IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cdl/ucsbec/qt3n25b620.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Silence is Golden: Communication Costs and Team Problem Solving

Author

Listed:
  • Charness, Gary
  • Cooper, David
  • Grossman, Zachary

Abstract

Numerous studies have compared the performance of individuals and teams at solving intellective problems. The ubiquitous finding in the economics literature is that teams out-perform individuals. This result is intuitively appealing, as teams can benefit from sharing insights. We analyze experiments comparing the performance of teams and individuals at solving a series of challenging logic puzzles. Contrary to the existing literature, individuals meet or exceed the performance of teams on all measures. If we impose a small cost of communication on teams, the performance of teams improves to closely resemble the performance of individuals. Underlying these results is a definite negative relationship between frequency of communication and team performance. We also document a strong gender effect. Teams with more women perform considerably better even though men slightly outperform women when solving the puzzles individually.

Suggested Citation

  • Charness, Gary & Cooper, David & Grossman, Zachary, 2015. "Silence is Golden: Communication Costs and Team Problem Solving," University of California at Santa Barbara, Economics Working Paper Series qt3n25b620, Department of Economics, UC Santa Barbara.
    • Handle: RePEc:cdl:ucsbec:qt3n25b620
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/3n25b620.pdf;origin=repeccitec
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alessia Isopi & Daniele Nosenzo & Chris Starmer, 2014. "Does consultation improve decision-making?," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 77(3), pages 377-388, October.
    2. Oprea, Ryan & Charness, Gary & Friedman, Daniel, 2014. "Continuous time and communication in a public-goods experiment," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 212-223.
    3. Urs Fischbacher, 2007. "z-Tree: Zurich toolbox for ready-made economic experiments," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 10(2), pages 171-178, June.
    4. Irving Lorge & Herbert Solomon, 1955. "Two models of group behavior in the solution of eureka-type problems," Psychometrika, Springer;The Psychometric Society, vol. 20(2), pages 139-148, June.
    5. Ben Greiner, 2004. "The Online Recruitment System ORSEE 2.0 - A Guide for the Organization of Experiments in Economics," Working Paper Series in Economics 10, University of Cologne, Department of Economics.
    6. Russell Cooper & Douglas V. DeJong & Robert Forsythe & Thomas W. Ross, 1992. "Communication in Coordination Games," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 107(2), pages 739-771.
    7. Sander Hoogendoorn & Hessel Oosterbeek & Mirjam van Praag, 2013. "The Impact of Gender Diversity on the Performance of Business Teams: Evidence from a Field Experiment," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(7), pages 1514-1528, July.
    8. Charness, Gary & Rustichini, Aldo, 2011. "Gender differences in cooperation with group membership," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 72(1), pages 77-85, May.
    9. Gary Charness & Edi Karni & Dan Levin, 2007. "Individual and group decision making under risk: An experimental study of Bayesian updating and violations of first-order stochastic dominance," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 35(2), pages 129-148, October.
    10. Alistair Wilson, 2012. "Costly Communication in Groups: Theory and an Experiment," Working Paper 499, Department of Economics, University of Pittsburgh, revised Feb 2014.
    11. Gary Charness & Martin Dufwenberg, 2006. "Promises and Partnership," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 74(6), pages 1579-1601, November.
    12. Ben Greiner, 2004. "The Online Recruitment System ORSEE - A Guide for the Organization of Experiments in Economics," Papers on Strategic Interaction 2003-10, Max Planck Institute of Economics, Strategic Interaction Group.
    13. M. Casari & J. Zhang & C. Jackson, 2011. "When Do Groups Perform Better than Individuals? A Company Takeover Experiment," Working Papers wp763, Dipartimento Scienze Economiche, Universita' di Bologna.
    14. Blume, Andreas & Ortmann, Andreas, 2007. "The effects of costless pre-play communication: Experimental evidence from games with Pareto-ranked equilibria," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 132(1), pages 274-290, January.
    15. Cooper, David J. & Kagel, John H., 2009. "Equilibrium selection in signaling games with teams: Forward induction or faster adaptive learning?," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(4), pages 216-224, December.
    16. Gary Charness & Martin Dufwenberg, 2011. "Participation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(4), pages 1211-1237, June.
    17. Jordi Brandts & David J. Cooper, 2007. "It's What You Say, Not What You Pay: An Experimental Study of Manager–Employee Relationships in Overcoming Coordination Failure," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 5(6), pages 1223-1268, December.
    18. Charness, Gary & Dufwenberg, Martin, 2003. "Promises & Partnership," Research Papers in Economics 2003:3, Stockholm University, Department of Economics.
    19. Laughlin, Patrick R. & Bonner, Bryan L. & Miner, Andrew G., 2002. "Groups perform better than the best individuals on Letters-to-Numbers problems," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 88(2), pages 605-620, July.
    20. Charness, Gary & Karni, Edi & Levin, Dan, 2010. "On the conjunction fallacy in probability judgment: New experimental evidence regarding Linda," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 68(2), pages 551-556, March.
