Collective efficacy and interdisciplinary work

I studied as an interdisciplinary studies major in my undergraduate program, and while our research was incredibly individualized we studied and discussed group interdisciplinary research at length. Group research in general requires significant collective efficacy to achieve a goal, even regarding domain-specific topics; therefore, when broadening research to interdisciplinary realms it’s even more difficult to encourage building collective efficacy amongst people who may not know how to mesh/communicate their research interests. Even when it is necessary to have multiple perspectives to solve a particular issue or achieve a certain goal, the group must understand each other well in order to do this effectively.
Last week we discussed that the reason people have known about problems like climate change for so long and haven’t done anything about it is because they have very little collective efficacy to make a difference. I see this issue as an interdisciplinary one because it not only requires climate scientists to publish research, but it also requires advocates in fields of business, education, politics/law, and service in order to enact true change. However, if each of these fields possibly have personal/disciplinary interests in acting a certain way regarding issues like climate change, it is entirely reasonable that they would have low collective efficacy to work together to resolve the problems. Not only that, but it also takes collective efficacy of the general population as a whole to make these sorts of changes, and in a time when such collective efficacy is…timid at best, there is little surprise that such issues have not been resolved even with the physical resources to do so.
Is there truly a way to raise collective efficacy?

Collective efficacy and teamwork, the sequel

A few years ago, I started a new job in Boston working in international educational travel. The company that I worked for had one of the best workplace cultures that I have ever been part of, and they provided lots of opportunities to get to know your colleagues outside of work. One of these opportunities was a Fun Run. I never put these two words in the same sentence, but I decided maybe I should participate to get to know more colleagues since I was new. The event was a competition for whose team could run the most laps in 24 hours, which I did not have any sense of self or collective efficacy for, but it included camping which I love, so I joined a team. When the weekend arrived, it was raining and chilly. We were on the Cape at a state park and, despite the rain, bugs, and mud, the atmosphere was generally positive. Now, since I derive no pleasure from running, normally I don’t run in anything but the most optimal of conditions… and these conditions were subpar, at best. I was not amused. When the race began, my team set off and at first it wasn’t so bad. But the running loop was four miles long, which was two more miles than I’d ever run consecutively before. Soon (also read, after half a mile) my doubt set in, and I began to wonder why I had committed to this event. The terrain was hilly and sandy, then hilly and full of tree roots to trip over, I was questioning why I had eaten a hamburger at dinner, people started trying to talk while running… hopefully I’m painting a picture of how miserable I felt. Something strange happened along the way though, amidst trying to talk to my new colleagues and run and not trip, I started to forget about the roots, the sand, the hills, and the hamburger. Everyone was having fun and staying together as a group, even though some had run marathons before and clearly could have run three laps in the time most of us could do one. Our shared purpose was not to be the fastest or the best, but just to enjoy the company and the friendly competition. We finished the lap, and then decided to do another one. I called it quits with 8 (consecutive!) miles behind me and spent the rest of the night by the bonfire. I woke up with a puddle in my tent in the morning, yet I felt a great sense of accomplishment and sense of connection to my colleagues. To me, this story illustrates some important facets of collective efficacy. While I lacked self-efficacy for running, I still believed I could (or maybe felt obligated to!) contribute to the group, and the group believed in the purpose of the Fun Run. I persevered with the support of my colleagues, and those with advanced skills who could have run faster did not because that would not have been best for the group’s goals or purpose. This makes me think about the classroom and how there are learners with so many different levels of ability. For teachers, it can be difficult to match instruction and activities with this varying ability, not to mention create a shared purpose that 20+ students believe in. How could we set a shared goal so that collective efficacy is fostered and so those with lesser abilities feel safe and supported to struggle on, while those with higher abilities provide encouragement? Additionally, how can we identify the strengths of all students and design goals so that each student has the chance at some point to feel competent, be the model of success, and provide encouragement to peers? 

