Deck 10: Applying Social Psychology to Organizations

Question 1

Current research and theories of leadership focus on leadership as

A) the exercise of power for the advancement of one's career
B) an individual characteristic
C) a complex social dynamic
D) the effective use of manipulation

Answer 1

a complex social dynamic

Question 2

Process theories of work motivation focus on

A) what motivates workers
B) how motivation occurs
C) why workers are motivated
D) why workers are de-motivated

Answer 2

how motivation occurs

Question 3

Which of the following is false? Research on factors that influence a supervisor's causal attributions concerning an employee's work performance has found that

A) a supervisor is more likely to attribute an employee's poor performance to internal factors than to external factors
B) supervisors' reactions to the poor performance of employees are directly related to their attributions in that the more internal the attribution, the more likely they are to recommend disciplinary action
C) if an employee's high level of performance is attributed to effort rather than to ability, a supervisor will give the employee a more positive performance appraisal
D) a supervisor is more likely to attribute an employee's poor performance to external factors than to internal factors

Answer 3

a supervisor is more likely to attribute an employee's poor performance to external factors than to internal factors

Question 4

As outlined in Hackman and Oldham's (1976)job characteristics model,______ refers to the degree to which a person can see his or her work through from beginning to end.

A) task significance
B) task completion
C) task identity
D) task difficulty

Question 5

______ is the process of selecting and interpreting information about how we view ourselves and others.

A) Selective perception
B) Social perception
C) Fundamental attribution
D) Conceptual filtering

Question 6

______ occurs when particular individuals exert influence on the goal achievement of others in an organizational setting.

A) Work motivation
B) Social influence
C) Power
D) Leadership

Question 7

The relationship between job characteristics that are challenging and job satisfaction should be higher among employees with a high level of ______.

A) internal locus of control
B) growth need strength
C) extroversion
D) education

Question 8

When we draw a general impression of an individual on the basis of a single characteristic,such as intelligence,we are demonstrating ______.

A) poor judgment
B) selective perception
C) attribution bias
D) the halo effect

Question 9

The shortcuts people use in order to be efficient in interpreting and making sense of their social worlds can lead to ______.

A) lapses in memory
B) social biases
C) more effective information gathering
D) perceptual biases

Question 10

When a supervisor evaluates the performance of an employee and shows a tendency to assign too much credit to the employee for his or her successes and too much blame to the employee for his or her failures,this is a demonstration of the ______.

A) fundamental attribution error
B) actor-observer difference
C) the halo effect
D) the similar-to-me effect

Question 11

The ______ model of job satisfaction is based on the premise that people adapt their attitudes,behavior,and beliefs to their social context and to the reality of their own past and present behavior and situation.

A) social information processing
B) social comparison
C) job characteristics
D) social environment

Question 12

Suppose that you are the supervisor of an employee who performs well across a variety of tasks.In other words,the employee's success on a particular task is not unusual.Furthermore,you notice that he or she is the only employee who performs this task well.Finally,you observe that the employee performs this task well at different times.Given these observations,based on Kelly's (1973)covariation model,you are most likely to attribute the employee's successful performance to

A) internal factors, such as ability and effort
B) external factors, such as the ease of the task
C) the quality of your supervision
D) the quality of the employee's coworkers

Question 13

______ models state that job satisfaction results from complex interactions between personal dispositions and environmental (job)characteristics.

A) Job interaction
B) Personal disposition
C) Person-fit
D) Social information processing

Question 14

Which of the following is NOT one of the five core job characteristics described in Hackman and Oldham's (1976)job characteristics model?

A) job feedback
B) task identity
C) skill variety
D) growth need strength

Question 15

According to the textbook,which of the following approaches is used in measuring job satisfaction?

A) the balance approach
B) the person-fit approach
C) the global approach
D) the biopsychosocial approach

Question 16

Which of the following phenomena is a perceptual bias that can affect organizational behavior?

A) the halo effect
B) group polarization
C) risky shift
D) groupthink

Question 17

Because we cannot assimilate everything we see,any characteristic that makes a person,object,or event stand out will increase the probability that it will be perceived.This refers to the concept of ______.

A) perceptual bias
B) the halo effect
C) selective perception
D) attribution bias

Question 18

Which of the following statements is NOT true with regard to employee withdrawal behaviors?

