中、美大學生在問題解決小團體中團體成績與工作分配策略之比較

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(1)169 Journal of Education & Psychology Vol. 7, PP. 169-191, Augus t, 1984. the older. , problems. lttention to about their. Chinese and American· Differences in Group Performance and Strategies in Problem Solving Groups Chang-I Bonnie Chen. ABSTRACT Under one of two drive-arousing conditions (luck or skill) manipulated within a laboratory setting, 12 American and 12 Chinese 3-male-student groups were compared in terms of group strategies and group performanre outcomes in solving five jigsaw puzzles.. Chinese students were assumed. to be more group oriented and cohesive than American students because of their different cultural structures.. Results showed that support. for the hypotheses was found on measures of anticipated strategies used by Chinese vs.. American groups (p. to American groups,. ~ntended. orienting strategies.. < .05).. Chinese· 'groups, as .compared. to use more group as opposed to individual. The hypotheses were not confirmed on· the actual. strategies used and the task outcome measures.. Contrary to the hypo. thesis, groups performed better under the luck condition than the skill condition.. Under the luck condition, American groups had better perfor. mance outputs than Chinese groups.. Seve.ral factors that might accout. for this outcome are discussed.. The study of group dynamics and performance has attracted the attention of social psychologists for seleral decades.. Of particular. interest has been the search for factors and principles underlying group performance.. Most of these studies have focused on group per. formances in Western societies.. A major purpose of this research is to. continue the search for underlying factors and principles of effective group performance by contrasting performances of members of Western.

(2) 170 culture with those of an Eastern culture---in this case, the Chinese. The present study is based on the assumption that within the American culture, group performance is governed more by individual rather than collective activity; the opposite assumption is held for those raised in the Chinese culture.. That is, their group performance. is based more on group activity than on individual activity.. These. different characteristics of two groups may be accounted for by cultural 'differences--that is, the differences in the social systems, philosophy, training, education methods between the two cultures.. It appears that. in the United States of America, individl.'al differences are emphasized in home, in school, and in society.. For example, individual freedom. is stressed in the Constitution, as well as in the Bill of Rights. Developin; individuals characteristics. and~ccomplishing. individual. achievement appears to be highly expected and. greatly reinforced.. In. school and society, there Clre a variety of arrangements and directions that satisfy individual needs, e.g., flexible course requirements and various school activities.. However, in China, individual differences. seem to be ignored frequently.. A person will be rejected by the. society i f he/she does not accept the main philosophy that was suggested by Confucius and developed later by many other scholars.. This philosophy. emphasizes some specific role expectations for each person as members of a family, a society, a country, etc.. Each person is considered to. belong to different kinds of organizations and he/she is expected to have close relationships with other organization members; to share bliss, as well as adversity.. Each person is also expected to follow the same. moral standards and to have similar value systems.. In. additio~,. because. of the high population density (in Taiwan and in mainland China), the.

(3) *·~*.~~~M.~~~a*~a.mRI~%OOm~z~.. 171. Chinese historically have tended to use military-like training in education in order to enhance efficiency.. Competitive activities. among classes, schools, and organizations are often held in order to improve group performance and the efficiency of group management. :::e. Therefqre, being brought up in this system, Chinese tend to be more group-oriented, to have higher group cohesiveness and to perceive. lral. themselves more as part of. ?hy,. it ~d. d. group than do Americans.. Following the assumptions mentioned previously, the present study asks the question:. Do Chinese students, as compared to American students,. have different group behaviors, such as performance outputs and work eplitting strategies in accomplishing a task?. The question' is important. for both theoretical reasons, e.g., building a comprehensive theory of group performance, and practical reasons, e.g., manufacturers who are considering locating establishments in a variety of countries need :to. LS. know whether to organize tasks around the group or the individual. The role of group cohesiveness in the group problem study litera ture is extensive; and in general,.shows that group related to some behavioral responses.. ted. ophy. i.ss,. lse. cohesivenes~.is. In the social psychological. literature, group cohesiveness has been measured in a number of ways. cartwright (1968) has summarized five indices of group cohesiveness: (1) interpersonal attraction among members, (2) evaluation of a qroup ~s. a whole, (3) closeness or icentification with a group, (4) expressed. desire to remain in a group, and (5) composite indexes or a combination of the above. Since cohesive groups are generally supposed (HusLdnd, 1940; Moreno, 1953) to be better coordinated than non-cohesive groups and to have a greater sense of "we" feeling (group togetherness) ,'it should follow that the more cohesive the group, the greater should be its.

