dampak self-esteem terhadap perilaku kemalasan sosial makalah

UNIVERSITAS INDONESIA

DAMPAK SELF-ESTEEM TERHADAP PERILAKU KEMALASAN

SOSIAL

MAKALAH NON SEMINAR

Diajukan sebagai salah satu syarat untuk memperoleh gelar sarjana Psikologi

MELLISA TARA NURSALIM

1006718391

FAKULTAS PSIKOLOGI

PROGRAM STUDI KELAS KHUSUS INTERNASIONAL

Depok

Agustus 2014

Dampak self-esteem.., Mellisa Tara Nursalim, FPsi UI, 2014





Dampak Self-esteem Terhadap Perilaku Kemalasan Sosial

Mellisa Tara Nursalim dan Ike Anggraika

1. Fakultas Psikologi, Universitas Indonesia, Depok, 16424, Indonesia

2. Fakultas Psikologi, Universitas Indonesia, Depok, 16424, Indonesia

E-mail: [email protected]

Abstrak

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menginvestigasi dampak self-esteem terhadap perilaku kemalasan sosial.

Penelitian ini menggunakan design 2x2 independent group antara dua kondisi tugas (koaktif x kolektif) dan dua

tingkat kesulitan tugas (mudah x sulit). Partisipan di dalam grup kondisi koaktif menyelesaikan tugas secara

individu sedangkan partisipan di dalam group kondisi kolektif menyelesaikan tugas secara berkelompok.

Partisipan di dalam group tugas mudah diminta untung menghafal 15 nama buah dan hewan sedangkan

partisipan di dalam group tugas sulit diminta untuk menghafal 15 istilah ilmiah. Setelah itu partisipan diminta

untuk mengisi kuesioner untuk mengukur self-esteem mereka. Tugas tersebut diberikan kepada 60 mahasiswa

dengan jumlah yang seimbang untuk setiap group. Hasil analisis menunjukan bahwa partisipan yang berada

dalam grup tugas mudah mengerahkan usaha yang lebih besar dalam mengerjakan tugas ketika bekerja sendiri

dibandingkan dengan ketika bekerja bersama-sama. Namun prestasi partisipan yang berada di dalam group

tugas sulit tidak berbeda. Partisipan di dalam grup tugas sulit mempunyai self-esteem lebih tinggi dibandingkan

dengan partisipan di dalam group tugas mudah. Di dalam grup kondisi koaktif, self-esteem yang rendah

mengarah kepada kompensasi sosial sedangkan di dalam group kolektif hal tersebut mengarah kepada

kemalasan sosial. Partisipan dengan self-esteem yang tinggi cenderung mengerahkan usaha yang lebih besar di

dalam group kolektif. Kesimpulannya, penelitian ini menunjukan bahwa self-esteem mempengaruhi kemalasan

sosial. Kinerja sebuah group dapat ditingkatkan dengan memfokuskan persepsi anggota kelompok tentang

kesulitan tugas yang dilakukan.

Effects of Self-Esteem on Social Loafing

Abstract

This research aimed to investigate the effect of self-esteem in social loafing. 2x2 independent group analysis

was conducted between task condition (coactive x collective) and task difficulty (easy x difficult). Participants

in the coactive task condition complete the task individually whereas participants in the collective task condition

complete the task as a group. Participants in the easy task condition were asked to memorize 15 fruit and animal

name whereas participants in the difficult task condition were asked to memorize 15 scientific terms. Afterward,

the participants were asked to complete questionnaire to measure their self-esteem. The task was given to 60

university students with equal amount for each group. As expected, the results show that participants in easy

task condition exert more effort when working coactively compared to working collectively. However, the

performances do not differ in the difficult task condition. Participants in the difficult condition have higher self-

esteem than participants in the easy condition. In coactive condition, low self-esteem lead to social

compensation whereas in collective condition, it leads to social loafing behavior. On the other hand, people with


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high self-esteem incline to exert more effort for group performance. In conclusion, this research suggests that

self-esteem affects social loafing. We can increase group performance by focusing on group members’

perceptions of the task difficulty.

