Groupthink is a type of thought exhibited by group members who try to minimize conflict and reach consensus without critically testing, analyzing, and evaluating ideas. Critical thinking consists of mental processes of discernment, Analysis and Evaluation. During groupthink, members of the group avoid promoting viewpoints outside the comfort zone of consensus thinking. Consensus has two common meanings One is a general agreement among the members of a given group or Community, each of which exercises some discretion in A variety of motives for this may exist such as a desire to avoid being seen as foolish, or a desire to avoid embarrassing or angering other members of the group. Groupthink may cause groups to make hasty, irrational decisions, where individual doubts are set aside, for fear of upsetting the group’s balance. The term is frequently used pejoratively, with hindsight.

Contents 1 Origin 2 Causes of groupthink 3 Symptoms of groupthink 4 Groupthink and de-individuation 5 Preventing groupthink 6 Recent developments and critiques 7 Notes 8 References 9 See also

Origin

The term was coined in 1952 by William H. Whyte in Fortune:

“

Groupthink being a coinage — and, admittedly, a loaded one — a working definition is in order. William Hollingsworth "Holly" Whyte (1917- January 12 1999 was an American sociologist, journalist, and peoplewatcher We are not talking about mere instinctive conformity — it is, after all, a perennial failing of mankind. What we are talking about is a rationalized conformity — an open, articulate philosophy which holds that group values are not only expedient but right and good as well. [1]

”

Irving Janis, who did extensive work on the subject:

“

A mode of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group, when the members' strivings for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action. Irving L Janis ( 26 May 1918 - 15 November 1990) was a research Psychologist at Yale University and a professor emeritus [2]

”

The word groupthink is reminiscent of Newspeak words such as "doublethink" and "duckspeak", from George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. Newspeak is a Fictional language in George Orwell 's novel Nineteen Eighty-Four. Doublethink is the act of simultaneously accepting as correct two mutually contradictory beliefs In George Orwell 's Nineteen Eighty-Four, the Fictional language Newspeak attempts to influence thought by influencing the expressiveness of the Nineteen Eighty-Four (also titled 1984) by George Orwell (the pen name of Eric Arthur Blair) is a 1949 English Novel

Causes of groupthink

Highly cohesive groups are much more likely to engage in groupthink. The closer they are, the less likely they are to raise questions to break the cohesion. Although Janis sees group cohesion as the most important antecedent to groupthink, he states that it will not invariably lead to groupthink: 'It is a necessary condition, but not a sufficient condition' (Janis, Victims of Groupthink, 1972). According to Janis, group cohesion will only lead to groupthink if one of the following two antecedent conditions is present:

• Structural faults in the organization: insulation of the group, lack of tradition of impartial leadership, lack of norms requiring methodological procedures, homogeneity of members' social background and ideology.
• Provocative situational context: high stress from external threats, recent failures, excessive difficulties on the decision-making task, moral dilemmas.

Social psychologist Clark McCauley's three conditions under which groupthink occurs:

• Directive leadership. Clark Richard McCauley is an American social Psychologist. He currently is a professor of psychology at Bryn Mawr College.
• Homogeneity of members' social background and ideology.
• Isolation of the group from outside sources of information and analysis.

Symptoms of groupthink

In order to make groupthink testable, Irving Janis devised eight symptoms that are indicative of groupthink (1977).

1. Illusions of invulnerability creating excessive optimism and encouraging risk taking.
2. Rationalising warnings that might challenge the group's assumptions.
3. Unquestioned belief in the morality of the group, causing members to ignore the consequences of their actions.
4. Stereotyping those who are opposed to the group as weak, evil, disfigured, impotent, or stupid.
5. Direct pressure to conform placed on any member who questions the group, couched in terms of "disloyalty".
6. Self censorship of ideas that deviate from the apparent group consensus.
7. Illusions of unanimity among group members, silence is viewed as agreement.
8. Mindguards — self-appointed members who shield the group from dissenting information.