(4) 172 productivity.. Research on experimental groups as well as operating. nece. organization has yielded data on the positive relationship between. grou. productivity and group cohesiveness (Horwitz & Cartwright, 1953;. In a. Cohen, Whitmyre & Fund, 1960; Pe1z & Andrews, 1966).. be 1=. However, these. findings are not conclusive, other researchers (Schacter, Ellertson, McBride & Gregory, 1951;.Fied1er, 1954; Palmer & Myers, 1968; Stinson,. ence. Note 1) have pointed out that the productivity of a group is not. gro\. necessarily a direct function of .cohesiveness.. The. They indicated that a. highly cohesive group could have norms encouraging low rather than high. and. rates of productivity.. COhE. In an earlier analyses, Stodgdi11 (1959) found that group produc. Arnel. tivity tends to be related positively to another variab1e--group drive.. ind:. Group drive has been defined as a degree of group arousal, motivation,. morE. freedom, enthusiasm, or esprit.. app.. This group drive has been largely. ignored as a dimension of group performance.. Most of the research. Arne:. that relates drive to productivity is concerned with work groups in. whe:. industry and the results indicate that productivity and drive tend to. One. be positively related (Mann, Indik & Vroom, 1963; Pepinsky, Pepinsky. ski. & Pavlick, 1956).. IISU. Very few theories of group performance or the studies of produc. var. tivity, group drive and cohesiveness have considered the relationship. 5fro. between these three variables.. eff. The research is usually based on any. two of these three variables and conducted independently of the third. tio. variable (e.g., Shaw & Shaw, 1962; Fiedler,. jec. ~967).. There are few. researchers who have investigated group productivity under different. out. conditions of drive and cohesiveness (Schacter, Ellertson, McBride &. are. Gregory, 1951; Berkowitz, 1954; DeCharms, 1957).. Results of the. available research do not support the view that high group cohesiveness. of. inc.

(5) h. '*', ~*~~:arR'W!M~/HIIIl,*,Im.Jl!(;.t~IrF7Hilm~z!trc. 173. necessarily leads to high productivity., It is found, instead, that group drive is the variable most consistently related to productivity. In addition, the relationship between, drive and. productivity tends to be positive. This study proposes to investigate how group drive levels influ ences group strategies, and how the interactions between group drive and group cohesiveness influence __ roup proouctivity and group. strategies.. The underlying assumption of the different structures between Chinese and American cultures leads to the concept of different degree of group cohesiveness between these two groups.. That is, Chinese, as compared to. American Caucasians, perceive and act together more as a group than as individual achievers; in other words, they are more cohesive.. mo~e. group oriented and. Further, it is expected that this pattern will be most·. apparent under conditions in which drive has 'not been aroused.. That is,. Americans will exhibit fewer group behaviors than Chinese, particularLY when the task is presented as not being' contingent upon hard working. One way of increasing or decreasing the drive is by ascribing luck or skill to the task.. That is, instructions of "skill" or "luck" determing. "success" or "failure" can be used to manipulate the degree of drive variable in the experiment.. Subjects with skill instructions in a. 9roup might believe that their performance will depend upon their effort.. Therefore, it is assumed that they will increase their motiva. tion and drive, and work as a group to finish a task.. Oppositely, sub. jects with luck instructions will perceive that chance or other forces outside their control would determine their success and therefore they are not going to try as hard to accomplish the task. This research, then, is intended to partially test the verdicality of these assumptiQns by comparing the relative presence of group versus individual strategies and behaviors exhibited by groups of Chinese.