Keywords: social loafing; self-esteem; group performance

Introduction

There is a saying here “ TEAM Together Everyone Achieves More”. This is fascinating as it

explains that an individual goal is easier to be fulfilled when they work together as a group.

In contrast, when there are many people available in the group, people usually do not work as

hard as when they are alone because they divided the tasks for some people. It means that

people tend to work less than they ought to.

The phenomenon of this issue that has recently received significant attention is social

loafing. Social loafing occurs in different domain such as education and business. According

to Latané, Williams, and Harkins (1979), social loafing refers to the situation that people tend

to reduce individual effort when they work collectively than when they work individually.

Some people might not work at all or relaying on other reliable people to finish the work on

time. In previous studies, social loafing occurs in various tasks such as decision making

(Chidambaram & Tung, 2005), shouting ability (Jackson & Harkins, 1985), and

brainstorming (Gagné & Zuckerman, 1999).

The effectiveness of group is important to predict the group performance. In the group

condition, each member of the group should understand their role and participate effectively

because their work will affect the work of other people. When the work is not clear and the

delegation of tasks is not balance, some member may think they are not needed as a member

(Chidambaram & Tung, 2005). As the result, they will not participate and loaf more.

Therefore, understanding the theory of social loafing is important and research in social

loafing is also required to understand the group dynamic.

Factors affecting social loafing in the group performance have been widely

investigated. People tend to loaf more in groups because there is a stronger relationship


between individual efforts and valued outcomes when they work individually (Karau &

William, 1993). People tend to lose their individuality and the recognition that comes with

their contributions when they work in a group condition. Therefore, those people lose

motivation to offer their ability since it will not be acknowledge (Charbonnier, Huguet,

Brauer, & Monteil, 1998. Social loafing also negatively related to group cohesiveness (Yip et

al., 2007). In line with Latané, Williams, and Harkins (1981), social loafing has generally

been explained as due to lack of identifiability. However, social loafing reduces when

working collectively does not eliminate valued outcomes (Karau & William, 1993).

Furthermore, research indicated that individual differences such as need of cognition

(Smith, Kerr, Markus, & Stasson, 2001), self-beliefs (Charbonnier, Huguet, Brauer, &

Monteil, 1998; Huguet, Charbonnier, & Monteil, 1999), and personal involvement (Brickner,

Harkins, Ostrom, 1986) affect social loafing in group performance. People with high self-

uniqueness exert less effort in group performance on easy task, however, they exert effort as

much as individually on more challenging task (Huguet et al., 1999). Harkins and Petty

(1982) stated that with a difficult task, participants work as hard as individually, even thought

their outputs are not identifiable.

According to Lin, Baruch, and Shih (2012), group performance is affected by the

components of corporate social responsibility that mediated by team-efficacy and team self-

esteem. Moreover, individual in coactive condition will work harder because they are really

involved in the tasks and they have to try hard to hold their pride as they performance is

identified as individual performance. In addition, group performance lead to social loafing

which caused by attribution and equity, submaximal goal setting, and lessened contiguity

between input and outcome (Latané et al., 1979). Submaximal goal settings occurs when the

team members perceive that they can work less as the goal is well defined and several

reliable people are already working for that. Therefore, they become more optimizing rather

than maximizing. In addition, lessened contingency between input and outcome refer to the

feeling of lost in a crowd and unable to gain recognition for their contribution (Latané et al.,

1979; Charbonnier, Huguet, Brauer, & Monteil, 1998). However, there is no evidence

whether or not self-esteem affects social loafing in group performance. Therefore, we are

questioning whether self-esteem has an affect on social loafing.

The present study aimed to investigate the effect of self-esteem on social loafing

behavior. This is a part of understanding the moderating influence of individual differences

on social loafing (Huguet, Charbonnier, & Monteil, 1999). The participants are university


students and they will be asked to complete task specific self-esteem (memorization task) and

questionnaire includes self-esteem scale and manipulation checks. Task condition (coactive

and collective) and task difficulty (easy and difficult) will be manipulated to examine the

effect of task condition, task difficulty, and self-esteem on their individual performance. By

increasing the task difficulty we expect that social loafing will reduce in their performance.

