Facilitating information exchange in small decision-making groups

Abstract

The present study examined the effects of several conditions on the information jlow during unstructured discussion in small groups. We build on the experimental work of Stasser and his colleagues on information sampling. The results of their research suggest that groups often fail to exchange information effectively. Three experiments with a 2 x 2 factorial design were set up to look for conditwns that could facilitate the exchange of unshared information in particular. In a first study, we replicated the experiment of Stasser and Titus (1987). The main results of the original study were confirmed; additional discussion content analysis of video-recorded material made further differentiation possible. Apart from the mere mentioning of items during discussion, the reactions to and the repetition of the items were analysed. In the second experiment we introduced partially shared information and we made group members aware of the unique information that they can contribute. In the thud experiment the nature of the task was manipulated and an attempt was made to prevent an information bias in favour of decision-supporting items. Conditions that signijkantly enhance the dissemination of unshared information were found. An empirical basis was gathered so that the guidelines for effective information sampling as they were laid down by Stasser (1992) could be reformulated.

Distributed People and Distributed Information

“…Although previous studies using information exchange tasks showed no effect on task performance and information pooling of informing groups explicitly about having different information sets (Stasser et al, 1995; Stasser et al, 2000), those studies provided no evidence about whether group members pay attention to this forewarning. The results reported here are more consistent with research by Schittekatte and colleagues (Schittekatte, 1996; Schittekatte & van Hiel, 1996) who found that when members were told not only that there were differences in their information but also told which pieces of their information were unique, information pooling increased. A limitation that should be mentioned here is that I did not manipulate reminders of information differences, and thus cannot claim that such reminders caused the increase in information exchange.…”

“…This kind of understanding is comparable with the metaknowledge discussed in the transactive memory literature wherein groups need to know what they know (Austin, 2003; Griffith & Neale, 2001). Knowledge of which members hold specific information has been found in previous research to improve information exchange (Schittekatte, 1996; Stasser et al, 1995), and I found that reminders of information differences was the single best predictor of information pooling in this study. Therefore, attention to how information is distributed and the processes for making the information available to the group as a whole is a new aspect of vigilance precipitated by the rise in virtual teamwork.…”

Distributed People and Distributed Information

“…Although previous studies using information exchange tasks showed no effect on task performance and information pooling of informing groups explicitly about having different information sets (Stasser et al, 1995; Stasser et al, 2000), those studies provided no evidence about whether group members pay attention to this forewarning. The results reported here are more consistent with research by Schittekatte and colleagues (Schittekatte, 1996; Schittekatte & van Hiel, 1996) who found that when members were told not only that there were differences in their information but also told which pieces of their information were unique, information pooling increased. A limitation that should be mentioned here is that I did not manipulate reminders of information differences, and thus cannot claim that such reminders caused the increase in information exchange.…”

“…This kind of understanding is comparable with the metaknowledge discussed in the transactive memory literature wherein groups need to know what they know (Austin, 2003; Griffith & Neale, 2001). Knowledge of which members hold specific information has been found in previous research to improve information exchange (Schittekatte, 1996; Stasser et al, 1995), and I found that reminders of information differences was the single best predictor of information pooling in this study. Therefore, attention to how information is distributed and the processes for making the information available to the group as a whole is a new aspect of vigilance precipitated by the rise in virtual teamwork.…”

Hidden Profiles and Concealed Information: Strategic Information Sharing and Use in Group Decision Making

“…In such a transparent task, group members had no difficulty in pooling their unshared information, and especially so when working cooperatively. This is consistent with studies showing that unshared information increases if participants are given clues to distinguish shared from unshared information (Parks, 1992;Schittekatte, 1996).…”

“…One may wonder if these characteristics are responsible for the increased pooling of unshared information. We believe they are, which would be consistent with studies of Parks (1992) and Schittekatte (1996) that equally manipulated task characteristics. However, what is important for the present contention is that the increase in pooling unshared information occurred especially in cooperation, more than in competition.…”

Exploring the Hidden-Profile Paradigm

“…As predicted, they found that unshared information has a higher chance to be recalled when members have less information to process. While Schittekatte (1996) was able to replicate these findings, Hightower and Sayeed (1995) did not find any support for the effect of information load on discussion bias for face-to-face teams. Findings of two recent meta-analyses (Lu et al, 2012; Reimer, Reimer, & Czienskowski, 2010) support Stasser and Titus’s (1987) speculation and provide evidence that a high information load exacerbates discussion bias with shared information.…”

