what is group work essay

Group Writing

What this handout is about.

Whether in the academic world or the business world, all of us are likely to participate in some form of group writing—an undergraduate group project for a class, a collaborative research paper or grant proposal, or a report produced by a business team. Writing in a group can have many benefits: multiple brains are better than one, both for generating ideas and for getting a job done. However, working in a group can sometimes be stressful because there are various opinions and writing styles to incorporate into one final product that pleases everyone. This handout will offer an overview of the collaborative process, strategies for writing successfully together, and tips for avoiding common pitfalls. It will also include links to some other handouts that may be especially helpful as your group moves through the writing process.

Disclaimer and disclosure

As this is a group writing handout, several Writing Center coaches worked together to create it. No coaches were harmed in this process; however, we did experience both the pros and the cons of the collaborative process. We have personally tested the various methods for sharing files and scheduling meetings that are described here. However, these are only our suggestions; we do not advocate any particular service or site.

The spectrum of collaboration in group writing

All writing can be considered collaborative in a sense, though we often don’t think of it that way. It would be truly surprising to find an author whose writing, even if it was completed independently, had not been influenced at some point by discussions with friends or colleagues. The range of possible collaboration varies from a group of co-authors who go through each portion of the writing process together, writing as a group with one voice, to a group with a primary author who does the majority of the work and then receives comments or edits from the co-authors.

Group projects for classes should usually fall towards the middle to left side of this diagram, with group members contributing roughly equally. However, in collaborations on research projects, the level of involvement of the various group members may vary widely. The key to success in either case is to be clear about group member responsibilities and expectations and to give credit (authorship) to members who contribute an appropriate amount. It may be useful to credit each group member for their various contributions.

Overview of steps of the collaborative process

Here we outline the steps of the collaborative process. You can use these questions to focus your thinking at each stage.

• Share ideas and brainstorm together.
• Formulate a draft thesis or argument .
• Think about your assignment and the final product. What should it look like? What is its purpose? Who is the intended audience ?
• Decide together who will write which parts of the paper/project.
• What will the final product look like?
• Arrange meetings: How often will the group or subsets of the group meet? When and where will the group meet? If the group doesn’t meet in person, how will information be shared?
• Scheduling: What is the deadline for the final product? What are the deadlines for drafts?
• How will the group find appropriate sources (books, journal articles, newspaper articles, visual media, trustworthy websites, interviews)? If the group will be creating data by conducting research, how will that process work?
• Who will read and process the information found? This task again may be done by all members or divided up amongst members so that each person becomes the expert in one area and then teaches the rest of the group.
• Think critically about the sources and their contributions to your topic. Which evidence should you include or exclude? Do you need more sources?
• Analyze the data. How will you interpret your findings? What is the best way to present any relevant information to your readers-should you include pictures, graphs, tables, and charts, or just written text?
• Note that brainstorming the main points of your paper as a group is helpful, even if separate parts of the writing are assigned to individuals. You’ll want to be sure that everyone agrees on the central ideas.
• Where does your individual writing fit into the whole document?
• Writing together may not be feasible for longer assignments or papers with coauthors at different universities, and it can be time-consuming. However, writing together does ensure that the finished document has one cohesive voice.
• Talk about how the writing session should go BEFORE you get started. What goals do you have? How will you approach the writing task at hand?
• Many people find it helpful to get all of the ideas down on paper in a rough form before discussing exact phrasing.
• Remember that everyone has a different writing style! The most important thing is that your sentences be clear to readers.
• If your group has drafted parts of the document separately, merge your ideas together into a single document first, then focus on meshing the styles. The first concern is to create a coherent product with a logical flow of ideas. Then the stylistic differences of the individual portions must be smoothed over.
• Revise the ideas and structure of the paper before worrying about smaller, sentence-level errors (like problems with punctuation, grammar, or word choice). Is the argument clear? Is the evidence presented in a logical order? Do the transitions connect the ideas effectively?
• Proofreading: Check for typos, spelling errors, punctuation problems, formatting issues, and grammatical mistakes. Reading the paper aloud is a very helpful strategy at this point.

Helpful collaborative writing strategies

Attitude counts for a lot.

Group work can be challenging at times, but a little enthusiasm can go a long way to helping the momentum of the group. Keep in mind that working in a group provides a unique opportunity to see how other people write; as you learn about their writing processes and strategies, you can reflect on your own. Working in a group inherently involves some level of negotiation, which will also facilitate your ability to skillfully work with others in the future.

Remember that respect goes along way! Group members will bring different skill sets and various amounts and types of background knowledge to the table. Show your fellow writers respect by listening carefully, talking to share your ideas, showing up on time for meetings, sending out drafts on schedule, providing positive feedback, and taking responsibility for an appropriate share of the work.

Start early and allow plenty of time for revising

Getting started early is important in individual projects; however, it is absolutely essential in group work. Because of the multiple people involved in researching and writing the paper, there are aspects of group projects that take additional time, such as deciding and agreeing upon a topic. Group projects should be approached in a structured way because there is simply less scheduling flexibility than when you are working alone. The final product should reflect a unified, cohesive voice and argument, and the only way of accomplishing this is by producing multiple drafts and revising them multiple times.

Plan a strategy for scheduling

One of the difficult aspects of collaborative writing is finding times when everyone can meet. Much of the group’s work may be completed individually, but face-to-face meetings are useful for ensuring that everyone is on the same page. Doodle.com , whenisgood.net , and needtomeet.com are free websites that can make scheduling easier. Using these sites, an organizer suggests multiple dates and times for a meeting, and then each group member can indicate whether they are able to meet at the specified times.

It is very important to set deadlines for drafts; people are busy, and not everyone will have time to read and respond at the last minute. It may help to assign a group facilitator who can send out reminders of the deadlines. If the writing is for a co-authored research paper, the lead author can take responsibility for reminding others that comments on a given draft are due by a specific date.

Submitting drafts at least one day ahead of the meeting allows other authors the opportunity to read over them before the meeting and arrive ready for a productive discussion.

Find a convenient and effective way to share files

There are many different ways to share drafts, research materials, and other files. Here we describe a few of the potential options we have explored and found to be functional. We do not advocate any one option, and we realize there are other equally useful options—this list is just a possible starting point for you:

• Email attachments. People often share files by email; however, especially when there are many group members or there is a flurry of writing activity, this can lead to a deluge of emails in everyone’s inboxes and significant confusion about which file version is current.
• Google documents . Files can be shared between group members and are instantaneously updated, even if two members are working at once. Changes made by one member will automatically appear on the document seen by all members. However, to use this option, every group member must have a Gmail account (which is free), and there are often formatting issues when converting Google documents back to Microsoft Word.
• Dropbox . Dropbox.com is free to join. It allows you to share up to 2GB of files, which can then be synched and accessible from multiple computers. The downside of this approach is that everyone has to join, and someone must install the software on at least one personal computer. Dropbox can then be accessed from any computer online by logging onto the website.
• Common server space. If all group members have access to a shared server space, this is often an ideal solution. Members of a lab group or a lab course with available server space typically have these resources. Just be sure to make a folder for your project and clearly label your files.

Note that even when you are sharing or storing files for group writing projects in a common location, it is still essential to periodically make back-up copies and store them on your own computer! It is never fun to lose your (or your group’s) hard work.

Try separating the tasks of revising and editing/proofreading

It may be helpful to assign giving feedback on specific items to particular group members. First, group members should provide general feedback and comments on content. Only after revising and solidifying the main ideas and structure of the paper should you move on to editing and proofreading. After all, there is no point in spending your time making a certain sentence as beautiful and correct as possible when that sentence may later be cut out. When completing your final revisions, it may be helpful to assign various concerns (for example, grammar, organization, flow, transitions, and format) to individual group members to focus this process. This is an excellent time to let group members play to their strengths; if you know that you are good at transitions, offer to take care of that editing task.

Your group project is an opportunity to become experts on your topic. Go to the library (in actuality or online), collect relevant books, articles, and data sources, and consult a reference librarian if you have any issues. Talk to your professor or TA early in the process to ensure that the group is on the right track. Find experts in the field to interview if it is appropriate. If you have data to analyze, meet with a statistician. If you are having issues with the writing, use the online handouts at the Writing Center or come in for a face-to-face meeting: a coach can meet with you as a group or one-on-one.

Immediately dividing the writing into pieces

While this may initially seem to be the best way to approach a group writing process, it can also generate more work later on, when the parts written separately must be put together into a unified document. The different pieces must first be edited to generate a logical flow of ideas, without repetition. Once the pieces have been stuck together, the entire paper must be edited to eliminate differences in style and any inconsistencies between the individual authors’ various chunks. Thus, while it may take more time up-front to write together, in the end a closer collaboration can save you from the difficulties of combining pieces of writing and may create a stronger, more cohesive document.

Procrastination

Although this is solid advice for any project, it is even more essential to start working on group projects in a timely manner. In group writing, there are more people to help with the work-but there are also multiple schedules to juggle and more opinions to seek.

Being a solo group member

Not everyone enjoys working in groups. You may truly desire to go solo on this project, and you may even be capable of doing a great job on your own. However, if this is a group assignment, then the prompt is asking for everyone to participate. If you are feeling the need to take over everything, try discussing expectations with your fellow group members as well as the teaching assistant or professor. However, always address your concerns with group members first. Try to approach the group project as a learning experiment: you are learning not only about the project material but also about how to motivate others and work together.

Waiting for other group members to do all of the work

If this is a project for a class, you are leaving your grade in the control of others. Leaving the work to everyone else is not fair to your group mates. And in the end, if you do not contribute, then you are taking credit for work that you did not do; this is a form of academic dishonesty. To ensure that you can do your share, try to volunteer early for a portion of the work that you are interested in or feel you can manage.

Leaving all the end work to one person

It may be tempting to leave all merging, editing, and/or presentation work to one person. Be careful. There are several reasons why this may be ill-advised. 1) The editor/presenter may not completely understand every idea, sentence, or word that another author wrote, leading to ambiguity or even mistakes in the end paper or presentation. 2) Editing is tough, time-consuming work. The editor often finds himself or herself doing more work than was expected as they try to decipher and merge the original contributions under the time pressure of an approaching deadline. If you decide to follow this path and have one person combine the separate writings of many people, be sure to leave plenty of time for a final review by all of the writers. Ask the editor to send out the final draft of the completed work to each of the authors and let every contributor review and respond to the final product. Ideally, there should also be a test run of any live presentations that the group or a representative may make.

Entirely negative critiques

When giving feedback or commenting on the work of other group members, focusing only on “problems” can be overwhelming and put your colleagues on the defensive. Try to highlight the positive parts of the project in addition to pointing out things that need work. Remember that this is constructive feedback, so don’t forget to add concrete, specific suggestions on how to proceed. It can also be helpful to remind yourself that many of your comments are your own opinions or reactions, not absolute, unquestionable truths, and then phrase what you say accordingly. It is much easier and more helpful to hear “I had trouble understanding this paragraph because I couldn’t see how it tied back to our main argument” than to hear “this paragraph is unclear and irrelevant.”

Writing in a group can be challenging, but it is also a wonderful opportunity to learn about your topic, the writing process, and the best strategies for collaboration. We hope that our tips will help you and your group members have a great experience.

Works consulted

We consulted these works while writing this handout. This is not a comprehensive list of resources on the handout’s topic, and we encourage you to do your own research to find additional publications. Please do not use this list as a model for the format of your own reference list, as it may not match the citation style you are using. For guidance on formatting citations, please see the UNC Libraries citation tutorial . We revise these tips periodically and welcome feedback.

Cross, Geoffrey. 1994. Collaboration and Conflict: A Contextual Exploration of Group Writing and Positive Emphasis . Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press.

Ede, Lisa S., and Andrea Lunsford. 1990. Singular Texts/Plural Authors: Perspectives on Collaborative Writing . Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press.

Speck, Bruce W. 2002. Facilitating Students’ Collaborative Writing . San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

You may reproduce it for non-commercial use if you use the entire handout and attribute the source: The Writing Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

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Teaching excellence & educational innovation, what are the benefits of group work.

“More hands make for lighter work.” “Two heads are better than one.” “The more the merrier.”

These adages speak to the potential groups have to be more productive, creative, and motivated than individuals on their own.

Benefits for students

Group projects can help students develop a host of skills that are increasingly important in the professional world (Caruso & Woolley, 2008; Mannix & Neale, 2005). Positive group experiences, moreover, have been shown to contribute to student learning, retention and overall college success (Astin, 1997; Tinto, 1998; National Survey of Student Engagement, 2006).

Properly structured, group projects can reinforce skills that are relevant to both group and individual work, including the ability to: 

• Break complex tasks into parts and steps
• Plan and manage time
• Refine understanding through discussion and explanation
• Give and receive feedback on performance
• Challenge assumptions
• Develop stronger communication skills.

Group projects can also help students develop skills specific to collaborative efforts, allowing students to...

• Tackle more complex problems than they could on their own.
• Delegate roles and responsibilities.
• Share diverse perspectives.
• Pool knowledge and skills.
• Hold one another (and be held) accountable.
• Receive social support and encouragement to take risks.
• Develop new approaches to resolving differences. 
• Establish a shared identity with other group members.
• Find effective peers to emulate.
• Develop their own voice and perspectives in relation to peers.

