research-article

Effects of simultaneous and sequential work structures on distributed collaborative interdependent tasks

Authors:

Robert E. Kraut,

Aniket KitturAuthors Info & Claims

CHI '14: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

Pages 139 - 148

https://doi.org/10.1145/2556288.2557158

Published: 26 April 2014 Publication History

Abstract

Distributed online groups have great potential for generating interdependent and complex products like encyclopedia articles or product design. However, coordinating multiple group members to work together effectively while minimizing process losses remains an open challenge. We conducted an experiment comparing the effectiveness of two coordination strategies (simultaneous vs. sequential work) on a complex creative task as the number of group members increased. Our results indicate that, contrary to prior work, a sequential work structure was more effective than a simultaneous work structure as the size of the group increased. A mediation analysis suggests that social processes such as territoriality partially accounts for these results. A follow up experiment giving workers specific roles mitigated the detrimental effects of the simultaneous work structure. These results have implications for small group theory and crowdsourcing research.

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Index Terms

Effects of simultaneous and sequential work structures on distributed collaborative interdependent tasks
1. Human-centered computing

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cover image ACM Conferences

CHI '14: Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

April 2014

4206 pages

ISBN:9781450324731

DOI:10.1145/2556288

General Chairs:
Matt Jones
Swansea University, Wales, UK
,
Philippe Palanque
Université Paul Sabatier, France
,
Program Chairs:
Albrecht Schmidt
University of Stuttgart, Germany
,
Tovi Grossman
Autodesk Research, Canada

Copyright © 2014 ACM.

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Published: 26 April 2014

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April 26 - May 1, 2014

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Overall Acceptance Rate 6,199 of 26,314 submissions, 24%

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Sharma NColucci-Gray Lvan der Wal RSiddharthan A(2022)Consensus Building in On-Line Citizen ScienceProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35555356:CSCW2(1-26)Online publication date: 11-Nov-2022
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Neumayr TAugstein MKubicek B(2022)Territoriality in Hybrid CollaborationProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35552246:CSCW2(1-37)Online publication date: 11-Nov-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3555224
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