What makes groups smarter? WOMEN

[Mistress Fei]

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/01/the-secret-to-smart-groups-isnt-smart-people/384625/

 

this is a must read

[Zantafio]

  Intersting topic, but I find the study a bit removed from concrete applications. What about a team where reading minds is unnecessary because all feel safe enough to speak sincerely ? That would seem to me more effective than a group where all have to figure out who is their friend and who their foe.

[loveinthetimeofcollaring]

 

(A) "That is, the best groups were also the best at reading the non-verbal cues of their teammates. And, since women score higher on this metric of emotional intelligence, teams with more women tended to be better teams"

 

( "First: Isn't it possible that there are specific personality traits—like openness or empathy—that might make some men just as good as women at reading the minds of their teammates?

 

© The researchers answer the first question explicitly, with a no. "We found no significant correlation between a general factor of personality and collective intelligence or RME," they write. Mind-reading isn't a personality trait. It's a skill."

 

Sorry for the weird quoting format, wasn't sure how to put these two statements side-by-side. I don't disagree with the premise of the article, but I wasn't satisfied with the reasoning © for why ( was thought to be false. Surely some men have an above average social sensitivity and an EQ, and those men--few in number as they might be--would contribute the same benefit that women are providing, no? Vice-versa for women who have below average social sensitivity and low EQ.

 

That quibble aside, I'm not surprised about the conclusion. In many a group project, it's often the men who are barking orders and charging forward without observing or listening. It can be... frustrating. Not to get on this topic again, but I wonder how much of that is tied into the codified gender roles. Do men ignore others because they're charging forward to "win" via some social imperative or is it more of a biological one?

[risotto]

I read the piece when it came out. It's interesting, but I can only imagine it depends very delicately on context. Because I'm lazy as anything, I only intervene in groups when it becomes clear no one else is going to do the job.