The cognitive underpinnings of effective teamwork: A meta-analysis.

Abstract

Major theories of team effectiveness position emergent collective cognitive processes as central drivers of team performance. We meta-analytically cumulated 231 correlations culled from 65 independent studies of team cognition and its relations to teamwork processes, motivational states, and performance outcomes. We examined both broad relationships among cognition, behavior, motivation, and performance, as well as 3 underpinnings of team cognition as potential moderators of these relationships. Findings reveal there is indeed a cognitive foundation to teamwork; team cognition has strong positive relationships to team behavioral process, motivational states, and team performance. Meta-analytic regressions further indicate that team cognition explains significant incremental variance in team performance after the effects of behavioral and motivational dynamics have been controlled. The nature of emergence, form of cognition, and content of cognition moderate relationships among cognition, process, and performance, as do task interdependence and team type. Taken together, these findings not only cumulate extant research on team cognition but also provide a new interpretation of the impact of underlying dimensions of cognition as a way to frame and extend future research. Keywords: team cognition, mental model, transactive memory, shared cognition, meta-analysisWinning is about having the whole team on the same page.-Bill WaltonIf everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking.-George PattonThe reality for many organizations today is that work has become complex enough to require the use of teams at all hierarchical levels. Organizational success hinges upon the ability of teams to collaborate effectively and work efficiently toward solving complex problems. Therefore, understanding how information is collectively processed has become critical (Hinsz, Tindale, & Vollrath, 1997). As the opening quotes illustrate, there are commonly held beliefs that effective teamwork requires members to hold similar cognitive structures, and also those suggesting distinctive knowledge configurations are key. Consistent with these commonsense views of cognition, researchers have invoked constructs such as shared mental models (Cannon-Bowers, Salas, & Converse, 1993) and transactive memory systems (Moreland, Argote, & Krishnan, 1996) to examine the role of emergent collective cognition in team functioning. Since the early 1990s, investigators have attempted to uncover the importance of collective cognition using a variety of conceptualizations, empirical methods, and research strategies. Despite this substantial progress, the substantive and methodological differences across studies present a challenge for discerning a clear pattern of relationships in a way that enables research in this area to move forward (CannonBowers & Salas, 2001).In the current study, we used meta-analysis to empirically organize prior work on the basis of underlying dimensions of cognition, team features, and study characteristics. In doing so, we h...

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