While the potential learning benefits of group work are significant, simply assigning group work is no guarantee that these goals will be achieved. In fact, group projects can – and often do – backfire badly when they are not designed , supervised , and assessed in a way that promotes meaningful teamwork and deep collaboration.

Benefits for instructors

Faculty can often assign more complex, authentic problems to groups of students than they could to individuals. Group work also introduces more unpredictability in teaching, since groups may approach tasks and solve problems in novel, interesting ways. This can be refreshing for instructors. Additionally, group assignments can be useful when there are a limited number of viable project topics to distribute among students. And they can reduce the number of final products instructors have to grade.

Whatever the benefits in terms of teaching, instructors should take care only to assign as group work tasks that truly fulfill the learning objectives of the course and lend themselves to collaboration. Instructors should also be aware that group projects can add work for faculty at different points in the semester and introduce its own grading complexities .

Astin, A. (1993). What matters in college? Four critical years revisited. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Caruso, H.M., & Wooley, A.W. (2008). Harnessing the power of emergent interdependence to promote diverse team collaboration. Diversity and Groups. 11, 245-266.

Mannix, E., & Neale, M.A. (2005). What differences make a difference? The promise and reality of diverse teams in organizations. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 6(2), 31-55.

National Survey of Student Engagement Report. (2006). http://nsse.iub.edu/NSSE_2006_Annual_Report/docs/NSSE_2006_Annual_Report.pdf .

Tinto, V. (1987). Leaving college: Rethinking the causes and cures of student attrition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

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My Experience Working in a Group: a Reflection

Table of contents, challenges of group work, benefits and learning opportunities, lessons learned.

• Johnson, D. W., & Johnson, R. T. (2009). An educational psychology success story: Social interdependence theory and cooperative learning. Educational researcher, 38(5), 365-379.
• Belbin, R. M. (2012). Team roles at work. Taylor & Francis.
• Tuckman, B. W. (1965). Developmental sequence in small groups. Psychological Bulletin, 63(6), 384-399.
• Forsyth, D. R. (2014). Group dynamics (6th ed.). Cengage Learning.
• Katzenbach, J. R., & Smith, D. K. (2015). The wisdom of teams: Creating the high-performance organization. Harvard Business Review Press.

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How to write a Reflection on Group Work Essay

Chris Drew (PhD)

Dr. Chris Drew is the founder of the Helpful Professor. He holds a PhD in education and has published over 20 articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. [Image Descriptor: Photo of Chris]

Learn about our Editorial Process

Here are the exact steps you need to follow for a reflection on group work essay.

• Explain what Reflection Is
• Explore the benefits of group work
• Explore the challenges group
• Give examples of the benefits and challenges your group faced
• Discuss how your group handled your challenges
• Discuss what you will do differently next time

Do you have to reflect on how your group work project went?

This is a super common essay that teachers assign. So, let’s have a look at how you can go about writing a superb reflection on your group work project that should get great grades.

The essay structure I outline below takes the funnel approach to essay writing: it starts broad and general, then zooms in on your specific group’s situation.

Disclaimer: Make sure you check with your teacher to see if this is a good style to use for your essay. Take a draft to your teacher to get their feedback on whether it’s what they’re looking for!

This is a 6-step essay (the 7 th step is editing!). Here’s a general rule for how much depth to go into depending on your word count:

• 1500 word essay – one paragraph for each step, plus a paragraph each for the introduction and conclusion ;
• 3000 word essay – two paragraphs for each step, plus a paragraph each for the introduction and conclusion;
• 300 – 500 word essay – one or two sentences for each step.

Adjust this essay plan depending on your teacher’s requirements and remember to always ask your teacher, a classmate or a professional tutor to review the piece before submitting.

Here’s the steps I’ll outline for you in this advice article:

Step 1. Explain what ‘Reflection’ Is

You might have heard that you need to define your terms in essays. Well, the most important term in this essay is ‘reflection’.

So, let’s have a look at what reflection is…

Reflection is the process of:

• Pausing and looking back at what has just happened; then
• Thinking about how you can get better next time.

Reflection is encouraged in most professions because it’s believed that reflection helps you to become better at your job – we could say ‘reflection makes you a better practitioner’.

Think about it: let’s say you did a speech in front of a crowd. Then, you looked at video footage of that speech and realised you said ‘um’ and ‘ah’ too many times. Next time, you’re going to focus on not saying ‘um’ so that you’ll do a better job next time, right?

Well, that’s reflection: thinking about what happened and how you can do better next time.

It’s really important that you do both of the above two points in your essay. You can’t just say what happened. You need to say how you will do better next time in order to get a top grade on this group work reflection essay.

Scholarly Sources to Cite for Step 1

Okay, so you have a good general idea of what reflection is. Now, what scholarly sources should you use when explaining reflection? Below, I’m going to give you two basic sources that would usually be enough for an undergraduate essay. I’ll also suggest two more sources for further reading if you really want to shine!

I recommend these two sources to cite when explaining what reflective practice is and how it occurs. They are two of the central sources on reflective practice:

• Describe what happened during the group work process
• Explain how you felt during the group work process
• Look at the good and bad aspects of the group work process
• What were some of the things that got in the way of success? What were some things that helped you succeed?
• What could you have done differently to improve the situation?
• Action plan. What are you going to do next time to make the group work process better?
• What? Explain what happened
• So What? Explain what you learned
• Now What? What can I do next time to make the group work process better?

Possible Sources:

Bassot, B. (2015).  The reflective practice guide: An interdisciplinary approach to critical reflection . Routledge.

Brock, A. (2014). What is reflection and reflective practice?. In  The Early Years Reflective Practice Handbook  (pp. 25-39). Routledge.

Gibbs, G. (1988)  Learning by Doing: A guide to teaching and learning methods . Further Education Unit, Oxford Brookes University, Oxford.

Rolfe, G., Freshwater, D., Jasper, M. (2001). Critical reflection in nursing and the helping professions: a user’s guide. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Extension Sources for Top Students

Now, if you want to go deeper and really show off your knowledge, have a look at these two scholars:

• John Dewey – the first major scholar to come up with the idea of reflective practice
• Donald Schön – technical rationality, reflection in action vs. reflection on action

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Step 2. Explore the general benefits of group work for learning

Once you have given an explanation of what group work is (and hopefully cited Gibbs, Rolfe, Dewey or Schon), I recommend digging into the benefits of group work for your own learning.

The teacher gave you a group work task for a reason: what is that reason?

You’ll need to explain the reasons group work is beneficial for you. This will show your teacher that you understand what group work is supposed to achieve. Here’s some ideas:

• Multiple Perspectives. Group work helps you to see things from other people’s perspectives. If you did the task on your own, you might not have thought of some of the ideas that your team members contributed to the project.
• Contribution of Unique Skills. Each team member might have a different set of skills they can bring to the table. You can explain how groups can make the most of different team members’ strengths to make the final contribution as good as it can be. For example, one team member might be good at IT and might be able to put together a strong final presentation, while another member might be a pro at researching using google scholar so they got the task of doing the initial scholarly research.
• Improved Communication Skills. Group work projects help you to work on your communication skills. Communication skills required in group work projects include speaking in turn, speaking up when you have ideas, actively listening to other team members’ contributions, and crucially making compromises for the good of the team.
• Learn to Manage Workplace Conflict. Lastly, your teachers often assign you group work tasks so you can learn to manage conflict and disagreement. You’ll come across this a whole lot in the workplace, so your teachers want you to have some experience being professional while handling disagreements.

You might be able to add more ideas to this list, or you might just want to select one or two from that list to write about depending on the length requirements for the essay.

Scholarly Sources for Step 3

Make sure you provide citations for these points above. You might want to use google scholar or google books and type in ‘Benefits of group work’ to find some quality scholarly sources to cite.

Step 3. Explore the general challenges group work can cause

Step 3 is the mirror image of Step 2. For this step, explore the challenges posed by group work.

Students are usually pretty good at this step because you can usually think of some aspects of group work that made you anxious or frustrated. Here are a few common challenges that group work causes:

• Time Consuming. You need to organize meetups and often can’t move onto the next component of the project until everyone has agree to move on. When working on your own you can just crack on and get it done. So, team work often takes a lot of time and requires significant pre-planning so you don’t miss your submission deadlines!
• Learning Style Conflicts. Different people learn in different ways. Some of us like to get everything done at the last minute or are not very meticulous in our writing. Others of us are very organized and detailed and get anxious when things don’t go exactly how we expect. This leads to conflict and frustration in a group work setting.
• Free Loaders. Usually in a group work project there’s people who do more work than others. The issue of free loaders is always going to be a challenge in group work, and you can discuss in this section how ensuring individual accountability to the group is a common group work issue.
• Communication Breakdown. This is one especially for online students. It’s often the case that you email team members your ideas or to ask them to reply by a deadline and you don’t hear back from them. Regular communication is an important part of group work, yet sometimes your team members will let you down on this part.

As with Step 3, consider adding more points to this list if you need to, or selecting one or two if your essay is only a short one.

8 Pros And Cons Of Group Work At University

You’ll probably find you can cite the same scholarly sources for both steps 2 and 3 because if a source discusses the benefits of group work it’ll probably also discuss the challenges.

Step 4. Explore the specific benefits and challenges your group faced

Step 4 is where you zoom in on your group’s specific challenges. Have a think: what were the issues you really struggled with as a group?

• Was one team member absent for a few of the group meetings?
• Did the group have to change some deadlines due to lack of time?
• Were there any specific disagreements you had to work through?
• Did a group member drop out of the group part way through?
• Were there any communication break downs?

Feel free to also mention some things your group did really well. Have a think about these examples:

• Was one member of the group really good at organizing you all?
• Did you make some good professional relationships?
• Did a group member help you to see something from an entirely new perspective?
• Did working in a group help you to feel like you weren’t lost and alone in the process of completing the group work component of your course?

Here, because you’re talking about your own perspectives, it’s usually okay to use first person language (but check with your teacher). You are also talking about your own point of view so citations might not be quite as necessary, but it’s still a good idea to add in one or two citations – perhaps to the sources you cited in Steps 2 and 3?

Step 5. Discuss how your group managed your challenges

Step 5 is where you can explore how you worked to overcome some of the challenges you mentioned in Step 4.

So, have a think:

• Did your group make any changes part way through the project to address some challenges you faced?
• Did you set roles or delegate tasks to help ensure the group work process went smoothly?
• Did you contact your teacher at any point for advice on how to progress in the group work scenario?
• Did you use technology such as Google Docs or Facebook Messenger to help you to collaborate more effectively as a team?

In this step, you should be showing how your team was proactive in reflecting on your group work progress and making changes throughout the process to ensure it ran as smoothly as possible. This act of making little changes throughout the group work process is what’s called ‘Reflection in Action’ (Schön, 2017).

Scholarly Source for Step 5

Schön, D. A. (2017).  The reflective practitioner: How professionals think in action . Routledge.

Step 6. Conclude by exploring what you will do differently next time

Step 6 is the most important step, and the one far too many students skip. For Step 6, you need to show how you not only reflected on what happened but also are able to use that reflection for personal growth into the future.

This is the heart and soul of your piece: here, you’re tying everything together and showing why reflection is so important!

This is the ‘action plan’ step in Gibbs’ cycle (you might want to cite Gibbs in this section!).

For Step 6, make some suggestions about how (based on your reflection) you now have some takeaway tips that you’ll bring forward to improve your group work skills next time. Here’s some ideas:

• Will you work harder next time to set deadlines in advance?
• Will you ensure you set clearer group roles next time to ensure the process runs more smoothly?
• Will you use a different type of technology (such as Google Docs) to ensure group communication goes more smoothly?
• Will you make sure you ask for help from your teacher earlier on in the process when you face challenges?
• Will you try harder to see things from everyone’s perspectives so there’s less conflict?

This step will be personalized based upon your own group work challenges and how you felt about the group work process. Even if you think your group worked really well together, I recommend you still come up with one or two ideas for continual improvement. Your teacher will want to see that you used reflection to strive for continual self-improvement.

Scholarly Source for Step 6

Step 7. edit.

Okay, you’ve got the nuts and bolts of the assessment put together now! Next, all you’ve got to do is write up the introduction and conclusion then edit the piece to make sure you keep growing your grades.

Here’s a few important suggestions for this last point:

• You should always write your introduction and conclusion last. They will be easier to write now that you’ve completed the main ‘body’ of the essay;
• Use my 5-step I.N.T.R.O method to write your introduction;
• Use my 5 C’s Conclusion method to write your conclusion;
• Use my 5 tips for editing an essay to edit it;
• Use the ProWritingAid app to get advice on how to improve your grammar and spelling. Make sure to also use the report on sentence length. It finds sentences that are too long and gives you advice on how to shorten them – such a good strategy for improving evaluative essay  quality!
• Make sure you contact your teacher and ask for a one-to-one tutorial to go through the piece before submitting. This article only gives general advice, and you might need to make changes based upon the specific essay requirements that your teacher has provided.

