Techniques for the study of group structure and behavior: II. Empirical studies of the effects of structure in small groups.

1961 ◽  
Vol 58 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Murray Glanzer ◽  
Robert Glaser
Keyword(s):  
Small Groups ◽  
Group Structure ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
And Behavior

Culture, names and economic development

2016 ◽  
pp. 81-106
Author(s):  
E. Borisova ◽  
A. Kulkova
Keyword(s):  
Economic Development ◽  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Economic Research ◽  
Cultural Norms ◽  
Individual Values ◽  
Personal Names ◽  
Economic Significance ◽  
And Behavior

Various components of culture have long been in the focus of economic research. Numerous empirical studies show that cultural norms, as well as religion and language, matter for economic development and have not only statistical but also economic significance. This paper considers various examples of how culture can affect individual values and behavior. It also deals with personal names as a key marker of one’s cultural identity. Overall, the paper contributes to the more profound understanding of a famous notion that "culture matters", and helps clarify the mechanisms through which culture exerts its influence.

scholarly journals Major renovations of apartment complexes: Russian people’s projective attitudes and behavior practices

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 190-211
Author(s):  
Anna V. Ermishina ◽  
Lyudmila V. Klimenko
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Common Property ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
European Social Survey ◽  
Actual Behavior ◽  
Apartment Buildings ◽  
Public Property ◽  
Property Owners ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
Attitudes And Behavior

This article analyzes the Russian people’s projective attitudes and behavior practices when it comes to participating in the funding and organizing of major renovations of apartment buildings. The empirical base for the study consists of data from sociological surveys conducted by VCIOM (2015-2020), the Institute of Sociology of the RAS (2003-2019), FOM (2015), Levada Center (2019), The European Social Survey (2016, 2018), as well as the authors’ own expert interviews conducted in 2020. The need to ensure the safety of housing, the complexity and high cost of renovations is a reasonable explanation for government interference in this sector. Russia’s housing legislature assigns responsibility for maintaining and renovating common property to apartment owners, while also stipulating a funding procedure for major renovations based on deposits made by property owners. The system currently in place in Russia for funding and organizing major renovations, which implies the existence of both a “common reserve” and “special accounts” for regulated property owner contributions (that resemble a tax), is far from perfect, it being associated with such issues as a lack of funding, low quality of major renovations, susceptibility to corruption, owners having insufficient control when it comes to decision making. While analyzing material from all-Russian and regional empirical studies, the gap becomes evident between projective attitudes and the actual behavior of Russian people in the realm of major renovations. Despite a marked critical attitude when it comes to evaluating utility service quality, not to mention the “common reserve” model (which is a way of pulling together funds for major renovations and keeping them on the regional operator’s account) being regarded as socially unjust, nevertheless property owners demonstrate a low degree of civic self-organization and meager capability when it comes to taking collective action (as in participating in apartment complex meetings to discuss major renovations, creating and transferring money to dedicated accounts, keeping track of the major renovation process etc.). The reasons why property owners are so slow to develop any efficiency largely lie in the specifics of the institutional collective decision-making environment in regards to the funding and execution of local public property renovation, which also includes major renovations of apartment buildings.

Usability and Affordances for Teaching and Learning in Second Life

2012 ◽  
pp. 1307-1322
Author(s):  
Trevor Barker
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Environments ◽  
Small Groups ◽  
Second Life ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Task Completion ◽  
Science Students ◽  
The University ◽  
3D Virtual Environments

This chapter presents a summary of research undertaken at the University of Hertfordshire into the usability and affordances of three-dimensional (3D) virtual environments (VE) used in teaching and learning. Our earlier experimental work identified important variables related to individual differences and how these affected task completion, learning, and attitude to the environment. More recently the results of these laboratory-based empirical studies have been applied to teaching and learning in the Second Life virtual world. The results of two studies are presented with undergraduate Computer Science students. In the first study the affordances of the Second Life environment for project group working and teaching was evaluated. In the second study small groups of learners developed real world games and modified these for play in Second Life. Based on experiences from these studies, a set of recommendations related to the use of 3D virtual environments in teaching and learning is presented.

scholarly journals Multiple Functional Solutions During Flightless to Flight-Capable Transitions

