Types of Roles in Small Groups

Abstract

The types of roles played by members of small groups have been describedfrom a number of different perspectives. Most of the research has been based on laboratory or therapy-like groups in their "task-oriented " phase, after the overall purpose of the group has been given, resources supplied, and basic formal roles indicated. Informal roles tend to develop as a response to the set of formal roles. They may provide additional activities necessary for effective group functioning or they may be in opposition to the formal roles. Little attention has been paid to groups beginning de novo. However roles are described, they must be placed, eventually, along with other concepts in a comprehensive social-psychological theory. As an illustration, several category systems, derivedfrom different social-psychological perspectives, can be used to describe the form and content of formal, informal, and dramaturgical roles in small groups.

Emergent Team Roles in Organizational Meetings: Identifying Communication Patterns via Cluster Analysis

“…Second, our findings speak to the idea that team role differentiation primarily occurs through interaction among team members (Hare, 1994;Salazar, 1996). Our results suggest the informal structure and role differentiation created in these teams were based on team member interaction.…”

Group communication analysis: A computational linguistics approach for detecting sociocognitive roles in multiparty interactions

“…When individuals engage in everyday interactions, they act in ways that are both enabled and constrained by social structure: the social context, history, structures of interaction, and the attributes which individuals bring to the interaction (Gleave, Welser, Lento, & Smith, 2009;Hare, 1994;Sapru & Bourlard, 2015). In this context, social roles provide a valuable window into the underlying sociocognitive structure of group interaction, and one that researchers can use to differentiate individuals and explain the consequences of an individual's and overall group's behavior (Gleave et al, 2009;Mudrack & Farrell, 1995).…”

Effects of a social tutor on participation, sense of community and learning in online university courses

“…In recent years, the notion of assigning roles to students has been studied as a factor that supports students' interaction in online university courses (Strijbos & De Laat, 2010). Rovai (2001), inspired by Benne and Sheats (1978), described the function of roles in group-building as guiding the group towards functioning as a whole; individuals can assume roles in a group to guide their behaviour and to regulate interaction among group members (Hare, 1994). In fact, roles are designed to alter or maintain individuals' ways of working in order to strengthen, regulate and perpetuate the groups dynamics.…”

“…In addition, role takers, compared to non-role takers, tend to vary the nature of their contributions using a larger repertoire of Conversational Functions in online interactions. Functions are particular rights or duties assigned to roles which guide the role takers to interact with other community members and contribute to the conversation (Hare, 1994). However, only few studies (eg, Sansone, Ligorio, & Buglass, 2016;Xie, Yu & Bradshaw, 2014) have investigated whether roles and peer moderations can influence student participation and group cohesiveness, and no study has examined the effects of peer moderation on developing SC.…”