Collective efficacy and teamwork

It is an integral part of the team experience that members’ desire for collective achievement. According to Bandura’s (1997) social cognitive theory, both tasks self-efficacy and collective efficacy could influence performance and achievement related to outcomes. Contrary to task self-efficacy which represent a team member’s confidence in performing one’s own capacity to a certain level, collective beliefs depict the teams shared confidence in its ability to generate collective action and complete a task relative to a specific goal. It sometimes makes me confused to make a distinction between two terms since a team cannot run without individual’s effort while the form that several people work as a team could yield essentially different effort. They emphasize how to evaluate the function and mechanism of an entity through an individual or team level. Collective perceptions of confidence are rooted in individual perceptions of task self-efficacy. Individual perceptions of collective efficacy could represent an emergent effect on climate and the effectiveness on teamwork. Social support behavior and positive feedback act on individual could post positive effect on ego orientation and boost aspirational organic teamwork. However, autocratic behavior and forced collaboration might lead to individual-level despondence and strike. Even though teamwork is a notion of a collectivity, individual agency and characteristics still needs to be taken into consideration when it comes to division of work, responsibility to the group, goals set up for the task. A group consisting of outstanding talents does not guarantee an appreciable outcome, while how various members of the team interact and harmonize with each other could reflect the quality of teamwork. Considering the issue of group level consensus, the perceptions of climate might be a team level predictor of collective efficacy. Feltz and Lirgg (1998) acknowledged the importance of perceptual consensus among teams. Perceptual consensus represents a broader conception of climate dimensions (motivational climate, collective efficacy). 

To Save or To Destroy?

I appreciated themes from the posts of classmates in considering how to develop collective efficacy around a cause.  Quiannan offered the quote that suggested that if a group acknowledged that there is good work worth doing, “…it would make us save the world from now on."  This powerful and shared purpose would move us from standing beside each other with our individual self-efficacy in our own skill set toward embracing a role in a goal worth achieving together.  World changers, unite!

I can appreciate Robin’s perspective that we often hear of groups, passionate with collective efficacy, determined to do harm rather than “save the world.”  Her questions were thought-provoking: can we shift from destructive goals to redeeming ones?

Loretta and Robin both mentioned the online environment – Loretta referring to building our collective efficacy as a class through blogging, and Robin referring to damaging purposes of promoting hatred.  In the online setting, the connection between others is different from direct interaction.  How does this evoke collective efficacy in ways that face-to-face interaction may not?  Does a level of separation facilitate our ability to express ourselves more honestly, whether that be a Green New Deal advocate or a white supremacist?  Or, are we just drawn to collective efficacy in our human desire to connect with others?  I worry that we are forgetting how to genuinely connect with those sitting right in front of us, but we are built for connection.  So, when we lack genuine connection with the humans we can see, we are primed in our online settings to seek deep connection with those who would welcome us into the fold – whether for a world-saving mission that they are committed to but are doubtful will succeed or for a world-destroying mission that they are sacrificially zealous for and know they will accomplish no matter what.  Or maybe media is more interested in showcasing destructive collective work rather than progress toward causes to heal humanity, so our perception is that destructive collective efficacy holds more power?

How to develop goals in Collective Efficacy?

" When we recall what we are destined to do in this life, it would recover ourselves; when we recall what the human beings are destined to do in this world, it would make us save the world from now on." I came across this from a book several years ago, at Edinburgh. I did not fully understand it, but I began to question the meaning of the things which I was engaging with every day.

Before I went there, I worked at a company in Guangzhou, China. Every day's life was quite busy and my colleagues spent lots of time in doing the job that they had no love in it. Managers argued with each other about how to make more profit. The general manager tried so hard to let everyone understand the company's culture, mission as well as goals. Each of us could notice that information on bulletin boards clearly and we even need to take exams. (I made those boards and test questions..) I felt like it wouldn't work since everyone had their own life focus. Work is merely a way to earn money and to support the family. To motivate the morale, the manager also generated many reward mechanisms. But it still did not work for the whole development of the company. I would say that many of the colleagues are actually very intelligent when they engaged in their work individually. They hold different expertise in their fields, like marketing, finance, designing etc. But every time, when people from different departments came together, the efficiency of working is reduced largely. To achieve collective learning or working was really difficult even though each of them possesses distinguished skills and was notified about each goal of the company. 

