Research Design Connection: Supporting Team Work
Confirming previous research, Greenway, Thai, Haslam and Murphy report that a group’s performance is tied to the “decoration” of the spaces where they work. The research team told participants in a study they conducted that they were members of a red team and then had them personalize their work area with a poster they developed and red decorations. A rival group was identified as a blue team. Then, the test groups were moved to another space with red decorations, with blue decorations, or with none at all. Greenway and her group determined that “Work teams performed better [on a cognitive task] in both ingroup [red] spaces and outgroup [blue] spaces than in undecorated spaces.” Team room design and policies can support customization by group members. Katharine Greenway, Hannibal Thai, S Haslam, and Sean Murphy. 2016. “Spaces That Signal Identity Improve Workplace Productivity.” Journal of Personnel Psychology, vol. 15, pp. …
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