Working in Crossdisciplinary Groups: challenges and opportunities

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Working in Crossdisciplinary Groups challenges
and opportunities

• david.kronlid_at_did.uu.se

Based on a presentation by Cato Bjørkli David
Kronlid, Trondheim, Norway, October 9, 2006
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Aims

• To introduce a discussion about the challenges of
  crossdisciplinary group research
• Based on
• Crossdisciplinary theory
• Social psychology theory
• Experiences of a crossdisciplinary research
  projects MOTEROM (2003-2006)

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MOTEROM

• A transdisciplinary research project Mobility in
  technological space (MOTEROM), NTNU, Trondheim,
  Norway (2003-2006)
• Architecture, Theology, Ethics, Psychology of
  Religion, Psychology, Ecological Psychology,
  Design, and Engineering and planning
• Professors, associate professors, post-Docs,
  PhD-students, and McS students
• Three women and nine men
• Ages from late twenties to early sixties
• Two meetings per semester (two days), one guest
  scholar per semester, an international finalizing
  conferense
• Three sub projects (a) Ecological psychology, (b)
  Theology and ethics, and (c) Engineering and
  planning

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Björkli Kronlids problem

• MOTEROM was set out to be a transdisciplinary
  project
• When interviewed several of the project members
  testified to that MOTEROM was a multidisciplinary
  project
• How come MOTEROM could not maintain a
  transdisciplinary profile or strategy?

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(No Transcript)
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1. Crossdisciplinary Theory

• One of four realms of academic
  crossdisciplinarity
• crossdisciplinary knowledge
• crossdisciplinary research
• crossdisciplinary education
• crossdisciplinary theory
• Crossdisciplinary theory
• Knowledge, research, or education as its main
  objects of study (Nissani 2004 2).
• My perspective
• Non-theoretical aspects of crossdisciplinarity
  social activities within crossdisciplinary
  projects.

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2. Crossdisciplinary Research

• Crossdisciplinary research
• work that integrates knowledge and modes of
  thinking from two or more disciplines (Boix,
  Mansilla Gardner 2004).
• Combines distinctive components of two or more
  disciplines while searching or creating new
  knowledge, operational procedures, or artistic
  expressions (Nissani 2004 2).

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No conceptual consensus

• Various concepts are used in different and
  overlapping meanings (Colpaert 2004 459).

Metadisciplinarity
Crossdisciplinarity

• Transdisciplinarity

Pluridisciplinarity
Multidisciplinarity
Interdisciplinarity
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Three main strategies

• Multidisciplinary
• interdisciplinary, and
• transdisciplinary research (Colpaert 2004
  Nissani 2004 Manathunga 2003)
• Each strategy (a) demands different modes of
  collaboration and integration between researchers
  and their disciplines,which (b) suggests a
  variation of richness of integration.

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Multidisciplinary research

• Multidisciplinary research projects deal with a
  common theme from traditionally established
  perspectives by adding questions, theories, and
  methods typical for the cooperating disciplines
  in question (Fry, 2001160).
• Result
• additative knowledge (Sandström, 2003239).
• parallel knowledge about the common theme in
  question, reported in separate articles or books
  by the scholars involved.

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Interdisciplinary research

• Projects in which elements from several
  disciplines are integrated for the purpose of
  producing completed knowledge that could not be
  produced without the integration of the specific
  disciplines in question (Sandström 2003239
  Åberg 2004119).
• Dealing with a common theme or problem with
  theories and methods, which are products of the
  group process.
• Explicitly involve integration activities beyond
  addition as part of the project.
• Result
• integrated, common theoretical and methodological
  standpoints.
• New knowledge

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Transdisciplinary research

• Deals with research problems or themes that are
  not defined in beforehand.
• Push for a reformulation of the problem or theme
  through the completed integration of theories,
  methods, and modes of interpretation.
• Like interdisciplinary research,
  transdisciplinary projects include the
  possibility to use new or un-orthodox methods and
  theorizing that are products of the group
  process.
• Result
• integrated, common theoretical and methodological
  standpoints beyond the research community.
• New knowledge

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3. Entering the twilight zone

• A journey beyond our current knowledge, which
  demands exploration of the unknown and bears the
  risk of diminishing the comforting coherence of
  existing mono-disciplinary knowledge (Sperber
  2004 Fry 2001, Kronlid, coming).
• We are expected to leave our roles as confident
  experts behind, and proceed as novices into an
  unknown territory.
• We experience ourselves in a new light, possible
  uncomfortable situations of incompetence,
  uncertainty, and potential failure potential
  threatening and painful experiences that may
  trigger defensive behaviour.
• Involves change, and any change process involves
  the departure from the known and familiar.