But at Edinburgh, I once observed an educational round table meeting in the parliament of Scotland as a course requirement. To reach an agreement in policy, people discussed educational issues from different perspectives based on various researches. When I searched about educational department website, I was amazed by the details of each policy. Later on, through visiting history museums, I realized that there was a bloody history for Scotland people to fight for freedom and democracy. That might be the reason they cherish freedom and democracy so much no matter how British people would say they are so poor. 

Referring to collective efficacy, I'm thinking of what culture, value and goals could really bring people together and achieve collective learning. If we say successful experiences and high level of expertise could play their part very well in self-efficacy, then what factors could help a group of people achieve success and then develop collective efficacy? Especially, what kinds of goals would be efficient in collective efficacy and how to generate those goals?

Is this blog forum facilitating Collective Efficacy?

The two articles the Minimally Invasive Education research in India were very interesting. During the “hole in the wall” project, unsupervised and unguided children from low socioeconomic areas in India were presented with opportunities to acquire computer skills. Isn’t it interesting how children can learn independently, regardless of who or where they are, and without regard to socio-economic status? These children in India learned to operate a computer with the freedom to seek help from other children, lack of structured setting and with the absence of the aid of a school or teachers.  What a testament to children's ability to learn without structure or professional intervention. All children are naturally curious and (as we have been discussing this semester) will continue to pursue understanding if they feel they can succeed. I am curious how this research shows support for the increased implementation of technology into lower socioeconomic areas in the United States. Could technology (with lack of structured oversight) be an essential tool in increasing self-efficacy in these schools?  

After class, I was pondering the idea of teachers choosing to strike for better salaries. Many teachers may choose NOT to spend their time/resources participating in a strike because the risk of an improved salary does not outweigh the sacrifice of summer vacation. They simply do not have enough collective efficacy to strike, so they chose the vacation. What causes enough teachers to gather and sacrifice the vacation for the potential of a raise?  Is it relationships?  Is it professional pressure?  Is it being fed up with the status quo?  It seems to me that each teacher’s “breaking point” would vary, based on varying personal and professional experiences and motivations. 

Speaking of Collective Efficacy, how could this blog foster an increased Collective Efficacy of our class? In this online forum, students present their reflections, ideas, and questions to the group. How could we grow in our Collective Efficacy of Self-Efficacy in education through the online setting? What about our students… how should educators facilitate student engagement in the online setting to encourage collective efficacy? 

Does collective efficacy do more harm than good?

Last week it seemed like we talked a lot about when collective efficacy is aimed towards positive goals or at least neutral things, a team winning their basketball game, teachers protesting for higher wages, playing video games, and young people fighting for climate change. And while all of that is well and good (literally), but I often think times people have as much if not more collective efficacy for negative things, for doing harm rather than good. Yes, I get this may be seen as cynical in the eyes of some, but I have always believed myself to be a realist. I cannot live in a world of dreaming of what it could be or envisioning what it might be. I tend to be realistic about where we are at, what the state of things today is, and honestly, what is likely to happen, rather than living in a world of hope.

Thus, as I think about collective efficacy what comes to mind, more than all the good, is the bad. A group of kids working together to bully someone or effectively leave them out of the group, online forums where people are attacking or tearing down someone for being different. A group of people collectively believing that others are less than them, that inherently somehow they are more than others due to their sexual orientation, the color of their skin, or the god(s) that they believe in. When the shared purpose of a group is about tearing others down, harming them, belittling them, even killing them. It seems to me that collective efficacy towards “negative things” (yes I understand I am calling them negative and others may not), can do a whole lot of harm, may permeate society more than collective efficacy for positive things.  Negativity seems to spread like wildfire, as Ariana touched on in her post last week, and is the base for many people's actions. Particularly in online settings, there are all kinds of websites, groups, etc. created with the sole purpose of getting people together who all believe in harming others in the same way. With all the harm of negative collective efficacy, is it actually a good thing?

