Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascoes [Paperback]

Irving L. Janis (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 349 pages
• Publisher: Cengage Learning; 2 edition (May 19, 1982)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0395317045
• ISBN-13: 978-0395317044
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #60,017 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Extremely important and underrecognized study of groups, July 29, 2001

By 

Russell Conte "Russ Conte" (Forest Park, IL) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascoes (Paperback)

Irving L. Janis culls together evidence regarding three fiascoes, the Bay of Pigs invasion, Pearl Harbor, and the United States' invasion into North Korea, and contrasts those with the Cuban Missile Crisis and Marshall Plan. The bottom line is that the first three incidents were examples of groupthink, the last two were able to avoid this problem.

Groupthink is the process described by Janis when a group follows a certain set of patterns that result in disastrous consequences. Clearly if the same group patterns were applied to the Cuban Missile Crises that were used in the Bay of Pigs, the world might well have been destroyed by nuclear war. The possible consequences for groups are enormous.

When a group, whether it is a business, church, school, little league, not for profit, or other organization, knows how to avoid groupthink, it can come to a much better decision for the group itself, as well as those the group represents. Janis provides the means to help groups accomplish this very important goal. This is material from which any group can benefit, if they chose to put it into practice.

I recommend this work very highly to anyone who works with groups of any kind.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A classic work in decision-making, January 3, 2008

By 

Steven A. Peterson (Hershey, PA (Born in Kewanee, IL)) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascoes (Paperback)

When you fill a room with smart, capable people, why do decisions sometimes go so wrong? Janis has one hypothesis: They can become victims of "groupthink." Groupthink refers to (Page 9) ". . .deterioration of mental efficiency, reality testing, and moral judgment that results from in-group pressures." Janis describes the dynamic thus (Page 5):

"In studies of social clubs and other small groups, conformity pressures have frequently been observed. Whenever a member says something that sounds out of line with the group's norms, the other members at first increase their communication with the deviant. . .But if they fail after repeated attempts, the amount of communication they direct toward the deviant decreases markedly. The members begin to exclude him. . . . [T]he more cohesive the group and the more relevant the issues to the goals of the group, the greater is the inclination of the members to reject a nonconformist." In short, groups will tend to reinforce their own views and reject the words of those who disagree. In this case, members of the group become "conformist to some conformity."

Janis uses several case studies of what he considers to be "groupthink"--The Bay of Pigs invasion, the escalation of the Korean War in 1950, the attack on Pearl Harbor while the "fortress slept," and escalation of the Viet Nam War. In each instance, according to Janis, top decision-makers walled themselves off from dissenting voices and tended to reinforce one another's preexisting positions. In counterpoint are two successes, where groupthink did not triumph--the Cuban Missile Crisis and the development of the Marshall Plan.

The thesis may be a bit simplistic, but it is abundantly clear from this book and from what we see around us that groupthink can be problematic. I suspect that one could argue that decisions such as the following, which appear to be one poor decision on top of another, may be examples of this phenomenon at work: Jimmy Carter's failed effort at a rescue mission to liberate the hostages in Iran; the plan to attack Iraq without any serious planning for what would happen afterwards; the dividing up of the Middle East into artificial countries after World War I. Readers can try to think of other examples, too--whether in politics, in their workplace, or in any other location where group decision-making takes place.

What to do? Some point out Franklin Roosevelt's style of getting input from many different advisors, this hearing an array of voices (although in the run up to Pearl Harbor, one doesn't find much of this in the President's Inner Circle). In the last chapter, Janis provides a number of suggestions as to how decision-making can be structured so as to reduce the odds of groupthink occurring (e.g., don't have the leader express preferences until all voices have been heard; have the leader encourage questions to be raised and then pay attention to those who dissent and taker their arguments seriously). These may not be earth shaking ideas, but they would, in Janis' view, at least reduce the odds of dire consequences coming from groupthink.

The first version of this book came out in the early 1970s, but it is still timely today.

16 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is a classic of social psychology, June 12, 2002

By 

Bernard M. Patten "Book worm" (Seabrook, TX United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascoes (Paperback)

This classic of social psychology is based on the idea that people in groups might think differently and by implication less well than they would have thought as individuals on the same issue at the same time. That is probably true for some groups at some times just as it is also probably true that some groups at some times might actually think better than any individual member of that group. In fact, most of the evidence cited in this book supports the idea that group thinking, like thinking in general, goes awry when there is a failure to evaluate all the available evidence for relevance and sufficiency in quality, quantity, and weight. When a group or an individual fails to evaluate the evidence, then the group or the individual reaches a decision not justified by the data and vice versa. Failure to perceive the reality, as demonstrated by evidence, has tremendous adverse consequences as is so well illustrated by Janis' detailed account of the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Correct evaluation of the data, as demonstrated by evidence, has tremendous beneficial consequences as is so well illustrated by Janis' detailed account of the Cuban Misssile crisis. In fact, the fascinating parts of this book relate to the detailed analysis of group decisions in history, a reason enough to buy and read this fine work despite the price. Incidentally, Gilbert Murray has sought to explain the group cohesiveness thing by another myth which he calls "the groping of a lonely-souled gregarious animal to find its herd or its herd-leader." But however we attempt to account for the craving for unity in some groups, it seems to be a deeply rooted human irrational demand. Like James' "sentiment of rationality," it is a sentiment and a need long before it is justified by any discoverable facts. Our duty is to be on guard against it. Groupthink, this classic book, should boost our defenses.