In their TED Talk, Mariano Sigman and Dan Ariely discuss how groups of people agree and make decisions. The speakers conducted a series of tests that demonstrated how breaking up big groups of individuals into smaller discussion groups led to more informed and reflective group decisions involving knowledge and even ethical issues (Ariely & Sigman, 2017). They conclude that thoughtful discussion and a range of perspectives are necessary for arriving at sound group choices.
As a final year student in nursing, during the choice of a dissertation project in our study group, we debated the causes of male infertility. The basis of the discussion was whether male fertility is genetically inherited. Observing how group decision-making operates, most members had dire symptoms of group thinking. The group secretary, James, always has stereotyped views on technical subjects and much pressure against alternative opinions. Cindy, the group’s chairperson, consistently demonstrates the illusions of vulnerability. It was interesting to view how creative ideas emerge when we discuss controversial topics as a group rather than individual decision-making.
The primary reason for the discussion was to find the major causes of male infertility. The dilemma was that the majority’s opinion argued that male infertility cannot be a genetically inheritable disease since it is not linked with any gene in the gene loci on chromosome X or Y. They argued that age, dietary habits, and lifestyle factors could cause infertility. Some members claimed that experts have confirmed that around 10 to 15% of male infertility has been genetically caused, although there is no tangible evidence to prove that.
The rest of the members stated they were not very informed about the subject since male infertility has not been thoroughly studied and understood. However, evidence suggests that infertile men are more likely to have infertile sons (Borge et al., 2018). The members laughed at the statement and argued that an infertile man would not know if his children would be infertile because he would not do not have his sons in the first place.
After a lengthy debate and careful observations of laboratory findings, there was no conclusive evidence on the causes of low-quality sperm count parameters. They argued that not in any indexes measurable could a condition caused by lifestyles such as smoking, excessive drinking, or poor diet be transferable from one father to an offspring, so they called the debate irrelevant. The debate opened a learning platform for individuals to brainstorm and provide competitive ideas. The conversations prove that collective thinking is a source of individual elevation since one can collect ideas by analyzing how other people think (Newstead, 2021).
After averaging the ideas and answers, the members gave proof to provide. From the answers, the human mind is different from one individual to another, one person can find an idea right, and the person right next to them can find the same idea very wrong. There is another dynamic view of the group members finding both arguments have merit and are more likely to reach a consensus.
Depending on the kind of ideas each member gave, the confidence levels of individuals could be measured from the group’s collective decisions and variation of opinion. According to the TED Talk video, individuals who base their arguments on opposing ends are more confident than those who base their arguments somewhere in the middle (Ariely & Sigman, 2017). However, the ones that argued distinguishably in the middle were also very confident in what they believed in and thought that both sides of the argument, whether male fertility is caused by genetic mutation or lifestyle habits, are substantial arguments that hold equal merit. The group composition could be heterogeneous since each member is critical in opinion contribution and collective effort. The group has informal leadership; therefore, members can freely debate.
References
Ariely, D., & Sigman, M. (2017). How can groups make good decisions? TED Talks. Web.
Borge, M., Ong, Y. S., & Rosé, C. P. (2018). Learning to monitor and regulate collective thinking processes. International Journal of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning, 13(1), 61-92.
Newstead, T. (2021). Being explicit about virtues: Analyzing TED talks and integrating scholarship to advance virtues-based leadership development. Journal of Business Ethics, 1-19.