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This paper reports on work adapting an industry standard team practice referred to as Mob Programming into a paradigm called Online Mob Programming (OMP) for the purpose of encouraging teams to reflect on concepts and share work in the midst of their project experience. We present a study situated within a series of three course projects in a large online course on Cloud Computing. In a 3x3 Latin Square design, we compare students working alone and in two OMP configurations (with and without transactivity-maximization team formation designed to enhance reflection). The analysis reveals the extent to which grading on the produced software rewards teams where highly skilled individuals dominate the work. Further, compliance with the OMP paradigm is associated with greater evidence of group reflection on concepts and greater shared practice of programming.
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On the relationship between network connectivity and group performance in small teams of humans: experiments in virtual reality
Abstract Optimizing group performance is one of the principal objectives that underlie human collaboration and prompts humans to share resources with each other. Connectivity between individuals determines how resources can be accessed and shared by the group members, yet, empirical knowledge on the relationship between the topology of the interconnecting network and group performance is scarce. To improve our understanding of this relationship, we created a game in virtual reality where small teams collaborated toward a shared goal. We conducted a series of experiments on 30 groups of three players, who played three rounds of the game, with different network topologies in each round. We hypothesized that higher network connectivity would enhance group performance due to two main factors: individuals’ ability to share resources and their arousal. We found that group performance was positively associated with the overall network connectivity, although registering a plateau effect that might be associated with topological features at the node level. Deeper analysis of the group dynamics revealed that group performance was modulated by the connectivity of high and low performers in the group. Our findings provide insight into the intricacies of group structures, toward the design of effective human teams.
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- PAR ID:
- 10303693
- Publisher / Repository:
- IOP Publishing
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Journal of Physics: Complexity
- Volume:
- 1
- Issue:
- 2
- ISSN:
- 2632-072X
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- Article No. 025003
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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