Reading focus
Syllabus: How Do Groups Shape Identity and Collective Action?
Compare performance across tasks with the single-decision problem just examined.
Why you’re reading it. Ask what a general measure of group capability adds and what it leaves unexplained.
A question to consider. Could a group score well on a task battery yet fail a hidden-profile decision? What would that imply about the measure's scope?
Why this reading
Do groups that succeed at one task also succeed at others? These studies turn collective capability into a measurement question and compare group performance with members' individual abilities.
Before you read
Factor analysis describes shared variation across measures. A factor is a statistical summary, not by itself an explanation. A criterion task tests whether that summary predicts another outcome.
Read for
- Examine the range of tasks and how success is scored.
- Separate evidence for a common factor from explanations of its origin.
- Distinguish associations with interaction or composition from effects of changing them.
Consider afterwards
- What would justify using a short group task battery to predict performance on a months-long project?
Editorial context
The short laboratory tasks limit generalization. Bates and Gupta challenge the modest role attributed to individual ability using different measurements and models. A later synthesis has a 2022 correction affecting variance estimates and model-fit reporting. That is separate from this paper's corrected supplementary Table S4 labels. Composition correlations do not establish a staffing rule.