Perceptions of social loafing during the process of group development

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to extend the social loafing literature by investigating the role of group development process on perceptions of social loafing within groups. Building on extant literature, it is contended that group members’ association with the group development stages can help in predicting their perceptions of social loafing.

Design/methodology/approach

Using a cross-sectional survey data were collected from 164 individuals nested in 39 groups. Mixed-effect modeling in R was unitized to test the proposed hypotheses.

Findings

Results of mixed-effect modeling in R show that group development stage of inclusion and dependency (stage 1) has no significant effect on perceptions of social loafing. Whereas, group development stage of counterdependency and fight (stage 2) has positive, and trust and structure (stage 3) and work (stage 4) has negative effect on perception of social loafing by group members.

Originality/value

This study investigates unique relationships between group members’ association with different stages of group development and their perceptions of social loafing. Additionally, a newer, shorter and cost-effective scale to measure four stages of group development is developed.

Citation

Zhu, M., Singh, S. and Wang, H. (2019), "Perceptions of social loafing during the process of group development", International Journal of Organization Theory & Behavior, Vol. 22 No. 4, pp. 350-368. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJOTB-04-2018-0049