1989 — 1994 |
Kanfer, Ruth |
N/AActivity Code Description: No activity code was retrieved: click on the grant title for more information |
Complex Skill Development: a Self-Regulatory/Information Processing Framework @ University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
This proposal develops and empirically tests a theoretical model of self-regulatory processes as they affect the acquisition of skills needed for performance of complex, high-consequence decision making. Self-monitoring of learning affects both job performance and job training, and this project has general implications for the study of decision making and specific implications for the training and performance of the selected target population of Air Traffic Controllers (ATC). The behavior in question includes establishing realistic performance goals, anticipating the consequences of activities, and monitoring the effects of one's own actions. The proposed study involves three parts: a first phase in which a theoretical model is refined and initial hypotheses tested on ATC trainees, a second phase in which experiments are conducted using a computerized, real-time simulation of an ATC task, and a third phase in which self-regulatory determinants of behavior are tested using advanced ATC trainees. The proposed hypotheses are interesting and complex, including questions about when task-related demands are sufficiently high that self-monitoring may become counter-productive. The empirically-verified research results could have direct implications for the design of job-training programs and for increasing the effectiveness of complex decision making in stressful job situations.
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0.913 |
1993 — 1998 |
Kanfer, Ruth |
N/AActivity Code Description: No activity code was retrieved: click on the grant title for more information |
Cognitive Mechanisms in Complex Skill Acquisition @ University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
An information-processing, resource-allocation theory is used to investigate motivational and self-regulatory mechanisms as they affect the acquisition and maintenance of complex decision-making performance in jobs demanding highly skilled performance. Air traffic controllers will be used at the target skill group in this project. Key determinants of self-monitoring strategies and competency judgments, their interrelations, and their associations with performance are evaluated using an integrative aptitude/treatment interactions approach. Three studies examine the influence of the information environment on self-regulatory activities and task performance. These studies have implications for the development of training interventions to maximize on-task attentional effort and skill development in cognitively demanding, information-rich jobs. A second series of studies examines cognitive ability, task conception, and motivational determinants of individual differences in competency judgments of aspects of performance. The findings of these studies have implications for understanding the role of conative processes in skill acquisition, as well as for the development of more precise non-cognitive selection measures for the prediction of performance in complex jobs involving protracted training. The use of a high-fidelity work task simulation permits the integrations of laboratory findings with results obtained in two longitudinal field studies, and provides critical information for ultimate implementation in training and on-the-job situations.
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0.93 |
2013 — 2016 |
Dechurch, Leslie Kanfer, Ruth |
N/AActivity Code Description: No activity code was retrieved: click on the grant title for more information |
Collaborative Research: Multiteam System Design For Maximizing Scientific, Technological, & Policy Innovation @ Georgia Tech Research Corporation
There is conflicting evidence about the capacity for scientific collectives (i.e., teams, centers) to seed grand innovations. On the one hand, sociological research convincingly argues for the "dominance of teams in the production of knowledge," particularly in the production of "high-impact" knowledge. On the other hand, research shows that many science teams, particularly the ones most prized for their diverse and distributed "dream teams" are especially prone to underachieving when it comes to publications, patents, and commercialization. This program of research investigates a large number of scientific collectives, from their initial formation to their maturity, in order to uncover the dynamic interplay between structure (i.e., how the collective is designed) and process (i.e., leadership and member interactions). Although collaboration across disciplines and units has been frequently recognized as one of the key obstacles to innovation, research is needed to determine how system design affects the multi-level processes that facilitate collaboration within and across teams and units. This research integrates psychological, organizational, and network science perspectives in a multilevel system model to detail the impact of goals, leadership, and system design on key drivers of collaboration within and across teams in innovation systems. Four empirical studies are being conducted over the course of two years in order to evaluate the impact of variations in the architecture of scientific innovation systems on resulting innovation. This research investigates scientific collectives comprised of students working across two universities, three disciplines, and two countries who must work collaboratively to solve interdisciplinary challenges in environmental sustainability.
Broader Impacts. The project develops an evidentiary-base for informing policy on how to manage scientific collaborations to foster innovation. In particular, this project will enable concrete prescriptions about the optimal integration of science and policy. The project identifies the structural and interactional building blocks of successful collaboration in scientific collective in which teams are distributed, are affected by complex social and motivational forces, and interact through virtual technology to innovate using knowledge across temporal and spatial boundaries. This project will yield greater understanding of how to improve, through design and leadership interventions, knowledge generation and policy implementation in multiteam science. A second set of broader impacts of the project concern the education of four communities: (1) future scientists, (2) science policy leaders, (3) academics, and (4) students. This project is enabling the training of future scientists who will work as part of distributed multidisciplinary international science teams. An estimated 10 PhD students and 10 research-oriented undergraduate students will have the opportunity to work directly on this research, engaging in virtual scientific collaboration. The project will create new curricula in distributed multidisciplinary teamwork at Georgia Tech aimed at computing and engineering students. At George Mason, this project will foster a continuing collaboration between instructors in the Environmental Science & Policy and Psychology programs. This collaboration has as its goal the design of integrated curricula to help students understand how to use both principles of ecology and social psychology to foster greater environmental sustainability. Finally, the project contributes to the teamwork training of more than 2,000 Engineering, Ecology, Psychology, and Business students who will participate in this research.
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0.93 |