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ashley M. Heers ◽  
Stephanie L. Varghese ◽  
Leila K. Hatier ◽  
Jeremiah J. Cabrera
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Three Dimensional ◽  
Muscle Size ◽  
Whole Body ◽  
Ontogenetic Changes ◽  
Skeletal Morphology ◽  
Avian Flight ◽  
And Performance ◽  
Locomotor Behaviors ◽  
And Behavior

The evolution of avian flight is one of the great transformations in vertebrate history, marked by striking anatomical changes that presumably help meet the demands of aerial locomotion. These changes did not occur simultaneously, and are challenging to decipher. Although extinct theropods are most often compared to adult birds, studies show that developing birds can uniquely address certain challenges and provide powerful insights into the evolution of avian flight: unlike adults, immature birds have rudimentary, somewhat “dinosaur-like” flight apparatuses and can reveal relationships between form, function, performance, and behavior during flightless to flight-capable transitions. Here, we focus on the musculoskeletal apparatus and use CT scans coupled with a three-dimensional musculoskeletal modeling approach to analyze how ontogenetic changes in skeletal anatomy influence muscle size, leverage, orientation, and corresponding function during the development of flight in a precocial ground bird (Alectoris chukar). Our results demonstrate that immature and adult birds use different functional solutions to execute similar locomotor behaviors: in spite of dramatic changes in skeletal morphology, muscle paths and subsequent functions are largely maintained through ontogeny, because shifts in one bone are offset by changes in others. These findings help provide a viable mechanism for how extinct winged theropods with rudimentary pectoral skeletons might have achieved bird-like behaviors before acquiring fully bird-like anatomies. These findings also emphasize the importance of a holistic, whole-body perspective, and the need for extant validation of extinct behaviors and performance. As empirical studies on locomotor ontogeny accumulate, it is becoming apparent that traditional, isolated interpretations of skeletal anatomy mask the reality that integrated whole systems function in frequently unexpected yet effective ways. Collaborative and integrative efforts that address this challenge will surely strengthen our exploration of life and its evolutionary history.

Sentiments as Status Processes? A Theoretical Reformulation from the Expectation States Tradition

2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (3) ◽  
pp. 217-235
Author(s):  
Alison J. Bianchi ◽  
Robert K. Shelly
Keyword(s):  
Social Inequality ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
Task Group ◽  
Performance Expectations ◽  
Task Groups ◽  
Expectation States ◽  
Status Characteristics ◽  
Group Members ◽  
And Behavior

Do the ties that bind also create social inequality? Using an expectation states theoretical framework, we elaborate status characteristics and behavior-status theories to explore how sentiments, network connections based on liking and disliking, may affect processes entailing status, the prestige based on one’s differentially valued social distinctions. Within task groups, we theorize that positive and negative sentiments may themselves be status elements capable of evoking performance expectations within dyadic configurations typically modeled by expectation states theorists. Having a reputation for being liked or disliked “imported” into the group may enact status generalization. Alternatively, a status element based on sentiments may emerge during task group interaction as group members ascertain if alters are liked or disliked. Finally, we conclude by discussing how our theorizing motivates future theories and empirical studies.

Exploring Environmental Values through the Medium of Small Groups: 2. Illustrations of a Group at Work

1988 ◽  
Vol 20 (4) ◽  
pp. 457-476 ◽  
Author(s):  
J Burgess ◽  
M Limb ◽  
C M Harrison
Keyword(s):  
Group Dynamics ◽  
Small Groups ◽  
Open Space ◽  
Group Structure ◽  
Environmental Values ◽  
Research Strategy ◽  
Group Discussions ◽  
Group Matrix ◽  
Space Project

In this paper we present the discussions of the Eltham group in the Greenwich Open-Space project, as a case study of the contributions that in-depth small groups can make in the study of environmental values. The major themes of the group discussions are presented, and extracts of dialogue illustrate several aspects of small-group dynamics: how the group establishes its identity, how members negotiate increasing levels of intimacy and trust, how they handle conflict among themselves, and how they deal with termination. These themes demonstrate the importance of the group matrix, the levels of manifest and latent meaning in discourse, and the role of the conductor in facilitating the group structure and processes. We conclude that in-depth small groups are a valuable research strategy for the exploration of the interpenetration of individual and collective values for environment.

scholarly journals Leader Identification through Networks of Conversational Interruptions

