Doctoral Dissertations

Date of Award

8-2004

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Major

Psychology

Major Professor

Kathleen L. Davis

Committee Members

Janie Elaine Seat, Schuyler W. Huck, John Lounsbury

Abstract

As the use of work teams has increased in American corporations during the last 30 years, much of the empirical research has focused upon the relationship between individual personality traits and job performance rather than on individual attitudes about working on team settings. This study attempted to establish the construct (convergence of indicators and discriminant validity) and criterion-related validity of an instrument designed to measure individual receptiveness to working in teams. Four hundred seventy-four undergraduate, first-year engineering students (over 80% were male) were asked to complete the Teamwork Receptiveness Inventory (TRI; Fearrington, 2001), the NEO-FFI (Costa and McCrae, 1992a), the Self-Reliance (Q2) scale on the 16-PF (Cattell, Cattell, & Cattell, 1994), the Team Player Inventory (TPI; Kline, 1999), and the BIDR Version 6 (Paulhus, 1991), as well as answer a question about the number of teams/groups in which they had participated during the previous 2 years. A principal components analysis was performed to examine the underlying factor structure of the TRI. Pearson Product Moment correlations were calculated between the TRI and all of the aforementioned measures. The findings suggest that the TRI is composed two primary factors rather than just one. The convergence of indicators for the TRI was supported by the significant correlations with the TPI, Q2,and 2 of the NEO-FFI scales: Extraversion and Agreeableness. Discriminant validity was supported by the absence of significant correlations between the TRI and 3 of the NEO-FFI scales: Neuroticism, Conscientiousness, and Openness. The criterion-related validity of the TRI was not supported, as the TRI was not significantly correlated with the number of teams in which the students had participated during the previous 2 years. These results support the construct validity of the TRI, but there is a need for further research to establish the criterion-related validity. It is recommended that future research explore the underlying factor structure of the TRI to determine if the instrument measures a unique construct.

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