Keywords: social loafing, laziness, group performance, group dynamics, habitual response.

GROUP LAZINESS: THE EFFECT OF SOCIAL LOAFING ON
GROUP PERFORMANCE

XIANGYU YING, HUANHUAN LI, SHAN JIANG, FEI PENG, AND ZHONGXIN LIN
Renmin University of China

Social loafing has been defined as a phenomenon in which people exhibit a sizable decrease
in individual effort when performing in groups as compared to when they perform alone,
and has been regarded as a state variable. In this study, we instead conceptualized social
loafing as a habitual response, given that many people have been found to be susceptible
to social loafing in group tasks. We developed the self-reported Social Loafing Tendency
Questionnaire (SLTQ) to measure individual variations in social loafing. In Study 1, the
reliability and validity of the SLTQ were established in a sample of college students. In Study
2, SLTQ scores significantly negatively predicted individual performance in the group task
condition, but not in the individual task condition. Social loafing can also be considered a
trait variable, as it was found to modulate group dynamics when it was activated in a typical
situation (i.e., being in a group).

Keywords: social loafing, laziness, group performance, group dynamics, habitual response.

Many tasks in our lives require the collective efforts of a group. In general,
teamwork is most often associated with positive effects regarding individuals’
efforts and performance (Høigaard, Säfvenbom, & Tønnessen, 2006). However,
working collectively may reduce individual motivation and efforts. This is
known as social loafing, which refers to the decrease in individual effort that
people exhibit when performing in groups as compared to when they perform

SOCIAL BEHAVIOR AND PERSONALITY, 2014, 42(3), 465-472
© Society for Personality Research
http://dx.doi.org/10.2224/sbp.2014.42.3.465

465

Xiangyu Ying, Huanhuan Li, Shan Jiang, Fei Peng, and Zhongxin Lin, Department of ,
Renmin University of China.
This research was supported by the National College Students’ Innovative Program of China
(90212061). The authors thank Mr. Weizhen Xie for his comments and advice in the preparation of
this paper.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to: Huanhuan Li, Department of
, Renmin University of China, 1004, Floor 10, Suite D, Huixian Building, No. 59
Zhongguancun Street, Beijing 100872, People’s Republic of China. Email: [email protected]

SOCIAL LOAFING AND GROUP PERFORMANCE466

alone (Latané, Williams, & Harkins, 1979). Social loafing can lead to low
productivity and poor group performance.

Social loafing pervades our lives, regardless of task type. When asked to
demonstrate physical effort such as shouting, people shout louder and longer
when they are alone than when they are in pairs or in groups of six (Latané et
al., 1979). Similarly, when making a cognitive effort, such as evaluating a poem
ostensibly written by another person, people report putting in less effort and
evaluating the work less favorably when they are in a group than when they
are alone (Harkins & Petty, 1982). In general, larger groups or male dominance
in a group induce a greater social loafing effect (Karau & Williams, 1993).
Conversely, group evaluation and reward during group management, as well as
increased task difficulty, can reduce social loafing (Mefoh & Nwanosike, 2012).

Individual factors are also of great importance when delineating the nature of
social loafing (Smrt & Karau, 2011). For instance, “when individuals high in self-
uniqueness work together, they are prone to social loafing” (Huguet, Charbonnier,
& Monteil, 1999, p. 124). In contrast, high-need-for-achievement individuals do
not loaf when working with others (Hart, Karau, Stasson, & Kerr, 2004). Tan and
Tan (2008) found that conscientiousness had a negative correlation with social
loafing in classroom project teams. However, it remains unclear whether or not
preference for group work induces more or less social loafing behavior in a group
setting (Duffy, Shaw, & Stark, 2000; Wagner, 1995).

Many people appear susceptible to social loafing in group tasks (Smrt & Karau,
2011), including 5-year-old children, whose performance in group settings has
been found to be affected in different ways by evaluation according to task
difficulty (Arterberry, Cain, & Chopko, 2007). It is reasonable to infer that
social loafing may be a trait-like habitual response, or a tendency recurring in
similar circumstances. Individuals with a high social loafing tendency make less
effort and have a decreased motivation when working in a group. Therefore, it is
valuable to measure the degree of the group members’ social loafing tendency at
the beginning of the group task, in order to effectively predict their efforts and
work performance in various situations.

