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groupthink

 
Dictionary: group·think   (grūp'thĭngk') pronunciation
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n.
The act or practice of reasoning or decision-making by a group, especially when characterized by uncritical acceptance or conformity to prevailing points of view.


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Small Business Encyclopedia: Groupthink
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Home > Library > Business & Finance > Small Business Encyclopedia

Groupthink occurs when the pressure to conform within a group interferes with that group's analysis of a problem and causes poor group decision making. Individual creativity, uniqueness, and independent thinking are lost in the pursuit of group cohesiveness, as are the advantages that can sometimes be obtained by making a decision as a group—bringing different sources of ideas, knowledge, and experience together to solve a problem. Psychologist Irving Janis defines groupthink as: "a mode of thinking people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group, when the members' striving for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action. Groupthink refers to a deterioration of mental efficiency, reality testing, and moral judgment that results from in-group pressures." It can also refer to the tendency of groups to agree with powerful, intimidating bosses.

The concept of groupthink provides a summary explanation of reasons groups sometimes make poor decisions. Indeed, groups are supposed to be better than individuals at making complex decisions, because, through the membership, a variety of differing perspectives are brought to bear. Group members not only serve to bring new ideas into the discussion but also act as error-correcting mechanisms. Groups also provide social support, which is especially critical for new ideas. But when new perspectives are rejected (as in the "not invented here" syndrome), it is hard to correct errors. And if the social support is geared toward supporting the group's "accepted wisdom," the elements that can make groups better decision makers than individuals become inverted, and instead make them worse. Just as groups can work to promote effective thinking/decision making, the same processes which enhance the group's operation can backfire and lead to disastrous results.

How Groupthink Works

Janis identified seven points on how groupthink works. First, the group's discussions are limited to a few alternative courses of action (often only two), without a survey of the full range of alternatives.

Second, the group does not survey the objectives to be fulfilled and the values implicated by the choice. Third, the group fails to reexamine the course of action initially preferred by the majority of members from the standpoint of the nonobvious risks and drawbacks that had not been considered when it was originally evaluated. Fourth, the members neglect courses of action initially evaluated as unsatisfactory—they spend little or no time discussing whether they have overlooked nonobvious gain. Fifth, the members make little or no attempt to obtain information from experts who can supply sound estimates of gains and losses to be expected from alternative courses of action. Sixth, selective bias is shown in the way the group reacts to factual information and relevant judgments from experts. Seventh, the members spend little time deliberating about how the chosen policy might be hindered by bureaucratic inertia or sabotaged by political opponents; consequently, they fail to work out contingency plans.

Three general problems seem to be at work: overestimation of group power and morality, closed mindedness, and pressures toward uniformity. Group-think occurs when a group feels too good about itself. The group feels both invulnerable and optimistic. The group feels morally right. Linked to this attitude of perfection is a correlative close mindedness. Warnings are ignored. Messengers of difference are dismissed. Negative, stereotypical views of opponents are created and used. Finally, there is pressure for uniformity. A certain amount of self-censorship occurs. If individuals have questions, they keep them to themselves. This lack of dissent results in what Janis calls an "illusion of unanimity." If any difference does occur, group pressure is applied to bring the dissident into line. Janis also mentions "the emergence of self-appointed mindguards—members who protect the group from adverse information that might shatter their shared complacency."

If these precipitating problems support tendencies to groupthink, there are predisposing conditions as well. Janis suggests four conditions that predispose a group to groupthink: cohesiveness, group isolation/ insulation, leader intimidation, and an absence of decision-making procedures. As a group "hangs together" and members grow to like each other, there will be greater pressure not to introduce disturbing information and opinions that might tear at that cohesiveness. Maintaining the good feelings that come from such cohesion become part of the group's "hidden agenda." The insulation of the policy-making group is another factor. Frequently groupthinking groups are removed from interaction with others, perhaps because of their position within the organization. Lack of impartial leadership is a third contributing cause. When powerful leaders want to "get their way" they can overtly and covertly pressure the group into agreement. Finally, the lack of a template or protocol for decision making, or what Janis calls "norms requiring methodological procedures for dealing with decision making tasks," can also contribute to groupthink.

How to Avoid Groupthink

There are several things businesspeople can do to avoid groupthink: follow good meeting procedures, including the development of an agenda; aim for proper and balanced staff work; present competing views; and attend to correlative meeting problems, like exhaustion. A template for discussion might also be useful. One suggestion is to use an "options memo technique" in which information is presented as a problem statement, a list of options, and a preliminary recommendation. The group then looks at the preliminary recommendation with at least four questions in mind: 1) is the logic correct? (in selecting the preliminary recommendation from among the options); 2) is the judgment correct? (the logic may be fine, but the judgment may be poor); 3) are there any problems or errors remaining in the preliminary recommendation?; and 4) can the preliminary recommendation be improved? In order to prevent group isolation, it may be helpful to bring in new participants on a regular basis, use outside experts, and invite the group to meet off-site so that changes in settings and surroundings are a stimulant.

