Roxanne Hiltz
New Jersey Institute of Technology
Newark, NJ 07102
Phone: (201) 596-3388
Fax: (201) 621-2433
E-mail: hiltz@eies.njit.edu
URL: http://eies.njit.edu/~hiltz
"Coordination in Distributed Group Support Systems"
NSF IRI 9408805 (March 1995 - June 1997) NJIT
Starr Roxanne Hiltz, PI
(with Jerry Fjermestad, Ajaz Rana, Rosalie Ocker, Murray Turoff and Others)
February 1997
Distributed Group Support Systems use asynchronous computer mediated
communication to support anytime/anywhere group discussions and decision
making. New Jersey Institute of Technology's project is an integrated program
of theory building, software tool development and assessment, and empirical
studies (both controlled experiments, and as opportunities arise, field
studies). The project investigates the effectiveness of different types of
tools and procedures for various types of tasks and groups, within the
distributed environment. Specific studies also contrast the distributed mode
of communication with other modes. Below is the abstract of the most
interesting study which was completed during the last year.
Ocker, R., Fjermestad, J., Hiltz, S.R. and Turoff, M., "An exploratory
comparison of four modes of communication for determining requirements:
Results on creativity, quality and satisfaction," Proceedings, HICSS 1997.
Previous research has indicated that groups can benefit from the combination
of face-to-face and asynchronous computer-mediated communication for
conducting work. This experiment compares the effectiveness of four different
modes of communication for groups working on the upstream phases of software
development: (1) face-to-face (2) synchronous computer conferencing (3)
asynchronous computer conferencing (4) combined -- FtF and computer
conferencing. Teams of graduate students determined the requirements for an
automated post office as a course assignment, over a two-week time period.
The creativity and quality of solutions produced by groups in the combined
condition were higher than those of the remaining three communication modes.
Combined groups were also more satisfied with their solutions, although no
differences among conditions were found regarding satisfaction with the
process used to accomplish work.
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