Team Production and Gift Exchange

 After reading three articles regarding sharing the marbles, fairness, and altruism, I found it really interesting to learn about children's different behaviors towards others based on the situation and how their behaviors are related to our society and my experiences in team production and gift exchange. In the article about sharing the marbles, there was one experiment where children needs to pull the ropes to get marbles. If both children pull the ropes at the same time, one will get one marble where the other will get three marbles. However, the one who gets three marbles will share one marble to the other since they both have done works together, meaning "share-the-spoils" button is pressed. Two children collaborated to produce gain from the action, so "rich" kid is willing to share the gain as gift exchange. Regarding the gift exchange in the team production, it is the social behavior where teammate voluntary deliver good or service.  In this example, it was easily distinguishable that the work was evenly shared with the same effort. In the real word, it is extremely hard to evenly divide the work with the same effort in the team production. However as we discussed how successful team works earlier, members need to have common commitment to working relationships and should be able to count other members as accountable to be successful team.  For example, in the group project, there are various tasks that members should complete with different amount effort to put in. Obviously, most members want to be in charge of the least effort required unless they are really passionate or interested in. It is hard to fairly distribute the workload among members. So, members can be unsatisfied with having the same grade or result on the team project since members can think that they have put more effort than certain members and it is unfair to share the result of the work or get the same grade. It commonly happens in college, there are always some students who would take advantage of getting the same grade after all.

The article regarding fairness suggests that how human being wants to be treated equally as others and how humans feel jealous to others when they think that they weren't rewarded or treated fairly. I do agree that people wants to be treated fairly. I think the word “fairness” is a relative term since the one decides the treatment was fair or not is ultimately depends on the one who decide, meaning there is no discrete meaning of fairness. For example, one can think that it is fair if one doesn’t know how others get treated but once the one know how others get treated, the one will start to compare and can think it is unfair considering other circumstances. For example, when I was in group project with other college students, the work is divided in first-come-first-served. So, when one student asked in group chat dividing the individual tasks, I was in the middle of the RSO meeting and I had to do the one was left, which I thought that the workload was relatively higher than others and was unfair to do so. I wonder what is the most “rightful” way to divide the work in team for the betterment of the team. I think the member who is confident or more professional than others in the team should be in charge of it. However, members tend to act selfish in the team.

The article regarding the altruism claims that all people have an aspect of altruism of helping others  without expecting any compensations. Our society was built with the assumption where people are fundamentally selfish. They make decisions to maximize their self-interest. When I was in high school, I used to volunteer at Humane Society to walk dogs during weekends, because I love the dogs. I didn’t expect any compensations from walking the dogs. I didn’t write in my resume to look good when applying college. I just thought that walking the dog is beneficial to dogs and kind actions to the dogs. From this, I think people can act with altruism if they have passionate about it. My mom was high school teacher for a long time and after she retired she would volunteer at the organization to tutor students who needs financial aid to get educated with no cost. However, if people think about what they would get out from the action, there will be some kind of expectations on compensation which is no longer altruism. In team production, if the members of team are passionate about the work and strong commitment into the team, members will act with altruism. In the organization that my mom volunteered, there were many members who are willing to provide gift exchange to students who needs help with the education. The organization was supported by government and many retired teachers volunteer at the organization to help students. Volunteers at the organization collaborated well to help students get educated. With abundant volunteers, students can be well-educated despite of their financial hardships.

People tend not to be motivated to work harder if there is no compensation in our society. However, I also think that people were originally born with love and care to others. I believe that being a good citizen to help others and provide gift exchange is important to make the caring and supportive environment.

Comments

  1. Professor ArvanNovember 4, 2019 at 10:08 AM

    Let me remark about your "group project" for classes and the dividing up the work. First, I wonder if the pieces just fit together like in a jigsaw puzzle, or if they need to be modified somewhat to make a coherent whole. If the latter, who does that? It is somebody's individual task, or does the entire team partake in producing a smooth final product? I would argue that if there is no need to coordinate after the individual pieces are done, this really isn't group work. It's just being labelled that way.

    Also, I want to note that in the class example, there is no "opt in" but in your dog walking example, there was such an opt in. So one wants to know whether you can get altruistic behavior in the first case. I think it is possible sometimes, but the person who behaves altruistically otherwise need their needs to be satisfied. If those needs are not satisfied one might reasonably expect the person to act selfishly.

    About your mother's volunteering, I would if you've ever asked her if she was taught to do this - by her parents, her teachers, or by somebody else. I know of others who volunteer this way and for me it is an interesting question whether it is a learned response or if it is was always in the person to do something like this. It seems to me that for some people the volunteering gives their lives meaning - provided that their basic needs have already been provided. You might ask your mother whether she feels the same way about it.

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    1. Lawrence Klein Econ 490 fall 2019November 4, 2019 at 4:38 PM

      For the group project, the one who sent in the group chat divided the work in parts and other members agreed to it while I was in the meeting. So, I took the part with the solution part which was most important and required lots of effort to put in. Later, we had to meet once and talk about my part if other group members are agreeing on my part and develop further with members, but this was it. However, I thought that dividing the workload wasn't fair since the importance of each tasks were differ. For some members, they just had to search information and summarize while I had to come up with some solution with research.

      Now I acknowledge that there is no "opt in" in altruistic behavior. For me, I love the dogs, and I enjoy myself walking the dogs and helping them to somewhat "enjoy" their dog life at shelter, which is meaningful voluntary action for me.

      I asked my mom about volunteering today, and she said that teaching students who needs help in their education is meaningful to her. She has been fulfilled with education in her whole life (as the fact, her father was principal of high school), and she would like to share the education opportunity with others. I guess her volunteering could be also seen as learning behavior from my grandfather. However, I believe her motivation to share the education can be seen as altruistic behavior.

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