To avoid groupthink, it is vital for the group leader to become a statesperson or conductor instead of a partisan virtuoso. Leadership almost always involves getting work done through others. High-quality decisions are not made through intimidation, whether intentional or unintentional. Some bosses have no idea why people do not speak up, while the reason they do not is because they are likely to be attacked. Bosses encourage the best performance from groups when they can alert them to the kind of review that is expected. If the leader can be clear, and temperate, there is a great likelihood that norms of disagreement will develop.

Finally, there is the cohesion process itself. Decision making tears at the fabric of group cohesion, and it is the desire to preserve cohesion that is an underlying dynamic of groupthink. But if decisions lower group cohesion it is not necessary to avoid decisions; an alternative is to rebuild cohesion each time. One way to accomplish this rebuilding is to complete decision making by about 65 percent of the way through the meeting, then move on to brainstorming for the last 20-30 percent of the meeting. People who have differed before have a chance to continue to interact, now around less threatening, future-oriented items. This meeting technique allows for decompression, and for rebonding of the group.

Because of the flaws of individual decision making—selective perception, excessive self-interest, limited knowledge, limited time—most important decisions today are made in groups. And groups can do a spectacular job; but they often do not. Meetings, the place where groups do their decision-making work, have a bad reputation these days, largely because of processes such as groupthink. Groupthink is the result of flawed procedures, poor leadership, insulation, and an unmanaged desire for the maintenance of group cohesion and its good feelings. These factors can be addressed positively, and group decision making improved, while groupthink is kept to a minimum.

Further Reading:

"Creating a Team of Individuals." Journal of Management Development. September 1995.

Esser, James K. "Alive and Well aftter 25 Years: A Review of Groupthink Research." Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes. February-March 1998.

Janis, I. Crucial Decisions. Free Press, 1989.

Janis, I. Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascoes. Houghton Mifflin, 1983.

Janis, I., and L. Mann. Decision Making: A Psychological Analysis of Conflict, Choice, and Commitment. Free Press, 1977.

Moorhead, Gregory, Christopher P. Neck, and Mindy S. West. "The Tendency Toward Defective Decision Making within Self-Managing Teams: The Relevance of Groupthink for the 21st Century." Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes. February-March 1998.

Neck, Christopher P., and Charles C. Manz. "From Groupthink to Teamthink: Toward the Creation of Effective Thought Patterns in Self-Managing Work Teams." Human Relations. August 1994.

Neck, Christopher P., and Gregory Moorhead. "Groupthink Remodeled: The Importance of Leadership, Time Pressure, and Methodical Decision-Making Procedures." Human Relations. May 1995.

Tropman, John E. Effective Meetings. Sage Publications, 1995.

Political Dictionary: groupthink
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Situation where committees, cabinets, or other groups make suboptimal decisions, occurring when considerations of cohesiveness override a fully rational examination of the situation. The concept was developed by the social-psychologist Irving Janis in Victims of Groupthink (1972). Janis used examples of foreign policy failure in the United States to illustrate the idea, including the Bay of Pigs invasion and escalation of the Vietnam War.

— Alistair McMillan

Wikipedia: Groupthink
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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. Individual creativity, uniqueness, and independent thinking are lost in the pursuit of group cohesiveness, as are the advantages of reasonable balance in choice and thought that might normally be obtained by making decisions as a group.[1] During groupthink, members of the group avoid promoting viewpoints outside the comfort zone of consensus thinking. 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

Origin

William H. Whyte coined the term in 1952, in Fortune magazine:

Groupthink being a coinage—and, admittedly, a loaded one—a working definition is in order. 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.[2]


Irving Janis, who did extensive work on the subject, defined it as:

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.[3]

Causes of groupthink

Highly cohesive groups are much more likely to engage in groupthink, because their cohesiveness often correlates with unspoken understanding and the ability to work together with minimal explanations (e.g., techspeak or telegraphic speech). Vandana Shiva refers to a lack of diversity in worldview as a "monoculture of the mind" while James Surowiecki warns against loss of the "cognitive diversity" that comes from having team members whose educational and occupational backgrounds differ.[4] The closer group members are in outlook, the less likely they are to raise questions that might break their 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.
  • Homogeneity of members' social background and ideology.
  • Isolation of the group from outside sources of information and analysis.

Symptoms of groupthink

To make groupthink testable, Irving Janis devised eight symptoms indicative of groupthink (1977).

  1. Illusions of invulnerability creating excessive optimism and encouraging risk taking.
  2. Rationalizing 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, biased, spiteful, 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. Mind guards — self-appointed members who shield the group from dissenting information.