That’s it! 7 steps to writing a quality group work reflection essay. I hope you found it useful. If you liked this post and want more clear and specific advice on writing great essays, I recommend signing up to my personal tutor mailing list.

Let’s sum up with those 7 steps one last time:

• Explain what ‘Reflection’ Is
• Explore the benefits of group work for learning
• Explore the challenges of group work for learning
• Explore the specific benefits and challenges your group faced
• Discuss how your group managed your challenges
• Conclude by exploring what you will do differently next time

• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 10 Reasons you’re Perpetually Single
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 20 Montessori Toddler Bedrooms (Design Inspiration)
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 21 Montessori Homeschool Setups
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 101 Hidden Talents Examples

2 thoughts on “How to write a Reflection on Group Work Essay”

Great instructions on writing a reflection essay. I would not change anything.

Thanks so much for your feedback! I really appreciate it. – Chris.

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Collaborative and Group Writing

Introduction

When it comes to collaborative writing, people often have diametrically opposed ideas. Academics in the sciences often write multi-authored articles that depend on sharing their expertise. Many thrive on the social interaction that collaborative writing enables. Composition scholars Lisa Ede and Andrea Lunsford enjoyed co-authoring so much that they devoted their career to studying it. For others, however, collaborative writing evokes the memories of group projects gone wrong and inequitable work distribution.

Whatever your prior opinions about collaborative writing, we’re here to tell you that this style of composition may benefit your writing process and may help you produce writing that is cogent and compelling. At its best, collaborative writing can help to slow down the writing process, since it necessitates conversation, planning with group members, and more deliberate revising. A study described in Helen Dale’s “The Influence of Coauthoring on the Writing Process” shows that less experienced writers behave more like experts when they engage in collaborative writing. Students working on collaborative writing projects have said that their collaborative writing process involved more brainstorming, discussion, and diverse opinions from group members. Some even said that collaborative writing entailed less of an individual time commitment than solo papers.

Although collaborative writing implies that every part of a collaborative writing project involves working cooperatively with co-author(s), in practice collaborative writing often includes individual work. In what follows, we’ll walk you through the collaborative writing process, which we’ve divided into three parts: planning, drafting, and revising. As you consider how you’ll structure the writing process for your particular project, think about the expertise and disposition of your co-author(s), your project’s due date, the amount of time that you can devote to the project, and any other relevant factors. For more information about the various types of co-authorship systems you might employ, see “Strategies for Effective Collaborative Manuscript Development in Interdisciplinary Science Teams,” which outlines five different “author-management systems.”

The Collaborative Writing Process

Planning includes everything that is done before writing. In collaborative writing, this is a particularly important step since it’s crucial that all members of a team agree about the basic elements of the project and the logistics that will govern the project’s completion.Collaborative writing—by its very definition—requires more communication than individual work since almost all co-authored projects oblige participants to come to an agreement about what should be written and how to do this writing. And careful communication at the planning stage is usually critical to the creation of a strong collaborative paper. We would recommend assigning team members roles. Ensure that you know who will be initially drafting each section, who will be revising and editing these sections, who will be responsible for confirming that all team members complete their jobs, and who will be submitting the finished project.

Drafting refers to the process of actually writing the paper. We’ve called this part of the process drafting instead of writing to highlight the recursive nature of crafting a compelling paper since strong writing projects are often the product of several rounds of drafts. At this point in the writing process, you’ll need to make a choice: will you write together, individually, or in some combination of these two modes?

Individually

Revising is the final stage in the writing process. It will occur after a draft (either of a particular section or the entire paper) has been written. Revising, for most writing projects, will need to go beyond making line-edits that revise at the sentence-level. Instead, you’ll want to thoroughly consider all aspects of the draft in order to create a version of it that satisfies each member of the team. For more information about revision, check out our Writer’s Handbook page about revising longer papers .Even if your team has drafted the paper individually, we would recommend coming together to discuss revisions. Revising together and making choices about how to improve the draft—either online or in-person— is a good way to build consensus among group members since you’ll all need to agree on the changes you make.After you’ve discussed the revisions as a group, you’ll need to how you want to complete these revisions. Just like in the drafting stage above, you can choose to write together or individually.

Person A writes a section Person B gives suggestions for revision on this section Person A edits the section based on these suggestions

Person A writes a section The entire team meets and gives suggestions for revision on this section Person B edits the section based on these suggestions

Think through the strengths of your co-authoring team and choose a system that will work for your needs.

Suggestions for Efficient and Harmonious Collaborative Writing

Establish ground rules.

Although it can be tempting to jump right into your project—especially when you have limited time—establishing ground rules right from the beginning will help your group navigate the writing process. Conflicts and issues will inevitably arise in during the course of many long-term project. Knowing how you’ll navigate issues before they appear will help to smooth out these wrinkles. For example, you may also want to establish who will be responsible for checking in with authors if they don’t seem to be completing tasks assigned to them by their due dates. You may also want to decide how you will adjudicate disagreements. Will the majority rule? Do you want to hold out for full consensus? Establishing some ground rules will ensure that expectations are clear and that all members of the team are involved in the decision-making process.

Respect your co-author(s)

Everyone has their strengths. If you can recognize this, you’ll be able to harness your co-author(s) assets to write the best paper possible. It can be easy to write someone off if they’re not initially pulling their weight, but this type of attitude can be cancerous to a positive group mindset. Instead, check in with your co-author(s) and figure out how each one can best contribute to the group’s effort.

Be willing to argue

Arguing (respectfully!) with the other members of your writing group is a good thing because it means that you are expressing your deeply held beliefs with your co-author(s). While you don’t need to fight your team members about every feeling you have (after all, group work has to involve compromise!), if there are ideas that you feel strongly about—communicate them and encourage other members of your group to do the same even if they conflict with others’ viewpoints.

Schedule synchronous meetings

While you may be tempted to figure out group work purely by email, there’s really no substitute for talking through ideas with your co-author(s) face-to-face—even if you’re looking at your teammates face through the computer. At the beginning of your project, get a few synchronous meetings on the books in advance of your deadlines so that you can make sure that you’re able to have clear lines of communication throughout the writing process.

Use word processing software that enables collaboration

Sending lots of Word document drafts back-and-forth over email can get tiring and chaotic. Instead, we would recommend using word processing software that allows online collaboration. Right now, we like Google Docs for this since it’s free, easy to use, allows many authors to edit the same document, and has robust collaboration tools like chat and commenting.

Dale, Helen. “The Influence of Coauthoring on the Writing Process.” Journal of Teaching Writing , vol. 15, no. 1, 1996, pp. 65-79.

Lunsford, Andrea A., and Lisa Ede.  Writing Together: Collaboration in Theory and Practice . Bedford St. Martin, 2011.

Oliver, Samantha K., et al. “Strategies for Effective Collaborative Manuscript Development in Interdisciplinary Science Teams.”  Ecosphere , vol. 9, no. 4, Apr. 2018, pp. 1–13., doi:10.1002/ecs2.2206.

Writing Process and Structure

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Getting Started with Your Paper

Interpreting Writing Assignments from Your Courses

Generating Ideas for Your Paper

Creating an Argument

Thesis vs. Purpose Statements

Developing a Thesis Statement

Architecture of Arguments

Working with Sources

Quoting and Paraphrasing Sources

Using Literary Quotations

Citing Sources in Your Paper

Drafting Your Paper

Generating Ideas for Your Paper Introductions Paragraphing Developing Strategic Transitions Conclusions

Revising Your Paper

Peer Reviews

Reverse Outlines

Revising an Argumentative Paper

Revision Strategies for Longer Projects

Developing Strategic Transitions

Finishing your Paper

Twelve Common Errors: An Editing Checklist

How to Proofread your Paper

Writing Collaboratively

Essay on Group Work

Students are often asked to write an essay on Group Work in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Group Work

What is group work.

Group work is when two or more people work together to achieve a common goal. This can happen in many places, like school, work, or even at home. People in a group have to communicate, cooperate, and share their ideas and skills. This way, they can solve problems and complete tasks faster and better.

Benefits of Group Work

Working in a group has many benefits. It helps people learn from each other, build teamwork skills, and understand different viewpoints. It also divides the workload, making it easier for everyone. Group work can also help improve communication and social skills.

Challenges in Group Work

Despite the benefits, group work can also have challenges. Sometimes, people may not agree with each other, leading to conflicts. Some group members may not contribute equally, causing frustration. It’s important to address these issues to make group work effective.

Effective Group Work

To make group work effective, everyone should have a clear role and understand the goal. Good communication and respect for each other’s ideas are also important. Everyone should contribute equally and help each other. This way, the group can achieve its goal effectively and efficiently.

250 Words Essay on Group Work

Group work is when two or more people come together to do a task. It is like a team playing a game. Everyone has a role in the team, and they all work together to win the game. This is the same in group work. Everyone has a job to do, and they work together to finish the task.

Why is Group Work Important?

Group work is important for many reasons. First, it helps us learn from each other. We all have different skills and ideas. When we work in a group, we can share these skills and ideas. This helps us learn new things. Second, group work teaches us how to work with others. We learn how to listen, how to share, and how to solve problems together. These are important skills that we need in life.

Group work has many benefits. One benefit is that it can make a big task easier. If we have to do a big task by ourselves, it can be hard. But if we do it in a group, we can share the work. This makes the task easier and faster. Another benefit is that group work can help us make better decisions. When we make decisions in a group, we can hear many different ideas. This can help us make a better decision.

Challenges of Group Work

Group work also has some challenges. Sometimes, people in the group may not agree. This can cause problems. But if we learn how to listen and respect each other, we can solve these problems.

In conclusion, group work is a good way to learn and work. It has many benefits and can help us in many ways. But like all things, it also has challenges. We need to learn how to work in a group to make the most of it.

500 Words Essay on Group Work

The importance of group work.

Group work is important for many reasons. First, it helps us to learn how to work with others. This is a skill that is very useful in real life, especially in jobs where teamwork is important. Second, group work can make difficult tasks easier. When we work in a group, we can share the workload and help each other. Third, group work can help us to learn new things. By working with others, we can learn from their experiences and knowledge.

There are many benefits of group work. One of the main benefits is that it can improve our problem-solving skills. When we work in a group, we need to solve problems together. This can help us to think in new ways and come up with creative solutions.

Finally, group work can also help us to develop our leadership skills. In a group, we often need to take turns leading the team. This can help us to learn how to lead others and make important decisions.

While group work has many benefits, it can also have some challenges. One of the main challenges is that it can sometimes be difficult to work with others. People have different ideas and ways of doing things, which can lead to disagreements.

In conclusion, group work is a very useful tool that can help us to learn new skills, solve problems, and work more efficiently. While it can have some challenges, the benefits of group work often outweigh the difficulties. By working together in a group, we can achieve more than we could on our own.

In the end, group work is not just about getting the job done. It’s also about learning to work with others, developing new skills, and growing as individuals. And these are things that can help us in many different areas of our lives.

That’s it! I hope the essay helped you.

Apart from these, you can look at all the essays by clicking here .

Happy studying!

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Group Work That Works

Educators weigh in on solutions to the common pitfalls of group work.

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Mention group work and you’re confronted with pointed questions and criticisms. The big problems, according to our audience: One or two students do all the work; it can be hard on introverts; and grading the group isn’t fair to the individuals.

But the research suggests that a certain amount of group work is beneficial.

“The most effective creative process alternates between time in groups, collaboration, interaction, and conversation... [and] times of solitude, where something different happens cognitively in your brain,” says Dr. Keith Sawyer, a researcher on creativity and collaboration, and author of Group Genius: The Creative Power of Collaboration .

So we looked through our archives and reached out to educators on Facebook to find out what solutions they’ve come up with for these common problems.

Making Sure Everyone Participates

“How many times have we put students in groups only to watch them interact with their laptops instead of each other? Or complain about a lazy teammate?” asks Mary Burns, a former French, Latin, and English middle and high school teacher who now offers professional development in technology integration.

Unequal participation is perhaps the most common complaint about group work. Still, a review of Edutopia’s archives—and the tens of thousands of insights we receive in comments and reactions to our articles—revealed a handful of practices that educators use to promote equal participation. These involve setting out clear expectations for group work, increasing accountability among participants, and nurturing a productive group work dynamic.

Norms: At Aptos Middle School in San Francisco, the first step for group work is establishing group norms. Taji Allen-Sanchez, a sixth- and seventh-grade science teacher, lists expectations on the whiteboard, such as “everyone contributes” and “help others do things for themselves.”

For ambitious projects, Mikel Grady Jones, a high school math teacher in Houston, takes it a step further, asking her students to sign a group contract in which they agree on how they’ll divide the tasks and on expectations like “we all promise to do our work on time.” Heather Wolpert-Gawron, an English middle school teacher in Los Angeles, suggests creating a classroom contract with your students at the start of the year, so that agreed-upon norms can be referenced each time a new group activity begins.

Group size: It’s a simple fix, but the size of the groups can help establish the right dynamics. Generally, smaller groups are better because students can’t get away with hiding while the work is completed by others.