Further, as I think about this idea more ( I won’t bore you with all my rambling thoughts), I cannot help but wonder how an outsider can alter, break up, or change the collective efficacy of a group. As a teacher if a group of students have a lot of collective efficacy for bullying another child, how as an outsider, can one alter their collective efficacy and get them to shift it towards something more positive or at least stop having it for being bullies? How can we get white pride fanatics who have insane levels of collective efficacy for their mission and their goal, of protecting the white race, how can you break up that collective efficacy? How can you change or limit the collective efficacy of religious extremists? Is it all about getting individuals one by one to feel less collective efficacy for the mission and more self-efficacy for something else? Is it about getting them to keep having high levels of collective efficacy but for something different more positive? Can we combat the power of collective efficacy aimed at hurt, and harm of others?

Collective efficacy and the effect of instrumentalism on our conception of experience

While talking about how collective and self efficacy lie on two different planes, I was also simultaneously thinking about Habermas' arguments on the nature of civil discourse, as Michael had discussed this with some of us a week ago. Jurgend Habermas' theory of communicative action aligns with the adaptable notions of human behavior set forth by Dewey, and talk about how true learning occurs through communicative action or developing a shared purpose, that take us beyond the often mundane, instrumental nature of brick and mortar institutions (Habermas, 1987). Creating true, reflective understandings of social studies content is epistemologically rooted in curating reflective experience, be it aesthetic, literary or theoretical, and capitalizing on the adaptive nature of the human mind to develop collective efficacy. How can we achieve this communicative action? How can we transcend instrumentalism? When we talk about the principles of Dewey, the usual response lies in the obvious idealism associated with the way in which Democracy and Education. However, when we build upon Dewey and add the feedback cycles of self-efficacy that Bandura has posited, it all starts to take collective shape when considered in an allied form.

If we want to achieve deeper levels of processing and go beyond just 'our grades', the very level of what has now been 'labeled' as performance oriented tendencies tells us that this is what we need to focus on. This (maybe subconsciously) would induce that very sense of anxiety in the classroom, as well as the thin border between resignation and total despondency that Bandura's hypothesized relationship between efficacy and outcome expectations posits in case of failure. However, when we take away the labels and arbitrary evaluations that we've assigned and look at how to create thoughtful, and as Mezirow would say 'transformative' learners, collective efficacy plays a huge role. Why you ask? Well, naturally, it's because arriving at a shared purpose and immersing oneself into a progressively developing common consciousness is associated with taking multiple, criterialist perspectives that are based on both learning and the gifts that the overworld has given us through experience (Stoel et al.,2017).

To touch on our discussions about technology, while technology is definitely a fad today, it so happens that it is associated deeply with collective efficacy in a way that is observed in practice and transcends arbitrary numbers and statistics and surveys, but needs to be documented in such forms due to the obsession we have with instrumentalism. One can say that they don't 'appreciate the disruption' that technology has caused, but the true potential that it has is just the tip of an extremely large iceberg that needs to be chipped at by both observing and subtly manipulating student experience. If we don't explore the avenues that open source forums like Reddit and MUVE's like Second Life offer to this shared purpose that can power (especially) the social studies to add meaning to the measurement we are all so obsessed with, what's the point of the very idea of developing education to reach closer to the golden age that I hope that we all hope are harbingers of? We just need more hope and less cynicism to somewhat achieve this, as well as a true desire to move beyond instrumentalism to transcend the era of 'working for an A', and our militant insistence on the existence of a spuriously large number of what we have now labeled 'evidence based practices'.

References:

Habermas, J. (1987). The Foundations of Social Science in the Theory of Communication. In THE THEORY OF COMMUNICATIVE ACTION (2). Boston: Beacon Press.3-43.

Stoel, G. L., van Drie, J. P., & van Boxtel, C. A. (2017). The Effects of Explicit Teaching of Strategies, Second-Order Concepts, and Epistemological Underpinnings on Students’ Ability to Reason Causally in History. Journal of Educational Psychology, 109(3), 321-337.