In current measures of the characteristics of social loafing researchers have
mainly focused on the magnitude of perceived social loafing in a team, treating
social loafing as a state variable. For example, Høigaard (2010) developed the
Perceived Social Loafing Questionnaire (PSLQ) to enable athletes to quantify
their perception of social loafing in their teammates. Also, Høigaard et al. (2010)
developed the Self-Reported Social Loafing Questionnaire (SRSLQ) to measure
athletes’ perception of their own magnitude of social loafing. However, these
measures cannot be used to predict individual performance in a group task and
this significantly undermines their application in real-life settings.

SOCIAL LOAFING AND GROUP PERFORMANCE 467

Our aim in this study was to examine differences in individuals’ social loafing
tendency by conceptualizing the tendency as a habitual response. In Study 1,
we developed the Social Loafing Tendency Questionnaire (SLTQ) and tested its
reliability and validity with a college student sample. In Study 2, we examined
the relationship between SLTQ scores and group productivity. We hypothesized
that SLTQ scores would have a negative predictive effect on group task
performance. This means the higher the social loafing tendency, the worse will
be the performance in a group task.

Study 1

Method
Participants. Participants (N = 212) comprised 109 men and 103 women

recruited from Renmin University of China, with ages ranging from 19 to 22
(M = 20.07, SD = .89) years. Of the participants, 165 completed the SLTQ to
demonstrate internal consistency and for exploratory factor analysis (EFA), and
47 – who had actually worked together for their group course work (3-5 people in
a team) – completed the SLTQ, and their real team leaders completed the PSLQ
to evaluate the members’ magnitude of social loafing. All participants provided
informed consent.

Measures
Perceived Social Loafing Questionnaire (PSLQ). The original 5-item PSLQ

was translated into Chinese. Higher scores indicate a higher degree of perceived
social loafing (Høigaard et al., 2010). Participants respond to each item on a scale
ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). In this study, Cronbach’s
 of the Chinese version of the PSLQ was .84.

Social Loafing Tendency Questionnaire (SLTQ). We developed the 7-item
self-reported SLTQ to measure individual variations in social loafing. Participants
respond to each item on a scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly
agree).

Results
Participants’ SLTQ (M = 15.38, SD = 3.59) and PSLQ scores (M = 9.09, SD =

3.43) were lower than the median levels. The correlation matrix of the seven items
for the sample (N = 165) was subjected to principal-axis factoring and oblimin
rotation. Two rotated factors (cognitive tendency and behavioral tendency) that
were extracted explained 52.77% of the variance among scores. The cognitive
tendency items describe covert ideas and motivation closely related to social
loafing, whereas the behavioral tendency items measure overt loafing behavior.
The results of the EFA are shown in Table 1.

SOCIAL LOAFING AND GROUP PERFORMANCE468

Table 1. Factor Loadings for Exploratory Factor Analysis With Varimax Rotation of the SLTQ

Items Factor loadings
Behavioral Cognitive

1. In a team, I am not indispensable .37 .63
2. In a team, I will try as hard as I cana .77 .08
3. In a team, I will contribute less than I should .16 .57
4. In a team, I will actively participate in the discussion and contribute ideasa .81 .17
5. In a team, it is okay even if I do not do my share -.24 .62
6. In a team, it does not matter whether or not I try my best .22 .79
7. In a team, given my abilities, I will do the best I cana .80 .09

Note. N = 165. a Items reverse scored. Exploratory factor analysis based on total sample.

The SLTQ demonstrated acceptable internal consistency, with Cronbach’s 
ranging from .58 (behavioral tendency) to .74 (cognitive tendency), with the total
score being .69. Although the Cronbach’s  for the behavioral tendency subscale
showed a lower consistency, it may be adequate for a scale with fewer than 10
items (Buss & Perry, 1992).

In addition, PSLQ scores showed a significant positive correlation between
total SLTQ scores (r = .40, p < .01) and behavioral tendency scores (r = .48, p < .01). No significant correlation was found between cognitive tendency scores and PSLQ scores (p > .05).

Study 2

Method
Participants. On the basis of data for the upper and lower 27% of the group

SLTQ scores (N = 165) in Study 1, 79 participants were invited to take part in
Study 2 in return for a small monetary compensation (¥15). They were divided
into a high social loafing tendency (HSLT) group (n = 35) and a low social
loafing tendency (LSLT) group (n = 44). Participants in these groups were then
randomly assigned to complete either a group or an individual version of a uses
generation task (Harkins & Petty, 1982). They were required to report as many
uses as possible for a newspaper within 12 minutes. Informed consent was
obtained from all participants.