“When there is less room to hide, nonparticipation is more difficult,” says Burns. She recommends groups of four to five students, while Brande Tucker Arthur, a 10th-grade biology teacher in Lynchburg, Virginia, recommends even smaller groups of two or three students.

Meaningful roles: Roles can play an important part in keeping students accountable, but not all roles are helpful. A role like materials manager, for example, won’t actively engage a student in contributing to a group problem; the roles must be both meaningful and interdependent.

At University Park Campus School , a grade 7–12 school in Worcester, Massachusetts, students take on highly interdependent roles like summarizer, questioner, and clarifier. In an ongoing project, the questioner asks probing questions about the problem and suggests a few ideas on how to solve it, while the clarifier attempts to clear up any confusion, restates the problem, and selects a possible strategy the group will use as they move forward.

At Design 39, a K–8 school in San Diego, groups and roles are assigned randomly using Random Team Generator , but ClassDojo , Team Shake , and drawing students’ names from a container can also do the trick. In a practice called vertical learning, Design 39 students conduct group work publicly, writing out their thought processes on whiteboards to facilitate group feedback. The combination of randomizing teams and public sharing exposes students to a range of problem-solving approaches, gets them more comfortable with making mistakes, promotes teamwork, and allows kids to utilize different skill sets during each project.

Rich tasks: Making sure that a project is challenging and compelling is critical. A rich task is a problem that has multiple pathways to the solution and that one person would have difficulty solving on their own.

In an eighth-grade math class at Design 39, one recent rich task explored the concept of how monetary investments grow: Groups were tasked with solving exponential growth problems using simple and compound interest rates.

Rich tasks are not just for math class. When Dan St. Louis, the principal of University Park, was a teacher, he asked his English students to come up with a group definition of the word Orwellian . They did this through the jigsaw method, a type of grouping strategy that John Hattie’s study Visible Learning ranked as highly effective.

“Five groups of five students might each read a different news article about the modern world,” says St. Louis. “Then each student would join a new group of five where they need to explain their previous group’s article to each other and make connections to each. Using these connections, the group must then construct a definition of the word Orwellian .” For another example of the jigsaw approach, see this video from Cult of Pedagogy.

Supporting Introverts

Teachers worry about the impact of group work on introverts. Some of our educators suggest that giving introverts choice in who they’re grouped with can help them feel more comfortable.

“Even the quietest students are usually comfortable and confident when they are with peers with whom they connect,” says Shelly Kunkle, a veteran teacher at Wasawee Middle School in North Webster, Indiana. Wolpert-Gawron asks her students to list four peers they want to work with and then makes sure to pair them with one from their list.

Having defined roles within groups—like clarifier or questioner—also provides structure for students who may be less comfortable within complex social dynamics, and ensures that introverts don’t get overshadowed by their more extroverted peers.

Finally, be mindful that introverted students often simply need time to recharge. “Many introverts do not mind and even enjoy interacting in groups as long as they get some quiet time and solitude to recharge. It’s not about being shy or feeling unsafe in a large group,” says Barb Larochelle, a recently retired high school English teacher in Edmonton, Alberta, who taught for 29 years.

“I planned classes with some time to work quietly alone, some time to interact in smaller groups or as a whole class, and some time to get up and move around a little. A whole class of any one of those is going to be hard on one group, but a balance works well.”

Assessing Group Work

Grading group work is problematic. Often, you don’t have a clear understanding of what each student knows, and a single student’s lack of effort can torpedo the group grade. To some degree, strategies that assign meaningful roles or that require public presentations from groups provide a window in to each student’s knowledge and contributions.

But not all classwork needs to be graded. Suzanna Kruger, a high school science teacher in Seaside, Oregon, doesn’t grade group work—there are plenty of individual assignments that receive grades, and plenty of other opportunities for formative assessment.

John McCarthy, a former high school English and social studies teacher and current education consultant and adjunct professor at Madonna University for the graduate department for education, suggests using group presentations or group products as a non-graded review for a test. But if you want to grade group work, he recommends making all academic assessments within group work individual assessments. For example, instead of grading a group presentation, McCarthy grades each student on an essay, which the students then use to create their group presentation.

Laura Moffit, a fifth-grade teacher in Wilmington, North Carolina, uses self and peer evaluations to shed light on how each student is contributing to group work—starting with a lesson on how to do an objective evaluation. “Just have students circle :), :|, or :( on three to five statements about each partner, anonymously,” Moffit commented on Facebook. “Then give the evaluations back to each group member. Finding out what people really think of your performance is a wake-up call.”

And Ted Malefyt, a middle school science teacher in Hamilton, Michigan, carries a clipboard with the class list formatted in a spreadsheet and walks around checking in on students while they do group work.

“Using this spreadsheet, you have your own record of which student is meeting your expectations and who needs extra help,” explains Malefyt. “As formative assessment takes place, quickly document with simple checkmarks.”

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Teaching Resources

Benefits of Group Work

Resource overview.

Why using group work in your class can improve student learning

There are several benefits for including group work in your class.  Sharing these benefits with your students in a transparent manner helps them understand how group work can improve learning and prepare them for life experiences (Taylor 2011).  The benefits of group work include the following:

• Students engaged in group work, or cooperative learning, show increased individual achievement compared to students working alone.  For example, in their meta-analysis examining over 168 studies of undergraduate students, Johnson et al. (2014) determined that students learning in a collaborative situation had greater knowledge acquisition, retention of material, and higher-order problem solving and reasoning abilities than students working alone. There are several reasons for this difference. Students’ interactions and discussions with others allow the group to construct new knowledge, place it within a conceptual framework of existing knowledge, and then refine and assess what they know and do not know. This group dialogue helps them make sense of what they are learning and what they still need to understand or learn (Ambrose et al. 2010; Eberlein et al. 2008). In addition, groups can tackle more complex problems than individuals can and thus have the potential to gain more expertise and become more engaged in a discipline (Qin et al 1995; Kuh 2007). Group work creates more opportunities for critical thinking and can promote student learning and achievement.
• Student group work enhances communication and other professional development skills.  Estimates indicate that 80% of all employees work in group settings (Attle & Baker 2007). Therefore, employers value effective oral and written communication skills as well as the ability to work effectively within diverse groups (ABET 2016-2017; Finelli et al. 2011).  Creating facilitated opportunities for group work in your class allows students to enhance their skills in working effectively with others (Bennett & Gadlin 2012; Jackson et al. 2014). Group work gives students the opportunity to engage in process skills critical for processing information, and evaluating and solving problems, as well as management skills through the use of roles within groups, and assessment skills involved in assessing options to make decisions about their group’s final answer. All of these skills are critical to successful teamwork both in the classroom and the workplace.

Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology, Inc. Criteria for accrediting Engineering Programs (ABET), 2016-2017  http://www.abet.org/accreditation/accreditation-criteria/criteria-for-accrediting-engineering-programs-2016-2017/

Ambrose, S. A., Bridges, M. W., Lovett, M. C., DiPietro, M., & Norman, M. K. (2010).  How learning works: 7 research-based principles for smart teaching. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Attle, S., & Baker, B. 2007 Cooperative learning in a competitive environment: Classroom applications.  International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education ,  19 (1), 77-83.

Bennett, L. M., & Gadlin, H. (2012). Collaboration and team science.  Journal of Investigative Medicine ,  60 (5), 768-775.

Davidson, N., & Major, C. H. (2014). Boundary crossings: Cooperative learning, collaborative learning, and problem-based learning.  Journal on Excellence in College Teaching ,  25 (3/4), 7-55.

Eberlein, T., Kampmeier, J., Minderhout, V., Moog, R. S., Platt, T., Varma‐Nelson, P., & White, H. B. (2008). Pedagogies of engagement in science.  Biochemistry and molecular biology education ,  36 (4), 262-273.

Finelli, C. J., Bergom, I., & Mesa, V. (2011). Student teams in the engineering classroom and beyond: Setting up students for success.  CRLT Occasional Papers ,  29 .

Jackson, D., Sibson, R., & Riebe, L. (2014). Undergraduate perceptions of the development of team-working skills.  Education+ Training ,  56 (1), 7-20.

Johnson, D. W., Johnson, R. T., & Smith, K. A. (2014). Cooperative learning: Improving university instruction by basing practice on validated theory.  Journal on Excellence in University Teaching ,  25 (4), 1-26.

Kuh, G. D., Kinzie, J., Buckley, J. A., Bridges, B. K., & Hayek, J. C. (2007). Piecing Together the Student Success Puzzle: Research, Propositions, and Recommendations. ASHE Higher Education Report, Volume 32, Number 5.  ASHE Higher Education Report ,  32 (5), 1-182.

Qin, Z., Johnson, D. W., & Johnson, R. T. (1995). Cooperative versus competitive efforts and problem solving.  Review of educational Research, 65 (2), 129-143.

Taylor, A. (2011). Top 10 reasons students dislike working in small groups… and why I do it anyway.  Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Education ,  39 (3), 219-220.

the encyclopaedia of pedagogy and informal education

What is group work?

What is group work while many practitioners may describe what they do as ‘group work’, they often have only a limited appreciation of what group work is and what it entails. in this piece we introduce groups and group work, define some key aspects, and suggest areas for exploration. in particular we focus on the process of working with groups..

Contents : introduction  • what is a group?  • working with  • working with groups – a definition  • three foci  • exploring the theory and practice of group work  • conclusion  • further reading and references  • how to cite this article

For some group work is just another way of talking about teamwork. In this context, working in groups is often presented as a good way of dividing work and increasing productivity. It can also be argued that it allows for the utilization of the different skills, knowledge and experiences that people have. As a result, in schools and colleges it is often approached as a skill to be learnt – the ability to work in group-based environments. Within schools and colleges, working in groups can also be adopted as a mean of carrying forward curriculum concerns and varying the classroom experience – a useful addition to the teacher or instructor’s repertoire.

In this article our focus is different. We explore the process of working with groups both so that they may undertake particular tasks and become environments where people can share in a common life, form beneficial relationships and help each other. Entering groups or forming them, and then working with them so that members are able be around each other, take responsibility and work together on shared tasks, involves some very sophisticated abilities on the part of practitioners. These abilities are often not recognized for what they are – for when group work is done well it can seem natural. Skilled group workers, like skilled counsellors, have to be able to draw upon an extensive repertoire of understandings, experiences and skills and be able to think on their feet. They have to respond both quickly and sensitively to what is emerging in the exchanges and relationships in the groups they are working with.

Our starting point for this is a brief exploration of the nature of groups. We then turn to the process of working with. We also try to define group work – and discuss some of foci that workers need to attend to. We finish with an overview of the development of group work as a focus for theory-making and exploration.

What is a group?

In a separate article we discuss the nature of groups and their significance for human societies (see What is a group? ). Here I just want to highlight five main points.

First, while there are some very different ways of defining groups – often depending upon which aspect of them that commentators and researchers want to focus upon – it is worthwhile looking to a definition that takes things back to basics. Here, as a starting point, we are using Donelson R. Forsyth’s definition of a group as ‘ two or more individuals who are connected to one another by social relationships ’ [emphasis in original] (2006: 2-3). This definition has the merit of bringing together three elements: the number of individuals involved, connection, and relationship.

Second, groups are a fundamental part of human experience. They allow people to develop more complex and larger-scale activities; are significant sites of socialization and education; and provide settings where relationships can form and grow, and where people can find help and support.

Humans are small group beings. We always have been and we always will be. The ubiquitousness of groups and the inevitability of being in them makes groups one of the most important factors in our lives. As the effectiveness of our groups goes, so goes the quality of our lives. (Johnson and Johnson 2003: 579)

However, there is a downside to all this. The socialization they offer, for example, might be highly constraining and oppressive for some of their members. Given all of this it is easy to see why the intervention of skilled leaders and facilitators is sometimes necessary.

Third, the social relationships involved in groups entail interdependence. As Kurt Lewin wrote, ‘it is not similarity or dissimilarity of individuals that constitutes a group, but interdependence of fate’ (op. cit.: 165). In other words, groups come about in a psychological sense because people realize they are ‘in the same boat’ (Brown 1988: 28). However, even more significant than this for group process, Lewin argued, is some interdependence in the goals of group members. To get something done it is often necessary to cooperate with others.

Fourth, when considering the activities of informal educators and other workers and animateurs operating in local communities it is helpful to consider whether the groups they engage with are planned or emergent. Planned groups are specifically formed for some purpose – either by their members, or by some external individual, group or organization. Emergent groups come into being relatively spontaneously where people find themselves together in the same place, or where the same collection of people gradually come to know each other through conversation and interaction over a period of time. (Cartwright and Zander 1968). Much of the recent literature of group work is concerned with groups formed by the worker or agency. Relatively little has been written over the last decade or so about working with emergent groups or groups formed by their members. As a result some significant dimensions of experience have been left rather unexplored.

Last, considerable insights can be gained into the process and functioning of groups via the literature of group dynamics and of small groups. Of particular help are explorations of group structure (including the group size and the roles people play), group norms and culture, group goals, and the relative cohesiveness of groups (all discussed in What is a group? ). That said, the skills needed for engaging in and with group life – and the attitudes, orientations and ideas associated with them – are learnt, predominantly, through experiencing group life. This provides a powerful rationale for educative interventions.

