Social Loafing (and Facilitation)

Abstract

The presence of other people can influence an individual's motivation level and task performance. When other people are present as coworkers, individuals often work less hard on the collective task than they would on an individual task, a phenomenon known as social loafing. When other people are present as observers or coactors, individual performance tends to be enhanced on simple or well-learned tasks but reduced on complex or novel tasks, a phenomenon known as social facilitation. Both social loafing and social facilitation have stimulated a large number of empirical studies, and several theories have been proposed to explain each phenomenon.