Chapters 11-12 (LeUnes): Leadership and Group Cohesion Audience Effects on Sport

1. Chapters 11-12 (LeUnes):Leadership and Group Cohesion Audience Effects on Sport Psychology of Sport Sep 28-Oct 5, 2009 Class #14-17

2. Definition of a Leader... • One that leads or guides • One in charge or command of others • One who has influence, especially of a political nature • American Heritage Dictionary Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.

3. What are the Common Traits of a Leader? • Can you find characteristics common to the great leaders of both past and present? • Does every leader have to have certain traits?

4. Leadership Traits - The Big 8 • Self-confidence • Trustworthiness/Integrity • Assertiveness • Emotional stability • Sense of Humor/Sociability • Self-awareness and self-objectivity • Cognitive skills • Emotional Intelligence

5. What not to do: • Have an insensitive, abrasive, or bullying style • Be aloof or arrogant • Betray personal trust • Have self-centered ambition • Fail to constructively face obvious problems • Micro-manage • Select poor subordinates • Think short-term • Don’t adapt to your boss’s different style • Overly depend on a “sponsor” or mentor

6. Common Leadership Traits • What do leadership studies have in common? • Let’s look at a few in more detail…

7. Intelligence • Definition: • The capacity to acquire and apply knowledge • Application: • To make difficult decisions • To find information • To synthesize and interpret data • Discussion: • Is it necessary to be intelligent to be a good leader?

8. Self-Confidence • Definition • Confidence in oneself or one’s abilities • Application: • Willing to tackle difficult situations • Confident in own abilities • Discussion: • Can self-confidence be a hindrance in certain situations and/or contexts?

9. Integrity • Definition • Rigid adherence to a code or standard of values • Application: • Being able to make the ‘right’ decision • Modelling ethical propriety • Discussion: • Can integrity hinder a leader from making certain decisions?

10. Sociability • Definition • The disposition or quality of being sociable. • Application: • Being able to work with different groups towards a common goal • Being seen as a positive leader from a variety of groups • Discussion: • Is it possible to be an effective leader without social skills?

11. Trait Theory:“The Great Man Theory” • Focuses solely on the leader • Emphasis on core traits for ‘success’ • Organizations should focus the selection process on these traits • Effective for individuals: • Allows for growth/change • Reflection

12. How about in sports??? • John Wooden is always mentioned when talking about the best leaders in sports…

13. Vince Lombardi: “Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing…”

14. Behavior Theory: • But what of the situation? • What of the subordinates? • What of the culmination of different events and situations?

15. Situation-Contingent Leader Influence Contingency Trait Theories Fiedler’s Contingency Theory - Personality traits that lead to leader effectiveness in one situation may lead to failure in another - Personality traits are linked here to the specific situation - Examples: Doug Collins; Bobby Knight

16. Coach Doug Collins had differences with his young star...

17. Bobby Knight: “My way or the highway…” • Discipline is his trademark…

18. Fiedler’s Contingency Theory • Two Factors involved: • Personality of the leader • Degree to which the situation gives the leader power • Two types of motivation involved: • Relationship motivation • Task motivation

19. Fiedler’s Contingency Theory • Born or not born debate… • Supporters of this theory feel leadership training programs are of little to no value • They can only enhance power and influence that the leader already possesses

20. Path-Goal Theory • Situation Specific Leader Influence • This theory is concerned with the situations under which various leader behaviors are most effective • Effective leadership is a function of learned behaviors that are situation specific

21. Path-Goal Theory • Emphasis is on the needs and goals of the athlete • Coach is viewed as more of a facilitator • Coach helps athlete to realize his or her goals • Bottom line: Guide the athlete to success

22. Tom Landry and Roger Staubach may be good examples of this theory...

23. Path-Goal Theory • Born or not born debate… • Here, the view would be that individual can be taught to be a good leader

24. Life Cycle Theory • Emphasis in leadership behavior on the subordinates and not the leader • The type of leadership style for any specific situation depends on the maturity of the subordinate

25. Life Cycle Theory • Task structure behavior decreases with increased maturity • Relationship behavior is low when dealing with athletes of both low and high levels of maturity but high when dealing with athletes of moderate levels

