Journal article
Engineering students’ perceptions of team conflict and high-performance teams
International journal of collaborative engineering, Vol.1(3-4), pp.274-297
01/01/2014
DOI: 10.1504/IJCE.2014.063351
Abstract
Our study investigates the role of team conflict in the context of student design project work. We are interested in how students experience conflicts in a team environment and how these conflicts relate to other aspects of teamwork such as communication, division of work, shared goals, and leadership. We are using a mixed-method approach to data collection through peer-review data, team observations, and reflective memos. This paper reports results from a study implemented in a required first-year engineering design course. The majority of participants recognise the benefits that task and procedural conflicts have on team performance. Specifically, teamwork aspects such as communication, open-mindedness, and working towards a common goal were connected to cognitive conflict. The peer-review data illustrates that some class sections showed statistically significant improvements in goal commitment, idea communication during conflicts, conflict engagement and attentive listening over time. The results of the post-hoc tests further suggest that students in teams with a predominantly male composition (three males and one female) reported a statistically significant decrease in goal commitment and attentive listening during the ten-week evaluation period. Finally, methodologically we found that the reflective memos and team observations were better instruments for capturing team conflict, more so than peer-review surveys.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- Engineering students’ perceptions of team conflict and high-performance teams
- Creators
- Xaver Neumeyer - Northwestern UniversityAnn F McKenna - Arizona State University
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- International journal of collaborative engineering, Vol.1(3-4), pp.274-297
- Publisher
- Inderscience Publishers Ltd
- DOI
- 10.1504/IJCE.2014.063351
- ISSN
- 1745-0039
- eISSN
- 1745-0047
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 01/01/2014
- Academic Unit
- Engineering Administration
- Record Identifier
- 9984461864502771
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