title: Utilities of gossip across organizational levels : Multilevel selection, free-riders, and teams.
abstract: Gossip is a subject that has been studied by researchers from an array of disciplines with various foci and methods. We measured the content of language use by members of a competitive sports team across 18 months, integrating qualitative ethnographic methods with quantitative sampling and analysis. We hypothesized that the use of gossip will vary significantly depending on whether it is used for self-serving or group-serving purposes. Our results support a model of gossip derived from multilevel selection theory that expects gossip to serve group-beneficial rules when rewards are partitioned at the group level on a scale that permits mutual monitoring. We integrate our case study with earlier studies of gossip conducted by anthropologists, psychologists, and management researchers.
authors.affiliation: Department of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1180 Observatory Drive, 5240 Social Science Building, 53706, Madison, WI. kmkniffin@wisc.edu.
authors.forename: Kevin M
authors.initials: KM
authors.lastname: Kniffin
authors.affiliation: State University of New York, Binghamton.
authors.forename: David Sloan
authors.initials: DS
authors.lastname: Wilson
keywords: Gossip; Multilevel selection theory; Organizational behavior; Organizational levels; Social control