Working with

Educators and animateurs often have to ‘be around’ for a time in many settings before we are approached or accepted:

It may seem obvious, but for others to meet us as helpers, we have to be available. People must know who we are and where we are to be found. They also need to know what we may be able to offer. They also must feel able to approach us (or be open to our initiating contact). (Smith and Smith 2008: 17)

Whether we are working with groups that we have formed, or are seeking to enter groups, to function as workers we need to be recognized as workers. In other words, the people in the situation need to give us space to engage with them around some experience, issue or task. Both workers and participants need to acknowledge that something called ‘work’ is going on.

The ‘work’ in ‘group work’ is a form of ‘working with’. We are directing our energies in a particular way. This is based in an understanding that people are not machines or objects that can be worked on like motor cars (Jeffs and Smith 2005: 70). We are spending time in the company of others. They have allowed us into their lives – and there is a social, emotional and moral relationship between us. As such, ‘working with’ is a special form of ‘being with’.

To engage with another’s thoughts and feelings, and to attend to our own, we have to be in a certain frame of mind. We have to be open to what is being said, to listen for meaning. To work with others is, in essence, to engage in a conversation with them. We should not seek to act on the other person but join with them in a search for understanding and possibility. (Smith and Smith 2008: 20)

Not surprisingly all this, when combined with the sorts of questions and issues that we have to engage with, the process of working with another can often be ‘a confusing, complex and demanding experience, both mentally and emotionally’ (Crosby 2001: 60).

In the conversations of informal and community educators the notion of ’working with’ is often reserved for describing more formal encounters where there is an explicit effort to help people attend to feelings, reflect on experiences, think about things, and make plans (Smith 1994: 95). It can involve putting aside a special time and agreeing a place to talk things through. Often, though, it entails creating a moment for reflection and exploration then and there (Smith and Smith 2008:20).

As Kerry Young (2006) has argued, ‘Working with’ can also be seen as an exercise in moral philosophy. Often people seeking to answer in some way deep questions about themselves and the situations they face. At root these look to how people should live their lives: ‘what is the right way to act in this situation or that; of what does happiness consist for me and for others; how should I to relate to others; what sort of society should I be working for?’ (Smith and Smith 2008: 20). This inevitably entails us as workers to be asking the same questions of ourselves. There needs to be, as Gisela Konopka (1963) has argued, certain values running through the way we engage with others. In relation to social group work, she looked three ‘humanistic’ concerns. That:

• individuals are of inherent worth.
• people are mutually responsible for each other; and
• people have the fundamental right to to experience mental health brought about by social and political conditions that support their fulfilment. (see Glassman and Kates 1990: 14).

Working with groups – a definition for starters

What does it mean, then, to say that we work with groups, or that we are group workers? A problem that immediately faces us is that most commentators and writers come at this question from the tradition or arena of practice in which they are located. However, if we bring together the discussion so far we can say that at base working with groups involves engaging with, and seeking to enhance, interactions and relationships within a gathering of two or more other people.

Some will be focusing on issues and problems, and individual functioning. It is not surprising, for example, that Gisela Konopka (1963) writing from within social work would have this sort of focus – although she does look across different areas where these might arise:

Social group work is a method of social work which helps individuals to enhance their social functioning through purposeful group experiences, and to cope more effectively with their personal, group or community problems.

However, as Allan Brown (1992: 8) and others have pointed out, many group workers look beyond helping the individual with a problem. Group work can emphasize ‘action and influence as well as reaction and adaption’ ( op. cit. ). Thus, Allan Brown argues:

… group work provides a context in which individuals help each other ; it is a method of helping groups as well as helping individuals; and it can enable individuals and groups to influence and change personal, group, organizational and community problems. (Brown 1992: 8. Emphasis in the original)

This particular way of conceptualizing group work is helpful in that it looks to strengthen the group as what Lawrence Shulman (1979: 109; 1999) described as a ‘mutual aid system’. The worker seeks to help people to help each other. Crucially, it is concerned with the ways in which both individuals and groups can build more fulfilling lives for themselves and for communities of which they are a part. It also looks to wider change.

From this exploration I want to highlight three foci for group workers. They need to ‘think group,  attend to purpose, and stay in touch with themselves.

Thinking group

For the worker working with a group entails ‘thinking group’ (McDermott 2002: 80-91). ‘Thinking group’ means focusing on the group as a whole – ‘considering everything that happens in terms of the group context (also the wider context in which it is embedded –social, political, organizational) because this is where meaning is manifest’ ( op. cit. :81-2). She continues:

In advocating for the group worker to keep in mind that, while groups are comprised of individuals, at the same time their coming together may enable the expression of powerful forces reinforcing as sense of commonality and solidarity. These are the building blocks for the development of trust. Trust and its counterpart – reciprocity amongst members, may establish the bonds which serve to enable members to achieve their individual and common goals. The task of the worker is to nurture such developments. ( op. cit. : 82)

For Fiona McDermott the capacity to ‘think group’ is the single most important contribution that group workers can bring to their practice. They need to avoid working with individuals in the setting of the group, but rather see individual growth and development as something that emerges out of group interaction and group life.

Attending to purpose

As well as attending to the group as a process of harnessing the collective strengths of group members, workers also need to look to purpose. Urania Glassman and Len Kates (1990: 105-18), for example, have argued that group workers should attempt to effect two complementary objectives. The first is the development of mutual aid systems; the second is to help the group to attend to, and achieve, their purpose (what they describe as the actualization of purpose). In other words, workers need to keep their eyes on the individual and collective goals that the group may or does want to work towards. They also need to intervene in the group where appropriate to help people to clarify and achieve these.

When considering purpose it is also important to bear in mind the nature of the group engaged with – and the context within which we are working with them. An influential model for thinking about this in social work came from Papell and Rothman (1966). They distinguished between three models:

• remedial – where the aim on the part of the work/agency is individual social adaption.
• reciprocal – where the aim is to strengthen mutual aid and to mediate between individuals and society.
• social goals – where the concern is to further social justice often through collective, social action.

Subsequently, there has been various variations and developments of this model e.g. Shulman (1999) – but this original model still remains helpful as a way of alerting us to thinking about purpose – especially from the perspective of the agency employing group workers.

Attending to ourselves

As Parker Palmer has argued in the context of education any attempt at reform or development will fail if we do not cherish and challenge the human heart that is the source of good practice (Palmer 1998: 3). For Palmer, good practice is rather more than technique, it flows from the identity and integrity of the worker’ (Palmer 2000: 11). This means that they both know themselves, and that they are seeking to live life as well as they can. Good group workers are, thus, connected, able to be in touch with themselves, with those they work with and their ‘subjects’ – and act in ways that further flourishing and wholeness.

In a passage which provides one of the most succinct and direct rationales for a concern with attending to, and knowing, our selves Parker Palmer draws out the implications of his argument.

Teaching, like any truly human activity, emerges from one’s inwardness, for better or worse. As I teach, I project the condition of my soul onto my students, my subject, and our way of being together…. When I do not know myself, I cannot know who my students are. I will see them through a glass darkly, in the shadows of my unexamined life – and when I cannot see them clearly, I cannot teach them well. When I do not know myself, I cannot know my subject – not at the deepest levels of embodied, personal meaning. I will know it only abstractly, from a distance, a congeries of concepts as far removed from the world as I am from personal truth. (Parker Palmer 1998: 2)

If we do not know who we are then we cannot know those we work with, nor the areas we explore.

Exploring the theory and practice of group work

The emergence of the group as a focus for intervention and work within social work and informal education in Britain and north America was a slow process and initially largely wrapped up with the response of Christians, particularly evangelical Christians, to the social conditions they encountered in the late eighteenth and throughout the nineteenth century. Examples from Britain include Hannah More and Robert Raikes and Sunday schooling ; John Pound and Quentin Hogg and ragged schooling ; George Williams and the YMCA ; Arthur Sweatman and Maude Stanley in boys’ and girls’ club work. Their motives were often a complex mix of concern for others, the desire to bring people to Bible truths and values, and worries about the threat to order that the masses posed.

Alongside this a considerable amount of mutual aid activity developed during the nineteenth century especially around chapels, meeting houses, working men’s clubs and in the field of adult education (see, for example, Smith 1988 on the making of popular youth work; Horton Smith 2000; Rose 2002). There was also a growing appreciation of group process and sophistication in approach within adult education. However, it was with developments in psychology and sociology (with the emergence of ‘small group theory’ and studies of group dynamics, for example) that the scene for a more thorough building of theory about working with groups – particularly in north America. Alongside this, the influence of progressive education as a philosophy – particularly through the work of John Dewey and William Kilpatrick – began to be felt by many practitioners (see Reid 1981a ).

In the USA, courses on group work started to appear in the early 1920s – and the first sustained treatments of group work began to appear. In particular, the work of Grace Coyle (1930; 1937) drawing upon her experience of settlement work, the YWCA and adult education was influential – but many others around the field such as Eduard Lindeman (1924), Margaretta Williamson (1929) and Mary Parker Follett (1918; 1924) were exploring different aspects of working with groups. There began to be a discourse around the work that transcended professional and sector boundaries.

First, it was discovered that workers in a variety of agencies had a great deal in common and that the major component of that common experience lay in their experience with groups. Out of this recognition came the widespread use of the term social group work and the development of interest groups focusing on work with groups in a number of cities. The second discovery was that what was common to all the groups was that, in addition to the activities in which the group engaged, groups involved a network of relationships between the members and the worker, between the group as a whole and the agency and neighborhood in which the members lived. This combination of relationships was called the group process. This second realization produced a search for deeper insights into these relationships, an attempt to describe them and to understand their dynamics. (Reid 1981a:123)

Group work began to be seen as a dimension of social work in north America (perhaps best symbolized by it being accepted as a section at the 1935 National Conference of Social Work). It’s potential as a therapeutic process was also starting to be recognized (Boyd 1935). As might be expected there was considerable debate around what group work was – and where it belonged (see, for example, Lieberman 1938). Although group work methodology was developed within recreation and informal education agencies it was increasingly being used in social work-oriented agencies within other institutions such as children’s institutions, hospitals, and churches (Reid 1981b: 145-6). Influential commentators such as Gertrude Wilson (1941) argued that group work was a core method of social work and not a field, movement, or agency. At the same time theorizing about group work was benefiting from significant advances in the understanding of group dynamics (most especially through the work of Kurt Lewin) and small work groups (Elton Mayo’s research at the Hawthorne Plant of the Western Electric Company being the best known).

By the start of World War II, group work in north America ‘was beginning to change its emphasis from social action and preparation of group members for social responsibility to problems of individual adjustment’ (Reid 1981b: 154). This gathered pace during the 1940s and was reflected in the publication of key practice texts – notably Grace L. Coyle’s (1948) Group Work with American Youth: A Guide to the Practice of Leadership , and Gertrude Wilson and Gladys Ryland’s (1949) Social group work practice; the creative use of the social process . There were those, such as Alan Klein (1953) who continued to explore the connection between group work and democracy – but much of the running was now being made by those working within social work and therapy. Gisela Konopka’s explorations of therapeutic group work with children (1949), group work in institutions (1954) and of social group work as a helping process (1963) were amongst the most important here. Some more generic texts around social group work such Phillips (1957) also appeared.

In Britain, there was some awareness of these developments – but there was very little explicit exploration of group work theory and practice until the early 1950s. A number of the key figures involved in stimulating debate and exploration came from youth work – notably Peter Kuenstler at the University of Bristol. Kuenstler encouraged Grace Coyle to come to Britain to spend time with workers – and edited the first major text on social group work in Britain (Kuenstler 1955). Josephine Klein was another pivotal researcher and writer. Her books The Study of Groups (1956) and Working with Groups (1961) were major additions to the literature – and brought groups and group work firmly into the discourse of social work. This was helped by the attention given by the Younghusband Report (Ministry of Health 1959) to social group work.

Group work as form of social work is directed towards giving people a constructive experience of membership in a group, so that they may develop further as individuals and be better able to contribute to the life of the community.

There was also important work happening within community development – with studies of community groups (Spencer 1964) and small social groups (Phillips 1965). George Goetschius ’ (1969) long term exploration of work with community and estate groups was also important. Further significant work followed – notably Joan Matthews (1966) explorations of working with youth groups, Leslie Button’s (1974) examination of developmental group work, and Bernard Davies’ (1975) path-breaking interactionalist perspective with regard to the use of groups in social work practice.

At the same time there had been an explosion in exploration and publishing in the United States. Aside from the obvious problem of scale, there are issues around categorizing material, quality (many texts are are repeats of a basic how-to-do-it formula), and purpose. To make life easier I have adapted a framework used by Kenneth E. Reid in his helpful study of the use of groups in social work (1981) and added in a more therapeutically strand. I am not very comfortable with the categories – but they do provide a way of mapping material:

Case-focused group work . This approach can be described as ‘preventative and rehabilitative’, ‘remedial’ or ‘organizational’ – and is focused on the individual. The group provides a means by which an individual’s problems can be assessed and addressed. It is most clearly connected with social work and casework and case management. The emphasis is upon ‘ameliorating or preventing the adverse conditions that negatively influence individuals and result in deviant behaviour’ (Reid 1981: 191). Classic examples of this literature come from Gisela Konopka (1949, 1954, 1963) and Paul Glasser et al. (1974).

