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Collective motives for alcohol consumption represent a nascent field, with individual-level attributes, peer pressure and broad-level environmental elements being at the forefront of research. The purpose of this paper is to explore the role of friendships in the context of alcohol consumption and determine what group-level motives exist for alcohol consumption.

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 18 participants aged 18–30, these discussed the role the participant’s friendship group played in alcohol consumption and helped to elucidate what collective and group-level motives existed.

Group-level motives can steer a collective’s alcohol consumption by either endorsing it or degrading it, the findings revealed four group-level motives: these were, competition, conformity, hedonism, with opportunity cost receptiveness acting as a buffer.

The small sample and qualitative nature of the study means external validity still needs to be established to generalize the research to other audiences.

By unpacking group-level motives researchers can develop group-level strategies and match specialized interventions with the right priority group.

This paper is the first to address group-level motives for alcohol consumption and makes an important contribution to understanding how group-level factors can impact individuals.

The extant literature mainly focuses on the antecedents and outcomes of envy at the individual level. Workgroups have become ideal units for research on envy given the ubiquitous teamwork in organizations. This study aims to examine whether, how and when envy climate can influence group performance.

The authors analyzed data collected in three waves from a sample of 72 groups with 475 team members in full-service hotels in China.

Envy climate was negatively associated with group performance via intragroup relationship conflict. Furthermore, competitive climate moderated the effect of envy climate on intragroup relationship conflict and the indirect effect of envy climate on group performance through intragroup relationship conflict.

The present research offers organizations valuable insights into how to minimize the climate of envy and competition within a group and relieve the relationship conflict that may damage group performance.

Drawing on a social functional perspective of emotions, this study enriches the envy research by conceptualizing envy climate as a collective perception and clarifying its effect on group performance. The authors extend the understanding of envy climate by showing how a climate of envy embedded in a group influences group performance and also explain when group members may be more likely to act in a destructive way to respond to such a climate.

Purpose – This chapter reviews the authors’ research on group procedural justice and group-serving behavior. It makes the case that fairness and unfairness can both motivate group-serving behavior; the former makes group members feel good about their identity, leading them to “reward” the group, and the latter indicates a group shortcoming, leading members to “repair” the group.

Design/methodology/approach – The chapter describes several studies published elsewhere. Correlational research with employees and students examines the relationship between group procedural fairness and group members’ positive affect, which should translate into group-serving behavior. Experimental research with students investigates whether group procedural unfairness can result in group-serving behavior (measured via self-report and observed helping). Complementary findings from other authors are briefly described and discussed in support of a developed theoretical model of group procedural justice and group-serving behavior.

Findings – Group procedural fairness was more strongly related to arousing positive affect for strongly identified group members. Separately, strongly identified group members engaged in more group-serving behavior when their group had unfair rather than fair procedures.

Research limitations/implications – Possible boundary conditions for the motivating effects of unfairness are discussed (e.g., group permeability, time frame, and anonymity of unfairness). Suggestions for future research are proposed (e.g., examine the effect of justice information on group-serving behavior when group members can also modify group procedures).

Practical implications – Better understanding the effects of group procedural unfairness should influence how organizations and societies promote group-serving behavior.

Originality/value – Research on the motivating effects of both group procedural fairness and unfairness are synthesized into one theoretical model.

Purpose – This chapter highlights that we do not know why justice climate is related to various unit outcomes and proposes a number of mechanisms.

Design/methodology/approach – This chapter draws on the extant literature on justice climate, organizational climate, and a number of theories to link justice climate to unit outcomes.

Findings – We have little understanding of the mechanisms linking justice climate to unit outcomes and it is important to consider various mechanisms.

Research limitations/implications – The primary limitation of this chapter is that although we present several ideas for future research, we do not provide any new empirical findings. The primary implications have to do with specifying the theoretical mechanisms responsible for the effects of justice climate on unit outcomes.

Originality/value – The novel aspect of this chapter is that it questions why justice climate is related to several disparate outcomes and tries to take a theoretical approach to uncover the mechanisms.

Purpose – Criminal groups have long been central to explanations of crime and deviance. Yet, challenges in measuring their dynamic and transient nature meant that group-level explanations were often displaced in favor of individual-level ones. This chapter outlines how network methods provide a powerful tool for modeling the dynamic nature of criminal groups.

Approach – The chapter starts by providing a brief introduction to social network analysis, including key concepts and terminology. The chapter then focuses on the types of relational data available to study criminal groups, and how network methods can be used to delineate group boundaries. The chapter concludes by presenting a framework for understanding group dynamics from a network perspective, describing the contributions of network analysis to theories of group processes.

Findings – Network methods have provided meaningful advances to the study of group dynamics, leading scholars to revisit assumptions about the impact of group’ structure on delinquent behavior. Network studies of group dynamics have primarily focused on the cohesion–delinquency link (within-group structure) and the social contagion of conflict (between-group structure), highlighting important opportunities for the intersection of these two inquiries.

Value – Network methods provide a means to revisit and extend theories of crime and delinquency with a focus on social structure. The unique affinity between group dynamics and network methods highlights immense opportunities for expanding the knowledge of collective trajectories.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the causal correlation between the work stress of immigration officers (IOs) and the cross-level effect of social support.

A multilevel model was used to analyze the quantitative data obtained from 231 IOs in Taiwan, who served as the research objects.

From the results of this study, it was found that a positive significant relationship existed between role conflict and work stress, as well as between work stress and job burnout. Also, cross-level context and moderating effect for the relationship between social support and work stress, as well as between social support, work stress and job burnout were obtained.

