Lee Sproull

Managerial Response to Changing Environments: Perspectives on Problem Sensing from Social Cognition.

? 1982 by Cornell University. 000 1-8392/82/2704-0548/

Group decision making and communication technology

00.7 5 This paper characterizes managerial problem sensing, a necessary precondition for managerial activity directed toward organizational adaptation, as composed of noticing, interpreting, and incorporating stimuli. It then reviews the constituent social cognition processes that make certain kinds of problem-sensing behavior, including errors, relatively likely to occur. Implications for the organizational issues of crisis, chance events, break points, and extreme change are explored.

Response Effects in the Electronic Survey

Abstract Advances in computing and telecommunications technology are changing how people can meet and make group decisions. Technological changes help people cross physical, social, and psychological boundaries, and have secondary effects on group behavior and decision making. Experiments show that, compared with a face-to-face meeting, a computer-mediated discussion leads to delays; more explicit and outspoken advocacy; “flaming;” more equal participation among group members; and more extreme, unconventional, or risky decisions. Technological and social psychological variables that cause these effects in laboratory groups do not scale at equal rates. Technological change in organizational group decision making can lead to outcomes not seen in the laboratory, which makes it essential to do field research. Three phenomena observed in field studies are redistributions of work time, relative advantages in participation for peripheral workers, and increases in complexity of group organization. Experimental and field studies on these technology effects are useful not just as an “impact statement” for those considering technological change; this research also can put a new light on basic processes in which we have always had an interest.

More Than an Answer: Information Relationships for Actionable Knowledge

IN ALL SCIENTIFIC ENDEAVOR the available tools affect the questions one can ask and the data one can collect. In this report, we examine a new tool in survey research, the electronic or computer-mediated survey. In the last two decades, electronic computers have come to figure in many phases of survey research-instrument design, sampling, moni- toring of work in the field, coding and editing, data entry, data clean- ing, scale and index construction, data base organization, data base retrieval, statistical analysis, documentation, and report writing (Kar- Abstract This report examines the electronic survey as a research tool. In an electronic survey, respondents use a text processing program to self-administer a computer-based questionnaire. As more people have access to computers, electronic surveys may be- come widespread. The electronic survey can reduce processing costs because it auto- mates the transformation of raw data into computer-readable form. It can combine advantages of interviews (e.g., prompts, complex branching) with those of paper mail surveys (e.g., standardization, anonymity). An important issue is how the electronic survey affects the responses of people who use it. We conducted an experimental sample survey on health attitudes, behaviors, and personal traits using two forms of administra- tion: electronic and paper mail. Closed-end responses in the electronic survey were less socially desirable and tended to be more extreme than were responses in the paper survey. Open-ended responses that could be edited by respondents were relatively long and disclosing. These findings are consistent with other research on computer-mediated communication, raising general issues about using computers to collect self-report data. Sara Kiesler is a Professor of Social Sciences and Social Psychology, and Lee Sproull

Using a human face in an interface

Research on information processing, managerial cognition, and social networks demonstrates that people rely on other people for information. However, this work has not specified how seeking information from others results in actionable knowledge--knowledge directed at making progress on relatively short-term projects. This research employs both qualitative and quantitative methods to investigate how personal sources of information contribute to actionable knowledge. Our qualitative study found that people cultivate different kinds of information relationships that are the source of 5 components of actionable knowledge: (1) solutions (both know-what and know-how), (2) referrals (pointers to other people or databases), (3) problem reformulation, (4) validation, and (5) legitimation. Our quantitative study revealed that, while source expertise predicted receipt of these components of actionable knowledge, so too did expertise of the seeker and features of the relationship between the seeker and source. We draw implications from these findings for the study of social capital and organizational learning.

Using Electronic Mail for Data Collection in Organizational Research

We investigated subjects’ responses to a synthesized talking face displayed on a computer screen in the context of a questionnaire study. Compared to subjects who answered questions presented via text display on a screen, subjects who answered the same questions spoken by a talking face spent more time, made fewer mistakes, and wrote more comments. When we compared responses to two different talking faces, subjects who answered questions spoken by a stern face, compared to subjects who answered questions spoken by a neutral face, spent more time, made fewer mistakes, and wrote more comments. They also liked the experience and the face less. We interpret this study in the light of desires to anthropomorphize computer interfaces and suggest that incautiously adding human characteristics, like face, voice, and facial expressions, could make the experience for users worse rather than better.

Legitimacy, Authority, and Community in Electronic Support Groups

In this article the author discusses a study he conducted that examined the effectiveness of using electronic mail for carrying out research. He notes that some of the benefits of using electronic ...

Beyond hearing: Where the real-world and online support meet.

In electronic support groups, people use Internet-based electronic text communication to discuss personal problems or disorders with others who share common circumstances. Although their discussions exist only in the electronic medium, these groups can be viewed usefully as discourse communities. The authors draw on what is known about two other popular sources of help—face-to-face self-help groups and self-help books—to frame the rhetorical challenges faced by members of electronic support groups. The authors then compare the discourse of electronic support groups with that of electronic hobby groups to demonstrate that the two sets differ in terms of the rhetorical behavior of their participants. The authors analyze messages to determine how members establish legitimacy and authority in their texts and how message exchange gives rise to group identity and a sense of community. Our observations indicate that although some discourse characteristics and some rhetorical features are common to all the electronic groups we studied, others are unique to the special requirements of electronic support groups.

Pool Halls, Chips, and War Games: Women in the Culture of Computing

A random sample survey of an online self-help group for people with hearing loss was conducted. Two factors predicted active participation in the group: a lack of real-world social support and being comparatively effective (having less disability, coping more effectively, and using real-world professional services). More active participation in the group was associated with more benefits from the group and stronger reports of community orientation. The authors also found evidence that integration of online and real-world support (if it existed) benefited participants. That is, if supportive family and friends in the real world shared the online group with participants, participants reported above average benefits, whereas if supportive family and friends were uninvolved in the online group, participants reported below average benefits.

A prisoner's dilemma experiment on cooperation with people and human-like computers.

Computers are becoming ubiquitous in our society and they offer superb opportunities for people in jobs and everyday life. But there is a noticeable sex difference in use of computers among children. This article asks why computers are more attractive to boys than to girls and offers a cultural framework for explaining the apparent sex differences. Although the data are fragmentary, the world of computing seems to be more consistent with male adolescent culture than with feminine values and goals. Furthermore, both arcade and educational software is designed with boys in mind. These observations lead us to speculate that computing is neither inherently difficult nor uninteresting to girls, but rather that computer games and other software might have to be designed differently for girls. Programs to help teachers instill computer efficacy in all children also need to be developed.