(6) 174 students and by groups of American students.. The specific hypotheses. Subje. are: (1) Chinese groups, as compared to American Caucasian groups, will use more group as opposed to individual orienting strategies.. (2). Chinese. the \'. groups will have better group outputs than American groups, (3) The pattern. the. described in hypothesis 2 will be accentuated under conditions of decreased. or fl. drive (luck), (4) Both groups will have better performance outputs under. Amerj. skill condition than the luck condition.. studE. f. to bl this. METHOD. them. Overview Under conditions of luck or skill, manipulated within a laboratory. each. setting, 3-person groups of Chinese and 3-person groups of American Cau. almo:. casian students were asked to put puzzles together as quickly as possible.. dolL. Just prior to starting the experiment, the participants filled out a questionnaire in which they indicated how long they thought it would take. to s. to complete the puzzles and what the best strategies were (e.g., working. expe. in pairs, three working together) for maximum performance.. Following the. actual assembling of the puzzles, each participant also filled out a questionnaire in which various demographic characteristi9s (age, education, living arrangements--with roomate or not, etc.) and general feelings. tior. about the experiment were obtained.. inst. Measures of group strategy were. obtained from the first questionnaire and from analysis of the videotaped. cul1. interactions.. behc. The time it took the group to complete the puzzles was. the ,only measure of actual group performance outcome. In order to obtain a comparative baseline of individual performance. to (. chi]. outcome, a number of the participants were called back one month after their participation, and'the time it took them to put together the same puzzles was recorded.. *. AI. b.

(7) <ft ' s. 175. ~*~~tEfYJM mi~uN~1I <ft1ll1l"il(JJt~Iff'~rh!m ~z.ltil!l. Subject. ill. Twenty-four 3-person groups*. (72 male students) were selected from. .1inese. the Washington University (St. Louis) student population.. ?attern. the sample were consisted of Chinese foreign students (from Hong Kong. ~reased. or from Taiwan) and the other half of the sample were consisted of. lder. American Caucasian students.. One-half :of '. Twelve Chinese students and 12 Caucasian. students were selected by persOnal contact and each of them was asked to bring two male friends of his own race to the lab to participate in this study.. The purpose of asking 24 students to briag friends with·. them was to control. the degree of familiarity among group members for. 'ry. each group.. (Since the Chinese forei<Jn student population was so small,. au-. almost all Chinese students knew each" other.) Each subject was paid two. ible.. dollars for his participation. Prior to participation in the study, the subjects were requested. take. to sign consent forms which secured their permission to videotape the. ing. expe;imental tasks.. the ~anipulation. 'ation,. Iped. of experimental condit,ions. The manipulation of experimental condition was based on the instruc tions given to the participants.. First, the experimenter gave some general. instructions for the experiment.. "We are trying to investigate the cx:oss-. cultural differences between Americans and Chinese in problem-solving behaviors.. In the past, many studies have been done, using jigsaw· puzzles,. to compare puzzle solving behaviors between American children. and Chinese, ce. children.. You can see that jigsaw puzzles are not just a children's game.. e. *. An additional 12 subjects (4 groups) were run but had to be discarded because of equipment failure..

(8) 176 Therefo:o-e, this· study is going to investigate the differences in puzzle to co: sulving between Chinese adults and American adults.". Tran different The e. instructions were given to each of the two experimental conditions: (I) workSkill condition--" In a previous study of children's problem solving to co: behavior, it was found that skill was important in solving jigsaw puzzles.. by th. In other words, if you get high scores in this game, you have hLgh. puzzle-solving skill.". (2) Luck condition--"In a previous study of. Desig. children's puzzle-solving behavior, it was found that no special ·skill. was needed to solve a jigsaw puzzle... The solution depends upon luck only.. If you have good· luck, you will solve it quickly.. Otherwise, you may. take a long time to solve it.". Chine subje Amer:i, diffe. Procedure Exp~rimenter.. ~xperimenter-rdce. Two. ~xperimenters. were used to control for possible. effects; half of the Chinese groups had a Chinese. experimenter and half of them had an American experimenter.. The some. The equipment for the study was five jigsaw . puzzles--two 20-piece, two 3D-piece and one 35-piece puzzles. The experimental procedure. puzzles as quickly as possible.. The groups were asked to solve five They were also told that if they could. not finish one 25-piece puzzle and one 3S-piece puzzle within 10 minutes, their group scores would be zero no matter how fast they could finish the puzzle later.. quest and :t to. was true for American groups. The experimental tasks.. categ. Then they would get only half the pay the experimenter had. promised earlier, that is, only one dollar.. Therefore, prior to starting. the task, each participant was asked to write down his own opinion about. the best strategy to work on the task (e.g., working individually on. each puzzle, or working together on one puzzle) and to estimate the time. b. genel othel quesi perCE expel will: the. ~. stra1 tota:.

