Social facilitation in motor tasks: a review of research and theory

Background and purpose. To overview research and theories on the impact of social facilitation for persons performing motor tasks. Methods. A narrative review is adopted. The origins of the research tradition are presented and the different theoretical explanations are reviewed. Results and conclusions. It is noted that these explanations claim validity for both the cognitive and motor domains. Results of research are reported on the impact of the presence of others while working on different kinds of motor tasks such as coordination tasks, power and stamina tasks, and a mixture of these. These empirical findings are often in contradiction to the presented theoretical models. The paper discusses whether results of different kinds of motor tasks need different theoretical explanations. It is concluded that if any effects of the mere presence of others are to be found at all, they tend to be weak. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.