Self-study
P1
In principle, a cohesive group—one whose members generally agree with one another and support one another's judgments—can do a much better job at decision making than it could if it were noncohesive. ███
intro topic ·
Cohesive group can have better decision-making than non-cohesive group
Cohesive group = members generally agree with each other and support each other's judgments.
Causal mechanism ·
Group members more willing to say what they think
When cohesiveness is low, people are less willing to speak freely because of fear of social harm.
P2
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High cohesion can have risks ·
Can be less likely to deviate from majority opinion
Causal mechanism ·
Groupthink
Members of high-cohesion group may not scrutinize others' proposals. They'll either think the proposal is good without critical thinking, or they'll suppress any doubts for the benefit of group consensus.
P3
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Factors that can lead to groupthink ·
Overestimating group's power and morality, closed-mindedness, pressure toward uniformity
Requirement for groupthink ·
Cohesion in group is necessary, but not sufficient, for groupthink
Let's do some more research on other factors that can lead to groupthink.
Passage Style
Problem-analysis
Single position
24.
It can be inferred from ███ ███████ ████ ████ ███ ██████ ██ ███ ███████ ███ ███ ███████████ █████████ ██ ███ ███████ █████ ██ ████ ██████ ██ █████ ████ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ ██████████ █████ ███████████
a
Groupthink occurs in ███ ████████ ████████ ███████ ███ ███ ████████████ ██ ██████████ ████████ ██████ ██ ███ █████ ███████████
Not supported, because the author never suggests groupthink occurs in “all” highly cohesive groups. In fact, the author indicates that high cohesion alone is
b
The causal factors ████ █████████ █████ ████████ ████ ██████████ ███ ██████ ██ ████ █████
Not supported, because the researchers have identified groupthink as a
c
The continued study ██ ████████████ ██ ██████ ██ ████████ █████████ ███ ███████████ ████ ███████ ██████ ███████████
Not supported, because the author think additional research is “
d
Outside information cannot █████████ █████ █████████ ████ ████ ████ ██████ ██████████ ██ ███████████
Too strong. Although groupthink involves worse decisionmaking due to group members' lack of critical scrutiny of group decisions, we don’t know that outside information cannot influence group decisions. Perhaps outside information can influence group decisions — the group as a whole makes a decision based on outside information, and individual group members don’t critically evaluate the decision.
e
On balance, groupthink ██████ ██ ████████ ██ ████ █ ██████████ ██████ ██ █ ███████ ████████ ███████
Supported, because the author views groupthink as negative — she uses the word “