Interaction-focused group work . Here the group is understood as ‘a system of mutual aid wherein the worker and the members are engaged on the common enterprise of carrying out the group’s goals’ (Reid 1981: 191). Within this category fall humanistic approaches such as those of Glassman and Kates (1990), the social group work of Grace Coyle and the work of William Schwartz as his associates such as Lawrence Shulman (1979, 1999).

Group therapy, T-groups and encounter groups. There was a continuing growth in discussions that looked to the group as a key element in the therapeutic process – and that drew heavily upon central traditions of practice within psychotherapy e.g. psychoanalytic, Gestalt, cognitive-behavioural etc. Allied to this was material around family therapy (through which I have hardly bared to tread). ‘Classic’ work appeared from Wilfred Bion (1961) and some standard works from writers such as Irvin D. Yalom (1970). Another tradition of practice that could be said to fall in this strand is that of Training groups (T-groups). Here following on from Lewin’s interest in using small groups as training laboratories for teaching people interpersonal skills, Bradford’s work at the National Training Laboratory at Bethel, Maine; and the later development of sensitivity-training or encounter groups (e.g. Lieberman 1973, Rogers 1970) are examples of the use of groups for interpersonal learning.

Social goals group work . Here the focus is on dealing with ‘those problems that are related to the social order and the social value orientation in small groups’ (Reid 1981: 202). This long established set of traditions of practice is closely linked to community organization/community work. See, for example Mullender and Ward (1991) and Twelvetrees (1982, 1991, 2001, 2008).

In recent years there has been a significant development in the discussion of therapeutic traditions of group work, and some limited attention to group work within mainstream schooling. Unfortunately, much of the work within the social work arena has resulted in rather pedestrian ‘how-to-do-it’ texts – but there have been some good introductory texts examples over the last decade or so (e.g. Benson 2000; Brown 1993; Doel 1999).  Similarly, the quality of texts offered teachers and educators has been variable but one of the better examples is Jaques and Salmon (2006). Sadly, working with emergent groups, and with community groups has not had the attention it merits.

In this piece we have seen something of the development of thinking about group work – and explored some significant dimensions of practice. In many respects it raises as many questions as it answers.  For those concerned with informal education, social pedagogy and social action there is a considerable need to explore ways of working with groups that:

• is educationally informed.
• has a vision of the people as social beings.
• is committed to democracy and social justice.
• looks to the groups that arise as part of everyday living.

While there are fascinating examples of practice in this area, there is a huge gap in the literature.

Further reading and references

Reid, K. E. (1981) From Character Building to Social Treatment.  The history of the use of groups in social work , Westport, Connecticut .  Excellent discussion of the development of group work as a method within social work.

Benson, Jarlah. (2000) Working More Creatively with Groups . London: Routledge.

Bertcher, H. J. (1994) Group Participation. Techniques for leaders and members 2e. Thousand Oaks, Ca.: Sage.

Bion, W. R. (1961) Experiences in Groups and other papers . London: Tavistock.

Bion, W. R. (1970) Attention and Interpretation . London: Tavistock.

Boyd, Neva (1935) ‘Group Work Experiments in State Institutions in Illinois,’ in Proceedings of the National Conference of Social Work, 1935. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Brown, Alan (1992) Groupwork . London: Heinemann.

Brown, Rupert (1999) Group processes: Dynamics within and between groups 2e. Oxford: WileyBlackwell.

Butler, S. and Wintram, C. (1991) Feminist Groupwork. London: Sage.

Button, Leslie (1974) Developmental group work with adolescents . London: University of London Press.

Campbell, Douglas T. (1958) ‘Common fate, similarity, and other indices of aggregates of persons as social entities’, Behavioral Science 3: 14-25.

Cartwright, Dorwin and Alvin Zander (eds.) (1968) Group dynamics: research and theory 3e. London: Tavistock Publications.

Cooley, C. H. (1909) Social Organization. A study of the larger mind . New York: Scribners.

Coyle, G. L. (1930) Social Process in Organized Groups. New York: Richard R. Smith.

Coyle, G. L. (ed.) (1937) Studies in Group Behavior . New York: Harper and Brothers.

Coyle, G. L. (1947) Group Experience and Democratic Values. New York: Women’s Press

Coyle, G. L. (1948) Group Work and American Youth. A guide to the practice of leadership. New York: Harper and Brothers.

Crosby, Mary (2001) ‘Working with people as an informal educator’ in L. D. Richardson and M. Wolfe (eds.) (2001) Principles and Practice of Informal Education. Learning through life . London: RoutledgeFalmer

Davies, Bernard (1975) The Use of Groups in Social Work Practice . London:Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Doel, Mark (1999) The Essential Groupworker . London: Jessica Kingsley.

Follett, M. P. (1918) The New State – Group Organization, the Solution for Popular Government . New York: Longman, Green and Co.

Follett, M. P. (1924) Creative Experience . New York: Longman Green and Co (reprinted by Peter Owen in 1951).

Forsyth, Donelson R. (1990) Group Dynamics 2e. Pacific Grove CA.: Brooks Cole.

Forsyth, Donelson R. (2005) Group Dynamics 4e. Belmont CA.: Wadsworth Publishing.

Glasser, P., Sarri, R. and Vinter, R. (eds.) (1974) Individual Change Through Small Groups. New York: Free Press.

Glassman, Urania and Len Kates (1990) Group Work. A humanistic approach. Newbury Park, CA.: Sage.

Homans, George (1951) The Human Group . London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Jaques, David and Salmon, Gilly (2006) Learning in Groups: A Handbook for Face-to-face and Online Environments 4e. London: Routledge.

Jeffs, Tony and Mark K. Smith (2005) Informal Education. Conversation, democracy and learning 3e. Nottingham: Educational Heretics Press.

Johnson, David W. and Frank P. Johnson (2003) Joining Together. Group theory and group skills . Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Klein, Alan (1953) Society, Democracy and the Group . New York: Woman’s Press.

Klein, Josephine (1956) The Study of Groups . London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Klein, Josephine (1961) Working with Groups. The social psychology of discussion and decision . London: Hutchinson.

Konopka, G. (1949). Therapeutic Group Work with Children . Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

Konopka, K. (1954). Group Work in the Institution – A Modern Challenge . New York: Association Press.

Konopka, G. (1963) Social Group Work: A helping process. Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice Hall.

Kuenstler, Peter (ed.) (1955) Social Group Work in Britain . London: Faber and Faber.

Lewin, Kurt (1948) Resolving social conflicts; selected papers on group dynamics . Gertrude W. Lewin (ed.). New York: Harper & Row, 1948.

Lewin, Kurt (1951) Field theory in social science; selected theoretical papers . D. Cartwright (ed.). New York: Harper & Row.

Lieberman, Joshua (ed.) (1938) New Trends in Group Work . New York: Association Press.

Lieberman, M. A., Yalom, I. D. and Miles, M. B. (1973) Encounter Groups. First facts . New York: Basic Books.

Lindeman, E. C. (1924) Social Discovery. An approach to the study of functional groups. New York: Republic Publishing.

Lippitt, R. (1949) Training in Community Relations. A research exploration toward new group skills. New York: Harper.

Mayo, Elton (1933) The Human Problems of an Industrial Civilization . New York: Macmillan.

McDermott, Fiona (2002) Inside Group Work. A guide to reflective practice . Crows nest NSW.: Allen and Unwin.

Miles, M. B. (1959, 1981) Learning to Work in Groups. A practical guide for members and trainers. New York: Teachers College Press.

Mills, Theodore M. (1967) The Sociology of Small Groups . Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall.

Ministry of Health (1959) Report of the Working Party on Social Workers (The Younghusband Report). London: HMSO.

Mullender, A. and Ward, D. (1991) Self-Directed Groupwork. Users take action for empowerment. London: Whiting and Birch.

Palmer, Parker. J. (1998) The Courage to Teach. Exploring the inner landscape of a teacher’s life , San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Palmer, Parker, J. (2000) Let Your Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation ,  San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Papell, C and Rothman, B. (1966) ‘Social Groupwork models: possession and heritage’, Journal for Education for Social Work 2(2): 66-77.

Phillips, Helen U. (1957) Essentials of Social Group Work Skill . New York: Association Press.

Phillips, Margaret (1965) Small Social Groups in England . London: Methuen.

Reid, K. E. (1981a) ‘Formulation of a method, 1920-1936’ in From Character Building to Social Treatment.The history of the use of groups in social work, Westport, Connecticut. Available in the informal education archives: http://www.infed.org/archives/e-texts/reid_groupwork_formulation_method.htm .

Reid, K. E. (1981b) ‘Expansion and professionalism, 1937-1955’ in From Character Building to Social Treatment.  The history of the use of groups in social work , Westport, Connecticut : Greenwood Press. Available in the informal education archives : http://www.infed.org/archives/e-texts/reid_groupwork_expansion.htm .

Rogers, C. R. (1970) Encounter Groups . Harmondsworth: Penguin.

Schulman, L. (1979) The Skills of Helping Individuals and Groups. Itasca, Ill.:Peacock.

Schulman, L. (1999) The Skills of Helping Individuals and Groups. 2e. Itasca, Ill.:Peacock.

Schwartz, W. and Zalba, S. R. (eds.) (1971) The Practice of Group Work . New York: Columbia University Press.

Smith, Heather and Mark K Smith (2008) The Art of Helping Others . London: Jessica Kingsley.

Smith, Mark K. (1994) Local Education. Community, conversation, praxis. Buckingham: Open University Press.

Spencer, John C. (1964) Stress & Release in an Urban Estate. A study in action research . [Written with the collaboration of Joy Tuxford & Norman Dennis]. London: Tavistock.

Thrasher, F. (1927) The Gang . Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Turner, J. C. with M. A. Hogg (1987) Rediscovering the social group : a self-categorization theory . Oxford: Basil Blackwell.

Twelvetrees, A. (1982; 1991, 2001, 2008) Community Work.  London: Macmillan/Palgrave.

Westergaard, Jane (2009) Effective Group Work with Young People . Maidenhead: Open University Press.

Whyte, William Foote (1943, 1955, 1966, 1981, 1993) Street Corner Society: social structure of an Italian slum . Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Williamson, Margaretta (1929) The Social Worker in Group Work. New York: Harper and Brothers.

Wilson, Gertrude (1941) Group work and case work, their relationship and practice. New York, Family Welfare Association of America.

Wilson, Gertrude and Ryland, Gladys (1949) Social group work practice; the creative use of the social process . Boston, Houghton Mifflin Co.

Yalom, Irvin D. (1970, 1975, 1985, 1995) The Theory and Practice of Group Psychotherapy . New York: Basic Books.

Yalom, I. D. and Lescz (2005) The Theory and Practice of Group Psychotherapy 5e, New York: Basic Books.

Young, Kerry (2006) The Art of Youth Work . Lyme Regis: Russell House Publishing.

Zander, Alvin (1985) The Purposes of Groups and Organizations . San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Acknowledgement: The photograph – Group work – the relaxed way is by Jacob Bøtter ( http://www.flickr.com/photos/jakecaptive/47065774/ ) and is reproduced under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Licence .

How to cite this article : Smith, Mark K. (2008) ‘What is group work?’, The encyclopedia of pedagogy and informal education . https://infed.org/mobi/group-work/ . Retrieved: insert date] .].

© Mark K Smith 1996, 2005, 2008

Center for Teaching

Group work: using cooperative learning groups effectively.

Many instructors from disciplines across the university use group work to enhance their students’ learning. Whether the goal is to increase student understanding of content, to build particular transferable skills, or some combination of the two, instructors often turn to small group work to capitalize on the benefits of peer-to-peer instruction. This type of group work is formally termed cooperative learning, and is defined as the instructional use of small groups to promote students working together to maximize their own and each other’s learning (Johnson, et al., 2008).

Cooperative learning is characterized by positive interdependence, where students perceive that better performance by individuals produces better performance by the entire group (Johnson, et al., 2014). It can be formal or informal, but often involves specific instructor intervention to maximize student interaction and learning. It is infinitely adaptable, working in small and large classes and across disciplines, and can be one of the most effective teaching approaches available to college instructors.

What can it look like?

What’s the theoretical underpinning, is there evidence that it works.

• What are approaches that can help make it effective?

Informal cooperative learning groups In informal cooperative learning, small, temporary, ad-hoc groups of two to four students work together for brief periods in a class, typically up to one class period, to answer questions or respond to prompts posed by the instructor.

Additional examples of ways to structure informal group work

Think-pair-share

The instructor asks a discussion question. Students are instructed to think or write about an answer to the question before turning to a peer to discuss their responses. Groups then share their responses with the class.

