formation.
GROUP PROCESS Lecture
PSYCH 182 B | MS. ALLOUNDRA MAE BELANO | SEM 2 2025 - 2026
ANXIETY AND ATTACHMENT
JOINING GROUPS ● SHYNESS
● Not everyone who joins a group is a joiner ○ The dispositional tendency to feel uneasy,
● People who prefer independence over association uncomfortable, and awkward in response to
are not necessarily loners actual or anticipated social interaction
■ Nonshy: bilateral nucleus accumbens;
PERSONALITY TRAITS shy: amygdala
● PERSONALITY ● SOCIAL ANXIETY
○ The configuration of distinctive but enduring ○ A feeling of apprehension and
dispositional characteristics, including embarrassment experienced when
traits, temperament, and values, that anticipating or actually interacting with other
characterize an individual’s responses people
across situations ■ Innocuous Sociability – merging into
● FIVE-FACTOR MODEL group’s background by displaying
○ A conceptual model of the primary interest and agreement while
dimensions that structure individual minimizing personal involvement
differences in personality ○ Experience Sampling – a research method
asking participants to record their thoughts,
emotions, or behavior at the time they are
OCEAN (Costa & McCrae, 2013) experiencing them rather than at a later
time or date
People who vary on the five fundamental traits of personality ○ Social Anxiety Disorder – a persistent and
exhibit consistent differences across diverse times and pervasive pattern of overwhelming anxiety
situations. and self-consciousness experienced when
• EXTRAVERSION – engagement and interest in anticipating or actually interacting with other
social interactions, including friendliness, people
gregariousness, assertiveness, activity, excitement ● ATTACHMENT STYLE
seeking, and cheerfulness ○ One’s characteristic approach to
• AGREEABLENESS – cooperative orientation to relationships with other people
others, including acceptance, frankness, ■ Preoccupied (low avoidance, high
compassion, congeniality, modesty, and sympathy anxiety) – seek out membership but
• CONSCIENTIOUSNESS – persistence in the worry excessively about rejection
pursuit of tasks, including self-confidence, ■ Fearful (high avoidance, high anxiety)
orderliness, meeting of obligations, achievement – so insecure about themselves that
striving, self-regulation, and measured responding they fear rejection
• NEUROTICISM – strong emotional proclivities, ■ Dismissing (high avoidance, low
including anxiety, hostility, negative affect, anxiety) – uninterested in joining
shyness, lack of impulse control, and reactivity to groups
stressors ■ Secure (low avoidance, low anxiety) –
• OPENNESS TO EXPERIENCE – active pursuit of self-confident and willing to rely on
intellectually and aesthetically stimulating others
experiences, including imagination, fantasy, ○ Attachment Theory – from an early age,
appreciation of art, openness to emotions and children differ in the way they relate to
experiences, curiosity, and cognitive flexibility others, with some children developing very
secure and comfortable relationships with
their caregivers but others exhibiting
● JOINERS AND LONERS
dependence and uncertainty; these
○ EXTRAVERSION
differences emerge in adulthood as
■ The degree to which an individual
variations in attachment style
tends to seek out social contacts,
● SOCIAL MOTIVATION
including such related qualities as
○ Need for Affiliation – a motivating state of
outgoing, enthusiastic, energetic,
tension that can be relieved by joining with
and assertive
other people, which frequently includes
■ Introverts – oriented primarily
concerns about winning the approval of
toward inner perceptions and
other people
judgements of concepts and ideas
○ Need for Intimacy – a motivating state of
■ Extraverts – oriented primarily
tension that can be relieved by seeking out
toward social experiences
warm, positive relationships with others
● PERSONALITY-GROUP FIT
○ Need for Power – a motivating state of
○ Extraversion predicts individuals’ overall
tension that can be relieved by gaining
proclivities with regard to joining groups, but
control over other people and one’s
all the traits in the five-factor model
environment
influence the types of groups individuals
join.
1
formation.
