Group Influences on Inhibition in Decision-Making Contexts

It is recognized that group membership can make people feel safer. If people feel safer in groups, they should be less worried and concerned with negative outcomes. So compared to lone individuals, group members should feel less need to be inhibited. Thus, we predict groups will be more impulsive, risky, greedy, and less ethical when making decisions. To test this, participants are asked to navigate a moral dilemma either alone or as a dyad. We predict the safety provided by group consensus will lead dyads to choose more often what is recognized as the less ethical action. Participants are also asked to complete a negotiation task, balancing desires to gain rewards with risks of presenting an unfair offer. We predict anonymity will lead group members to be less concerned with how they are perceived, and will present greedier offers. Results will contribute to further understanding how group dynamics can influence psychological processes when making decisions that impact others