Social+Facilitation

__**How To Do Better In Everything**__ **What This Is** the term of __social facilitation__  refers to one’s motivation to do better in a situation where there is a need to impress the spectators. scientists have been researching the effects of social facilitation since the 1960s. scientists Robert Zajonc, Heingartner and Herman started by studying the effects on cockroaches and racing. they discovered that when individuals ran down a light tube alone they ran at a more relaxed level rather than when individuals ran in the company of others in which case they ran at a greatly increased speed. Michaels observed how inexperience pool players vastly improved their games when they were in the company of experienced players who were observing them play against each other. It has been shown that when people perform a task that they are comfortable with then they tend to do exceptionally well in the task. however on the other hand when people are forced to perform a task that they are uncomfortable with then they will tend to actually have a worse than average performance. [|__http://changingminds.org/explanations/theories/social_facilitation.htm__] **Heres How it Works** Athletes in general tend to have a more competitive nature during try outs for a season because they know they need to impress the coaches so in turn they play better to make a good impression. Robert Zajonc claims that some of the factors in one’s productivity levels are: the audiences attention, the participants comfortability level with the activity, whether the observer is a man or a woman, and even the participants mood during the activity. For example, during a race people will tend to make on average better times when there is pressure to either beat out the other participants or impress people observing them. Other experimants were conducted concluding the idea of social facilitation that can be seen on this link: [|__http://psychcentral.com/encyclopedia/2009/social-facilitation/__]

**When Push Comes To Shove** Social Facilitation is the reason for the extremely competitive nature in today’s society. We have all seen Karate Kid where the boy is creamed by another boy and then trains himself day and night in order to beat him in the end. That is the effects of social facilitation acting on the karate kid as well as the other boy. the bully wasn’t trying to overcome anything because he already assumed that he won, the karate kid knew he needed to push himself farther than ever before in order to win. in the end his determination and competitive nature allowed him to overcome his obstacle (the bully).

**Listen Up, This Applies To You** While the effects of social facilitation is seen in movies that involve beating up children in battles of honor, there are more obvious examples that happen in schools. Take Needham for example. You are surrounded with people who are just as good at the classes you take if not better. there is always pressure to do better than your classmates and get all A’s. By being surrounded by people all trying to be better than each other the competition to be the best goes way up. So much in fact that for most people the given average grade of a C would be considered a failure by most students in our school. since everyone is surrounded by straight A students most people are actually able to push themselves to perform on par if not better then those students. keep in mind that this competitive nature feeds off itself. person 1 gets a better grade than person 2. person 2 studies and strives to beat person 1 next time. person 1 then feels that they need to beat person 2 the next time. and so on. this is apparent inside the classroom as well as outside the class on the fields. Students perform perform at a higher level in practices during try outs than practices after they make a team. this is because they need to A.) impress the coaches so they will choose them B.) prove that they are better than their teammates so they will be picked to be on the better team.

 Social Facilitation is something that can cause people to improve and push themselves to break records and score higher in everyday life. if you want to see the effects in your life you can look at some of the examples listed above; during try outs, when trying out beat someone in a close race, when competing for just make the cut in sports and in school, or just getting a better grade than your best friend just to rub it in their face. whatever the situation make sure that it is performing something that you are comfortable with. if you are terrified of public speaking you won’t be able to win a state conference debate just because you are acting according to social facilitation. bottom line is if you put in 100% of your effort, your competitive nature will give you that extra push that will land you in 1st place.
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