GROUP PROCESS Lecture
PSYCH 182 B | MS. ALLOUNDRA MAE BELANO | SEM 2 2025 - 2026
○ Fundamental Interpersonal Relations ● MISERY LOVES MISERABLE COMPANY
Orientation (FIRO) – a theory of group ○ People are more interested in gaining
formation and development that clarifying information than in sharing the
emphasizes compatability among three experience with someone, particularly
basic social motives: inclusion, control, and when the situation is a dangerous one and
affection they can converse openly with other group
members
MEN, WOMEN, AND GROUPS ● EMBARRASSED MISERY AVOIDS COMPANY
● RELATIONALITY ○ Even when people need information about
○ The degree to which one’s values, a situation, they sometimes refrain from
attitudes, and outlooks emphasize and joining others because they do not wish to
facilitate establishing and maintaining embarrass themselves
connections to others
■ Women score higher than men do STRESS AND AFFILIATION
● SAFETY IN NUMBERS
ATTITUDES, EXPERIENCES, AND EXPECTATIONS ○ In times of trouble (illness/natural
● BELIEFS ABOUT GROUPS disaster/personal loss), people seek out
○ More positive belief in groupwork = higher friends and relatives
preference of being in one; more negative ○ People also react to large-scale traumatic
belief in groupwork = higher chance to events by joining with others
decline joining in one ○ Affiliation with others plays a key role in
● EXPERIENCE IN GROUPS both fight-or-flight and tend-and-befriend
○ Previous experience in groups, whether responses to stress
good or bad, influences one’s interest in ● AFFILIATION AND SOCIAL SUPPORT
joining groups in the future ○ A sense of belonging, emotional support,
● COLLABORATIVE CIRCLE advice, guidance, tangible assistance, and
○ A relatively small group of peers who work perspective provided by groups when
together for an extended period of time, members experience stress, daily hassles,
exchanging ideas for commentary and and more significant life crises
critique and developing a shared ■ Belonging – reassurance of inclusion
conception of what their methods and goals and acceptance
should be ■ Emotional Support – decrease self-
● TAKING COLLECTIVE ACTION doubt, increase self-esteem
○ SOCIAL MOVEMENT ■ Informational Support – providing
■ a deliberate, sustained, and organized information to help solve problems
group of individuals seeking change or ■ Instrumental Support – offer tangible
resisting a change in a social system assistance such as money
■ movements are sustained by ■ Meaning – existential or spiritual
individuals who may share a common support, sharing faith
outlook on issues or by members of ● AFFILIATION AND HEALTH
identifiable social groups or ○ Affiliation and social support are associated
categories, but not by businesses, with healthy changes in a body’s immune,
political organizations, or hormonal, and neurological systems
governments
SOCIAL COMPARISON AND THE SELF
● DOWNWARD SOCIAL COMPARISON
AFFILIATION ○ Selecting people who are less well off as
● The gathering together of conspecifics in one targets for social comparison (rather than
location individuals who are similar or superior to
● A formalized relationship, as when an individual is oneself or one’s outcomes
said to be affiliated with a group or organization ● UPWARD SOCIAL COMPARISON
○ Selecting people who are superior to
SOCIAL COMPARISON oneself or whose outcomes surpass one’s
● SOCIAL COMPARISON own as targets for social comparison
○ The process of contrasting one’s personal
qualities and outcomes, including beliefs, BIG-FISH-LITTLE-POND EFFECT
attitudes, values, abilities,
accomplishments, and experiences, to Academically gifted students who attend selective
those of other people schools are more unsure of their abilities and their
● MISERY LOVES COMPANY intellectual worth than equally bright students who attend
○ Most people who find themselves in a schools with a wide range of student ability.
predicament would choose to join with other
people to gain the information they need to
allay their anxiety
2
formation.
GROUP PROCESS Lecture
PSYCH 182 B | MS. ALLOUNDRA MAE BELANO | SEM 2 2025 - 2026
● SELF-EVALUATION MAINTENANCE (SEM) ○ Interchange Compatability
MODEL ■ Compatability between group
○ A theoretical analysis of social comparison members based on their similar needs
processes that assumes that individuals for inclusion, control, and affection
maintain and enhance their self-esteem by ○ Originator Compatability
associating with high-achieving individuals ■ Compatability between group
who excel in areas that are not relevant to members that occurs when individuals
the individual’s own sense of self-esteem who wish to express inclusion, control,
and avoiding association with high- or affection within the group are
achievening individuals who excel in areas matched with individuals who wish to
that are important to the individual’s sense receive inclusion, control, and
of self-esteem affection from others
● SOCIAL COMPARISON ORIENTATION ● RECIPROCITY PRINCIPLE
○ The dispositional tendency to compare ○ The tendency for liking to be met with liking
oneself to others in return; when A likes B, then B will tend to
like A
● MINIMAX PRINCIPLE
ATTRACTION ○ A general preference for relationships and
● Affiliation may set the stage for a group to form, but memberships that provide the maximum
attraction transforms acquaintances into friends number of valued rewards and incur the
fewest number of possible costs
PRINCIPLES OF ATTRACTION
● PROXIMITY PRINCIPLE THE ECONOMICS OF MEMBERSHIP
○ The tendency for individuals to form ● The decision to join is based on two factors:
interpersonal relations with those who are comparison level and comparison level for
close by alternatives
○ Also known as the principle of propinquity ● COMPARISON LEVEL (CL)
■ When people feel that their groups are ○ The standard by which the individual
cohesive or the bonds between evaluates the quality of any social
members are particularly strong, they relationship
describe them as close, recognizing if ○ Individuals whose prior relationships
only implicitly, that propinquity implies yielded positive rewards with few costs will
intimacy have higher CLs than those who
○ Familiarity Principle experienced fewer rewards and more costs
■ Aka Mere Exposure Effect in prior relationships
■ Suggests that people show a ● COMPARISON LEVEL FOR ALTERNATIVES
preference for the familiar rather than (CLalt)
the unknown ○ The standard by which individuals evaluate
● ELABORATION PRINCIPLES the quality of other groups that they may
○ The tendency for groups to expand in size join
as nonmembers become linked to a group ○ The lowest level of outcomes a member will
member and thus become part of the group accept in the light of available alternative
itself opportunities
○ Termed percolation in network theory
● SIMILARITY PRINCIPLE
○ The tendency for individuals to seek out,
affiliate with, or be attracted to an individual
who is similar to them in some way
○ Causes groups and other interpersonal
aggregates to be homogenous rather than
diverse
○ Homophily
■ Love of the same
■ The tendency for the members of the
groups and other collectives to be
similar to one another in some way
(demographic bg, attitudes, values)
■ Birds of a feather flock together
● COMPLEMENTARITY PRINCIPLE
○ A tendency for opposites to attract when the
ways in which people are dissimilar are
congruent (complementary) in some way