Group Dynamics

Last night Kate and Cindy and I drove up to Dunwoody and met with Mom and Dad and piled into Momma's Toyota Avalon and drove over to Olive Garden Italian Restaurant, where we met Kevin, Susan and the girls. After nearly thirty minutes of waiting, I was able to consider certain evidence about the workings of group dynamics in the context of a fairly busy restaurant.

Since all of the children are gone from home, my family (Mom, Dad, Tom, Frank and Susan) is normally rather quiet and reduced to the individual characteristics of the original components: mom and dad. Dad is usually quite quiet, his introspective nature predominating. Mom, on the other hand, is more effusive and seems to spend quite a bit of the day in conversation with her friends and family. The combination causes a relatively even mix of silence and easy noise.

Normally in my house, I am more introspective and less effusive than Cindy, and Kate is a good mix, enjoying her ability to find comfort in her own company. Whereas, Cindy always wants to be surrounded by the crowd. That doesn't mean that Cindy always wants a party around her. But at the same time, when the three of us are together, we can create some noise of our own. We all seem to be able to grab the reins of a group, from time to time, and join in the party. But with three adults in the house predominately, it seems that we are normally more low key than other families where the children are younger and less controlled or where the individual components are more outgoing.

Susan was always pretty introspective and quiet in our original family. She was more prone to be by herself or with her friends in the neighborhood. She has never seemed to want to be in the center of attention in her grouping, and Kevin, being more alpha than beta in the mix, still mixes comfortably in a crowd. Neither tend to want to take over a conversation, but more willing to participate on an equal footing.

Of course, you have to add the two girls to the mix. A three and two year old are going to effect the dynamics of a group. The first effect is the attraction factor, in which the two girls seem to attract the attention of the other members of the group. The other factor is the less-controlled behavior, which is probably normal in most two and three year olds, but causes the adults to become involved in the act of controlling the behavior of the children.

Last night, we were caught in an environment in which the mixture could cause the whole situation to spin out of control. When we got to the restaurant, there was to be a thirty minute wait. There were other large groups waiting in the waiting area of the restaurant, with their own differing mixes of introverts and extroverts. Then there was the normal inability for the girls to keep their behavior under control for long lengths of time. This caused a number of the adults to invest more time in keeping the children occupied and under control.

That doesn't mean that adult interaction ground to a halt. On the contrary, all of the adults in our group are relatively cordial and show an interest in the others. We mix well and don't ordinarily cause a problem with the group. However, there were a lot of variables involved in this project and there was no telling what was going to cause the mix to drift off.

The first variable involved the other groups in the small area in which we found ourselves. Immediately next to us was a hispanic extended family group, which took up space next to us. In some sense, we were interlopers on their territory since they were here first. However, they accomodated to our incoming group and there wasn't a big problem with the addition of our group into the mix. At the same time, there was too little room for the now expanded group to adjust to the new size of the group and the reduced size of our area and certain problems would be encountered.

For instance, the first problem involved trying to get to the restroom, which was immediately behind where the other family ahd retreated to make room for our family. This problem was ultimately accomodated when two of us were able to make our way through the crowd to the facilities. At this point, several of the men, pushed their way out of the immediate family group and found sanctuary just off of the family group. This accomodated the larger group, even if it caused group interactions to be truncated to some extent.

Meanwhile, the girls were given coloring books and crayons with which to entertain themselves, even while they continued to take the attention of the adults away from the adult interaction. Nevertheless, the larger group seemed to coexist rather well, even though the young girls, and there were young girls in both groups, continued to get more restless as the waiting period continued.

Fortunately, space in the restaurant was found in less time than was originally estimated. This allowed the larger group to be split apart and accomodated into the space in the restaurant and handled efficiently.

Interestingly, I did notice more than two or three tables of patrons staring at us apprehensively as we made our way to our table. I don't know if the size of our group worried them or the presence of the little girls. It is also possible that they were just curious.

At any rate, we were then positioned at a combination of tables, pulled into one long rectangle, at which my dad sat at the head, furthest away from Kevin, Susan and the girls. Meanwhile, my mother and wife took the medium position between Kate and myself and the girls. This enabled them to interact with us, which really was reduced, and to assist with the two girls.

Meanwhile, there were now more groups in the territory in which we now found ourselves. Particularly notable was the group of adults to the rear of my father, at our end of the table. This group, the Yankee group, was rather loud and extroverted. I noticed that several of the group predominated. Particularly what appeared to be the father and one of the sons. During our time in proximity to this group, two voices were dominant, even though other members of the group would take the lead from time to time. At the same time, their noise level was rather higher than ours during most of the meal, although they didn't seem to notice whether their noise level was predominate in the room, for which of a good bit of the time it was, or if they were bothering anyone. Both Kate and I, being nearer to this group, took notice of this group as their noise tended to encroach on our conversations and our general group harmony.

Meanwhile, the waiter arrived and began to accomodate our needs. Overall the time of dining went smoothly and there weren't many times in which a long wait for anything seemed to exacerbate the situation.

During the meal, which passed at a comfortable pace, the members of our group seemed to interact well and no one seemed to predominate for the lead in the conversation. The ingestion of our meals caused us to direct our attention partially away from each other and more toward the eating of the meals. Even during the actual meal, conversation and interaction proceeded cordially, without any break in the harmony of the group. It was only toward the end when the girls finished their meals and began to get restless to sit in their chairs and found their way to the floor, when the situation began to unravel and the adults took a more united and concerted effort to control the girls, rather than interact with each other.

At the end, the adults seemed pleased with the ability of our group to enter into the environment of the restaurant and create a harmonious group experience. There were moments of disharmony, caused predominately by interactions with other groups. However, all in all, the groups accomodated each other and did not create conflict in the environment.

I would have to say that our extended group has become well integrated, which allows us to interact in a positive manner, even when faced with difficulties caused by large crowds and small spaces, moderate waits for accomodation and the normal problems associated when groups are required to integrate together in what is a strange environment filled with intangibles and factors out of the control of the individual members of the group.

We had a nice meal.