Social Facilitation Theory
Introduction One of the three major principles of the cognitive level of analysis in psychology is that the mind can be scientifically studied by using theories and research models. One theory is the social facilitation theory, which is the tendency for people to perform better on simple tasks when they’re in the presence of others than when they are alone. Norman Triplett’s study on this theory in 1989 is believed to be the first of this kind. Triplett first noticed the effect of social facilitation in his research on racing cyclists. Cyclists performed better and faster when they were racing against each other compared to cyclists who were just racing by themselves against the clock. He decided to experiment this theory in laboratory conditions
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to investigate to what extent does the presence of co-actors affect the speed participants can reel in a set length of fishing line. “Co-actors” refer to participants who are doing the same action beside each other, or competing against each other. This was the experimental condition, the control condition was having participants reel in their fishing line in the absence of co-actors, by themselves. This experiment was conducted using repeated measures, meaning that all the participants were used in both conditions of this study. First, they reeled in 16 meters of fishing line as fast as they could alone, then they did it again but this time in the presence of another competitor. Participants alternated between these two conditions for a total of six trials, ending up with three trials per condition. Triplett tested “nearly 225 persons of all ages” (OG source) over the course of his whole study but he mostly focused his results on children. He found that the children working with others performed better and had faster times than the children working alone, and these findings support the social facilitation theory. This theory is important because it gives another perspective into what motivates people. This experiment is modeled after Triplett’s study and applies the social facilitation theory to a cognitive process. The aim is to investigate to what extent does the presence or absence of co-actors affect performance on a wordsearch.
Method
Design
Although the original study used repeated measures, this experiment uses independent measures.
One reason this design was chosen was so that order effects don’t influence the second condition. Because this experiment is testing performance on a wordsearch, order effects such as fatigue or boredom would greatly impact the results. Also, demand characteristics are less of a problem in an independent measures design. By giving each individual only one condition and testing them only once, they are less likely to guess the aim of the study and act accordingly. The single blind control used in this experiment also helps with this problem. Independent measures also made the experiment run faster, which was important since the researchers were limited on time. The independent variable is the presence or absence of other competitors or co-actors. The presence of other co-actors is the experimental condition, the absence of other co-actors is the control condition. The dependent variable is the performance on a wordsearch, and this is measured by the number of words found on the wordsearch. Controls included giving all participants the same wordsearch, giving everyone the same amount of time to complete their wordsearch, giving everyone a desk and chair to work on, making sure the words on the wordsearch were familiar to every participant, and standardized instructions. Ethical guidelines were accounted for through the briefing, debriefing form, and consent form. (See Appendix __ and …show more content…
__ ). No physical or emotional harm was done to any participant.
Participants
The 23 participants (14 males and 9 females) were high school students from the ages of 14 through 18 and were obtained using opportunity sampling because researchers were assigned one specific room by the teacher. Participants were randomly allocated by counting them off by 1’s and 2’s to assign their experimental condition. Participants assigned “1” were given the control condition, whereas participants assigned “2” were given the experimental condition.
Materials
Script and Standardized Instructions (Appendix __)
Consent Form (Appendix __)
Fruit Wordsearch (Appendix __)
Timer
Debriefing Letter (Appendix__)
Procedure
After researchers gave a brief introduction (see Appendix __), consent forms were collected from every participant (see Appendix __).
Participants were then randomly allocated by counting them off by 1’s and 2’s. Afterwards, the two groups were separated. Participants given “1” were given Condition 1, the control condition, and they went to a separate room. Participants given “2” were given Condition 2, the experimental condition, and they stayed in the same room they were at. Participants from Condition 1 were called out individually one-by-one and were given the same standardized instructions before starting the wordsearch. Every participant was given only 2 minutes to try to complete the wordsearch to the best of their ability. After each participant from Condition 1 finished their wordsearch, they waited in a separate waiting area so no communication could happen between those who have done the experiment and those who haven’t. Those given Condition 2 followed the same procedure except they were not tested individually, but all at
once. After testing was completed, all participants went back to class and debriefing letters were handed out informing participants about the aim of the experiment and how to contact the researchers if they wanted to know the results.
Results
Researchers collected ordinal data. Figure 1 below summarizes the results of the experiment using mean and standard deviation. The mean is used to easily compare the effect of the absence or presence of other co-actors on the number of words found on the wordsearch. For Condition 1, the mean number of words found was 4.82. For Condition 2, the mean was 6.75. Figure 2 puts this information into graph form. The standard deviation for Condition 1 is 2.44. For Condition 2, it’s 2.80. Standard deviation was used because it gives a good idea about how every piece of data varied from the mean.
