Leadership and voluntary seating choice.

Summa~y.-55 professional persons at a community mental health workshop were Ss in a study to determine the relationship between group judgments of those playing major leadership roles and the tendencies of leaders voluntarily to occupy head seats at mealtimes. A low, positive relationship was found. A high relationship was found bemeen judgments of staff and participants on perceived leaders. It is accepted in our culture that a group leader typically occupies the head of a table or ocher focal position in intexpersonal interactions. Such seating rypically provides the opportunity to communicate with the largest number of persons present. There is the further qualification that, when a person takes this seat, he is perceived by others as occupying a leadership role. The voluntary choosing of focal seating positions may indicate a willingness or a desire to play a leadership role. Bass and Klubeck (1952) testing a hypothesis of Steinzor (1950) studied the effects of seating position on leadership emergence in leaderless-group discussions. Two seating arrangements were utilized, a rectangular table with four chairs on either side and an inverted V-arrangement with six or seven chairs. For two of seven groups, when balanced for previous leadership status, one position proved significant. In a study designed to test the hypothesis that seaung arrangements influence the emergence of leadership, Howell and Becker (1962) suggested that spatial position ~n the group was a major factor in determining emergencc of leadership. They arranged persons around a table so chat rwo persons would be on one side and three on the other. Their hypothesis was that the rwoperson side would develop more leaders than the three-person side. Fourteen persons emerged as leaders from the mo-seat positions but only six from the three-person side. Individuals who attempt to avoid leadership positions typically place themselves distant from those spots where a focus of attention might occur. This also lowers their potential for communication and, using a variety of measures to assess leadership as, for example, a number of interactions directed to and from a particular individual, this seating factor would be of critical importance. It is difficult to sit in the middle of a group and not receive some remarks. The present study was undertaken to determine the relationship between leadership and voluntary seating at head positions during meal times. Ss were 55 professional persons (41 participants, 14 staff) in the field of mental health. They were psychiatrisrs, psychologists, social workers, administrators, nurses, and technicians, working in the m~ntal health centers, hospitals, and universities. All were attending a week-long workshop on experimental learning and community mental hcalth held in a rural North Carolina setting which afforded maximum contact berween participants and minimal intrusion by outsiders and outside activities. Data were obtained by two methods. On the last full day of the workshop, participnts and staff were asked to list those persons they felt were the true leaders in the community. The workshop was not staff designed. Participants were required to design the laboratory experience. For this reason, it was felt that the staff of 14 persons would not be inordinately represented in leadership roles, a fact subsequently borne out by the data. Data on seating arrangements were obtained by observing the dining room behavior for the entire group during the full period of the workshop. Serving was family style and