Games at work: Examining a model of team effectiveness in an interdependent gaming task

Abstract

Overall, this study emphasizes the importance of multi-level thinking and the potential influence of gamification in team tasks. The current study explores the relationships between contextualized intrinsic motivation, communication skills, collective efficacy, and satisfaction in an immersive, computer game context. Moreover, satisfaction was examined with both self- and team-referents to investigate whether self- and team-concepts are affected differently within an interdependent task. Collective efficacy was also assessed as a cross-level moderator on the relationships between individual-level inputs and outcomes. The results emphasize the importance of distinguishing between individual- and team-level referents. Team member satisfaction and group task satisfaction had different significant predictors, though there was some overlap. Results suggest individual's game motivation positively predicts group task satisfaction, but not individual satisfaction. Individuals' communication skills and collective efficacy both had positive direct effects on both individual and group task satisfaction. In terms of cross-level interactions, however, the only significant interaction was between communication skills and collective efficacy in predicting individual satisfaction.