Distributed People and Distributed Information

“…Although previous studies using information exchange tasks showed no effect on task performance and information pooling of informing groups explicitly about having different information sets (Stasser et al, 1995; Stasser et al, 2000), those studies provided no evidence about whether group members pay attention to this forewarning. The results reported here are more consistent with research by Schittekatte and colleagues (Schittekatte, 1996; Schittekatte & van Hiel, 1996) who found that when members were told not only that there were differences in their information but also told which pieces of their information were unique, information pooling increased. A limitation that should be mentioned here is that I did not manipulate reminders of information differences, and thus cannot claim that such reminders caused the increase in information exchange.…”

“…This kind of understanding is comparable with the metaknowledge discussed in the transactive memory literature wherein groups need to know what they know (Austin, 2003; Griffith & Neale, 2001). Knowledge of which members hold specific information has been found in previous research to improve information exchange (Schittekatte, 1996; Stasser et al, 1995), and I found that reminders of information differences was the single best predictor of information pooling in this study. Therefore, attention to how information is distributed and the processes for making the information available to the group as a whole is a new aspect of vigilance precipitated by the rise in virtual teamwork.…”

Hidden Profiles and Concealed Information: Strategic Information Sharing and Use in Group Decision Making

“…In such a transparent task, group members had no difficulty in pooling their unshared information, and especially so when working cooperatively. This is consistent with studies showing that unshared information increases if participants are given clues to distinguish shared from unshared information (Parks, 1992;Schittekatte, 1996).…”

“…One may wonder if these characteristics are responsible for the increased pooling of unshared information. We believe they are, which would be consistent with studies of Parks (1992) and Schittekatte (1996) that equally manipulated task characteristics. However, what is important for the present contention is that the increase in pooling unshared information occurred especially in cooperation, more than in competition.…”

Exploring the Hidden-Profile Paradigm

“…As predicted, they found that unshared information has a higher chance to be recalled when members have less information to process. While Schittekatte (1996) was able to replicate these findings, Hightower and Sayeed (1995) did not find any support for the effect of information load on discussion bias for face-to-face teams. Findings of two recent meta-analyses (Lu et al, 2012; Reimer, Reimer, & Czienskowski, 2010) support Stasser and Titus’s (1987) speculation and provide evidence that a high information load exacerbates discussion bias with shared information.…”

Distributed People and Distributed Information

“…Although previous studies using information exchange tasks showed no effect on task performance and information pooling of informing groups explicitly about having different information sets (Stasser et al, 1995; Stasser et al, 2000), those studies provided no evidence about whether group members pay attention to this forewarning. The results reported here are more consistent with research by Schittekatte and colleagues (Schittekatte, 1996; Schittekatte & van Hiel, 1996) who found that when members were told not only that there were differences in their information but also told which pieces of their information were unique, information pooling increased. A limitation that should be mentioned here is that I did not manipulate reminders of information differences, and thus cannot claim that such reminders caused the increase in information exchange.…”

“…This kind of understanding is comparable with the metaknowledge discussed in the transactive memory literature wherein groups need to know what they know (Austin, 2003; Griffith & Neale, 2001). Knowledge of which members hold specific information has been found in previous research to improve information exchange (Schittekatte, 1996; Stasser et al, 1995), and I found that reminders of information differences was the single best predictor of information pooling in this study. Therefore, attention to how information is distributed and the processes for making the information available to the group as a whole is a new aspect of vigilance precipitated by the rise in virtual teamwork.…”

Hidden Profiles and Concealed Information: Strategic Information Sharing and Use in Group Decision Making

“…In such a transparent task, group members had no difficulty in pooling their unshared information, and especially so when working cooperatively. This is consistent with studies showing that unshared information increases if participants are given clues to distinguish shared from unshared information (Parks, 1992;Schittekatte, 1996).…”

“…One may wonder if these characteristics are responsible for the increased pooling of unshared information. We believe they are, which would be consistent with studies of Parks (1992) and Schittekatte (1996) that equally manipulated task characteristics. However, what is important for the present contention is that the increase in pooling unshared information occurred especially in cooperation, more than in competition.…”

Exploring the Hidden-Profile Paradigm

“…As predicted, they found that unshared information has a higher chance to be recalled when members have less information to process. While Schittekatte (1996) was able to replicate these findings, Hightower and Sayeed (1995) did not find any support for the effect of information load on discussion bias for face-to-face teams. Findings of two recent meta-analyses (Lu et al, 2012; Reimer, Reimer, & Czienskowski, 2010) support Stasser and Titus’s (1987) speculation and provide evidence that a high information load exacerbates discussion bias with shared information.…”