Publisher
University of Tennessee at Chattanooga
Place of Publication
Chattanooga (Tenn.)
Abstract
The purpose of this study is to examine the effects that political affiliation and perceived exclusion have on workplace productivity (an adaptation of previous work conducted by Stewart, 2025). Specifically, the impact of participants’ similar or different affiliations with teammates and inclusion or exclusion during a shared task on workplace contribution. Nadler (2016) explains that people have been shown to be less helpful towards outgroups if the “costs for non-helping are low” (p.64). Thus, the proposed study will attempt to examine if political affiliation is enough to hinder an individual’s likelihood of assistance on work-related projects. Participants will report their affiliation during a series of questions described as a personality assessment. Before they begin the game, they will be given personality forms for their teammates and asked to visualize what they may look like. Then, they will play a game of Cyberball (OSU Version 6.0, 2026) with two other “participants” (computer programs). Participants will be randomly assigned to a condition in a 2x2 design: ingroup/outgroup & inclusion/exclusion in the Cyberball game. After completing the game, participants will be assessed on their feelings of belonging, feelings towards their teammates, and their willingness to help said teammates with a work-related project. They will also rate how much they like each teammate on a 1-8 Likert scale. It is expected that participants will be more willing to help those similar and less willing to help those who are dissimilar. A 2x2 factorial ANOVA will be used to assess this hypothesis. Results should find a significant difference in participants favoring the ingroup vs. the outgroup. Data collection has not begun, but will begin once IRB approval is received (expected n=100). Results may have implications for future research into workplace relations between ingroups and outgroups, as well as overcoming subject variables (e.g., political affiliation) that induce tension.
Date
November 2026
Subject
Industrial and organizational psychology
Document Type
posters
Language
English
Rights
http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Included in
Politics in the Projects: Examining Political Affiliation’s Effects on Workplace Efficiency
The purpose of this study is to examine the effects that political affiliation and perceived exclusion have on workplace productivity (an adaptation of previous work conducted by Stewart, 2025). Specifically, the impact of participants’ similar or different affiliations with teammates and inclusion or exclusion during a shared task on workplace contribution. Nadler (2016) explains that people have been shown to be less helpful towards outgroups if the “costs for non-helping are low” (p.64). Thus, the proposed study will attempt to examine if political affiliation is enough to hinder an individual’s likelihood of assistance on work-related projects. Participants will report their affiliation during a series of questions described as a personality assessment. Before they begin the game, they will be given personality forms for their teammates and asked to visualize what they may look like. Then, they will play a game of Cyberball (OSU Version 6.0, 2026) with two other “participants” (computer programs). Participants will be randomly assigned to a condition in a 2x2 design: ingroup/outgroup & inclusion/exclusion in the Cyberball game. After completing the game, participants will be assessed on their feelings of belonging, feelings towards their teammates, and their willingness to help said teammates with a work-related project. They will also rate how much they like each teammate on a 1-8 Likert scale. It is expected that participants will be more willing to help those similar and less willing to help those who are dissimilar. A 2x2 factorial ANOVA will be used to assess this hypothesis. Results should find a significant difference in participants favoring the ingroup vs. the outgroup. Data collection has not begun, but will begin once IRB approval is received (expected n=100). Results may have implications for future research into workplace relations between ingroups and outgroups, as well as overcoming subject variables (e.g., political affiliation) that induce tension.
Department
University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. Dept. of Psychology