Social Facilitation, explained.
Social facilitation concerns changes in performance in the presence of others. Zajonc's dominant-response account explains why an audience can help a familiar response but impair a task requiring a different response.
Why it happens
An authored habit chooses A with logistic probability based on habit strength. Audience boost adds to the same log-odds. The usual task requires A; the reversed task requires B. Compare expected correctness and a paired sample of 100 attempts.
Social facilitation concerns changes in performance in the presence of others. Zajonc's dominant-response account explains why an audience can help a familiar response but impair a task requiring a different response.
Read the result
Read the required response before comparing accuracy. The audience strengthens A in both tasks, but the same change helps one instruction and hurts the other.
A worked example
One habit under two instructions
Leave habit strength at one and audience boost at one; the habitual A response becomes more likely when the audience term is added.
Simulate attempts when A is correct, then reverse the instruction so B is correct without changing the habit.
The expected audience effect reverses direction. This follows the authored response rule, not a measurement of your anxiety or skill.
OPTIONAL DEEPER DETAILGo deeper: inside the model
Inside this model
An authored habit chooses A with logistic probability based on habit strength. Audience boost adds to the same log-odds. The usual task requires A; the reversed task requires B. Compare expected correctness and a paired sample of 100 attempts.
Where this idea is useful
A practical use
A well-rehearsed routine and a new procedure can respond differently to being watched.
A common misconception
“An audience always improves performance.”
Zajonc's dominant-response account distinguishes whether the strengthened response is appropriate. Other explanations and real task conditions can also affect performance.
What this explanation leaves out
- The audience coefficient is invented, not an estimated effect size. This isolates one historical account rather than all mechanisms of social facilitation. No live audience observes the reader, and the simulation does not predict personal performance.
Are these percentages Zajonc's measured effect sizes?
No. They come from a transparent logistic teaching rule with invented coefficients, so readers can inspect the proposed mechanism without mistaking it for an empirical forecast.
Is the response you are most likely to make actually the response the present task requires?
Associated thinkers
Associations marked provisional are awaiting source review.
Further reading
Explore the original research or the teaching reference behind this experiment.