Peer Instruction

This modification of the think-pair-share involves personal responses devices (e.g. clickers). The question posted is typically a conceptually based multiple-choice question. Students think about their answer and vote on a response before turning to a neighbor to discuss. Students can change their answers after discussion, and “sharing” is accomplished by the instructor revealing the graph of student response and using this as a stimulus for large class discussion. This approach is particularly well-adapted for large classes.

In this approach, groups of students work in a team of four to become experts on one segment of new material, while other “expert teams” in the class work on other segments of new material. The class then rearranges, forming new groups that have one member from each expert team. The members of the new team then take turns teaching each other the material on which they are experts.

Formal cooperative learning groups

In formal cooperative learning students work together for one or more class periods to complete a joint task or assignment (Johnson et al., 2014). There are several features that can help these groups work well:

• The instructor defines the learning objectives for the activity and assigns students to groups.
• The groups are typically heterogeneous, with particular attention to the skills that are needed for success in the task.
• Within the groups, students may be assigned specific roles, with the instructor communicating the criteria for success and the types of social skills that will be needed.
• Importantly, the instructor continues to play an active role during the groups’ work, monitoring the work and evaluating group and individual performance.
• Instructors also encourage groups to reflect on their interactions to identify potential improvements for future group work.

This video shows an example of formal cooperative learning groups in David Matthes’ class at the University of Minnesota:

There are many more specific types of group work that fall under the general descriptions given here, including team-based learning , problem-based learning , and process-oriented guided inquiry learning .

The use of cooperative learning groups in instruction is based on the principle of constructivism, with particular attention to the contribution that social interaction can make. In essence, constructivism rests on the idea that individuals learn through building their own knowledge, connecting new ideas and experiences to existing knowledge and experiences to form new or enhanced understanding (Bransford, et al., 1999). The consideration of the role that groups can play in this process is based in social interdependence theory, which grew out of Kurt Koffka’s and Kurt Lewin’s identification of groups as dynamic entities that could exhibit varied interdependence among members, with group members motivated to achieve common goals. Morton Deutsch conceptualized varied types of interdependence, with positive correlation among group members’ goal achievements promoting cooperation.

Lev Vygotsky extended this work by examining the relationship between cognitive processes and social activities, developing the sociocultural theory of development. The sociocultural theory of development suggests that learning takes place when students solve problems beyond their current developmental level with the support of their instructor or their peers. Thus both the idea of a zone of proximal development, supported by positive group interdependence, is the basis of cooperative learning (Davidson and Major, 2014; Johnson, et al., 2014).

Cooperative learning follows this idea as groups work together to learn or solve a problem, with each individual responsible for understanding all aspects. The small groups are essential to this process because students are able to both be heard and to hear their peers, while in a traditional classroom setting students may spend more time listening to what the instructor says.

Cooperative learning uses both goal interdependence and resource interdependence to ensure interaction and communication among group members. Changing the role of the instructor from lecturing to facilitating the groups helps foster this social environment for students to learn through interaction.

David Johnson, Roger Johnson, and Karl Smith performed a meta-analysis of 168 studies comparing cooperative learning to competitive learning and individualistic learning in college students (Johnson et al., 2006). They found that cooperative learning produced greater academic achievement than both competitive learning and individualistic learning across the studies, exhibiting a mean weighted effect size of 0.54 when comparing cooperation and competition and 0.51 when comparing cooperation and individualistic learning. In essence, these results indicate that cooperative learning increases student academic performance by approximately one-half of a standard deviation when compared to non-cooperative learning models, an effect that is considered moderate. Importantly, the academic achievement measures were defined in each study, and ranged from lower-level cognitive tasks (e.g., knowledge acquisition and retention) to higher level cognitive activity (e.g., creative problem solving), and from verbal tasks to mathematical tasks to procedural tasks. The meta-analysis also showed substantial effects on other metrics, including self-esteem and positive attitudes about learning. George Kuh and colleagues also conclude that cooperative group learning promotes student engagement and academic performance (Kuh et al., 2007).

Springer, Stanne, and Donovan (1999) confirmed these results in their meta-analysis of 39 studies in university STEM classrooms. They found that students who participated in various types of small-group learning, ranging from extended formal interactions to brief informal interactions, had greater academic achievement, exhibited more favorable attitudes towards learning, and had increased persistence through STEM courses than students who did not participate in STEM small-group learning.

The box below summarizes three individual studies examining the effects of cooperative learning groups.

What are approaches that can help make group work effective?

Preparation

Articulate your goals for the group work, including both the academic objectives you want the students to achieve and the social skills you want them to develop.

Determine the group conformation that will help meet your goals.

• In informal group learning, groups often form ad hoc from near neighbors in a class.
• In formal group learning, it is helpful for the instructor to form groups that are heterogeneous with regard to particular skills or abilities relevant to group tasks. For example, groups may be heterogeneous with regard to academic skill in the discipline or with regard to other skills related to the group task (e.g., design capabilities, programming skills, writing skills, organizational skills) (Johnson et al, 2006).
• Groups from 2-6 are generally recommended, with groups that consist of three members exhibiting the best performance in some problem-solving tasks (Johnson et al., 2006; Heller and Hollabaugh, 1992).
• To avoid common problems in group work, such as dominance by a single student or conflict avoidance, it can be useful to assign roles to group members (e.g., manager, skeptic, educator, conciliator) and to rotate them on a regular basis (Heller and Hollabaugh, 1992). Assigning these roles is not necessary in well-functioning groups, but can be useful for students who are unfamiliar with or unskilled at group work.

Choose an assessment method that will promote positive group interdependence as well as individual accountability.

• In team-based learning, two approaches promote positive interdependence and individual accountability. First, students take an individual readiness assessment test, and then immediately take the same test again as a group. Their grade is a composite of the two scores. Second, students complete a group project together, and receive a group score on the project. They also, however, distribute points among their group partners, allowing student assessment of members’ contributions to contribute to the final score.
• Heller and Hollabaugh (1992) describe an approach in which they incorporated group problem-solving into a class. Students regularly solved problems in small groups, turning in a single solution. In addition, tests were structured such that 25% of the points derived from a group problem, where only those individuals who attended the group problem-solving sessions could participate in the group test problem.  This approach can help prevent the “free rider” problem that can plague group work.
• The University of New South Wales describes a variety of ways to assess group work , ranging from shared group grades, to grades that are averages of individual grades, to strictly individual grades, to a combination of these. They also suggest ways to assess not only the product of the group work but also the process.  Again, having a portion of a grade that derives from individual contribution helps combat the free rider problem.

Helping groups get started

Explain the group’s task, including your goals for their academic achievement and social interaction.

Explain how the task involves both positive interdependence and individual accountability, and how you will be assessing each.

Assign group roles or give groups prompts to help them articulate effective ways for interaction. The University of New South Wales provides a valuable set of tools to help groups establish good practices when first meeting. The site also provides some exercises for building group dynamics; these may be particularly valuable for groups that will be working on larger projects.

Monitoring group work

Regularly observe group interactions and progress , either by circulating during group work, collecting in-process documents, or both. When you observe problems, intervene to help students move forward on the task and work together effectively. The University of New South Wales provides handouts that instructors can use to promote effective group interactions, such as a handout to help students listen reflectively or give constructive feedback , or to help groups identify particular problems that they may be encountering.

Assessing and reflecting

In addition to providing feedback on group and individual performance (link to preparation section above), it is also useful to provide a structure for groups to reflect on what worked well in their group and what could be improved. Graham Gibbs (1994) suggests using the checklists shown below.

The University of New South Wales provides other reflective activities that may help students identify effective group practices and avoid ineffective practices in future cooperative learning experiences.

Bransford, J.D., Brown, A.L., and Cocking, R.R. (Eds.) (1999). How people learn: Brain, mind, experience, and school . Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press.

Bruffee, K. A. (1993). Collaborative learning: Higher education, interdependence, and the authority of knowledge. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Cabrera, A. F., Crissman, J. L., Bernal, E. M., Nora, A., Terenzini, P. T., & Pascarella, E. T. (2002). Collaborative learning: Its impact on college students’ development and diversity. Journal of College Student Development, 43 (1), 20-34.

Davidson, N., & Major, C. H. (2014). Boundary crossing: Cooperative learning, collaborative learning, and problem-based learning. Journal on Excellence in College Teaching, 25 (3&4), 7-55.

Dees, R. L. (1991). The role of cooperative leaning in increasing problem-solving ability in a college remedial course. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 22 (5), 409-21.

Gokhale, A. A. (1995). Collaborative Learning enhances critical thinking. Journal of Technology Education, 7 (1).

Heller, P., and Hollabaugh, M. (1992) Teaching problem solving through cooperative grouping. Part 2: Designing problems and structuring groups. American Journal of Physics 60, 637-644.

Johnson, D.W., Johnson, R.T., and Smith, K.A. (2006). Active learning: Cooperation in the university classroom (3 rd edition). Edina, MN: Interaction.

Johnson, D.W., Johnson, R.T., and Holubec, E.J. (2008). Cooperation in the classroom (8 th edition). Edina, MN: Interaction.

Johnson, D.W., Johnson, R.T., and Smith, K.A. (2014). Cooperative learning: Improving university instruction by basing practice on validated theory. Journl on Excellence in College Teaching 25, 85-118.

Jones, D. J., & Brickner, D. (1996). Implementation of cooperative learning in a large-enrollment basic mechanics course. American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference Proceedings.

Kuh, G.D., Kinzie, J., Buckley, J., Bridges, B., and Hayek, J.C. (2007). Piecing together the student success puzzle: Research, propositions, and recommendations (ASHE Higher Education Report, No. 32). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.

Love, A. G., Dietrich, A., Fitzgerald, J., & Gordon, D. (2014). Integrating collaborative learning inside and outside the classroom. Journal on Excellence in College Teaching, 25 (3&4), 177-196.

Smith, M. E., Hinckley, C. C., & Volk, G. L. (1991). Cooperative learning in the undergraduate laboratory. Journal of Chemical Education 68 (5), 413-415.

Springer, L., Stanne, M. E., & Donovan, S. S. (1999). Effects of small-group learning on undergraduates in science, mathematics, engineering, and technology: A meta-analysis. Review of Educational Research, 96 (1), 21-51.

Uribe, D., Klein, J. D., & Sullivan, H. (2003). The effect of computer-mediated collaborative learning on solving ill-defined problems. Educational Technology Research and Development, 51 (1), 5-19.

Vygotsky, L. S. (1962). Thought and Language. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

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Working in a Group Essay

Introduction, advantages of working in a group, disadvantages of working in a group, reference list.

Group work has become very common not only in learning environment but also among workers in organizations. The common believe is that working in a group is more productive than working alone. Institutions emphasize on group and team work and invest heavily in team building among their members. Formation process of a group may determine its success. Tuckman & Jensen (1977) suggests that a successful group should be formed stepwise following stages like forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning.

Firstly, working in a group fosters an environment for learning since the individuals can learn from the experiences and expertise of each other. They learn different ways of approaching issues from his colleagues (Duch, 2000). Managers working in groups get more insight in solving problems as they interact with each other.

Another advantage is synergy creation i.e. group decisions tend to create synergy that combines and improves on the knowledge of the group to make decisions of high quality than the sum of individual decisions. This synergy results when each individual brings additional knowledge and skills to the decisions.

It also ensures that tasks are completed within the fastest time because duties are shared depending on the capability of a person in accomplishing a certain task (Traker, n. d.) As people possess different skills and capabilities, group work enhances the sharing of ideas and this has the effect of ensuring that best results are attained. Decisions made are also well thought out.

Creativity is enhanced as a result of working in groups because the diversity in culture, behaviours and attitude enables the members to become more innovative in dealing with difficult tasks.

Group work leads to the acceptance of decisions made as opposed to individual decisions because group decision making reflects acceptance. Group work also reduces the chances of intrapersonal conflicts i.e. conflicts that arise within an individual mainly about what is right and what is wrong (Belbin, 1981). Deciding the right things to do in certain situations as an individual can be quite stressful.

Group work ensures that members participate well unlike in working as individuals whereby employees can decide to sabotage work. An individual may decide not to work as effectively as would be considered reasonable and attempt not to get even the targets as opposed to a group situation (Traker, n. d.).

Also, the members of a group ensure that the resources are shared well and that there is no misuse of organizational resources for personal use.

Working in a group implies longer time frame than working as individuals because groups generally need more time to make decisions than individuals because a group has to exchange information among many individuals so as to obtain a consensus.

The decisions that are made while working in a group tends to be more extreme i.e. they are a bit riskier because no single person would be willing to shoulder the consequences of the decisions.

Also individual expertise is ignored while working in group and the group members may opt for group consensus instead.

Working in a group enhances decision making in an organization as opposed to working as an individual in which case there is information deficiency. The resources of the organization are shared and this minimizes the costs.

Belbin, M., 1981. Management Teams, Why they Succeed or Fail . Heinneman: London.

Duch, B., 2000. Working in Groups . USA: University of Delaware. Web.

Traker, H.B., n. d. Social Group Work: Principles and Practice . New York: Association Press N.Y.

Tuckman, B. W. & Jensen, M. A., 1977. Stages of small-group development revisited. Group Org. Studies, vol 2. pp. 419-27.