A) A strong correlation has been found between absenteeism and job satisfaction.
B) Sick pay, lost productivity, and overstaffing to compensate for absentee workers annually cost American organizations up to $46 billion.
C) People who are less satisfied with their jobs are more likely to quit.
D) People who are highly satisfied with their jobs are less likely to quit.

Question 19

Which of the following is NOT true with regard to the relationship between personal dispositions and job satisfaction?

A) Positive affect disposition is significantly correlated with overall job satisfaction.
B) Studies with identical twins have shown that people may be born with characteristics that predispose them to be satisfied or unsatisfied with their work.
C) Generalized self-efficacy has been linked with job satisfaction.
D) Positive affect disposition is not correlated with overall job satisfaction.

Question 20

Which of the following is NOT described in Kelley's (1973)covariation model as a type of information that people rely on in trying to explain reasons for behavior?

A) consistency
B) severity
C) distinctiveness
D) consensus

Question 21

Which of the following has NOT been proposed as an antecedent condition for groupthink?

A) overconfidence among group members
B) isolation of the group from outsiders
C) lack of pressure to make an accurate decision
D) directive leadership

Question 22

______ refers to a process of flawed decision making that occurs as a result of strong pressures among group members to reach agreement.

A) Concurrence seeking
B) Consensual validation
C) Cohesion
D) Groupthink

Question 23

Which of the following statements is true with regard to the role of a leader in preventing the occurrence of groupthink?

A) The leader should not play a critical role in initiating steps to prevent groupthink because these steps need to be initiated by other group members in order to be effective.
B) The leader should ensure that group members do not fall into the role of "critical evaluator."
C) The leader should remain impartial and not voice his or her opinions or expectations until all other group members' views have been heard.
D) The leader should voice his or her opinion first but only to a select few.

Question 24

Research by Emrich,Brower,Feldman,and Garland (2001)has found that leaders who use more image-based rhetoric are regarded as ______.

A) more charismatic
B) more powerful
C) less timid
D) more independent

Question 25

Which of the following is NOT a technique that leaders use to be persuasive?

A) rhetorical devices
B) amplify values
C) raising the volume of their voice
D) loss language

Question 26

With regard to the interpretive symbolic perspective of communication,the development of a "common sense" that people agree on because their collective experience makes it seem correct is referred to as ______.

A) social constructionism
B) consensual validation
C) selective perception
D) social perception

Question 27

Which of the following statements regarding group decision making in the workplace is true?

A) Teams are often responsible for making decisions that previously had been made by individual managers.
B) Most important decisions in organizations are made by senior individuals.
C) The prevalence of semiautonomous and self-managed work teams has remained more or less constant.
D) In the U.S., 30% of Fortune 500 companies have at least half of their employees working in teams.

Question 28

Which of the following statements regarding nonverbal communication is NOT true?

A) It refers to all the information conveyed by a sender, including the words themselves, that play a role in the transmission of meaning.
B) The tone of a person's voice is an aspect of nonverbal communication.
C) People's nonverbal signals can sometimes carry more accurate information than the actual words they use.
D) Nonverbal communication has been studied in organizational areas such as supervision and the employment interview.

Question 29

In the ______ perspective of communication,the locus of communication is people's conceptual filters.

A) nonverbal behavior
B) interpretative symbolic
C) psychological
D) mechanistic

Question 30

______ consist of attitudes,cognitions,and perceptions that may distort information exchange.

A) Interference mechanisms
B) Communication channels
C) Conceptual filters
D) Nonverbal behaviors

Question 31

The interpretative symbolic perspective has its roots in the theory of ______,which states that reality is constructed by means of consensual validation achieved through social interaction.

A) social constructionism
B) social communication
C) symbolic interactionism
D) social interactionism

Question 32

Which of the following is NOT true with regard to the relationship between job satisfaction and job performance?

A) There is likely a bidirectional causal relationship between job satisfaction and performance.
B) Job satisfaction is more strongly related to job performance for less conscientious employees than for conscientious employees.
C) The causal effects between job satisfaction and performance may be mediated by other variables such as positive affect.
D) There is no correlation between job satisfaction and job performance.

