Gettin’ to Crunch Time

Throughout this season of Survivor, the tribes have gone through the group development stages. When they first got there, they were in the forming stage and the loved ones stayed with one another until they had to separate and split into their tribes. At first everyone was polite and then entered the storming stage where group members address the conflict/cohesion dialectic and the leadership/ fellowship dialectic. During the storming stage the tribe members began to experience secondary tension, which meant that the members were growing comfortable enough with one another they have gained confidence and become assertive and even aggressive. I think that tribe members resolved secondary tension by making alliances with one another and and reduced the stress of being voted off. The norming stage kind of seems to be missing among the tribes. They resolve their tensions by voting someone off or creating new alliances. The performing stage really comes out when the tribes are involved in their immunity challenges and reward challenges. The tribes adapt and change according to group needs and task requirements. The adjourning stage is when the goals have been achieved and I think that this stage happened when the tribes merged. Although it is not the main goal in the game, it is still a major accomplishment to make it that far. The hidden agenda, what people really want rather than what they say they want, in Survivor for most tribe members could be they want to win, but they say they is that they want whats best for their tribe and vote people off because they are not contributing to their tribe. Creating an alliance, becomes a group norm that each tribe has. Everyone creates alliances, hoping it will get them further in the game and closer to winning. This chapter should have been used in one of the first episodes so we could really see how the tribes went through the development stages!!