Lazy is a condition where a person avoids work that should be able to be done with the potential of himself and energy he has. The type of lazy also varies depending on the originator. Lazy people are called slackers. Lazy nature itself is related to procrastination and silence without doing anything (Idleness).
Social Loafing Definition
Social loafing or social laziness is a tendency to decrease a person’s effort or performance caused by the presence of others or while in a group rather than when working individually, independently or alone. The term social loafing was first coined in 1979 by Latane, Williams & Harkins in the psychologist’s journal “Many hands make light the work: The causes and consequences of social loafing”.
Social loafing is the tendency of individuals to reduce their motivation and effort when working in groups or collectively rather than when working alone. They lower their efforts because they believe the task is also done by others (Karau and Williams, 1993).
According to Baron and Byrne (2004), social loafing is letting others do work while part of a group. Social loafing is quite common in a variety of tasks, both cognitive and involving physical effort. Social loafing has a negative impact, especially for organizations and groups. One of the negative impacts of social loafing is reduced group performance.
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Social loafing characteristics
There are a large number of characteristics of social loafing that fall into the category of diseases including,
- The social loafing person is well aware that he has responsibilities in the group, but prefers to ignore for reasons that do not matter.
- The social loafing person realizes that his group colleagues have and are trying hard to complete group tasks.
- Social loafing person are not able to contribute to other alternatives in any form, such as empathy, sympathy, praise, moral support, and so on.
Social Loafing Causes
Target Settings not Maximal
The purpose of a group that is not made to the maximum can cause a person to be able to perform social laziness, because they think the group will easily complete the task. So that the efforts of other group members are enough and do not spend more effort.
Group Evaluation
The individual will tend to perform social laziness if he or no one else evaluates the results of the work that the individual does.
Attribution and Equality
The process of attribution can cause an individual to perform social laziness, because they consider others incompetent and useless to expend more effort than the rest of the group.
Unbalanced Contingency
Individuals perform social laziness because the efforts they expend with the results obtained are not appropriate because they are in the group.
Distribution of Justice
Sometimes individuals have the perception that the results of the hard work of each member of the group will not get the same reward and that will cause the individual to reduce their efforts or hard work in the group.
Group Cohesion
An individual in a group that is not cohesive will tend to do social laziness because fellow members of the group do not know each other very well.
Coworker Performance
Individuals will do social laziness if they feel the effort of the rest of the group is higher, so that the individual does not need to expend more effort.
Individual Collectivity
Individuals who come from individualist cultures will perform social laziness rather than individuals who come from collectivist cultures. This is because individuals with a culture of collectivity will be more group oriented.
Motivation to Achieve
Usually individuals with low achievement will easily do social laziness, because there is no motivation that can eliminate the tendency of individuals to do social laziness.
Group Size
The more or greater the members of the group will increase a person to perform social laziness. The individual will feel his or her existence is divided by the other members.
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Impact of Social Loafing
The impact of the phenomenon of social loafing in a group is as follows:
- Social loafing can lead to envy in a group and decrease the potency and cohesiveness of a group and have an effect on group performance, presence and satisfaction (Duffy & Shaw, 2000).
- The loss of motivation of group members is also the impact of social loafing, the presence of individuals who do loafing will affect the performance of other group members (Brickner, Harkins, & Ostrom, 1986).
- Social loafing will eliminate individual opportunities to practice skills and develop themselves (Schnake, in Liden, Wayne, Jaworski & Bennet, 2003).
- Individuals who do social loafing productivity will be hampered by having to work in a group (Latane, Williams, & Harkins, 1979).