Trust as a cohesive force within a group

A strong basis of team cohesion is really important in sports teams, especially in the case of those groups where high levels of cooperation are required (see the section describing interactive sports teams). There are basically two interrelated factors that mainly influence group cohesion (Nagykáldi, 1998). One of them is known as social cohesion (meaning that teammates belong to the group because they enjoy themselves as members of the same company). The other one is called task cohesion (members are committed to reach a goal together). Both should exist ideally. If we only focused on the development of social cohesion, the accomplishment of tasks would be of second importance, which would affect the performance of the team adversely even if members enjoyed themselves together. However, due to their poor results, the emotional background of such teams would also be affected with time, which could lead to the weakening of relationships at the same time.

If task cohesion were stronger within a team, there would not be any reason for members to stay together after achieving their goals. In addition to this, positive emotional ties might also encourage members to survive failures.