assembly bonus effect

in groups working on a decision-making or intellectual task, an outcome that is superior to what would be achieved by the most capable member or by any simple pooling of individual member efforts. See also group synergy. [first proposed in 1964 by U.S. social psychologists Barry E. Collins and Harold Guetzkow (1915–2008)]

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Psychology term of the day

May 9th 2024

Megan’s law

an amendment to the Jacob Wetterling Crimes Against Children and Sexually Violent Offender Registration Act requiring that state registries of convicted but released sex offenders be disseminated to the public so that communities will be notified of offenders’ presence in a particular neighborhood. More formally known as the Community Notification Act, it was initially passed in New Jersey in 1994 after a repeat sex offender murdered a 7-year-old girl named Megan Nicole Kanka; it became a federal law in 1996.