Investigating social loafing in conducting an undergraduate thesis among student-researchers in UM Tagum College: a mixed-methods inquiry

Abstract

Social Loafing refers to an individual's tendency to exert less effort when working with groups than when working alone. This behavior has been regarded as a ‘social cancer’ that negatively affects individuals, organizations, and society. While there is research on social loafing in the workplace, there appears to be an apparent lack of knowledge, particularly in national and local settings, when it comes to studies pertaining to social loafing in educational contexts. This mixed-methods sequential explanatory research study sought to determine the level of social loafing and uncovered the lived experiences of student-researchers who encounter social loafing members in conducting an undergraduate thesis. In the first phase, a survey method was used to collect quantitative data from randomly selected 385 student-researchers at UM Tagum College. Data underscored an overall low level of social loafing among the student-researchers based on the descriptive analysis, particularly using mean as the statistical tool. Moreover, it was also found that although the preceding results showed that social loafing among the majority of groups was less observed, isolated cases of groups encountering social loafing members in conducting an undergrad thesis still prevail. In the second phase, qualitative responses using in-depth interviews and focus group discussion were gathered from 14 key participants selected through criterion sampling. The gathered data underwent a thematic analysis where essential themes emerged related to the queries on each research question. According to the participants, they experienced a sense of regret in group selection as they were caught up with various negative experiences in dealing with social loafers in the group, along with experiencing emotional distress and unfair distribution of tasks. On the other hand, participants shared that immersing in entertainment, expressing sentiments, and establishing agreements were among their coping strategies to deal with social loafing in the group. The results were discussed along with practical implications, limitations of the study, and future directions.