(9) ~·.*~~~MMM~+~m~~m. •• ~I~~~~~Z~~. 177. Izzle to complete all puzzles.. It (1). Later they were asked to work on the puzzles.. The entire session was videotaped for subsequent analysis of the actual work-splitting strategies.. After the experiment, subjects were asked. g. to complete two questionnaires.. Finally, the students were debriefed. uzzles. by the experimenter.. Design. ill. The independent variables were the subject's race (American or. { only.. iy. Chinese) and arousing drive instructions (skill or luck).. Chinese. subjects are assumed to be more group oriented and cohesive than Amer~can. subejcts.. The drive variable was manipulated by giving two. different instructions to the subjects. The dependent measures of this study can be divided into three. .ble. categor.ies: (1) Paper and pencil responses to (a) pre-experimental questionnaire (to indicate the estimated time. le. to complete the puzzles. and peroeived best strategies to finish the task) and (b) responses to two post-experimental questionnaires.. igsaw. One of them was about. general information on the subjects (age, education, etc.).. The. other one consists of six open-ended questions, one. choice. muit~ple. 9. question and 10 7-point scale questions concerning each subject's. lId. perception of the purpose of the study, familiarity with .two partners,. ltes,. experience in playing jiqsaw puzzles before, the group teamwork,. the. willingness to play with the same partners, how much they think that. had. the game depends upon luck and skill, etc. (2) the actual work-splitting. rting. strategies to finish the task, (3) overt group performance output-- tP.e. I. lout. ime. total time (minutes) the group spent to finish five puzzles..

(10) 178. were fj. RESULTS The hypotheses of the study were tested by the F statistic emplo ying an analysis of variance model. simple effects, were two-tailed,. ~. All tests, including those of. =. three C (a). thl. togethE. .05.. togethE subjec1. Manipulation checks A check on the effectiveness of the arousing drive instruction. -indica1. manipulation in the podt-experimental questionnaire revealed that the. penden1. subjects in the luck condition perceived the game as being more. work a:. dependent upon luck skill condition. (~=. (!!. = 3.83, SD = 1.87) than the subjects 3.06,. SD = 2.44) (£ <.05).. in the. However, there was no. difference in the subjects' perceptions of the importance of skillin playing a puzzle game (ll.. > .05).. The probable explanation of this. result was that subjects more or less believed that skill was necessary to solve jigsaw puzzles because of their intuitive impressions or based upon some past experience. From the responses to post-experimental open-ended questionnaire, there was no evidence to suggest that subjects were suspicious about the drive arousing instruction.. A check on the control of the degree of. familiarity among group members "in the' post-experimental questionnaire showed that the main effect for race of subject on knowing each other did not reach statistical significance at 0.05 level. grou~s. That is, two race. were not different in the degree of familiarity among group members. for each group.. Perceived best strategies In this study, strategies were defined as the subjects' work-splitting decisions in order to finish the task as quickly. ~s. possible.. Since there. to wor] said tl.