Groupthink and de-individuation

Cults are also studied by sociologists with regards to groupthink and its effect on deindividuation. Deindividuation is a state of lowered Self-awareness, a temporary loss of personal identity resulting from becoming part of a group, such as an Army The textbook definition states deindividuation as the loss of self-awareness and evaluation apprehension; occurs in group situations that foster anonymity and draw attention away from the individual (Myers, 305)

Preventing groupthink

According to Irving Janis, decision making groups are not necessarily destined to groupthink. He devised seven ways of preventing groupthink (209-15):

1. Leaders should assign each member the role of “critical evaluator”. This allows each member to freely air objections and doubts.
2. Higher-ups should not express an opinion when assigning a task to a group.
3. The organization should set up several independent groups, working on the same problem.
4. All effective alternatives should be examined.
5. Each member should discuss the group's ideas with trusted people outside of the group.
6. The group should invite outside experts into meetings. Group members should be allowed to discuss with and question the outside experts.
7. At least one group member should be assigned the role of Devil's advocate. In common Parlance, a devil's advocate is someone who takes a position sometimes one he or she disagrees with for the sake of argument. This should be a different person for each meeting.

By following these guidelines, groupthink can be avoided. After the Bay of Pigs invasion fiasco, John F. The Bay of Pigs Invasion (aka Playa Girón) was an unsuccessful attempt by a U Kennedy sought to avoid groupthink during the Cuban Missile Crisis. The Cuban Missile Crisis was a confrontation between the United States, the Soviet Union, and Cuba during the Cold War. ^[3] During meetings, he invited outside experts to share their viewpoints, and allowed group members to question them carefully. He also encouraged group members to discuss possible solutions with trusted members within their separate departments, and he even divided the group up into various sub-groups, in order to partially break the group cohesion. JFK was deliberately absent from the meetings, so as to avoid pressing his own opinion. Ultimately, the Cuban missile crisis was resolved peacefully, thanks in part to these measures.

Recent developments and critiques

In 2001, Ahlfinger and Esser described the difficulties of testing Janis' antecedants, specifically those related to government groups, stating in abstract:

"Two hypotheses derived from groupthink theory were tested in a laboratory study which included measures of the full range of symptoms of groupthink, symptoms of a poor decision process, and decision quality. The hypothesis that groups whose leaders promoted their own preferred solutions would be more likely to fall victim to groupthink than groups with nonpromotional leaders received partial support. Groups with promotional leaders produced more symptoms of groupthink, discussed fewer facts, and reached a decision more quickly than groups with nonpromotional leaders. The hypothesis that groups composed of members who were predisposed to conform would be more likely to fall victim to groupthink than groups whose members were not predisposed to conform received no support. It is suggested that groupthink research is hampered by measurement problems. "^[4][5]

After ending their study, they stated that better methods of testing Janis' symptoms were needed; It is impossible to create in labs the same conditions under which important government groups work. It is impossible to create the same levels of stress and pressure experienced by high level government officials, with the future of an entire nation hanging in the balance.

In a broad 2005 survey of post-Janis research Robert S. Baron contends that the connection between certain antecedents Janis believed necessary have not been demonstrated, and that groupthink is more ubiquitous and it's symptoms are "far more widespread" than Janis envisioned. Baron' premise is "that Janis’s probing and insightful analysis of historical decision-making was correct about the symptoms of groupthink and their relationship to such outcomes as the suppression of dissent, polarization of attitude and poor decision quality and yet wrong about the antecedent conditions he specified. . . not only are these conditions not necessary to provoke the symptoms of groupthink, but that they often will not even amplify such symptoms given the high likelihood that such symptoms will develop in the complete absence of intense cohesion, crisis, group insulation, etc. " As an alternative to Janis' model, Baron presents a "strong ubiquity" model for Groupthink:

". . . the ubiquity model represents more a revision of Janis’s model than a repudiation. The social identification variable modifies Janis’s emphasis on intense-high status group cohesion as an antecedent condition for groupthink. Similarly, low self efficacy amplifies Janis’s prior consideration of this factor. The one major shift is that the ubiquity model assumes that when combined, social identification, salient norms and low self efficacy are both necessary and sufficient to evoke “groupthink reactions. ” Such reactions include Janis’s array of defective decision processes as well as suppressed dissent, selective focus on shared viewpoints, polarization of attitude and action and heightened confidence in such polarized views. Note that such elevated confidence will often evoke the feelings of in-group moral superiority and invulnerability alluded to by Janis. "^[6]

Baron says in conclusion that the pervasiveness of “groupthink phenomena” has been underestimated by prior theoretical accounts. ^[7][8]

Notes

References

• Giddens, Anthony, Mitchell Duneier, and Richard P. Appelbaum. Essentials of Sociology. New York. W. W. Norton & Company, 2006.
• McCauley, Clark. "The Nature of Social Influence in Groupthink: Compliance and Internalization. " Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Vol. 57-2 (1989). 250-260.
• Vaughan, Diane. The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA. Chicago. University of and Chicago Press, 1996.