This study only considered IOs in airports and ports. Therefore, it is necessary to determine if other topics of organizational behavior, such as the leadership of supervisors, organizational climate and work values of IOs, have a positive moderating effect. In this regard, it is recommended that a longitudinal study should be conducted in the future.

Purpose – The integration of librarians and technologists to deliver information services represents a new and costly organizational challenge for many library administrators. To understand how to control the costs of integration, this study uses structural contingency theory to study the coordination of librarians and technologists within the information commons.

Design/methodology/approach – This study tests the structural contingency theory expectation that an organization will achieve higher levels of performance when there is a positive relationship between the degree of workflow interdependence and the complexity of coordinative structures necessary to integrate these workflows. This expectation was tested by (a) identifying and collecting a sample of information common; (b) developing and validating survey instruments to test the proposition; and (c) quantitatively analyzing the data to test the proposed contingency theory relationship.

Findings – The contingency theory expectations were confirmed by finding both a positive relationship between coordination and interdependence and a positive relationship between perceptions of performance and degree of congruency between interdependence and coordination.

Limitations – The findings of this study are limited to both the context of an information common and the structures tested. Future research should seek to both broaden the context in which these findings are applicable, and test additional structural relationships as proposed by contingency theory

Practical implications – This study contributes to the library profession in a number of ways. First, it suggests that managers can improve IC performance by matching coordination structures to the degree of interdependence. For instance, when librarians and technologists are strictly co-located, managers should coordinate workflows using less resource-intensive policies rather than meetings. Second, the instruments developed in this study will improve the library manager's ability to measure and report unit interdependence and coordination in a valid and reliable manner. Lastly, it also contributes to the study of structural contingency theory by presenting one of the first empirical confirmations of a positive relationship between interdependence and coordination.

Originality/value – This study represents one of the first empirical confirmations of the structural contingency theory expectations of both a positive relationship between workflow interdependence and coordination, and a positive relationship between performance and coordination's fit to workflow interdependence. These findings are of value to both organizational theorists and to administrators of information commons.

The purpose of this study is to explore whether a group dynamics perspective still exists in the scientific study of groups and what factors may account for the current situation.

Alongside reflections based on my professional experience, I have analyzed the main academic journals that publish group research.

A group dynamics perspective is almost totally absent in the scientific study of groups. Contributing factors to this state of affairs are disciplinary developments in psychology (e.g. individualization, experimentalization and specialization), the demise of the status of psychoanalysis, changes in the meaning and manifestation of the “group,” and effects of New Public Management.

The study offers a critical perspective on current group research practices and considers these in a larger (social and historical) context. It advocates a group dynamics perspective for the study of groups, based on systems-psychodynamic insights.

The purpose of this paper is to report upon research undertaken on deployment of information communication technology (ICT) diffusion initiatives in the Australian construction industry. The paper seeks to explain how innovation implementation drivers and barriers facilitate diffusion at the organisational, group and individual levels.

Data from two web‐based document management case studies and one intranet document management system case study are used to analyse ICT diffusion dynamics within three large information technology (IT) literate Australian construction firms. The sample was purposefully limited to large IT‐literate construction contracting organisations with a need to use ICT for their operational effectiveness.

Constraints at the personal level include limited budget for ICT investment, commitment from other project participants, issues of ICT standardisation, and security problems. At the organisational level, constraints include basic levels computer experience, time available to learn, and the identification of clear benefits of ICT use. Constraints at the group level include time available to share information, quality of personal contact and geographical distance.

The sample was purposefully limited to large IT‐literate construction contracting organisations with a need to use ICT for their operational effectiveness.

The driver and barrier models presented indicate that ICT innovation implementation requires intense management interventions to facilitate a supportive workplace environment that strongly links personal and organisational resource investment with demonstrated outcome benefits.

This study provides rich insights of the dynamics of ICT innovation implementation. Few studies in the literature have provided such insights that link the organisational, group and individual levels.

With faster innovation and shorter product cycles, time pressure is a highly relevant factor affecting contemporary business processes. This study aims to extend prior research on the effects of velocity at the firm level by considering the effect of time pressure on knowledge transfer effectiveness (KTE) on the team level and the role of trust as a mediator of this effect.

We empirically assess the impact of time pressure on knowledge transfer effectiveness in teams. Further, we test the mediating effect of trust on this relationship. We study a sample of 285 project teams applying partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM).

The authors find that time pressure is negatively associated with KTE. Moreover, trust among team members has a complementary mediating effect on this relationship. Thus, while trust is urgently needed for enhancing KTE under time pressure, time pressure reduces trust-building too.

This study establishes empirically the importance of time pressure and trust as drivers of KTE in teams. The contribution connects the field of knowledge management to important streams in the wider business literature: organization studies, management, strategic management, project management, innovation etc. Whereas the model is parsimonious, it has high explanatory power and high generalizability to other contexts.

Team managers should take care to allow enough time for knowledge transfer within the team. This is particularly important when knowledge sharing is central, e.g. in innovation, development and change processes. If this is not possible, measures should be taken to maintain trust among team members.

Effective knowledge management enhances the performance of business entities and public-sector organizations alike. Today, both the private and public sectors are under considerable pressure to increase both efficiency and effectiveness. Effective knowledge transfer within teams is a core capability to achieve this goal. More effective organizations result in more competitive private firms, more employment opportunities and improved public services to citizens.

Time pressure is an increasingly relevant factor in contemporary business but so far little explored in research. This study extends current knowledge by considering the effect of time pressure on KTE.