The astonishing principle of 90-9-1 in groups over twelve

Beyond a dozen participants, we cannot follow any more the entire interactions in the group. It becomes easier thus for a member of the group not to participate unless it is noticed. If in a small group, participation is a standard and non-participation an exception, in a big group on the contrary, only those who decide to participate do it.

But those who participate are not always the same. We to get involved a lot into certain groups and not into others, according to the interest we have in the group. If the number of people who are active seems to us too low, we have a natural tendancy " to supersede". If on the contrary, more people than what seems necessary are already at work, we tend to remain inactive, even become it if we were active. This explains a very counter-intuitive rule: whatever the peolpe in a large group, the percentage of active people stays even, according to the 90-9-1 principle¹⁰:
The proactive persons who take initiatives are between one and some percent.
The reactive people who react when asked are between ten and dozens percent.
Others are not all totally inactive. Some are " observers¹¹" who follow the works of the group, use them for them, even if they do not participate. So, there is a whole gradation in the more or less active roles that a participant can play, allowing him to get involved more and more or less and less.

The percentages observed in the existing groups confirm well the principle of 90-9-1. This rule has curious implications. Let's imagine a group of hundred people. We shall have thus naturally at some non-active people, decides to exclude them to concentrate on the small group of about ten active persons. His new group will keep not the same active persons but the same percentage of active persons which plumet to... approximately one. He will well end up alone ! On the contrary, let us take a group of about fifty people. To exceed five or six reactive persons, it is necessary to make quite a lot of efforts. Let's imagine that this time we add about fifty other people even less concerned and thus who may remain rather inactive. We observe that certain people who were inactive, including in the initial group, become more active to keep the same percentage of active persons in the group. Reactive people come up to a dozen...This surprising behavior is well verified on the spot: we have generally a rough understanding of the number of members of the group who allow some to choose to become active or inactive.