Two Field Experiments on Self-Selection, Collaboration Intensity, and Team Performance

Fischer, Mira; Rilke, Rainer Michael; Yurtoğlu, B. Burçin

doi:10.2139/ssrn.3590900

Cited by 4 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…The process leading to group composition is called the group formation, which is a critical phase within collaborative learning [22]. When strategically employed, it can improve group performance [39,40].…”

Section: Theoretical and Empirical Background 21 Collaborative Writin...mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Regarding the impact of student-selected versus teacher-assigned group formation on the collaborative process, students are more positive when collaborating with self-selected group partners as opposed to teacher-assigned group partners. More specifically, several studies have elicited that students experience more enjoyment, supportive behavior, and at-ease communications [23,40,44]. However, in other studies, students in self-selected groups realized that their partner, despite being a good friend, was not a good collaboration partner [41,45].…”

Section: Group Formationmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Unknown Is Not Chosen: University Student Voices on Group Formation for Collaborative Writing

Putzeys,

Van Keer,

De Wever

2023

Education Sciences

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University students are frequently required to collaborate, often in the form of collaborative writing tasks. The process as well as the outcomes of the collaboration depend on choices made during the group formation phase. Studies on why students select partners for collaborative writing tasks are, however, lacking. Therefore, the present study aims to gain insights into (1) university students’ preferences with regard to teacher-assigned and self-selected group formation, (2) which motives they take into account when self-selecting a partner, and (3) the degree to which students select a partner similar to themselves. Sixteen dyads collaboratively wrote a research paper. Prior to the collaboration, 30 students individually completed questionnaires and 28 students were individually interviewed. The findings show that most students have mixed opinions regarding teacher-assigned or self-selected group formation (n = 18), while the others bar one prefer to self-select a partner (n = 9). Students’ main motive for self-selecting is familiarity, and, more in particular, prior collaboration experience with a specific partner. Other motives include friendship, ability, convenience, and attitude. Furthermore, students tend to select a partner with a similar attitude, ability, task approach, and perspective towards the content of the task. Predictability seems to be the most important driver for self-selection.

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Section: Theoretical and Empirical Background 21 Collaborative Writin...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Group Formationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Unknown Is Not Chosen: University Student Voices on Group Formation for Collaborative Writing

Putzeys,

Van Keer,

De Wever

2023

Education Sciences

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“…Although we acknowledge that comparing teams of two and three individuals does not inform us about the performance of larger teams with even more members, we are confident that the opportunity to study behavior in a controlled workplace setting allows us to establish credible evidence regarding our main research questions. In particular, we can exogenously assign teams to identify the causal effect on outcomes, such as worker productivity, which appears necessary for empirical identification given that endogenous team formation is a relevant phenomenon in workplace contexts (Bäker & Mertins, 2013; Büyükboyaci & Robbett, 2019; Chen & Gong, 2018; Fischer et al, 2020; Kölle, 2017; Kuhn & Villeval 2015). The experimental evidence informs us about possible free‐riding after an increase in the team size and the occurrence of peer effects as a way to compensate for free‐riding.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Under (peer) pressure: Experimental evidence on team size and task performance

Chadi

Homolka

2023

Manage Decis Econ

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Causal evidence for the effect of team size on performance is lacking despite the high relevance of this question. From an economic perspective, one would expect performance incentives to decrease with increasing team size, but the psychological phenomenon of peer effects could mitigate the free‐rider problem. To analyze the behavioral implications due to changes in team size, we exploit a rich dataset from a controlled experiment with teams of either two or three participants of a university research project performing a real‐effort task. Our study provides three main findings. First, increasing team size does not change team performance on average, which is a robust result, be it across performance dimensions and even when introducing pay inequality between two work periods. Second, positive performance spillovers from peer to peer alleviate the free‐rider problem when team size increases. Third, changes in peer pressure due to changes in the transparency of others' performance could explain the variation in peer effects across team size. In contrast to discussions in previous literature, our evidence points to a potentially negative role of peer pressure for team performance. While lower peer pressure in teams of three allows for more positive performance spillovers, a high‐skilled peer in a team of two seems to pressure the other team member to produce more mistakes instead of more work output in high quality.

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“…Alternatively, we can ask students to self-select their teams. Unfortunately, this often results in unbalanced teams (Layton et al, 2010;Post et al, 2020;Fischer et al, 2020) or situations where students are singled out because they do not know others in the class or do not get along with them. Ideally, we would like to form teams based on specific pedagogical objectives that the instructor identifies and elicit additional information needed from the students, whether it be their traits, attitudes, skills or preferences.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…, 2010; Post et al. , 2020; Fischer et al. , 2020) or situations where students are singled out because they do not know others in the class or do not get along with them.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Design guidelines and research directions for team analytics

Hui

2022

IJILT

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PurposeThe purpose of this work is to illustrate the processes involved in managing teams in order to assist designers and developers to build software that support teamwork. A deeper investigation into the role of team analytics is discussed in this article.Design/methodology/approachMany researchers over the past several decades studied the success factors of a team. Despite many efforts, there is still no consensus on how a team should ideally be formed. Consequently, how one decides to form teams in a class depends on the domain, classroom context and pedagogical objectives. Therefore, software used to support an instructor in forming teams must be flexible enough to accommodate a variety of use cases and support the users throughout the lifecycle of teamwork. In this work, the author proposes a framework for designing general-purpose team management software. The author reviews existing team formation software and focuses specifically on opportunities for advancing research in team analytics.FindingsIn this context, the author identifies four areas of research opportunities for team analytics.Originality/valueLastly, the author proposes a series of research questions (RQs) and discusses the pedagogical, design, technical and social challenges involved.

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Two Field Experiments on Self-Selection, Collaboration Intensity, and Team Performance

Cited by 4 publications

References 17 publications

Unknown Is Not Chosen: University Student Voices on Group Formation for Collaborative Writing

Unknown Is Not Chosen: University Student Voices on Group Formation for Collaborative Writing

Under (peer) pressure: Experimental evidence on team size and task performance

Design guidelines and research directions for team analytics

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