The study begins with the prediction that people in the easy task condition will recall

more words in coactive condition than in collective condition. Moreover, we expect that the

people in the difficult task condition also will recall more words in coactive condition than in

collective condition. This study also suggests novel contribution in the effect of self-esteem

towards social loafing. Therefore, this research is relevant in the understanding about

individual differences in social loafing behavior.

Material and Methods

Participants

Sixty university students (21 male and 39 female) were asked to volunteer their time

in this study. The participants were selected around campus using convenience sampling.

Ages ranged from 18 to 24 years (M= 20.55; SD= 1.64). There are 15 participants involved

for each condition consist of seven male and eight female in collective easy, five male and

ten female in collective difficult, six male and nine female in coactive easy, and four male

and eleven female in coactive difficult.

Design

The participants completed one of four conditions on a 2x2 between subject design

(Task condition: coactive vs. collective X Task difficulty: easy vs. difficult). The dependent

variable is the number of words recalled by the participants.

Materials and Measures

The participants were given list of 15 words and asked to remember as many words as

possible in 1 minute. In the easy task, the list consists of five words each from animal, fruit,

and color categories (e.g., Bird, Lemon, Blue…). Moreover, difficult task consisted of 15

more abstract words (e.g., Dendrite, Celsius, Glucose…) to manipulate the task difficulty. In


coactive condition, participants were told that their individual scores will be assessed and

compared to others. In collective condition, participants were told that their individual scores

will be pooled and the average score will be assessed and compared with other groups.

The questionnaire was adapted from the 10-item Rosenberg Self Esteem Scale. It

consisted of 10 short statement designed to measure self-esteem by asking the participants to

reflect their feeling regarding their performance in memorization task. We were added four

questions regarding manipulation checks which were designed to measure interest toward

memorization task, perception about task difficulty, and whether or not they aware their

individual or group performance was being assessed. The items used Likert scale ranging

from one to five: one=not likely at all, two=somewhat unlikely, three=either, four=somewhat

likely, and five=extremely likely. The participants choose one answer to what extent they

agreed to each statement.

Procedure

The participants were acquired through convenience sampling. It is sampling design

where determining the individual participants depend on the ease of researcher (Gravetter &

Forzano, 2009). The participants were told that they would be participating in study about

memory ability and measures the amount of words a person were able to remember in 1

minute. There are four group conditions where the participants were asked to participate in

one of the groups. In order to ensure the control in the experiment, the participants in

collective and coactive conditions were explicitly told about the marking criteria whether

they were being assessed according to individual score or as an average of group. They were

then given a list of 15 words, asked to remember the words in one minute, and reported as

many words as they could remember in the following one minute. At the end of the study, the

participants completed the questionnaire measuring self-esteem and manipulation checks.

The participants were then thanked for their participation, debrief and given the opportunity

to ask any questions.

Results

Tests of Manipulations


An independent group t-test was used to analyze the result. Manipulation checks show

a significant difference between easy and difficult conditions, t(58)= 5.51, p < .01. In

examining the effects of the coactive and collective conditions, we find that the participants

in collective condition (M= 3.38, SD= .99) scored significantly higher in terms of the degree

to which they believe that their individual performance was being assessed compare to

coactive condition (M= 2.60, SD= .97), t(58)= 3.00, p < .01. However, there is no significant

difference in their awareness regarding the degree to which their group’s performance was

being assessed, t(58)= 1.19, p= .24. On average, the participants generally rated the task to be

interesting (M= 2.92, on five point Likert scales). Thus, we can conclude that the task was

moderately interesting for the participants.

Performance Data

Table 1. Means and Standard Deviations for Number of Words Recalled between Easy and Difficult Task

Conditions in Coactive and Collective Conditions.

Coactive Collective

Easy Task 13.067 8.533

(1.981) (2.134)

Difficult Task 9.333 9.133

(1.496) (1.598)

Note. Standard deviations are presented in parentheses.

