Title: Facilitating formation of shared mental models in interdisciplinary graduate student teams

Authors: Kacey Beddoes; Maura Borrego

Addresses: School of Engineering Education, Purdue University, ARMS 1300 701 West Stadium Avenue, West Lafayette, IN, 47907, USA ' Department of Engineering Education, Virginia Tech., (0218), Blacksburg, VA, 24061, USA

Abstract: Interdisciplinary teamwork is increasingly integrated into graduate programmes, despite numerous challenges arising from traditional disciplinary organisational structures. This paper presents a comparative case study of two interdisciplinary graduate teams at different US institutions. At both sites, team projects span multiple years and become the basis for students' dissertations. We describe how programmatic variables such as team formation, orientation activities and dissertation research support or discourage formation of shared mental models and ultimately influence team effectiveness and student satisfaction. Rather than provide a set of best practices, this paper presents considerations for academics designing an interdisciplinary graduate programme, based on their interdisciplinary domain, constituent disciplines and goals for students.

Keywords: interdisciplinary teams; graduate students; common ground; shared mental models; SMM; teamwork; team formation; orientation activities; dissertation research; higher education; team effectiveness; student satisfaction.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCE.2014.063355

International Journal of Collaborative Engineering, 2014 Vol.1 No.3/4, pp.236 - 255

Accepted: 06 Sep 2013
Published online: 29 Jul 2014 *

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