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Group-to-Individual Problem-Solving Transfer

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, plaughli{at}uiuc.edu

Harold R. Carey

COLSA International, Huntsville, Alabama

Norbert L. Kerr

Michigan State University

Many scientific, educational, business, military, and political groups assume that people who solve problems in groups and teams will solve subsequent problems better as individuals than people without previous group problem-solving experience. In order to assess such group-to-individual transfer, sets of three people solved four letters-to-numbers decoding problems as groups (G) or individuals (I) in five conditions: GGGG, GGGI, GGII, GIII, or IIII. Results supported four hypotheses: (a) groups performed better than individuals, (b) positive group-to-individual transfer occurred, (c) one group experience was sufficient for transfer, (d) transfer was at the level of group performance (complete) on problems 2 and 3 but incomplete on problem 4, due to exceptional performance in the GGGG condition.

Key Words: group-to-individual transfer • letters-to-numbers problems

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This Article Abstract Free Full Text (Free PDF) Free Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in ISI Web of Science Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Google Scholar Articles by Laughlin, P. R. Articles by Kerr, N. L. Social Bookmarking                   What's this?