Question 33

Which of the following statements regarding organizational citizenship behavior is true?

A) Organizational citizenship behavior cannot be distinguished from specified job requirements.
B) Organizational citizenship behavior involves performance behaviors such as conscientiously performing one's work.
C) The more employees are satisfied with their job, the less good citizenship contributions they tend to make.
D) When employees perceive organizational processes and outcomes to be unfair, they are more likely to engage in behaviors that go beyond their formal job requirements.

Question 34

With regard to the model of communication presented in Chapter 10,which of the following is NOT true?

A) A message refers to the verbal and nonverbal information imparted from one party to another.
B) A message must be imparted through a channel.
C) The sender is the person who conveys the message.
D) After being transmitted, the message is encoded by a receiver.

Question 35

In their study of the communication styles of American and British managers working in the United Kingdom,Dunkerley and Robinson (2002)found that

A) the managers from both countries believed the foreign managers' communication style was superior
B) the British managers' style was more direct and task focused while the American managers' style was more circuitous, cautious, and focused on maintaining the work relationship
C) the communication styles of managers from each country tended to become similar over time
D) both parties' conceptual filters influenced the information they attended to and deemed important

Question 36

With regard to research concerning the effects of nonverbal communication in organizational settings,which of the following statements is NOT true?

A) Job interviews conducted by telephone result in the interviewer making less accurate assessments of the applicant's personality than do job interviews conducted face to face.
B) Within virtual organizations, the volume of information transmitted through electronic communication tends to increase, thereby resulting in greater efficiency.
C) Message comprehension is lower in electronic communication relative to face-to-face communication.
D) Employees who communicate exclusively using e-mail may have a more difficult time achieving consensual validation.

Question 37

In the ______ perspective of communication,the locus of communication is the shared meaning that develops between or among the parties involved.

A) mechanistic
B) psychological
C) interpretative symbolic
D) nonverbal

Question 38

Based on research on nonverbal communication in organizational settings,which of the following statements is NOT true?

A) Nonverbal behaviors play a significant role in many areas of organizational functioning.
B) Salespeople who make more eye contact are perceived by customers to be more believable.
C) Interviewers rate job applicants as more suitable for employment when the applicants display low levels of direct eye contact than when they display high levels of direct eye contact.
D) The verbal and nonverbal behaviors of job applicants interviewed by a "cold" interviewer are rated more negatively by independent judges than the verbal and nonverbal behaviors of job applicants interviewed by a "warm" interviewer.

Question 39

The available research suggests that groups interacting through videoconferencing

A) have an easier time regulating their conversations compared with groups interacting face to face
B) find regulating their conversations as easy as those interacting face to face
C) have more difficulty regulating their conversations compared with those interacting face to face
D) perform better on tasks that require quick responses

Question 40

In the ______ perspective of communication,the locus of communication is the channel.

A) interpretative symbolic
B) mechanistic
C) nonverbal behavior
D) psychological

Question 41

The phenomenon whereby groups tend to shift and make more extreme the initial position of the majority of the members is referred to as ______.

A) risky shift
B) groupthink
C) normative influence
D) group polarization

Question 42

Social constructionism posits that there is no reality apart from that which we create socially.

Question 43

Normative influence refers to changes in behavior or attitudes as a result of information obtained from other people that provides evidence about the nature of the social situation.

Question 44

Which of the following statements is true with regard to group decision-making biases?

A) Decisions made by groups seldom show the types of biases that are demonstrated by individual decision makers.
B) Decisions made by groups seldom show the types of biases that are demonstrated by individual decision makers when the demonstrability of a solution is low.
C) Group members tend to serve an error-checking function when the demonstrability of a solution is high.
D) Group members tend to serve an error-checking function when the demonstrability of a solution is low.

Question 45

Define motivation,and differentiate between need theories of motivation and process theories of motivation.

Question 46

Perceptual biases refer to errors that distort the perception process and thus lead to faulty judgments.

Question 47

With selective perception,people learn to automatically filter out what they consider to be unnecessary information.

Question 48

Which alternative best characterizes the degree to which normative and informational influence affect the decision processes of virtual groups?