(11) ~·.*.~aoomM~~~.~~. ••• ~I~~~ • •Z~~. 179. were five puzzles to be solved and there were three subjects in a group,. 0. three different strategies could be used to accomplish the group work: . (al three subjects worked independently, (bl two subjects worked together and one worked individually, and (cl three subjects ,worked together.. As predicted, there was a significant effect for race of. subject on perceived best strategy. 2. !:... (2). =. 5.99, l'. < .05).. Table 1. 'indicates that Chinese subjects would rather work together than inde pendently.. That is 89% of the Chinese subjects intended to choose to. work all together or to work in pairs, while only 11% of them intended to work -independently. no. In constrast, only 61% of the American subjects. said that they would like to work together.. Table. 'y. 1. Frequency of perceived best group strategy.. d. =============================================================. Race Strategy*. Chinese. American. )f. e. #A. 14 (38.9%). A. #B. 17 (47.2%). 26· (72.2%). #C. 5 (13.9%). 6 (16.6%). 36 (100.0%). 36 (100.0%). Total. (11.2%). ers. :ing. ,re. 2. X. 5.99, df. 2, ll.. < .05. * Strategy A: 3 subjects worked independehtly. B: 2 subjects worked on 1 puzzle, and the other worked independently. C: 3 subjects worked together..

(12) 180 i\ctual group strategies Fl. The measures of actual strategies were coded through the video. tapes.. The results revealed that the two race groups were using a. different number of strategies for accomplishing the task.. Though. the frequency differences were not statistically significant, the. Chi square !2(2) =5.84, P =.06) was very close to the significant level. and might prove fruitful to briefly examine the frequencies in order. to get same flavor of the strategies of the two groups.. Table 2. suggests that the frequencies of group-orienting strategies were. different, though not enough to reach statistical significance (87%-of. the strategies made by the Chinese, as opposed to 70% by the Amricans,. were group-orienting strategies [either three two worked in pairs]).. ~orked. all together or. Specifically, for Chinese subjects the frequen. cies of three partiqipants working all together were three times greater. than those o£ three working independently.. Oppositely, for American. subjects, the frequencies of three working all together was lower than. those of three working independently.. These results more or less. confirmed the hypothesis that Chinese subjects, as compared to American. subjects, would use more group-orienting strategies than individual. orienting strategies..

(13) 181. *~~*.~rr~mM~~~m*~.~.~I~~re~~~~~. Table. 2. Frequency of different group strategies for solving jigsaw puzzles. ===========--===========================================. Race Strategy*. American. Chinese. A. 18 (29.1%). 8 (12.5%). B. 30 (48.3%). 34 (53.1%). C. 14 (22.6%). 22 (34.4%). 62 (100.0%). 64 (100.0%). 'el. Total. E'. 2 X. 5.84, df. 2, I>. .06. * Strategy A: 3 subjects worked independently.. 1. B: 2 subjects worked on 1 puzzle, and. er. the other worked independently. C: 3 subjects worked together.. Experience and attitudes of playing jigsaw puzzles Before proceeding with the analysis of the hypotheses regarding group performance (total time in solving jigsaw puzzles), several considerations had to be made. con~erning. the experience in solving. jigsaw puzzles and attitude toward puzzles in order to present a more valid. p~c~ure. of the results.. The responses to the 'questionnire revealed that the groups .differed significantly (1: puzzles. (~ =. <... .01) on experience in solving jigsaw. It shows that the American subjects had more experience. 3.69) than the Chinese subjects. < .. 05).. (~=. 1.86). (~(22). 5.92, £.

(14) 182 ha. It also reveals that .no group differences were found for liking jigsaw puzzle games (£. .05).. Subjects did not show any negative. attitude to solving jigsaw puzzles.. Group performance outputs Since it was shown above that the two race groups had different experience in playing jigsaw puzzles, the Chinese group :;>erformance data was statistically adjusted in order to compare it with American group data.. A follow-up experiment was developed to deal with the problem of. these experience differences.. The available subjects in each race group. were asked to come to the laboratory and assemble the same five puzzles individually one month after the first experiment.. E. That is, Chinese new scores would be. the original group scores subtracting the adjusted scores. grOl~r3,. C. The adjusted score. (minutes) was the mean difference in individual puzzle solving time of two race groups divided by three.. R. For Chinese. only new group scores will be used in later analysis.. A 2 X 2 analysis of variance was tested to examine the effects of race and rlrive arousing instructions on group performance.. In table 3 are. the results of the analysi.:l of variance and in table 4 are the means of four cells.. Contrary to the prediction, both groups performed worse in. the ::;kill condition thdn in the luck condition, The longer time (minutes) they group performance.. use~. E: (1, 20). = 5.59, £. < .05).. in solving the puzzles, the worse the. Combining two drive arousing conditions, American. groups performed better than Chinese groups,. !:. (1, 20). =. 10.29, £. < .01).. The interact jon effect of these two factors was not statistically signi ficant. (~. >. .05)·.. Contrary to the prediction, Chinese, as compared to. Caucasian groups, did not emit more outputs in the luck condition but. *.

