor
• Internal and external pressure for unanimous decision-making

The consequence of this group thinking is a very pronounced form of selective perception, which can ultimately lead to quite disastrous mistakes:

• Consideration of a few selected alternatives
• Failure to follow the opinion of experts or outsiders
• Very selective information retrieval (only information that fit into the already chosen direction ), no active effort to provide additional information
• Individual group members acknowledge each other's theories
• No creation of alternative or emergency plans

Prevent the Groupthink

There are various approaches to prevent situations of groupthink:

Responsibility and decision-making in a hand

Performs to the theory of Groupthink consistently that interpersonal constraints of groupthink could be circumvented so that the responsibility and the power to make decisions that are in the hands of a single person. This can and should at any time ask other group members for advice. Since compromises and actions are determined only from this one person, it is not dependent on an assumed group housing. This method is, however, very questionable because they either this person gives too much power or leads to unproductive power struggles within the group, and finally, because this person even provided can also be set by a group of people by their thinking under pressure or to set feels so also again succumbs to a groupthink.

Of course, go with the pooling of decision making quite other problematic phenomena associated. Thus, the lack of personal responsibility also lead to reduced engagement of the other group members. Even a strong, responsible leadership personality alone can also suppress critical remarks. If a sole arbiter determines further action needs to be taken in order to ensure the quality of the decision ( Clear decision rules, devil's advocate ... ).

Devil's advocate

By selecting a group member who always takes a negative attitude ( devil's advocate or black Denkhut of De Bono ), other group members in support of proposals can be motivated. Also, the pressure associated with the first counter-arguments decreases, as the devil's advocate only fulfills its task by the arguments of counter-arguments.

And structural measures

Anonymous feedback, suggestion boxes, and online chats have become established as an effective remedy for groupthink. Criticism and negative views can be raised without a specific group member can be held responsible.

Another way to discourage groupthink is a formal decision-making process, which governs the systematic consideration of possible alternatives especially. In cooperative groups, such a process can be most effectively applied.

Process losses

Are groups worse than the sum of its members, because information that has individuals who are not reported or observed, it is called process losses. Stasser & Titus (1985 ) demonstrated this with the following experiment: The best of several fictional presidential candidate has eight positive and four negative characteristics. Voting shall be by discussion in a group of four. All subjects learned the four negative characteristics; in Condition 1 knew the discussants all the positive characteristics of the candidates, in Condition 2 had known each group member only two each. Thus, both groups had a total of the same information. 83 % of the groups of the first condition, but only 24% of the groups of the second condition voted for the best candidate.