Skip to main content
Department of Psychiatry Department of Psychiatry
  1. HOME
  2. Research
  3. Programs, Centers & Labs
  4. IN STEP Center
  5. Tools and Resources
  6. Definitions of Team Constructs
  7. Emergent States
  8. Affective Emergent States
  9. Task Cohesion

Task Cohesion

Definition

'''An individual's attraction to the group because of shared commitment to the group task." (van Vianen & De Dreu 2001, p. 100) 

Key References 

  • Carron, A. V., Widmeyer, W. N., & Brawley, L. R. (1985). The Development of an Instrument to Assess Cohesion in Sport Teams: The Group Environment Questionnaire. Journal of Sport Psychology, 7(3), 244–266. https://doi.org/10.1123/jsp.7.3.244 
    • Introduces common measure of cohesion developed using conceptual model that seperates whether the cohesion exists on the indivdiula or group level then task and social cohesion.
  • Van Vianen, A. E., & De Dreu, C. K. W. (2001). Personality in teams: Its relationship to social cohesion, task cohesion, and team performance. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology, 10(2), 97–120. https://doi.org/10.1080/13594320143000573 
    • Compared how task cohesion and social cohesion were related to personality factors and team performance in both an applied (employee teams) and academic (student teams) settings.
  • Carron, A. V., Bray, S. R., & Eys, M. A. (2002). Team cohesion and team success in sport. Journal of Sports Sciences, 20(2), 119–126.https://doi.org/10.1080/026404102317200828 
    • Established a positive relationship between task cohesion and team performance in a sports context, support the practice of aggregating indivdiula task cohesion scores into a compositie team score based on score consistency amongst teammates.
  • Chiocchio, F., & Essiembre, H. (2009). Cohesion and Performance. Small Group Research, 40(4), 382–420. https://doi.org/10.1177/1046496409335103 
    • Determined the effect of performance type (outcome & behavioral) on the cohesion-performance relationship using data from primary studies involving project teams (meta-analysis), analyzed task and social cohesion seperately for comparison.

Key Measurements

  • Carron et al 1985 Group Envirnoment Questionnaire (GEQ): primarily adapted for team use, 18 item survey.
    • Carron, A. V., Widmeyer, W. N., & Brawley, L. R. (1985). The development of an instrument to assess cohesion in sport teams: the Group Environment Questionnaire. Journal of Sport Psychology, 7(3), 244–266. https://doi.org/10.1123/jsp.7.3.244

Recent Articles 

  • Salas, E., Grossman, R., Hughes, A. M., & Coultas, C. W. (2015). Measuring team cohesion. Human Factors: The Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, 57(3), 365–374. https://doi.org/10.1177/0018720815578267
    • Reviews empirical research about cohesion conceptualization, measurement, and relationship with performance.
  • Smith, M. J., Arthur, C. A., Hardy, J., Callow, N., & Williams, D. (2013). Transformational leadership and task cohesion in sport: The mediating role of intrateam communication. Psychology of Sport and Exercise, 14(2), 249–257. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychsport.2012.10.002
    • Examines whether intrateam communication mediates the effect of transformational leadership on task cohesion.
  • Wang, S.-L., & Hwang, G.-J. (2012). The role of collective efficacy, cognitive quality, and task cohesion in computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL). Computers & Education, 58(2), 679–687. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2011.09.003
    • Found that task cohesion and cognitive quality are both significant predictors of group performance.