(15) 183. ~·~*.~a~MM~~~m~~m~.~I~~~~~Z~~. had poorer performances than Caucasians under the luck condition.. ~. Table. 3. Summary of the race of subject x condition analysis of variance on the group puzzle solving time a. :lata Source. MS. df. F. of. 'oup. Race of Subject. (S). 199.96. 1. 10.29**. es. Condition (C). 108.71. 1. 5.59*. e. S x C. 2.09. 1. 0.11. f. Error. 19.44. 20. :>e. Ie. a New adjusted group scores were used for Chinese groups in data analysis.. * are. p.. ** £. <- .05.. <. .01.. f. Table. 11. .05) •. Group means involved in the interation effects of race of subject x condition on puzzle solving time a. :he. ). 4. .. Condition Race of Subject. Skill. Luck. American. 15.38. 11.71. Chinese. 21. 74. 16.89. a New adju~ted group scores were used for Chinese groups. the time, the worse the performance.. The longer.

(16) 184. bet' Estimated group performance Ame: A check of differences in expectation of group performance between bef, the two race groups under different conditions was tested by a 2 x 2 Fir factorial analysis of variance.. The results of estimated group perfor men. IDance revealed that the main effect for race of subject on estimated exp group performance achieved statistical significance,. £. .01.. ~. (1, 20). = 7.46,. was. The Chinese subj.ects were found to estimate longer times Ame. to finish five puzzles than American subjects.. No significant differ An. ences were found on either condition or interaction effects of race. The of subject by condition. grc Ho~. Responses to post-experimental questionnaire. le1. Responses to post-experimental questionnaire indicated that American subjects had more positive feelings after the experiment.. That is, they mu. liked the distribution of the work better; they perceived more contribu lu t~n. on the part of their partners; they perceived that they worked well qu. together as a team more and they were willing to play with the same wa partner~. again more ·than the Chinese subjects.. an be. DISCUSSION. ul. with respect to the findings of the current study, support for the hypotheses was found on measures of anticipated strategies but not on tJ. actual strategies used by Chinese versus American groups.. These two. findings indicated that Chinese groups said that they preferred to work c. together rather independently, but they did not act as they said.. The s. hypotheses were not confirmed on the task outcome measure.. Contrary c. to the prediction, group. ~erformance. than under the skill condition.. was better under' the luck condition. In addition, American groups performed.

(17) '*' ' ~*lJ\1:::tEf!,'Jlj Mtl!:/J\ lWIm ,*,~ItJil1;AU~If'I1~me1ll ~zJt~ better than Chinese groups under the luck condition.. 185. Furthermore,. American groups anticipated better performance than did Chinese groups before the game.. These outcomes might be due to a number of factors.. First, the analysis of the subjects' pre-experimental and post-experie mental questionnaires revealed an interesting picture that may help tQ explain this phenomenon.. The results indicated that the race condition. was confounded with degree of experience in solving jigsaw puzzles. American subjects had much more experience than Chinese subjects. An attellpt was made to solve this problem by adjusting the group scores. The new Chinese group scores were adjusted by subtracting the original group scores by one third of the individual score mean differences. However; the adjustment may not have made the two groups on the same level.. :tn. Secondly,. t~e. effects due to no confirmation on the outcome measure. ~y. must also be examined in terms of the strength of the effect under the. 1. luck versus skill condition.. From the responses of post-experimental. .1. questionnaire, it shows that the manipulation of skill-luck condition was somewhat weak.. The distribution of perceived importance of skill. and luck in solving jigsaw puzzles were highly overlapping rather than being independent.. That is, subjects who believed that the game depended. upon luck might also think that skill was important. Finally, it i3 suggested that an anxiety variable be considered in this kind of drive arousing manipulation study.. In this study,'it. appeared that subjects had already reached a very high level of drive condition, probably because of exposure to a complicated experimental setting or because of the knowledge that gr0up performance would be compared with that of another race group.. The arousing of a higher. drive level (skill instruction) would not increase the drive level but would induce anxiety and anxiousness which. would interfere with the. ;~i.