Groupthink, resulting from the symptoms listed above, results in defective decision making. That is, consensus-driven decisions are the result of the following practices of groupthinking[5]

  1. Incomplete survey of alternatives
  2. Incomplete survey of objectives
  3. Failure to examine risks of preferred choice
  4. Failure to reevaluate previously rejected alternatives
  5. Poor information search
  6. Selection bias in collecting information
  7. Failure to work out contingency plans.

Janis argued that groupthink was responsible for the Bay of Pigs 'fiasco' and other major examples of faulty decision-making. The UK bank Northern Rock, before its nationalisation, is thought to be a recent major example of groupthink.[5] In such real-world examples, a number of the above groupthink symptoms were displayed.

Groupthink and de-individuation

Cults are also studied by sociologists in regard to groupthink and its deindividuation effects. The textbook definition describes deindividuation as the loss of self-awareness and evaluation apprehension, which 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. 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. Kennedy sought to avoid groupthink during the Cuban Missile Crisis.[6] 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, 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."[7][8]

After ending their study, they stated that better methods of testing Janis' symptoms were needed.

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 its 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."[9]

Baron says in conclusion that the pervasiveness of “groupthink phenomena” has been underestimated by prior theoretical accounts.[10][11]

See also

References

Notes

  1. ^ Defintion of groupthink on Answers.com
  2. ^ Safire, William (August 8, 2004). "Groupthink". New York Times. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C01E2DD173CF93BA3575BC0A9629C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1. Retrieved 2008-11-02. "If the committee's other conclusions are as outdated as its etymology, we're all in trouble. Groupthink (one word, no hyphen) was the title of an article in Fortune magazine in March 1952 by William H. Whyte Jr. Groupthink is becoming a national philosophy, he wrote. Groupthink being a coinage -- and, admittedly, a loaded one -- a working definition is in order. 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. Whyte derided the notion he argued was held by a trained elite of Washington's social engineers." 
  3. ^ Janis, Irving L. Victims of Groupthink. Boston. Houghton Mifflin Company, 1972, page 9.
  4. ^ Surowiecki, James. The Wisdom of Crowds. New York. Doubleday, 2004, page 183.
  5. ^ a b Kamau, C. & Harorimana, D. (2008) Does knowledge sharing and withholding of information in organizational committees affect quality of group decision making? Proceedings of the 9th European Conference on Knowledge Management. Academic Publishing: Reading. Pages 341-348. ISBN 1906638101, 9781906638108 Google books
  6. ^ Janis, Irving L. Ibid., page 148-149.
  7. ^ Richardson Ahlfinger, Noni, and James K. Esser. "Testing the Groupthink Model: Effects of Promotional Leadership and Conformity Predisposition." Social Behavior and Personality (2001). 31-42.
  8. ^ Esser, James K.; Richardson Ahlfinger, N. (2001-02-01). "Testing the groupthink model: Effects of promotional leadership and conformity predisposition". Social Behavior and Personality: an International Journal (Scientific Journal Publishers Ltd.) 29 (1): 31–41. doi:10.2224/sbp.2001.29.1.31. http://www.atypon-link.com/SJP/doi/abs/10.2224/sbp.2001.29.1.31?journalCode=sbp. Retrieved 2008-05-29. 
  9. ^ "So right it’s wrong: Groupthink and the ubiquitous nature of polarized group decision-making" by Robert S. Baron, www.ourcomments.org
  10. ^ Baron, R. S. (2005). So Right It's Wrong: Groupthink and the Ubiquitous Nature of Polarized Group Decision Making. In Zanna, Mark P (Ed.) Advances in experimental social psychology, Vol. 37. (219-253). San Diego. Elsevier Academic Press.
  11. ^ Advances in Experimental Social Psychology By Mark P. Zanna on Google books

Bibliography

  • Amidon, M. (2005). Groupthink, politics and the decision to attempt the Son Tay rescue. Parameters US Army War College Quarterly, Autumn 2005, pp. 119-131.
  • 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.
  • Schafer, M. and Crichlow, S. (1996). Antecedents of groupthink: a quantitative study. The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 40, No. 3 (Sep., 1996), pp. 415-435.
  • Shiva, V. (1993). "Monocultures of the Mind: Biodiversity, Biotechnology and Agriculture." New Delhi. Zed Pressi.
  • Vaughan, Diane. The Challenger Launch Decision: Risky Technology, Culture, and Deviance at NASA. Chicago. University of and Chicago Press, 1996.
  • Whyte, G. (1989). Groupthink reconsidered. The Academy of Management Review, Vol. 14, No. 1 (Jan., 1989), pp. 40-56.

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Dictionary. The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.  Read more
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