Psychology Experiment

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n hypothesis of the experiment is that the group containing four members will perform better than the group containing two members. This is the foundation from which we have conducted our experiment. The research our experiment was founded on was that carried out by Taylor and Faust (1952). They carried out an experiment on 105 student’s, which was designed in the method of the game ‘twenty questions’. The students were split into teams of one member, two members and four members. They were then told that the experimenter would keep an object in mind whether it is animal vegetable or mineral was also stated, and they were then allowed 20 questions and guesses to reveal the identity of the object. In there experiment they found that the group of two members performed better than the group of four members in terms of how many guesses and questions it took them and how long it took them to deduce the identity of the object. However Taylor and Faust found that the efficiency did not differ in any significant way. Thomas and Fink (1961) stated that, for the majority of tasks, a group of five individuals is the ‘optimal’ size. The method for which a certain task is undertaken change as the size increases, according to Hare (1976). He states that as the size increases the approach towards introducing information to aid problem solving becomes more ‘mechanical’ in nature. According to Coleman & James (1961) ‘cohesion tends to be weaker and moral tends to be lower in a larger group than in a smaller one.’ The reason they state this happens is because, in the majority of cases there is a lack of intimacy within the group and in extremely large groups the members are almost strangers to one another. The size of a group is considered to be a restrictive condition on the quantity and quality of connection that can transpire amongst particular members. Kephart (1950) established that as group size increases the number of relationships that exist among member’s increases greatly. He suggests that as a result of this increase in relationships among members there will be an increased tendency towards divisions into subgroups in which participants relate to one another. According to research, two-person groups frequently consequent in a rise in tension. The tension is usually caused by the creation of a ‘dominant-submissive’ relationship that comes into being.

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