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Neil MacLaren ◽  
Francis J. Yammarino ◽  
Shelley D. Dionne ◽  
Hiroki Sayama ◽  
Michael D. Mumford ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Status ◽  
Small Group ◽  
Leadership Behaviors ◽  
Group Structure ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Applied Psychology ◽  
Rater Bias ◽  
Behavioral Differences ◽  
Survey Responses ◽  
Status Theory

Leaders are often identified in empirical studies by either their position in an organizationally defined hierarchy or by survey responses, yet such methods conflate behavioral antecedents and outcomes with behaviors themselves. Furthermore, without an external standard for comparison, it cannot be known to what extent differences in leader assignment or emergence between demographic or other categories are due to behavioral differences or biases in the assessment, selection, training, or rating processes. In this study, we propose the ``interruption network'' as a model of small group structure that is (a) grounded in social status theory, (b) definable in both lab and field groups, (c) minimally impacted by rater bias, and (d) based on assessed behaviors rather than antecedents or outcomes. We show that analysis of interruption networks suggests that the often-reported male bias in leadership attributions is found in the ratings but not in the behavior of the observed individuals: males and females may engage in leadership behaviors equally as often, but males are attributed leadership significantly more. Use of the interruption network to represent small group social status therefore extends well-established research on non-verbal behaviors to an explicitly group-oriented context, supporting theory-based unobtrusive assessment and new ways to address important questions in applied psychology.

Executive Coaching and Organisational Performance

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-26 ◽  
Author(s):  
James Kahugu Kibe ◽  
Stephen Muathe
Keyword(s):  
Organizational Performance ◽  
Executive Coaching ◽  
Goal Attainment ◽  
Systems Approach ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Goal Theory ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Effective Leader ◽  
Socratic Questioning ◽  
And Behavior

 Executive coaching is now becoming paramount in any organization that values performance. However, there is scanty research on the relationship between executive coaching and organizational performance. The purpose of this study is to identify the contextual, theoretical, conceptual and methodological gaps that exist between executive coaching and organizational performance. The study has found out that relatively few theories link the two major variables in the study. Experiential leaning theory talks about learning experiences and outcomes of executives but fails to give a clear link of how the various outcomes lead to organizational performance. More so, cognitive behavior theory is more inclined to behavioral changes and self-driven scrutiny on finding fault in oneself with aid of Socratic questioning, but does not clearly explain how the changes lead to organizational performance. The systems approach sheds light on how the various systems in the organization can be amalgamated to give an effective leader but fails to indicate how effective leadership translates to organizational performance. The goal theory on the other hand explains how the various environment and personal aspects lead to goal attainment in the organization. However, learning and behavior change have not been used categorically to explain the goal attainment process. The empirical studies conducted tend to relate executive coaching to other variables such as job satisfaction, individual commitment, self-efficacy and self awareness in the western context but fails to associate the coaching exercise to organizational performance. Finally, few studies have employed inferential statistics to show the association between executive coaching and organizational performance. The fundamental conclusion therefore, is that the gaps mentioned and explained in this study need to be addressed in order to show if indeed there is any association. The study would help organizations in realizing that, the association between executive coaching and organizational performance has an impact in the firm.

E-Collaboration between People and Technological Boundary Objects

2010 ◽  
pp. 133-168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra Y. Okita
Keyword(s):  
Learning Environments ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Boundary Object ◽  
Social Response ◽  
Computerized Instruction ◽  
Self And Other ◽  
Learning Partnerships ◽  
New Learning ◽  
Future Potential ◽  
And Behavior

Computerized instruction has become more common over the years. Students can now learn from computerized images of people in virtual environments. A new learning partnership can develop with a Technological Boundary Object (TBO) that simultaneously belongs to mutually exclusive categories. The TBOs may have human-like appearance and behavior that naturally elicit a social response. As learning environments become more human-like, should TBOs maintain a boundary-like state or aim for perfect human mimicry? The challenges to high fidelity seem to outweigh the benefits. Three common categories in TBOs: animate and inanimate, real and virtual, and self and other, are exemplified through empirical studies. The findings draw attention to the different learning partnerships that can be developed with TBOs and their future potential.

Attitudinal Variables and Behavior: Three Empirical Studies and a Theoretical Reanalysis

1970 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Fishbein ◽  
Icek Ajzen ◽  
Eva S. Landy ◽  
Lynn R. Anderson
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Studies ◽  
And Behavior
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