Collective efficacy, pyramid schemes, and the classroom

I found this week’s topic of collective efficacy very enlightening. As I was reading, several phenomena (if you can call it that) popped into my head and I realized that collective efficacy explained them rather well. As one example, every few weeks I am privy to an unsolicited Facebook message from at least one female acquaintance I attended high school with encouraging me to live my healthiest/happiest/fittest/financially freest life. At first, I would politely decline further contact, but now that it plagues my social feeds more and more I simply ignore it. In conversations from time to time with friends though, we would ponder how these people we know could buy into these businesses that seem so obviously to be pyramid schemes. This occurrence baffled me, at least until reading about collective efficacy. In Growing Primacy of Human Agency in Adaptation and Change in the Electronic Era (Bandura, 2002), Bandura discusses the self-regulation of health in the wake of technological innovations. While Bandura’s article preceded this plague of “network marketing,” several statements he makes helped me to understand why it works. On the topic of self-regulation of health, for instance, Bandura cites how some individuals need more support and guidance to stay on track, or be more efficacious, in the adoption of a healthy lifestyle. Behold, the power of the girls I went to high school with. All they need do is find the people on their friend lists who lack self-efficacy for lifestyle change. Arguably, however, this is exploiting those with lower self-efficacy in exchange for the promotion of the self-efficacy and collective-efficacy of those soliciting these quick fix products. From the posts I see, the girls I went to high school with highlight their sense of belonging in a group of “likeminded 18-35-year-old girl bosses dedicated to helping you live your best life.” They publish motivational posts about their new best friend Jenny who lost 75 pounds in 11 months, they post about the financial rewards for the effort they expend, and they post about believing in this system wholeheartedly. They gain self-efficacy and collective efficacy by leeching onto those with diminished self-efficacy who express interest in their silver bullet product and promise of “financial freedom.” At the risk of sounding overly cynical, I am sure that for some people it does make a meaningful difference; they get healthier and find a group of people to share this sense of collective efficacy with. For those that fail, however, the financial and efficacy losses are important to acknowledge. Bandura astutely warns to be wary of internet scam artists ready to take advantage of ill-informed consumers. As educators, how can we ensure that we are raising and teaching a generation that heeds this warning? Pyramid schemes and quick fad diets aside, the internet contains a deluge of information that children and adolescents need to know how to critically evaluate. While we may be teaching critical evaluation skills in more typical domains like history and science, are we specifically teaching students internet literacy? Could the role of the pediatrician or health and P.E. teachers evolve to encompass building students’ efficacy for things like positive body image and healthy lifestyle so that students are buffered against these quick fix diet fads that run rampant on social media? Maybe instead of playing dodgeball for two weeks, our time might be better spent teaching students to critically evaluate social media in order to help them understand how to feel efficacious and in control of their health habits. 

Proxy and Toxicity

I was reading Robin’s post and was wondering about a concept that may not actually be a thing.  Does proxy efficacy exist as a foundation for proxy agency?  If I don’t believe in my ability to affect outcomes, but I believe that the government by and large takes care of things for me, then do I have proxy efficacy rather than collective efficacy?  My perception of collective efficacy is that my contribution, along with that of others in the system, is important to accomplish the task at hand.  I’m clearly making this up…

To add to the discussion from the Exercise of human agency¹ article, I appreciated the point that collective efficacy is not the sum of individual efficacies of those who make up the group.  But also, the collective efficacy can impact the individual efficacy of a group member.  I am a part of a research group essentially made up of two teams.  One team serves as an encouragement for me.  While there have been notable challenges in our work, the team collectively discuss these issues, accepting that problems are part of the gig.  When I feel low self-efficacy (I am a newbie on the team), they give support and encouragement that builds my confidence.  I believe that I will develop and grow new skills mostly because they have told me that I will.  The second team, on the other had, has members who have high individual self-efficacy for the work that they do and the skills that they bring, but our collective efficacy (or at least my perception of it) is not only bad, but getting worse.  On our own, we get our piece of the work done, but when there is a teaming aspect, there is conflict, frustration, avoidance behaviors, and dissent.  There is blaming and angry emailing.  People take sides and throw others under the proverbial bus.  These experiences contribute to a downward spiral of collective efficacy, while pushing us toward more siloed work.

I suppose I wonder:

1.     Once trust is eroded, can collective efficacy be re-gained?

2.     Within a toxic group, can individuals with aspirations for greater collective efficacy affect change for the group as a whole?

Bandura A. Exercise of human agency through collective efficacy. Current Directions in Psychological Science. 2000;9(3):75-78.