26. Case (1987): Sport Psychology implications • Feels young athletes who lack maturity and highly skilled and mature athletes would not respond well to high task structure • They would benefit from coaches high in relationship motivation • Moderately mature athletes need more structure • But less relationship motivation

27. Life Cycle Theory • Born or not born debate… • Again, the view here would be that individual can be taught to be a good leader

28. The Ohio State/Michigan Studies - Initiating Consideration: the extent to which a leader is approachable and shows personal concern for employees - Initiating Structure: the degree to which a leader concentrates on group goal attainment • The idea here is that leadership behavior ca be trained

29. Okay, so far we can break leadership theories down like this:

30. Other theories: • The Functional Model • Chelladurai’s Multidimensional Model

31. The Functional Model • Leadership does not rest with one person but rests on a set of behaviors by the group that gets things done • Any member of the group can perform these behaviors • This model places greater emphasis on how an organization or task is being led rather than who has been formally assigned a leadership role

32. The Functional Model • A sport example of this model would be a group or committee that has been established to determine the club’s social activities for the season

33. Chelladurai’s Multidimensional Model • Proposed indicator of effective leadership • Performance outcomes • Member satisfaction • Interaction of three components of leadership are involved here: • Prescribed leader behaviors • Established norms • Preferred leader behaviors • Athletes prefer these in their coach • Actual leader behaviors • Coach’s actual behaviors

34. Best case scenario: Congruence • Congruence between all three types lead to optimal performance and satisfaction

35. Possible Problems… • All three leader behaviors are incongruent • If actual is incongruent with both prescribed and preferred – outcome is that coach will be fired • If prescribed and actual are congruent but incongruent with preferred – outcome is good performance despite low satisfaction • If actual and preferred are congruent but prescribed is incongruent – outcome is a satisfied but low performance athlete or team

36. Playing Position and Leadership • Those playing the central positions are often the leaders • Example: In baseball from what position do you find go on to become managers? Catchers

37. Leadership Scale for Sport (LSS) • See handout

38. Group Cohesion • The strength of the bonds among group members • Interpersonal cohesiveness: Enjoyment of one another’s company • Task cohesiveness: Commitment to the group’s task

39. Factors Affecting Team Cohesion • Groups Size • Task • Team Tenure • Satisfaction

40. Groups Size: Social Loafing • A group-produced reduction in individual output on easy tasks in which contributions are pooled • Individuals in a group who are working below their potential

41. Ringelman’s (1880’s) experiments • Individual output declines on pooled tasks in all his experiments • For example in a rope-tugging task • Units pulled in rope-tugging task: • 1 person 100 • 2 people 186 • 3 people 255 • 8 people 392

42. Social Loafing • Ingham et al (1974) • Blind folded rope pulling • DV: Effort • IV: Thought people were behind them or not • Subjects pulled 18% harder when they thought they were alone

43. Latane, Williams, and Harkins (1979) • Sat participant in a group of 6 people… • Blindfolded participant and had them put on headphones • Played clapping or shouting over headphones • I.V. thought they were making noise alone or with 5 others • Results: 1/3 less noise when they thought others were also making noise

44. Why does loafing happen ? • Diffusion of responsibility: • In a group we feel able to share responsibility and this may lead to a reduction of effort • Free-rider effect: • If we feel like our contribution is not essential…still benefit from the group and give little in return (low input, high output) • Sucker effect: • Willing to do your share but not more than that (esp. if others are free-riding) • Since everyone is benefiting and getting credit, you don’t want to be the sucker who does all the work (and no recognition), therefore do the minimum requirement

45. We loaf less when… • If personal efforts are identifiable • If a task is challenging, appealing, or involving • If the task is meaningful and important • If we think our contribution is essential • If we are working with friends vs. strangers • If the group expects to be punished for poor performance • If the group is small • If the group is cohesive

46. Task • Interactive vs. Coactive sports

47. Team Tenure • Team half-life

48. Team Satisfaction • Martens and Peterson (1971) • Williams and hacker (1982)

49. Social Facilitation • If performance can be individually evaluated, the presence of others will be arousing (improve performance on simple tasks but interfere with performance on complex tasks)

50. Triplett (1898) • One of first sport or social psychology experiment • We mentioned this during our talk first week of semester