Figure 1
Mean Number of Words Found
Standard Deviation
Condition 1: Absence of Co-Actors
4.82
2.44
Condition 2: Presence of Co-Actors
6.75
2.80
*Rounded to three digits
Figure 2
Discussion
These results are similar to what Triplett found in his study. In the presence of co-actors, participants performed better on a simple task. More words were found on a wordsearch by participants who did the wordsearch individually but in the presence of others than participants who did the wordsearch individually and were isolated.
to investigate to what extent does the presence of co-actors affect the speed participants can reel in a set length of fishing line. “Co-actors” refer to participants who are doing the same action beside each other, or competing against each other. This was the experimental condition, the control condition was having participants reel in their fishing line in the absence of co-actors, by themselves. This experiment was conducted using repeated measures, meaning that all the participants were used in both conditions of this study. First, they reeled in 16 meters of fishing line as fast as they could alone, then they did it again but this time in the presence of another competitor. Participants alternated between these two conditions for a total of six trials, ending up with three trials per condition. Triplett tested “nearly 225 persons of all ages” (OG source) over the course of his whole study but he mostly focused his results on children. He found that the children working with others performed better and had faster times than the children working alone, and these findings support the social facilitation theory. This theory is important because it gives another perspective into what motivates people. This experiment is modeled after Triplett’s study and applies the social facilitation theory to a cognitive process. The aim is to investigate to what extent does the presence or absence of co-actors affect performance on a wordsearch.
Method
Design
Although the original study used repeated measures, this experiment uses independent measures.
One reason this design was chosen was so that order effects don’t influence the second condition. Because this experiment is testing performance on a wordsearch, order effects such as fatigue or boredom would greatly impact the results. Also, demand characteristics are less of a problem in an independent measures design. By giving each individual only one condition and testing them only once, they are less likely to guess the aim of the study and act accordingly. The single blind control used in this experiment also helps with this problem. Independent measures also made the experiment run faster, which was important since the researchers were limited on time. The independent variable is the presence or absence of other competitors or co-actors. The presence of other co-actors is the experimental condition, the absence of other co-actors is the control condition. The dependent variable is the performance on a wordsearch, and this is measured by the number of words found on the wordsearch. Controls included giving all participants the same wordsearch, giving everyone the same amount of time to complete their wordsearch, giving everyone a desk and chair to work on, making sure the words on the wordsearch were familiar to every participant, and standardized instructions. Ethical guidelines were accounted for through the briefing, debriefing form, and consent form. (See Appendix __ and …show more content…
__ ). No physical or emotional harm was done to any participant.
Participants
The 23 participants (14 males and 9 females) were high school students from the ages of 14 through 18 and were obtained using opportunity sampling because researchers were assigned one specific room by the teacher. Participants were randomly allocated by counting them off by 1’s and 2’s to assign their experimental condition. Participants assigned “1” were given the control condition, whereas participants assigned “2” were given the experimental condition.
Materials
Script and Standardized Instructions (Appendix __)
Consent Form (Appendix __)
Fruit Wordsearch (Appendix __)
Timer
Debriefing Letter (Appendix__)
Procedure
After researchers gave a brief introduction (see Appendix __), consent forms were collected from every participant (see Appendix __).
Participants were then randomly allocated by counting them off by 1’s and 2’s. Afterwards, the two groups were separated. Participants given “1” were given Condition 1, the control condition, and they went to a separate room. Participants given “2” were given Condition 2, the experimental condition, and they stayed in the same room they were at. Participants from Condition 1 were called out individually one-by-one and were given the same standardized instructions before starting the wordsearch. Every participant was given only 2 minutes to try to complete the wordsearch to the best of their ability. After each participant from Condition 1 finished their wordsearch, they waited in a separate waiting area so no communication could happen between those who have done the experiment and those who haven’t. Those given Condition 2 followed the same procedure except they were not tested individually, but all at
once. After testing was completed, all participants went back to class and debriefing letters were handed out informing participants about the aim of the experiment and how to contact the researchers if they wanted to know the results.
Results
Researchers collected ordinal data. Figure 1 below summarizes the results of the experiment using mean and standard deviation. The mean is used to easily compare the effect of the absence or presence of other co-actors on the number of words found on the wordsearch. For Condition 1, the mean number of words found was 4.82. For Condition 2, the mean was 6.75. Figure 2 puts this information into graph form. The standard deviation for Condition 1 is 2.44. For Condition 2, it’s 2.80. Standard deviation was used because it gives a good idea about how every piece of data varied from the mean.
Figure 1
Mean Number of Words Found
Standard Deviation
Condition 1: Absence of Co-Actors
4.82
2.44
Condition 2: Presence of Co-Actors
6.75
2.80
*Rounded to three digits
Figure 2
Discussion
These results are similar to what Triplett found in his study. In the presence of co-actors, participants performed better on a simple task. More words were found on a wordsearch by participants who did the wordsearch individually but in the presence of others than participants who did the wordsearch individually and were isolated.