ASSIGNMENT #10 GROUP SIZE AND BEHAVIOR

Nieves Micolta

Class: POL 166

Professor: Barry Murdaco

Lehman College

GROUP SIZE AND GROUP BEHAVIOR

1. The Coherence and Effectiveness of Small Groups. 

  The greater effectiveness of relatively small groups the “privileged” and “intermediate” groups is evident from observation and experience as well as from theory. Consider, for example meetings that involved to many people and accordingly cannot make decisions promptly or carefully. Everyone would like to have the meeting end quickly. According to, professor James variety of institutions, public and private, national and local, “action taking”group and subgroups tended to be much small than “non-action taking.” He said, that committees should be small when you expect action and relatively large when you are looking for points of view, reaction, etc. However, James found that U.S. senate subcommittees at the time of his investigation had 5.4 members on the average, house subcommittees had 7.8, the Oregon state government, 4.7, and the Eugene; Oregon municipal government,5.3. In short the groups that actually do the work are quite small. In addiction, the sociologist George Simmel  explicitly stated that smaller groups could act more decisively and use their ressouces more effectively than large groups.

B.  Problems of the traditional theories.

   Homans belief that the lessons of the small group should be applied to large has that has much in common with the assumption up on which much small-group research is based. There has been group in recent year, much of it based on the idea that the results of (experimentally convenient) research on small groups can be made directly applicable to large group merely by multiplying these results by a scale factor. Some social psychologists, sociologists and political scientists assume that the small group is so much like the large group, in matters others than size, that it must behave according to somewhat similar laws. But if the distinctions drawn here among the “privileged” group, the “intermediate”group and the “latent”group have any meaning, this assumption is unwarranted, at least so long as the group have common, collective interest. For the small, privileged group can expect that its collective needs will probably be met one way or another, and the fairly small (or intermediate) group has a fair chance that the voluntary action will solve its collective problems. But the large; latent group cannot act in accordance with its common interests so long as the members of the group are free to further their individual interest.

C. Social Incentive and Rational Behavior.

  

    Economic incentives are not to be sure the only incentives; people are sometimes also motivated by a desire to win prestige, respect, friendship and other social and psychological objectives, though the phrase “Socio Economic Status” often used in discussions of status suggests that there maybe a correction between economic position and social position. There possibility that, in a case where there was no economic incentive for an individual to contribute to the achievement of a group interest, there might nonetheless be a social incentive for him to make such a contribution, must therefore be considered, and it is obvious that this is a possibility.

If a small group of people who had an interest in a collective good happened also to be personal friends, or belonged to the same social club, and some of the group left the course of action, lose socially by it and the social loss might outweigh the economic gain. their friends might use “Social Pressure” to encourage them to do social club might exclude them and such steps that most people value the fellowship of their friends and associates, and value social status, personal prestige, and self-esteem. Social sanctions and social rewards are “Selective Incentive”; that is, they are among the kinds of incentives that they can distinguish among individuals: the  recalcitrant individual can be invited into the center of the charmed circle. In general, social pressure and social incentive operate only in group of smaller size in the groups so small that the members can have face-to-face contact with one another.

     My understanding about this passage is, that “less talk and more work,” what I mean by this is that smaller groups have better communication and better decisions, while the large group behavior is always arguing and complaining for everything with no good results. In addition, the larger group should learn from the small group  according to Holmans, size of group should no be a problem in any decision made. Moreover, some groups only try to have some incentive that motivate them. For example, In exchange if the companies need their participations or feedbacks they may give a bonus or a raise that makes them look good and get respect for their participation and  ideas.

I chose this passage because I have heard that some small companies have broke after they got bigger. Unfortunately, some companies think that bigger is always better but it’s really not because “less is actually more.” That means small groups  usually have better results.