(18) 186 grou? performance.. Further, it was assumed that lack of experience. Tl:. would aggravate the arousing anxiety and nervousness of the subjects.. empha~. These two assumptions were supported by the data which showed that. to me,. (1) under the luck condition (low drive arousing and thus arousing. group!. low anxiety), subjects performed better than under the skill condition. style!. (high drive arousing and thus arousing higher anxiety), and (2) the. he wa!. less experienced group (Chinese groups), as oompared to more experienced. manip'. 'groups (American groups) performed worse and experienced more negative. whetht. feelings about the contributions of the partners, the willingness to. T(. play with the same partners, etc., shown in the questionnaire after. the bi. the experiment.. Ameri,. There is one more possibility that might explain the inconsistent findings. ~etween. strategy and group performance.. It is hypothesized. vidua. did n.. that Chinese might not be really interested in task outcome but more. that. concerned with friendship--in which case it might be expected that their. with. ratings of friends would be higher than Americans.. quite. has to be tested in the future.. This supposition. This assumption is consistent with. grou);:. Deutsch's finding (1968) that hinderings (i.e., time loss) appeared in. F. cooperative group due to the need to reduce tension, or in other words,. resec. to maintain friendship.. shoul. Interestingly, another finding from questionnaire responses indicates. have. that after the game, the preference group strategy patterns of two groups. and. were different from the anticipated group strategies and actual group. comp. strategies, American subjects preferred to play with one or two partners, but Chinese subjects preferred to play individually.. c. simp. The probable. explanation might be that the feeling of anxiety, frustration and failure. beha. changed Chinese subjects' decisions and the feeling of confidence and. 'Alth. success also changed American subjects' decisions. also to be confirmed by further studies.. This supposition has. it s.

(19) 1. 4' ' ~*lJ1ot£fII.IIliM~'NI • .pIllIlJjlt."IfF7}!il.lI&zlt~. 1&7. The problems of methodology in cross-cultural studies have been emphasized by Triandis (1972).. He mentioned that most people attempted. to measure behaviors cross-culturally without equating their cultural groups on such obvious variables as familiarity with the task, response styles, levels of anxiety generated by testing situations, etc.. Further,. he was strongly concerned with the equivalence of any experimental manipulations and indicated that sometimes it is impossible to know whether the experimental manipulation was equivalent in strength. To summarize, the results of the group strategies partly confirm the basic hypothesis of this study.. Chinese subjects, as compared to. American subjects, preferred more group-orienting strategies than indi vidual-orienting strategies.. Though the results of group performance. did not support the hypothesis, an important finding was the indication that the patterns of group strategies were not necessan.1y consistent with the output of the group performance. quite independent.. These two phenomena are. That is, the group-orienting strategies may improve. group performance, or it may not. Finally, the findings of this study strongly suggest that future researchers in the area of cross-cultural studies of group behaviors should select an appropriate experimental task that both race groups have equivalent experience with in order to test the qroup strategies and group performances. complicated and. en~le. Further, the group strategy task must be more the subjects to make more decisions than a. simple assembling task. Up to now, very few cross-cultural studies have bee done on group behaviors, especially the comparison between Chinese and Americans. -Although this study, like many others, might raise more questions than it answers, it was attempted to establish a. base1~ne. of a series of.

