My titles suck and we all know it

This semester, my boyfriend of two years decided that he would pledge one of the fraternities here on campus. As one might expect, his pledgeship has provided me with copious, real life examples of social psychology in action. Specifically, I have been able to observe many of the dynamics of group processes. When referring to group processes in psychology, a group signifies a collection of two or more individuals with interdependent goals who interact and influence one another (Meneses et al., 2008; Rutchick et al., 2008). As a part of the pledge class, my boyfriend has had to work together within a small, close-knit group in order to achieve a superordinate goal (i.e., to become “brothers.”) However, the more interesting dynamic has been the process by which he and the other pledges have been socialized into the larger group (AKA the fraternity itself.)

Throughout the semester, the pledges have progressed relatively smoothly throughout the stages of group development (Tuckman, 1965; Tuckman & Jensen, 1977). In chronological order the stages are: forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning. During the forming stage, members try to orient themselves and find a place within the group. Next in the storming stage, members become more assertive and attempt to influence the group so that the group best accommodates their individual needs. This stage often results in conflict that is then resolved in the norming stage, in which established norms, roles, and a sense of commitment and purpose begin to develop. Finally, in the performing stage each of the members perform their designated roles and work together to achieve common goals. If you have been reading closely, you will have noticed that I have yet to explain the adjourning stage. The adjourning stage is not a necessary step in development, and only occurs when a member becomes dissatisfied with the group. In the adjourning stage, members distance and disassociate themselves from the group when they no longer think that remaining in the group offers enough benefits.

Unfortunately, I recently provided the fodder for my boyfriend to enter into the adjourning stage in reference to his frat. At a large party, an individual affiliated with the group was rude to me and kicked me out for no reason. Naturally, I bawled hysterically for the rest of the night because my attempt to connect with his new group ended terribly. My boyfriend ended up raising hell about the incident with the other frat members, unbeknownst to me. He made it clear that I was his main priority rather than the frat. To maintain a sense of unity and cohesiveness within the frat and the pledge class, the members were forced to placate my boyfriend so that he would not adjourn from the group. Consequently, they were forced to apologize to me and accept me in to the group as well (in an unofficial fashion.) Luckily, the cohesiveness of the frat and my adorable baby face made it easy for them to respond empathically to my situation. Now the frat boys like me much better than they ever did before, or at least now they’re expressing that they like me.

And that is how I learned that men will do anything to make a girl stop crying.

(n = 537)

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Reference

Meneses, R., Ortega, R., Navarro, J., & de Quijano, S. D. (2008). Criteria for assessing

the level of group development (LGD) of work groups: Groupness, entitativity, and groupality as theoretical perspectives. Small Group Research, 39, 492–514.

Rutchick, A. M., Hamilton, D. L., & Sack, J. D. (2008). Antecedents of entitativity in

categorically and dynamically construed groups. Journal of Social Psychology, 38, 905–921.

Tuckman, B. W. (1965). Developmental sequence in small groups. Psychological

Bulletin, 63, 384–399.

Tuckman, B. W., & Jensen, M. A. (1977). Stages of small-group development

revisited. Group and Organization Studies, 2, 419–427.