Team Cognition at a Crossroad: Forging the Way Forward

Abstract

Team cognition enables members' diverse expertise and knowledge to be recognized, shared, and harnessed in teams. Over the past 30 years, the team cognition field has been regarded as an interdisciplinary success story. The empirically established team cognition – team performance link has also been noted as one of the most exciting developments in team research. Although there is much to celebrate, a careful evaluation of this literature reveals a surprising lack of shared cognition about team cognition, including little cross-integration across the multiple forms of team cognition (e.g., team mental models, transactive memory systems, team learning, cross-understanding, representational gaps). Moreover, team cognition measurement continues to be a significant challenge. How do we make intersections across previously siloed literatures normative rather than rare? How do we move from an emphasis on team aggregated measurement to more advanced techniques to permit answers to more expansive and nuanced research questions? Responding to these key issues, the panel will discuss the state-of-the-art in team cognition research and help craft a theoretical, methodological, and empirical agenda for future studies with audience participation.