How is metacognitive laziness with AI mediated by groups?

I’m quite taken with the concept of ‘metacognitive laziness‘ (even if I don’t like the term). It refers to a disposition to avoid difficulty, drawing on short-term assistance of AI in superficial ways rather than engaging in the metacognitive work prompted by challenges in learning. As I summarised it a few days ago:

The experience of difficulty activates metacognition. If the students cognitively outsource in increasingly habitual ways, it doesn’t just mean they lose the learning involved in what they are outsourcing. It means they lose their capacity to tolerate difficulty, as well to respond metacognitively to that difficulty. This points to the assumption which many educators have that there is something

How is this process mediated by group work? My sense is that it can be amplified by group dynamics or mitigated by them. The group can make it easier to sit with uncertainty by establishing that other people feel a similar anxiety in the face of uncertainty. But the group can also make it harder to sit with uncertainty if it’s defined by competitive dynamics or pluralistic ignorance.

Existing conceptualisations of how students engage with models are deeply individualised. The problem is not taking the individual as a unit of action, it’s remaining there in a way that stops us teasing out how these individual user-model dynamics are shaped by the social context in which students encounter task, enact them and talk about what they’ve done.

The article reports on a series of studies showing that frightening recreational activities can increase perceived social bonding, especially when followed by reflection and discussion after the experience. It highlights how fear, physical contact, and conversation during the activity predict closeness, with post-event reflection emerging as a key factor for lasting connection.

The topic is of interest to psychology enthusiasts because it explores how shared emotional arousal and social interaction contribute to relationship dynamics, lighting up questions about bonding, communication, and the processing of emotional experiences in everyday contexts.

Article Title: The benefits of frightening activities depend on what you do afterward, according to new psychology research

Link to PsyPost Article: https://nolinkpreview.com/www.psypost.org/the-benefits-of-frightening-activities-depend-on-what-you-do-afterward-according-to-new-psychology-research/

#psychology #socialbonding #recreationalfear #emotions #fear #groupdynamics #postexperienceprocessing #bonding #communication #reflection

Side note while thinking about politics: A major problem on the left (in the USA, at least) is black-and-white thinking, often expressed as "if you're not with us, you're against us." I've seen many reasonable and even outstanding liberal ideas and politicians attacked because they aren't perfectly #progressive according to someone's definition. It's the "crabs in a bucket" mentality.

I suspect this happens partly because of group dynamics: one of the most reliable ways to improve one's status in a group (e.g. among "online liberals") is to "one-up" other people on the issues important to a group: *Oh, it's a group for lefties? Well, I can be even more left-wing than you! *

Another tried-and-true way to increase one's in-group status is to attack group members for not being groupy enough: I see your comment about progressive taxation stopped short of seizing all billionaire wealth. You talk about wealth distribution, but are you really a leftist if you aren't calling for seizing the means of production? Yes, you're a socialist, but you apparently lack the courage to demand that all current Democratic party leaders be lined up against the wall...

The result of this is a constant bickering of liberals attacking liberals for not being liberal enough. Of course I think we need this as an ongoing and healthy dialectic, but it's often not that--it's just some people finding things to criticize, probably avoiding the personal insight that they are doing this to get positive attention from other online liberals.

It's not helpful.

#SocialPsychology #GroupDynamics #groups #Democrats #VeryOnline #uspol

#UtopianMicroFiction.

A: Hey kid, how was your first day of school? What subjects will you have?

B: Oh, it was so cool. Our main subjects will be #SocialPedagogy, #GroupDynamics, #PsychoEducation, #TraumaPedagogy and #NonViolentCommunication besides #Inclusion and #Diversity, which we started with today.
Other than that we'll have #ClimateJustice, #BlackHistory, #QueerFeminism, #anarchism, #RiotTraining, #solidarity, #degrowth, #PermaCulture, #ReduceRefuseRepair and a few others.
Didn't you always tell me school didn't teach you anything for real life? Well it's not like that anymore.

#utopia #MicroFiction #FediLZ

That feeling of having forgotten to unmute yourself in a videochat - I have that in written chats and face-to-face meetings too sometimes.

#SocialAnxiety #GroupDynamics