Studies in Interactive Communication: III. Effects of Similar and Dissimilar Communication Channels and Two Interchange Options on Team Problem Solving

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Abstract
16 teams of 2 college students each solved four credible “real world” problems for which computer systems have been or could be useful. Each of the 4 problems was solved on four successive days. A team member sent messages either by voice or by typewriter, and every team was tested with all 4 combinations of the 2 message channels assigned to individual team members. Half the teams could interrupt their partners at any time; half could not. Dependent measures were time to solution, number of messages exchanged, total number of words used per team, message length, messages communicated per minute of channel time, and words communicated per minute of channel time. The results show that communication by voice is much more rapid and wordy than is communication by typewriter. Giving Ss the freedom to interrupt had no effect on the time required to solve problems, on the number of words used in the solution of problems, or on the rate at which words were communicated. When Ss had the freedom to interrupt, they “packaged” their words differently: they exchanged more messages, messages were shorter, and messages were exchanged with greater frequency per unit time. Practice effects were almost entirely absent. A number of significant differences were attributable to the problems and the jobs assigned to the two communicators.

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