The Effects of Augmenting Face-to-Face Meetings with Web-Based Asynchronous Group Support Systems

ABSTRACT Most group support systems (GSS) laboratory studies compare face-to-face groups with groups assigned to either a synchronous or asynchronous decision support system. Research findings have been inconclusive. Results of a laboratory study of groups that worked on a selection problem are presented. One set of groups shared information using an asynchronous Web-based system before meeting in a face-to-face setting to discuss and make a decision. The other set of groups met, shared information, discussed the problem, and made a decision in a face-to-face meeting exclusively. Groups that shared information using a Web-based asynchronous system and discussed the shared information in a face-to-face meeting environment assembled more information and made higher quality decisions in less time than groups that shared and discussed information in a face-to-face meeting environment. INTRODUCTION Most important decisions in organizations are made by groups or by an individual with the advice of a group (Mintzburg 1983). However, it has been long established that groups can be ineffective decision makers because of group process losses that can outweigh group process gains (Maier 1967). Over the years research has been conducted aimed at finding ways of making groups more productive. Solutions have ranged from manual group process structuring techniques such as the Delphi method (Dalkey 1969) and the Nominal group technique (NGT) (Delbecq, Van de Ven, and Gustafson 1975) to contemporary group support systems (GSS) (DeSanctis and Gallupe 1987). Decision support systems were intensively studied during the last decade of the twentieth century. A meta-analysis of laboratory studies by Fjermestad and Hiltz (1998-99) included two hundred and thirty studies that had been reported in academic journals and conferences by August 1998. Researchers have noted with concern that research results have been inconclusive. Research has not been able to conclusively establish superiority of GSS over the traditional face-to-face meeting (Kiesler and Sproull 1992). A meta-analysis of laboratory studies that compared the performance of groups assigned to GSS with groups assigned to the traditional face-to-face meeting found only 16.3% of all hypotheses investigated had outcomes favorable to GSS groups (Fjermestad and Hiltz, 1998-99). Possible reasons for this are varied and include; poor experimental designs and subjects used in laboratory experiments. There are two major problems with subjects used in reported experiments. First, most of the experiments have used students. Student subjects are problematic in the sense that there is always a question of how motivated they are when participating in these experiments even in cases where some form of incentive is offered. Second, there is the issue of ad hoc versus established groups. Student subjects are mostly ad hoc groups assembled for the experiment only and hence lack the motivation and social cohesion to work as a unit. Experiments using professional subjects have not produced consistent results either. Some laboratory experimental studies that used professionals as subjects (Adrianson and Hjelmquist 1991; Hiltz, Johnson, and Turoff 1986), show higher dominance, more consensus and a higher degree of information exchange in face-to-face groups than in GSS groups. Other laboratory studies that also used professional subjects show GSS groups performing better than face-to-face groups (Lam 1997). As Fjermestad and Hiltz (1998-99) point out, most laboratory experiments have used either groups that are too small, that is, groups of four or less participants, or too few groups to produce meaningful generalizable results. In most cases, groups are made small to boost the number of groups. Another design problem is the nature of tasks. Tasks that are too simple may not enable the unveiling of the effects of a GSS on the group process. A consistent design feature in reported laboratory studies is the comparison of face-to-face groups with groups using either a synchronous or asynchronous group support system. …