    21. Tamar Kugler & Edgar E. Kausel & Martin G. Kocher, 2012. "Are Groups more Rational than Individuals? A Review of Interactive Decision Making in Groups," CESifo Working Paper Series 3701, CESifo.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gary Charness & David J. Cooper & Zachary Grossman, 2020. "Silence is golden: team problem solving and communication costs," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 23(3), pages 668-693, September.
    2. Erik O. Kimbrough & Andrew D. McGee & Hitoshi Shigeoka, 2022. "How Do Peers Impact Learning? An Experimental Investigation of Peer-to-Peer Teaching and Ability Tracking," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 57(1), pages 304-339.
    3. Marco Casari & Jingjing Zhang & Christine Jackson, 2016. "Same process, different outcomes: group performance in an acquiring a company experiment," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 19(4), pages 764-791, December.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gary Charness & David J. Cooper & Zachary Grossman, 2020. "Silence is golden: team problem solving and communication costs," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 23(3), pages 668-693, September.
    2. Cason, Timothy N. & Gangadharan, Lata & Grossman, Philip J., 2022. "Gender, beliefs, and coordination with externalities," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 214(C).
    3. Brosig-Koch, Jeannette & Heinrich, Timo & Helbach, Christoph, 2014. "Does truth win when teams reason strategically?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 123(1), pages 86-89.
    4. Jingjing Zhang, 2012. "Communication in asymmetric group competition over public goods," ECON - Working Papers 069, Department of Economics - University of Zurich.
    5. Faralla, Valeria & Borà, Guido & Innocenti, Alessandro & Novarese, Marco, 2020. "Promises in group decision making," Research in Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(1), pages 1-11.
    6. Feltovich, Nick & Grossman, Philip J., 2015. "How does the effect of pre-play suggestions vary with group size? Experimental evidence from a threshold public-good game," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 263-280.
    7. Timothy N. Cason & Lata Gangadharan, 2022. "Gender, Beliefs, and Coordination with Externalities Approach," Purdue University Economics Working Papers 1330, Purdue University, Department of Economics.
    8. Natalia Montinari & Antonio Nicolò & Regine Oexl, 2016. "The gift of being chosen," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 19(2), pages 460-479, June.
    9. Casoria, Fortuna & Riedl, Arno & Werner, Peter, 2020. "Behavioral Aspects of Communication in Organizations," IZA Discussion Papers 13005, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Tjaša Bjedov & Thierry Madiès & Marie Claire Villeval, 2016. "Communication And Coordination In A Two-Stage Game," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 54(3), pages 1519-1540, July.
    11. Odenkirchen, Johannes, 2017. "Pricing Behavior of Cartel Outsiders in Incomplete Cartels," VfS Annual Conference 2017 (Vienna): Alternative Structures for Money and Banking 168309, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    12. Philip Brookins & John P. Lightle & Dmitry Ryvkin, 2015. "The effects of communication and sorting on output in heterogeneous weak-link group contests," Working Papers wp2014_01_01, Department of Economics, Florida State University.
    13. Jeanette Brosid-Koch & Timo Heinrich & Christoph Helbach, 2013. "Does Truth Win When Teams Reason Strategically?," Ruhr Economic Papers 0396, Rheinisch-Westfälisches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universität Dortmund, Universität Duisburg-Essen.
    14. repec:zbw:rwirep:0396 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Grandjean, Gilles & Mantovani, Marco & Mauleon, Ana & Vannetelbosch, Vincent, 2017. "Communication structure and coalition-proofness – Experimental evidence," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 90-102.
    16. Bose, Neha & Sgroi, Daniel, 2019. "The Role of Theory of Mind and “Small Talk” Communication in Strategic Decision-Making," CAGE Online Working Paper Series 409, Competitive Advantage in the Global Economy (CAGE).
    17. Topi Miettinen & Sigrid Suetens, 2008. "Communication and Guilt in a Prisoner's Dilemma," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 52(6), pages 945-960, December.
    18. Stöckl, Thomas & Huber, Jürgen & Kirchler, Michael & Lindner, Florian, 2015. "Hot hand and gambler's fallacy in teams: Evidence from investment experiments," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 327-339.
    19. Baethge, Caroline, 2016. "Performance in the beauty contest: How strategic discussion enhances team reasoning," Passauer Diskussionspapiere, Betriebswirtschaftliche Reihe B-17-16, University of Passau, Faculty of Business and Economics.
    20. Jordi Brandts & Matthew Ellman & Gary Charness, 2016. "Let’s Talk: How Communication Affects Contract Design," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 14(4), pages 943-974.
    21. Andersson, Ola & Wengström, Erik, 2012. "Credible communication and cooperation: Experimental evidence from multi-stage Games," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 207-219.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Social and Behavioral Sciences; teams; communication; experimental economics;
    All these keywords.

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cdl:ucsbec:qt3n25b620. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Lisa Schiff (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/educsus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.