See also

Abilene paradox Bandwagon effect Collective behavior Collective consciousness Collective effervescence Collective intelligence Communal reinforcement Conformity (psychology) Crowd psychology

Group behavior Group polarization Group-serving bias Haragei Herd behaviour Informational cascade Keeping up with the Joneses Large group awareness training Mob rule Organizational dissent

Pack journalism Peer pressure Risky shift Sheeple Social comparison theory Spiral of silence System justification Team player The Wisdom of Crowds (James Surowiecki) Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds (Charles Mackay)

The Abilene paradox is a Paradox in which a group of people collectively decide on a course of action that is counter to the preferences of any of the individuals in the group The bandwagon effect, also known as Social proof or "cromo effect" and closely related to opportunism, is the observation that people often do and believe The term " collective behavior " was first used by Robert E Collective consciousness refers to the shared beliefs and moral attitudes which operate as a unifying force within society Collective effervescence (CE is a perceived Energy formed by a gathering of people as might be experienced at a sporting event a Carnival, a Rave, or Collective intelligence is a shared or group Intelligence that emerges from the collaboration and competition of many individuals Communal reinforcement is a social Phenomenon in which a concept or idea is repeatedly asserted in a Community, regardless of whether sufficient Empirical Crowd psychology, or social facilitation theory, is a branch of Social psychology. Group behavior in Sociology refers to the situations where people interact in large or Small groups The field of Group dynamics deals with Group polarization is the tendency of people to make decisions that are more extreme when they are in a group as opposed to a decision made alone or independently Group-serving bias is identical to Self-serving bias except that it takes place between groups rather than individuals under which group members make dispositional Hara & Ki The bushi of Feudal Japan were trained and conditioned to wield their weapons with deadly accuracy and precision Herd behaviour describes how individuals in a group can act together without planned direction In Game theory, an information cascade or informational cascade is a situation in which every subsequent actor based on the observations of others makes the same " Keeping up with the Joneses " is a popular Catchphrase in many parts of the English -speaking world The term Large Group Awareness Training ( LGAT) refers to training offered by some groups in what some call the Human potential movement. Ochlocracy ( Greek: οχλοκρατία or okhlokratía; Latin: ochlocratia) is government by mob or a mass of people Organizational dissent is the “expression of disagreement or contradictory opinions about organizational practices and Policies ” (Kassing 1998 Pack journalism is an often Derogatory term used to describe the tendency of News reporting to become homogeneous. Peer Pressure is a term describing the pressure exerted by a Peer group in encouraging a person to change their Attitude, Behavior and/or Morals Group polarization is the tendency of people to make decisions that are more extreme when they are in a group as opposed to a decision made alone or independently Sheeple is a Term of disparagement, a Portmanteau created by combining the words " Sheep " and " people. Social comparison is a theory initially proposed by Social psychologist Leon Festinger in 1954. The spiral of silence is a Political science and Mass communication theory propounded by the German Political scientist Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann System justification theory refers to a social psychological tendency to defend and bolster the Status quo, that is to see it as good fair legitimate and desirable A general dictionary defines teamwork as a " Cooperative or coordinated effort on the part of a group of persons acting together as a team or in the interests of a common The Wisdom of Crowds Why the Many Are Smarter Than the Few and How Collective Wisdom Shapes Business Economies Societies and Nations, first published in 2004 is a book James Michael Surowiecki ("soo-ro-wiki" (b 1967 is an American Journalist. Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds is a popular history of popular folly by Charles Mackay, first published in 1841. Charles Mackay (27 March 1814 &ndash 24 December 1889 was a Scottish poet journalist and song writer

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