Why do people make decisions based on their own perspective without considering alternative points of view? Do differences of opinion enhance or obstruct critical thinking? Is it wise to seek out people who disagree with you and listen to their objections to your conclusions? Focusing on the theory, research, and application of constructive controversy, this book analyses the nature of disagreement among members of decision-making groups, project teams, academic study groups, and other groups that are involved in solving problems. Johnson demonstrates that this theory is one of the most effective methods of enhancing creativity and innovation, decision making, teaching, and political discourse. The book includes entertaining and intriguing examples of how constructive controversy has been used in a variety of historical periods to advance creativity, achieve innovations, and guide democracies. It will be welcomed by students in the fields of social psychology, management/business studies, education, and communication studies.

Product Description: An innovative proposal for understanding how mental organisms make decisions and control behavior.In this book, Whitman Richards offers a novel and provocative proposal for understanding decision making and human behavior. Building on Valentino Braitenberg's famous “vehicles,” Richards describes a collection of mental organisms that he calls “daemons”―virtual correlates of neural modules...read more

The purpose of this book is to improve the decision-making process in social work groups. Illustrating the volume with various meeting models - including advisory groups, intergroup and intercultural meetings - John E Tropman examines a number of critical issues facing social workers including family and community violence, health care and homelessness. New to this Second Edition is a discussion of the relationship between meetings and missions, goals, and external and internal forces.

Product Description: This book is about the interplay of theory and experimentation on group decision making in economics. The theories that the book subjects to experimental testing mostly come from the theory of games. The decisions investigated in the book mostly concern economic interaction like strict competition...read more

Product Description: In recent years, there has been increasing implementation of group and team decision-making within organizations, much of it managed electronically, between members of what are "virtual" groups or teams. Recent research into effective team implementation emphasizes "trust" as an intermediary process, and trust must be a part of any account of team decision-making...read more

Product Description: The articles selected for this volume draw on game theory, political science, psychology, sociology and anthropology to consider how the process of dispute resolution is altered, challenged and made more complex by the presence of multiple parties and/or multiple issues...read more

Product Description: Are you frustrated by that common challenge called group decision-making? Consensus-Oriented Decision-Making can help! Clearly written and well organized, keep this book by your side and refer to it often. Groups you are part of will function better as a result...read more

This volume critically evaluates more than a century of empirical research on the effectiveness of small, task-performing groups, and offers a fresh look at the costs and benefits of collaborative work arrangements. The central question taken up by this book is whether -- and under what conditions -- interaction among group members leads to better performance than would otherwise be achieved simply by combining the separate efforts of an equal number of people who work independently. This question is considered with respect to a range of tasks (idea-generation, problem solving, judgment, and decision-making) and from several different process perspectives (learning and memory, motivation, and member diversity). As a framework for assessing the empirical literature, the book introduces the concept of 'synergy.' Synergy refers to an objective gain in performance that is attributable to group interaction. Further, it distinguishes between weak and strong synergy, which are performance gains of different magnitude. The book highlights the currently available empirical evidence for both weak and strong synergy, identifies the conditions that seem necessary to produce each, and suggests where the search for synergy might best be directed in the future. The book is at once a high-level introduction to the field, a review of the field's history, and a scholarly critique of the current state-of-the-art. As such, it is essential reading for graduate students, advanced undergraduate students, and researchers interested in group dynamics generally -- and small group performance in particular.

Product Description: Project teams are the rule, rather than the exception, in today's organizations. But, thanks to the pressure of performance goals, conflicting agendas, and political jockeying, few teams make consistently superior decisions. In Moving Out of the Box: Tools for Team Decision Making author Jana M...read more