Procedure. When participants entered the experiment room, they were told
to read the instructions on the computer screen and were then left alone in the
room. They were given a cover story that they were required to complete a
brainstorming task, which involved reporting as many uses as possible for a
newspaper. They wrote these uses on a piece of paper, which was then folded and
put into a box. In the group task condition, participants were reminded that they
shared the responsibility for the brainstorming task with another person, with

SOCIAL LOAFING AND GROUP PERFORMANCE 469

whom their performance would be evaluated. In the individual task condition,
participants were reminded that they alone were responsible for the task and their
performance would be counted separately.

Results
The number of uses reported represented the index of individual performance.

A 2 (social loafing tendency: high vs. low) × 2 (task: group vs. individual)
analysis of variance (ANOVA) indicated that the social loafing tendency, F(1,
75) = 10.336, p = .002, 2 = .121, and the task condition, F(1, 75) = 127.337,
p < .001, 2 = .629, had a significant main effect on the number of uses. A significant interaction was also observed between the social loafing tendency and the task in the number of uses, F(1, 75) = 10.501, p = .002, 2 = .123. A further post hoc test revealed that the number of uses in the HSLT group (M = 10.64, SD = 3.01) was significantly fewer than the number in the LSLT group (M = 18.38, SD = 2.92; t = 2.86, p < .01) in the group condition. In the individual task condition, there was no significant difference in the number of uses between the HSLT group and the LSLT group (p > .05). Furthermore,
the number of uses in the HSLT group in the group task condition was
significantly fewer than the number given in the individual task condition
(M = 29.20, SD = 6.80; t = 2.98, p < .001). The number of uses in the LSLT group in the group task condition was also significantly fewer than that in the individual task condition (M = 29.57, SD = 7.96; t = 2.86, p < .001). Further linear regression analysis showed that SLTQ scores significantly predicted the number of uses in the group task condition ( = -.81, p < .001) but not in the individual task condition ( = -.24, p > .05). SLTQ scores also
explained a significant proportion of variance in the number of uses in the group
task condition, R2 = .65, F(1, 79) = 74.38, p < .001, but not in the individual task condition, R2 = .00, F(1, 79) = 1.00, p > .05.

General Discussion

We demonstrated in this study that the psychometric indices of the SLTQ are
acceptable and that it can be used to measure individual social loafing habit
responses in various situations. SLTQ scores significantly negatively predicted
individual performance in the group task condition but not in the individual
task condition. These results provide support for the conceptualization of social
loafing tendency as a habitual response or a trait variable. For individuals with
high social loafing tendency, group settings activate this tendency. This produces
a negative effect on group task performance.

Our findings may be helpful for the application of the SLTQ in real-life
situations, such as industrial, business, or agricultural production settings, by

SOCIAL LOAFING AND GROUP PERFORMANCE470

enabling the development and implementation of an effective management
strategy. Moreover, the SLTQ can also be an alternative screening measure, to be
used in recruitment for positions in which a high level of cooperation is required.

Our results showed that participants, especially those in the HSLT group,
performed significantly worse in the group task condition than in the individual
task condition. This finding is consistent with that of Harkins and Szymanski
(1989), who found that participants exerted less effort in a group task than an
individual task. It is more important, however, that the similarity in the number
of uses between the HSLT and LSLT groups in the individual task condition
provides strong evidence for the trait nature of the social loafing tendency.

Our findings are significant because we proposed that social loafing might
be better considered as a habitual response or a trait variable rather than a state
variable. By evaluating the magnitude of the individual’s social loafing tendency
at the beginning of the group task, we established effective management. In
addition, we tested the validity of the SLTQ in the standard experimental
paradigm. This may be helpful for avoiding bias caused by self-reporting.

There are several limitations in this study. First, the sample consisted of college
students from one university in Beijing only, and may not be representative of all
Chinese college students. Second, because the 7-item SLTQ may not be sufficient
to evaluate the social loafing tendency, more items should be added to optimize
its psychometric indices. Third, generalization of the findings is limited by the
rather small sample size in Study 2, so caution should be used when generalizing
the current findings to other populations.

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