(20) 188 cross-cultural group strategy and performance studies.. In the future,. advanced studies will be planned in an attempt to discover more about the nature of crosscultul;'al differences in group behaviors.. Specifically,. studies are needed to clarify at least three major issues. 1. Would. the same pattern of expected behaviors be found using other tasks that two race groups are equally familar with? 2. Would the group-orienting strategy differences between Chinese. Berkowit Relat cartwrig A. Za. New. Y. Cohen,. and Americans be more significant using a complicated task rather than. and. a simple assembling task?. 1960. 3. Under·what condition would the group strategy pattern be. 1. DeCharm:. consistent with the group performance outputs?. Deutsch. REFERENCE NOTE. In D Thee. 1. Stinson, J. E. The differential impact. ~f. participdtion in labora. tory training in collaborative task effort in intact and fragmented groups. ·Ductoral Dissertation, The Ohio State University, 1970.. Fiedlel tivl Fied1e adj Horwit grc Husbar. So( Mann, An:. Moren.

(21) ~·.*~~rr~MM.~~m~~m. re,. •• ~I~~~.~~~.. 189. RE.'ERENCES. It. Berkowitz, L. .cally,. Group standards, cohesiveness, and proQuctivity.. Relations, 1954, Cartwright, r5.. 2,. Human. 509-519.. The nature of group cohesiveness.. In D. Cartwrigllt. &. A. Zander (Eds.), Group dynamics: Research and Theory (3rd ed.) New York: H-irper e. an. &. Row, 1968, 91-109 .. Cohen, D., Whitmyre, J. W.,. &. Fund, W. H.. and training upon creative thinking. 1960,. ii,. Effect of group cohesiveness Journal of Applied Psycholcgy,. 319-322.. DeCharms, R.. Affiliation, motivation and productivity in small groups •. .J ournal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 1957, 55, 222-226. Deutsch, M.. The effects of cooperative and competition upon group process.. In D. Cartwright & A. Zander (Eds.), Group dynamics: Research and Theory (3rd ed.) Fiedler, F. E. d. tiveness. Fiedler, F. E. adjustment.. New York: Harper & ROw, 1968.. Assumed similarity measures as predictors of team effec Journal of Abnormal and Social psychology.. The effect of inter-group competition on group members Personnel Psychology, 1967,. Horwitz, M., & Cartwright, D. group properties. Husband, R. W.. 1954, 49, 381-388.. Human. A projective. Relat~ons,. £9,. 33-44.. ~ethod. for the diagnosis of. 1953, 6, 397-410.. Cooperative versus solitary problem solution.. Social Psychology, 1940,. ~,. Journal of. 405-409.. Mann, F. C., Indik, B. P., & Vroom, V. H.. The productivity of work groups.. ". Ann Arbor: Moreno, J. L.. University of Michigan, Survey Research Center, 1963. Who shall survive?. (Rev. ed.) New York: Beacon House, 1953..

(22) t\illlfti&l'li*~I~ M' 169. 190. ~73, 7. Palmer, F. H., & Myeres, T. I. among radar crews.. Sociometric choices and group productivity. In Biliography of Publication.. Washington, D. C.:. Human Resources Research Office, 1968. Pelz, D. C., & Andrews, F. M. Scientists in organizations.. New York:. Wiley, 1966. Pepinsky, P. N., Pepinsky, H. B., & Pavlik, W. B. individual and group productivity: III.. MOtivational factor in. The effects of task complexity. and time pressure upon team productivity.. Columbus:. Ohio State. 1Il)~,(I)JtI. University, Personnel Research Board, 1956. Schacter, S., Ellertson, N., McBride, D., & Gregory, D. study of cohesiveness and productivity.. An experimental. Human Relations, 1951.. i,. 229-238. Some effects of sociometric grouping under. learning in a second-grade classroom.. Journal of Social Psychology,. 1962, 57, 453-458. Individual behavior and group achievement.. London:. Oxford University press, 1959. Triandis, H. C., Vassiliou, V., Vassiliou, G., Tanaka, Y., & Shanmugan, A. V.. -;ffWi £~. 0. rR'~~1t~. tlHIl. , '*. m~mA.l&rtu(. IIRlta:tE ec~ J. Shaw, M. F.., & Shaw, L. M.. Stogdill, R. M.. *{jJf~Z§. The analysis of subjective culture.. New York: Wiley, 1972.. .~zlIllIJ:U ~~lI1I1RltM ~.

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