Group

• A group is two or more people who share similar goals and interact with one another.

  Characteristics - collective identity (kit or team name), common goal, structured lines of communication that enable interaction and influence, mutual awareness (knowledge of member strength and weaknesses who are able to rely on each other).
• Tuckman’s formation of groups:

  1. Forming - members get to know each other, high dependence on leader for guidance, unclear roles and goal, and want to make a good impression.
  2. Storming - hostility between group members, group decisions are difficult, sub groups start to from and goals are established.
  3. Norming - conflict is resolved, start to work together towards common goal, more agreement and roles are accepted.
  4. Performing - shared goals, trust between members, fully cohesive group, optimal performance and coach doesn’t need to give as much input.
• Steiner’s model of group effectiveness:

  Actual productivity = potential productivity - loses due to faulty processes.

  Actual productivity is the outcome of the event produced by the group.

  Potential productivity is the best performance capable by the group given their resources.

  Faulty process is the thing that can go wrong due to coordination (team don’t work well together) and motivation problems (when team members lower their effort).
• Ringlemann effect:

  The tendency for individual members of a group to become increasingly less productive as the size of their group increases. (example of coordination problems)

  Failing team coordination and timing, could be due to errors in timing, group members may be pulling in different directions, more common in larger groups.

  Reduce by - giving individuals specific roles, having an effective leader, sharing team games and develop team coordination skills (through small sided games).
• Social loafing


  The loss of motivation by an individual within a group. Individual feels that a reduction in effort wouldn't be noticed (think they can hide and take it easy).
• Motivation problem


  • Social loafing
• Causes of social loafing

  • Lack of perceived external evaluation
  • Lack of individual attention
  • Negative past experiences
  • Perception that others aren't trying
  • Low levels of self efficacy
• Strategies to reduce social loafing

  1. Set individual targets

  2. Highlight individual performance

  3. Give feedback on individuals contribution/effort

  4. Increase social support/peer pressure

  5. Pick players who have interactive skills and don't social loaf

  6. Promote team spirit

  7. Inform player that their social loafing has been noticed, and if they fail to respond, substitute them.
• How strategies reduce social loafing

  • Increases accountability as they can't hide
  • Increase motivation
  • Increases group cohesion as they don't want to let others down
• Overall group productivity is influenced by group cohesiveness, clear goals, effective leader, group size, how hard individuals work within a group and how well the group co ordinates.
• Group size affect performance:

  Larger groups - more motivation problems (social loafing), more co ordination problems (ringlemann effect), more timing issues, more confusion over roles, less accountability and less chance an individual will be spotted not doing their job.

  Smaller groups - more accountability, less chance to hide, more focus on own role, less social loafing/ringlemann effect and less motivation/co ordination problems.
• Attitude is a learned emotional and behavioural response to a stimulus/situation, attitudes are learned not inherited, can have an attitude towards an attitude object (person, place, object and concept).
• Factors affecting attitude formation

  • Direct experience (can be positive or negative)
  • Socialisation (important people/role models that shape attitudes with rewards/punishments)
  • Media
  • Religious norms
  • Cultural norms
• Components of attitude (CAB)

  • Cognitive component - the thinking part, any information a person believes
  • Affective component - the emotional response, likes or dislikes of a person
  • Behavioural component - the actual intention/action of a person
• Behaviour is usually influenced by the affective component

  But if the cognitive component is strong it can override this
• Behaviour

  Dependent on the expectations of reinforcement/punishment and social norms
• Cognitive consonance


  When all 3 attitude components are in harmony and line up
• Cognitive dissonance


  Mental discomfort/conflict which is created when attitude components are conflicting/imbalanced
• Cognitive dissonance


  Can result in changing belief in order to remove discomfort and the aim is to create cognitive consonance
• Changes attitude by creating cognitive dissonance

  1. Emphasising beliefs/providing new information (cognitive component)

  2. Making activity fun/providing new experiences (affective component)

  3. Offering rewards/punishment (behavioural component)
• Persuasive communication changes attitude by using communication/discussion to persuade someone to change their attitude.

  Factors influencing effectiveness of persuasion:

  Status of persuader - the higher the status and the more persuaders the more successful persuasion.

  Quality of message - message is clear, has evidence and is presented in a convincing way the more successful persuasion.

  Situation - situation is comfortable and no threatening then the more successful persuasion.

  Recipient - if the recipient is open and not opposed to listening then the more successful persuasion.
• Attribution is the reasons that people give to explain the outcome of an event of behaviour in sport, the way we use attributions can influence motivation, feelings of pride/shame and satisfaction/dissatisfaction, future performance expectations and whether we developed learned helplessness or mastery orientation.
• Weiner's model of attribution

  Main attributions are luck, effort, ability and task difficulty, initial model had 2 dimensions - locus of causality and stability
• Locus of causality

  • Concerned with the location the individual perceives the cause of the outcome to be, attributions are either internal (effort and ability) or external (luck and task difficulty)
• Attributing success to internal factors

  Increases pride/confidence/motivation and increases MO
• Attributing success to external factors

  Feel pride but less so no effect on motivation/confidence so MO is retained.
• Attributing failure to internal factors


  Decreases pride/confidence, increases shame, increases LH.
• Attributing failure to external factors

  Feel less shame and retain pride/confidence so decreases LH.
• Stability


  • Concerned with whether the reason for the outcome is fixed/unchanging or can vary over time. Stable means the cause of the outcome is fixed so outcomes are predictable each time, e.g ability and task difficulty. Unstable means the cause can vary over time so outcome could change in the future, e.g luck and effort.
• Attributing success to stable factors

  Increases belief we should win next time, increases confidence/motivation and MO increases.
• Attributing success to unstable factors

  Increases motivation/confidence, prevent complacency so increase MO.
• Attributing failure to stable factors

  Believe failure will reoccur, decreases motivation/confidence, developing LH is more likely.
• Attributing failure to unstable factors

  Increases MO
• Weiner's model of attribution

  • 3rd dimension is added which is concerned with controllability (the extent to which an outcome of a situation is under control) and directly affects a players motivation
  • Attributions are either controllable, something can be done to change the outcome (effort and skill) or uncontrollable, nothing can be done to change the outcome (weather and luck)
• Locus of control used in subjunction with locus of casuality:

  Something can be done to change the outcome and someone else would have to change it (external and controllable) or something can be done to change the outcome and you can change it (internal and controllable)
• Uncontrollable attributions


  Nothing can be done to change the outcome
• Controllable attributes are unstable as they can change.
• Learned helplessness is an acquired belief that failure is inevitable resulting a ‘why bother’ attitude, caused by repeated failure that you blame on yourself, think there is nothing you can do to change, think there is nothing you can do to control the outcome. Other contributing factors include unrealistic goals, repeated failure or punishment. LH is avoided/reduced by attributing success to internal/stable/controllable factors and failure to internal and controllable factors.
• Mastery orientation is the motivation to try because you are an expert and you believe you are in control of the outcome, belief that success isn't just about winning and failure is a learning experience, encourage by setting appropriate goals, not focusing on winning all the time, losses should be looked at in perspective and attributing success/failure to internal/controllable factors.
• Attribute success or failure to controllable factors

  Increase motivation which increases MO