A) Both normative and informational influence are less influential in the decision making of virtual groups.
B) Normative influence increases and informational influence decreases when groups make decisions in virtual environments.
C) Normative influence decreases and informational influence increases when groups make decisions in virtual environments.
D) The degree to which the two forms of influence affect decision making in virtual groups is likely affected by other variables, such as the degree of anonymity of participants and the virtuality of the medium.

Question 49

The process of assigning a cause to a behavior is called the attribution process.

Question 50

Research on the effectiveness of group decision making conducted face to face (FTF)or through text-based computer-mediated communication (CMC)has found that

A) groups interacting FTF display greater bias in their decision making than do groups engaging in CMC
B) with the use of CMC, there is a decrease in informational influence, as opposed to normative influence
C) FTF groups perform better than CMC groups on idea generation
D) CMC groups show lower equality of participation than do FTF groups

Question 51

According to ______ theory,group polarization occurs when most of the arguments the group members hear favor one position over another.

A) groupthink
B) informational influence
C) normative influence
D) persuasive arguments

Question 52

With regard to group polarization,which of the following statements is true?

A) If group members' views, on average, are mildly supportive of a position, then, as a result of group discussion, the group's final decision will tend to be more opposed to the position.
B) Group polarization has been found to exacerbate the notion of "too much money to quit" when determining whether or not to invest more money into a failing business project.
C) Group polarization has been found to occur mainly in decisions involving risk.
D) Group polarization is more likely to influence the decisions of work-related groups than the decisions of non-work-related groups.

Question 53

In a study,conducted by Schulz-Hardt,Frey,Lüthgens,and Moscovici (2000),both individuals and groups were given a case study involving a chemical company that had to make the decision of whether or not to invest in a developing country.After making an initial decision,all participants were given a chance to receive additional pieces of information that either favored or opposed investment in the developing country.The results showed that

A) individuals but not groups demonstrated a clear preference for additional information that supported the initial decision they had made
B) groups but not individuals demonstrated a clear preference for additional information that supported the initial decision they had made
C) both individuals and groups demonstrated a clear preference for additional information that supported the initial decision they had made
D) both individuals and groups demonstrated a clear preference for additional information that opposed the initial decision they had made

Question 54

Which of the following statements is true regarding the relationship between normative influence and group polarization?

A) The mere knowledge of the positions or opinions of other people, without exposure to discussion, is not enough to produce polarization.
B) Polarization occurs depending on whether or not individuals believe that the positions or opinions derive from members of an out-group.
C) When involved in a group discussion, a person's views might become more extreme because he or she feels pressure to conform in order to be accepted.
D) When involved in a group discussion, a person's views might become more neutral because he or she feels pressure to be accepted by all.

Question 55

Nonverbal communication refers to all information (including the words themselves)conveyed by a sender that plays a role in the transmission of meaning,including the words.

Question 56

Selective perception is defined as the process of interpreting information about how we view others and ourselves.

Question 57

Research on the relationship between the occurrence of the representativeness heuristic and decision making has found that

A) individuals are more likely to exhibit the representativeness heuristic than are groups
B) individuals and groups are equally likely to exhibit the representativeness heuristic
C) groups are more likely to exhibit the representativeness heuristic than are individuals
D) neither groups nor individuals are likely to exhibit the representativeness heuristic

Question 58

A halo effect occurs when people perceive others who are like themselves more favorably than they do others who are dissimilar.

Question 59

The locus of communication refers to the point in the communication process that is the focus of the particular perspective of communication.

Question 60

Schemas are mental structures that people use to organize their knowledge about the social world around themes or subjects.

Question 61

Explain what is meant by the term groupthink.

Question 62

As the text outlines,there are different approaches to understanding organizational communication.Describe two in detail.

Question 63

Define communication,and identify the components of the communication process.

Question 64

Explain what is meant by group polarization,and discuss its link to groupthink.

Question 65

Explain what is meant by heuristics,and describe two decision-making biases that result from heuristics.

Question 66

Describe the persuasive argument theory.

Question 67

Explain the bias referred to as the actor-observer difference.

Question 68

Explain what is meant by a halo effect,and explain its link to a similar-to-me effect.

Question 69

Describe the elements of Kelley's (1973)attribution/covariation model,which explains how people understand the causes of other people's behavior.