TOEFL Speaking Task 3

Social loafing is a phenomenon in which individuals exert less effort when working in a group than when working alone. This reduction in effort often occurs because individuals feel their contributions are less identifiable or less essential to the overall outcome. Social loafing can undermine group productivity and is more likely to emerge in large groups where personal accountability is diluted. Researchers have studied this effect in various settings, including workplace teams and classroom projects, and have identified conditions that may reduce its occurrence, such as making individual contributions visible or increasing task importance.

Professor: Let me give you an example from a study I conducted with my students. I divided a class into two groups and asked them to work on a brainstorming task—coming up with as many creative uses for a paperclip as possible. In the first group, students wrote their ideas on a shared whiteboard, so everyone could see who contributed what. In the second group, students whispered their ideas to a group leader, who wrote them down without indicating who said what. After ten minutes, I counted the number of unique ideas. The first group produced, on average, 45 ideas per student. The second group produced only 18 ideas per student. When I interviewed the second group members afterward, many said they felt their individual ideas wouldn't be noticed, so they didn't push themselves. Interestingly, when I told the second group that I would later announce each student's contribution count, their output increased significantly in the next round. This clearly shows how reduced identifiability leads to less effort, and how making contributions visible can counteract that tendency.