Small Group Ethics

Public relations specialists are used to working with and for groups. Unique ethical issues occur within group settings that are distinct from what happens within a person or between two individuals. The hallmark of small groups is peer pressure, being forced by colleagues who are equal to each other in qualifications, abilities, maturity, and so on, to consider an alternative point of view or set of actions. Sometimes peer pressure can be positive, forcing groups to be innovative in their deliberations. At other times, peer pressure creates stagnating, predictable groupthink.

Peer pressure, actual and perceived, strongly influences ethical behavior. A study of marketing managers in the United States found that if a person perceived successful peers as behaving unethically or as having lots of opportunities to commit unethical acts, the subject was also likely to behave unethically in comparable situations.47 This study was later replicated with Israeli marketing managers, with the same results: the best predictor of ethical behavior is a person’s perception of peer behavior.48

Perceived unethical behavior by peers can become a negative, self-fulfilling prophecy. A survey of United States business executives found that most managers believed their colleagues to be far more unethical than they were themselves, giving the executives a rationale for unethical behavior.49 This harmful, downward-spiralling tendency suggests its own antidote: training programs and communication campaigns that address ethics in the workplace may correct negative misperceptions about peer behaviors. We will discuss such training programs in greater detail in this chapter.

Sometimes loyalty to the group becomes so strong that opposing views are not solicited, critical thinking is threatened, and decisions are rationalized to meet peer pressure—groupthink occurs.50 If independent thinking and freedom of choice are valued, then groupthink is unethical. If conformity and limited options are valued, then groupthink is ethical. There are a number of reasons why groupthink occurs:

1. The group, as a collective, thinks it is invulnerable and that it will protect its members from harm. Consequently, group members will bolster each other and collectively take risks that they would not take as individuals.

2. The group develops a we-versus-them mentality, with crude stereotypes of nongroup members.

3. The group defends, justifies, and rationalizes its decisions to meet group expectations.

4. Group members operate on the assumption that they are moral and ethical—that whatever they’re doing, it’s the right thing to be doing.

5. To be a good group member means self-censorship: not saying what is not wanted. Even when the group encourages free thinking—for example, in a brainstorming session—a lot of self-censorship occurs because group members want to save face and keep their colleagues from having to spend valuable time and energy discussing inappropriate issues.

6. The group most often perceives agreement and consent when there is silence, and there are many silent moments in most group meetings.

7. Direct pressure is applied when necessary to those who resist groupthink.51

Another reason groupthink is considered unethical in certain circumstances is because minority opinions are suppressed. “If some group members feel excluded, unappreciated, or powerless, it may indicate morally flawed group interactions,” according to communication scholars Jaksa and Pritchard,52 who based their argument on a principle of philosopher John Stuart Mill: “In order to find truth, we must hear all arguments in their most persuasive form.” The nineteenth century philosopher gave four rules why minority opinions should be given a full hearing:

1. The minority might be right.

2. Even if the minority view is not wholly right, it might contain elements of truth.

3. Even if the minority opinion is not right, the majority opinion will be understood better if it can be defended against a dissenting opinion.

4. If majority opinions are not openly debated, they run the risk of becoming “dead dogmas.”53