A Pilot Investigation of Functional Roles on Engineering Student Teams

项目团队正在迅速成为工科学生的主要学习环境。从教育的角度来看，积极的团队项目经历可以激励学生在更高的水平上表现。在工程教育中，哪些因素具体有助于成功的团队体验，这需要进一步的定义和实证研究。关于团队的文献中最一致的方面之一是团队角色对成功的团队运作的重要性。团队角色重要性背后的概念是，如果团队要蓬勃发展，就必须出现某些可预测的过程和行为。提高团队成员对这些角色的认识和培训会提高发生适当行为的机会，团队将实现其目标。本项目是一项探索性研究，旨在更好地理解和实证功能角色在工程项目团队中的重要性。本研究以焦点小组为基础，从一年级到四年级，对不同的工程团队班级进行调查。此外，还开展了主要工程学科的焦点小组、女性、少数族裔、专业工程师和不坚持工程课程的学生，以了解这些不同群体在团队经历和角色扮演方面的个体差异。此外，Capstone课程的讲师正在接受主要调查人员的单独面谈。如果功能角色对团队功能和学生学习的存在和重要性的存在和重要性得到经验上的支持，那么在试点研究之后，将会有一个更大规模的建议，以创建一个心理测量学上合适的评估方法来评估学生在功能角色中的表现。

The project team is fast becoming a primary learning environment for engineering students. From the perspective of education, positive team project experiences can motivate students to perform at higher levels. The definition of what factors specifically contribute to a successful team experience in engineering education requires further definition and empirical study. One of the most consistent aspects of the literature on teams is the importance of team roles to successful team functioning. The notion behind the importance of team roles is that certain predictable processes and behaviors must occur if a team is to thrive. Increasing the awareness and training of team members to these roles improves the chances that the appropriate behaviors will occur and the team will meet its goals. This project is an exploratory study seeking to better understand and empirically demonstrate the significance of functional roles on engineering project teams. This study uses a focus group based investigation of a variety of engineering team classes from freshman to seniors. In addition, focus groups of major engineering disciplines, women, minorities, professional engineers, and students who do not persist in an engineering program are being conducted to become aware of individual differences in the team experience and role taking by these diverse constituencies. Additionally, the instructors of the capstone courses are being individually interviewed by the Principle Investigators. If the presence and importance to team functioning and student learning of functional roles is empirically supported, then the pilot study will be followed by a larger scale proposal to create a psychometrically appropriate assessment measure for evaluating student performance in functional roles.