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Please note

• The twilight zone is not all about risk

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As a result

• Members of crossdisciplinary research projects
  often experience setbacks in the process of
  disciplinary integration.
• A lack in conceptual consensus is often
  experienced as well as methodological dissonance.
  
• Such setbacks are often only approached as
  problems which can be solved by intensified
  communication regarding the kind of
  crossdisciplinary project (Tengström, Emin,
  Trondheim, the MOTEROM project, xx-xx-xxxx,
  lecture).

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However

• These challenges can also be approached as the
  transgression of the identity of subject as the
  practitioner of the disciplines in question.
• It thus represents a cognitive and an emotionally
  challenging situation because it forces
  participants to question the basis of their
  disciplinary knowledge as defined in unitary
  schools of thought
• Climate

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4. Climate Relational Spaces

• Experiences from clinical psychology
• The creation of a movement within the
  phenomenological field of relationships
• Not just intentional and goal-oriented, but a
  social frame of reference as well

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Basic Concepts of Relational Spaces

• Alliance
• Group Cohesion
• Empathy
• Trust
• ... and then some tentative conclusions

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Crossdisciplinary research projects
Empathy
Climate group change
Alliance and Cohesion
Trust
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Alliance - individual relationships

• Some kind of formal agreement in terms of a
  union formed for mutual benefit of included
  partners
• (a) agreement on goals
• (b) agreement on tasks and methods
• (c) personal bond.

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Cohesion - group relationships1 of 4

• Alliance in group relationships
• (a) member-to-member
• (b) member-to-group
• (c) member-to-leader
• (d) leader-to-group
• (e) leader-to-leader

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Cohesion 2 of 4

• Factors in cohesion
• (1) Withdrawal vs Involvement
• (2) Mistrust vs Trust
• (3) Disruption vs Cooperation
• (4) Abusiveness vs Expressing Care
• (5) Unfocused vs Focused.
• Positive scores positive change

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Cohesion 3 of 4

• Effects of Cohesion
• - Increased sharing
• - Increased tolerance to frustration
• - Increased commitment
• The question then is how do we establish and
  maintain cohesion.

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Cohesion 4 of 4

• Main interventions
• pre-group preparation
• provision early group process and structure
• reflective group composition

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Groupthink as example of negative cohesion
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Groupthink

• the term groupthink points to how groups may
  serve as a context that drive group members into
  suboptimal decision processes
• Uphold coherence
• Maintain unity
• Group homogenity

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Empathy

• Empathy refers to the ability and willingness to
  understand others thoughts, feelings and
  struggles from their point of view
• Empathy implies to understand and share the
  experience of the other person in terms of
  rational and emotional aspects

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Trust (and trust factors) 1 of 2

• Trust refers to our belief in
• the reliability, truth and strength of another
  person
• that enables us to open ourselves and share
  personal experiences accordingly.

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Trust 2 of 2

• Factors of trust
• - Caring
• - Understanding
• - Autonomy (self-control own-control)
• - Respect
• - Knowledge

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Summary and Conclusions
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Summary

• The basic concepts of crossdisciplinary climate
• Alliance
• Cohesion
• Empathy
• Trust
• ... and here comes the conclusions

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Conclusion

• - Lack of pre-group Preparation
• - Lack of establishment of clear Early Group
  Structure
• - Lack of reflective Group Composition coherent
  with transintegration
• - Lack of Joint Theme and Cooperative Planning

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Our suggestions

• Establish a common understanding of the relevant
  crossdisciplinary strategies in practice
• Establish and maintain a continual and explicit
  commitment to structured pre-group preparation
  including a wider reflection of the roles of each
  participant
• Establish rules for adding and subtracting
  members during the process
• Establish strategies for early group structure
  and maintain these strategies throughout the
  process attuned with a concern for its relational
  impact
• Exercise firm leadership in the beginning of the
  process while loosening the structuring later in
  the process in order to establish relational
  space for the members to act within
• Explicate structural obstacles for joint theme
  and cooperative planning (such as geographical
  distance, group composition, etc.) and establish
  methods to overcome such obstacles.

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Exercise

• You are working in crossdisciplinary groups (a)
  support groups and (b) working groups
• How to establish Alliance, Cohesion, Empathy, and
  Trust in your groups
• What kind of pre-group preparation are needed?
• How can you establish an early group structure
  that is relevant?
• What group composition would you prefer in terms
  of climate and crossdisciplinary richness?
• Use the definitions in Cato Kronlid

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Crossdisciplinary Research Projects

• Cato Bjørkli David Kronlid
• Trondheim, October 9, 2006