An independent t-test performed on the number of words recalled between easy

coactive and easy collective conditions indicates that there is a significant difference, t(28)=

6.04, p < .00. As the table shown, the participants in the coactive condition tend to recalled

more words (M= 13.07, SD= 1.98) than the participants in the collective conditions (M= 8.53,

SD= 2.13). In addition, there is no significant difference on the number of words recalled by

the participants in the difficult coactive condition (M= 9.33, SD= 1.50) and the difficult

collective condition (M= 9.13, SD= 1.60), t(28) = 0.31, p = .76.


Test of Self-esteem

The result shows that there is a significant difference of self esteem between easy task

condition (M = 14.5, SD = 5.26) and difficult task condition (M= 18.4, SD= 5.31), t(58)=

2.85, p < .01. Participants in the difficult task condition have higher self-esteem compare to

the participant in the easy task condition.

Discussion

The purpose of this study was to examine whether self esteem affected social loafing

based on memorization task and Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale. We found strong support for

the first hypothesis which people in the coactive easy condition recalled more words

compared to the collective easy condition. It is consistent with prior conclusion, individuals

tended to engage in social loafing in the collective condition (Latané et al., 1979). It can be

viewed as the effect of group cohesiveness where there was only hypothetical group informed

among the collective condition. Shiue, Chiu & Chang (2010) argued that social loafing

occurs because of the weak social ties in the group. In addition, role of identitfiability also

supports the finding (Brickner & Harkins, 1986). Latané et al. (1981) stated that

identifiability or visibility of group member contributions related negatively to social loafing.

In fact, there is no real group presented in this research, thus, social loafing occurs more in

collective condition.

However, we reject the second hypothesis as we found that the amount of words

recalled do not differ in the difficult task conditions between the coactive and collective

group. One question still remain, why the participants in collective condition felt their

performance were more evaluable than those in the coactive condition. Jackson and Harkins

(1985) effort matching interpretation suggested that people tend to match their partners

efforts and in fact worked significantly harder to maintain equity when they were working

collectively. Therefore, they worked as hard with their partner as alone. In addition, because

the group size is unknown, it leads the participants to work harder as a function of social

impact theory. According to Latané et al. (1981), the amount of effort expended on group

should decrease as an inverse power function of the group size. Thus, the unknown group

size will increase self-awareness and self-regulation to work harder.


Moreover, by increasing the task difficulty, participants’ uncertainty about their

performance may have also increased (Huguet et al., 1999). Therefore, there is no significant

difference in difficult task conditions. It indicates that rather than individuating group

members to overcome social loafing, we can increase group performance by focusing on

group members’ perceptions of the task difficulty. It is supported by Harkins and Petty

(1982) stated that by increasing task difficulty, individuals perceive that they can make a

unique contribution to a group effort, social loafing is reduced even if the individual

contributions remain unidentifiable.

Besides the effect of task difficulty, the present study enhances the previous studies

by providing the effect of self-esteem in social loafing. The result indicates that people in the

easy condition significantly have lower self-esteem compare to the difficult task condition.

The fact that participants with low self-esteem engaged either in social loafing or in social

compensation becomes the key findings of our research. We suggested that the possibility of

making a difference is because they perceived their collective efforts would not make a

difference and essential on the easy task. However, in the difficult task condition, participants

work harder and incline to exert more effort in group because they have higher self-esteem.

They perceived their contribution as essential for the group outcomes.

One of the limitations of this study is lack of real group members presence in this

study. The participants in the collective conditions were only told that their scores would be

accumulated and averaged as group scores. Nevertheless, real group presented and more

precise instructions will provide more accurate findings about the manipulation of each

condition.

Further research is needed in order to really understand how self-esteem can have

different effects on individuals’ performance. Another question remains, how low self-esteem

lead to social loafing and social compensation. Real group members’ presence is necessary in

order to specify the boundary of each condition for the present effects. In addition, more

precise instruction and more participants is necessary considering that limitation of present

study.


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dampak self-esteem terhadap perilaku kemalasan sosial makalah