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Group Work, Essay Example

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Working in groups has been a common occurrence for several decades not only in educational spheres, but also in work and social environments.  In the latter two situations, people usually break up into groups to brainstorm, something that is too difficult to do in a large gathering.  Although that same reasoning is sometimes present in educational settings, it is not the main reason in these locales.  In colleges and universities—and even high schools—the main objective of group work is to learn how to work effectively in such settings.  Knowledgeable and dedicated people with a healthy self-esteem and good people skills find such work enjoyable and productive.  For some, however, it is pure torture. Being an introvert, group work was somewhat difficult for me.

The task of the group to which I was assigned was to write a group paper.  If there was one thing that I could say that this group did great, it was dividing up responsibilities amongst its members.  We were able to do this on the very first day that we began working on this writing project.  We were also able to decide on our writing project topic on our very first day, something that is often the toughest part of group work.

Although our group, as a whole, lacked effective communication skills, one member was actually quite adept at it.  After each group meeting, that person would email all the members with the details of what occurred.  While some of us replied, the majority did not.  This was quite frustrating because those who did not respond, did not update either on what they were doing, with the result that the rest of the group did not know what to do.  Also, one member did not show up for most of the meetings, which resulted in the group being concerned about whether

this person would do the required work or whether somebody else would have to do it.  At the end of the day, all members completed their assigned parts; and the project turned out good.  However, at the beginning, it was rather scary when I looked at the condition of the group and wondered whether or not they would slack off.

One person took the lead, which helped us make some quick decisions and get started quickly.  I did most of the listening.  However, at times when I felt that something was not right or something should be added, I did speak up and sort of spit out my opinions.  However, when it came to the actual work, I did well.  Later, I became so concerned about one of the group not sending in the assigned work that I emailed this member reminders about the fast-approaching deadline.  Nevertheless, there were no actual slackers.  Everyone took responsibility and did his or her part.  The only conflict within the group revolved around emails not being replied to by certain members and that some of us had to constantly remind them about the deadline.

I am most proud of the fact that through my entire experiences of working in groups, I do not remember a time when I spoke up as much as I did in this group.  I had confidence in my opinions, and I stood up and shared what I felt.  As for dissatisfaction, I really did not feel that much, only just at first the fact of working in groups.  I like to get my work done as soon as possible. If there was something we could improve upon, it was communication.  My greatest challenge was sharing my ideas as it is difficult for me by nature to speak up.  The paper turned out great:  It went as we planned.  However, if we could start over, I would speak up more.

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Teamwork Makes the Dream Work: The Importance of Working Together

Sanjana is a health writer and editor. Her work spans various health-related topics, including mental health, fitness, nutrition, and wellness.

Rachel Goldman, PhD FTOS, is a licensed psychologist, clinical assistant professor, speaker, wellness expert specializing in eating behaviors, stress management, and health behavior change.

Luis Alvarez / Getty Images

Why Teamwork Makes the Dream Work

Characteristics of good teamwork, how to foster good teamwork, how to be a good team player.

You’ve probably seen the phrase “Teamwork makes the dream work” printed on office mugs and motivational posters. But what exactly does it mean and what does good teamwork look like?

Teamwork Makes the Dream Work

The phrase “Teamwork makes the dream work” essentially means that dividing tasks and responsibilities among a team can lead to better outcomes than a single person doing the same task, says Sabrina Romanoff , PsyD, a clinical psychologist and professor at Yeshiva University.

The saying was initially coined by American clergyman John C. Maxwell. Maxwell published an eponymous book in 2002, in which he wrote, “Teamwork makes the dream work, but a vision becomes a nightmare when the leader has a big dream and a bad team.” In his book, Maxwell discusses the importance of working together collaboratively and shares some principles for building a strong team.

The phrase caught on and has become popular over the years. In this article, we explore the benefits of teamwork, the characteristics of good teamwork, as well as some steps to help you be a good team player and build a strong team.

Below, Dr. Romanoff explains why teamwork is important and the benefits it can offer:

• Improves efficiency and output: Teamwork is important because much more can be accomplished as part of a team than a single person working alone. Successful teams are much more efficient and effective at completing tasks than individuals.
• Produces better solutions: Teamwork allows the opportunity for diverse perspectives to tackle problems and find solutions that are more resourceful and effective than one person’s input alone. When multiple people are contributing, more knowledge, viewpoints, and feedback are incorporated, helping teammates arrive at more holistic solutions.
• Offers a larger pool of resources: Each member of the team can contribute their efforts, knowledge, abilities, and strengths to the task at hand. The team can tap into the resources each member provides to tackle new challenges.
• Promotes growth and learning: When people work together, there is an opportunity for each member of the team to learn and grow, both personally and professionally.
• Creates strong bonds among teammates: Collaborating on shared tasks, helping others, and working together helps teammates foster strong connections. People bond when they work together toward a common goal in an encouraging and supportive environment.
• Fosters a feeling of belonging: Teamwork also taps into our human need for belonging to a community or group and feeling like we are working towards something that is bigger than ourselves.
• Reduces stress: People tend to feel more supported when they’re part of a team. They often experience less perceived stress because they’re not facing the problem alone.

According to Dr. Romanoff, these are some of the characteristics of good teamwork: 

• Shared goal: A successful team articulates and agrees on a common goal that has meaning to its members. Shared understanding of the goal the team is working toward is crucial so that everyone is on the same page and the team can operate as a cohesive unit.
• Cooperation: It’s important for teammates to actively listen to one another, cooperate with each other, and help one other out when required. A collaborative approach leads to more efficient and effective output.
• Respect: When people feel respected by their teammates, they are able to freely share ideas and opinions without fear of rejection or judgment. This level of safety sets the stage for greater commitment among teammates, originality, and novelty.
• Trust: There is trust that each member will deliver on their role for the team and meet their commitments. Team members take their responsibilities seriously and commit to following through on behalf of the individual members but also for the collective group. Each member is also trusted with placing the team’s interests above their own.
• Coordination: The team is well-organized so everyone is systematically and efficiently working together toward deadlines and shared goals. Effective communication and coordination are the bedrock of good teamwork.
• Strong interpersonal relationships: There are strong relationships among teammates. Team members care about each other and relationships are deeper than just their roles in the team. For instance, there is knowledge and sharing about people’s personal lives, and interest in other’s talents, skills, and interests. Team members take the time to celebrate achievements or have social outings outside of work to get to know each other as people.
• Effective conflict-resolution: Members of the team understand that conflict is inevitable but they are able to successfully manage and resolve them, by prioritizing the team’s goal over individual differences and conflicts. This means addressing issues among team members as they come up instead of pushing them under the rug, while also keeping differences among members in perspective so they don’t override the group’s mission.

Dr. Romanoff shares some strategies that can help you foster good teamwork:

• Define the goal: Define the mission and goal of the team. These can be co-constructed with your teammates, as team members are likely to have more buy-in when they have a role in choosing goals that are personally meaningful to them.
• Regularly ask for and provide feedback: Checking in with team members is the best way to implement needed change. This doesn’t have to be a formal process. Instead, openly discussing how team members are feeling can be normalized as part of the team’s culture.
• Maintain transparency: Be transparent, not just about the goal of the team but the goal of smaller tasks and mandates. This helps people understand how each job and agenda item is contributing to the overall mission of the organization.
• Making learning a continuous priority: Offer trainings, reading material, and resources to team members. Bring in people to teach on new topics and host events where members can share new information and passions with their teammates.
• Recognize accomplishments: Give team members kudos for a job well done and have their good work acknowledged by their peers and managers. 
• Foster a culture of gratitude: It can be helpful to foster a culture of gratitude by having members consider what they are grateful for within the team or in their day, to help them reflect on what they appreciate in another.

If you’re wondering how to be a good team player, Dr. Romanoff has some suggestions that can help:

• Commit to the goal: Commit to the group process and the team’s goal. 
• Take ownership: Take your tasks and responsibilities seriously. Be accountable to yourself and your teammates. Be cognizant of how your actions impact the team.
• Be flexible: Be flexible , open to change, and willing to take on new challenges or responsibilities to help your team.
• Work with your peers, not against them: Don’t compete with your peers. Instead try to work together toward a common goal and help each other out.
• Maintain a positive mindset: Be positive and optimistic. This mindset is contagious and will draw other team members towards you.
• Stay true to your values: Have integrity and speak your mind to advocate for the greater good and values of the group, even if it means going against what other group members are saying.

If you’ve ever been part of a team that just clicked, you know that being part of a team can be engaging and gratifying. Whether it’s at home, at work, on a playground, or in a relationship, working together as part of a team offers several benefits.

Clark W. Teamwork: A multidisciplinary review . Child Adolesc Psychiatr Clin N Am. 2021;30(4):685-695. doi:10.1016/j.chc.2021.05.003

Rosen MA, DiazGranados D, Dietz AS, et al. Teamwork in healthcare: Key discoveries enabling safer, high-quality care . Am Psychol . 2018;73(4):433-450. doi:10.1037/amp0000298

By Sanjana Gupta Sanjana is a health writer and editor. Her work spans various health-related topics, including mental health, fitness, nutrition, and wellness.

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Essay: Working in a Group: Analyzing Benefits and Drawbacks

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The debate on whether working alone or in a group is more beneficial has been a long-standing one. While personal preference plays a significant role in this decision, working in a group often proves to be more advantageous due to the diversity of ideas, the variety of skills that members bring, and the potential for higher productivity and better outcomes. This essay will delve deeper into the benefits of group work, supported by academic theories, and will also address the reasons why some individuals may prefer working alone.

The Benefits of Group Work

One of the primary advantages of group work is the plethora of ideas generated. According to Lynda Moultry Belcher , “This type of collaboration benefits the project and gives team members an outlet to bounce around ideas to find the best fit.” The concept of brainstorming, introduced by Alex Osborn in the 1940s, supports this view. Brainstorming in groups facilitates a wide range of ideas that might not emerge when individuals work in isolation. The collective intelligence of a group often surpasses that of an individual, leading to more innovative and effective solutions.

Moreover, working in a group brings together people with different skills and expertise, which enhances the quality of the work produced. Chitra Reddy states, “To solve complex problems and to complete difficult tasks, team works better than an individual.” This is supported by Belbin’s Team Roles theory , which emphasizes that effective teams are composed of individuals who fulfill various roles, such as the Plant (creative problem solver), the Monitor Evaluator (analytical thinker), and the Implementer (practical organizer). Each member contributes their unique strengths, leading to a more comprehensive and well-rounded approach to problem-solving.

Another significant benefit of group work is increased productivity and creativity. Belcher emphasizes that, “Another key advantage of group work in the office is that it can increase efficiency.” Research on social facilitation, which refers to the tendency for people to perform better on tasks when in the presence of others, supports this claim. When individuals work in groups, they are often motivated to perform better due to peer pressure and the desire to not let their team down. This can lead to higher levels of productivity and more creative outputs.

The Challenges of Group Work

Despite the numerous benefits, working in a group can also present challenges. One common issue is the potential for conflicts and disagreements among group members. Tuckman’s stages of group development (forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning) highlight that groups often go through a “storming” phase where conflicts arise. While this can be a healthy part of group development, it requires effective conflict resolution skills and strong leadership to navigate.

Another challenge is the risk of social loafing, where some group members may contribute less effort, relying on others to carry the workload. This phenomenon was identified by Latane, Williams, and Harkins (1979) , who found that individuals tend to exert less effort when working in a group compared to when they work alone. To mitigate this, it is crucial to establish clear roles, responsibilities, and accountability within the group.

The Appeal of Working Alone

While working in a group has its advantages, some individuals find working alone more convenient and productive. Sam Ashe-Edmunds argues, “If you own your own business, you only answer to your clients, who have little say over how you do your work.” This autonomy can be highly appealing as it allows individuals to work at their own pace, make independent decisions, and avoid the potential frustrations of group dynamics.

Working alone can also lead to higher levels of concentration and focus. Without the distractions and interruptions that often accompany group work, individuals can immerse themselves fully in their tasks. This is particularly beneficial for complex or creative work that requires deep thought and sustained attention.

Balancing Individual and Group Work

The decision to work alone or in a group often depends on the nature of the task and the individual’s personal preferences. For tasks that require a wide range of skills, diverse perspectives, and collective problem-solving, group work is usually more effective. However, for tasks that require deep concentration, creativity, and independent decision-making, working alone may be more beneficial.

In modern workplaces, a balance between individual and group work is often the most effective approach. Organizations can foster environments that allow for both collaborative and independent work, recognizing the strengths and preferences of their employees. This approach aligns with the Job Characteristics Model (JCM) developed by Hackman and Oldham, which suggests that providing employees with a variety of tasks and the autonomy to choose how they work can lead to higher job satisfaction and productivity.

In conclusion, while working alone and in a group each have their distinct advantages, the benefits of group work often outweigh those of working independently. The diversity of ideas, the combination of various skills, and the potential for increased productivity and creativity make group work particularly effective for complex and multifaceted tasks. However, it is important to acknowledge and address the challenges that can arise in group settings, such as conflicts and social loafing, to ensure successful collaboration. Balancing individual and group work based on the task at hand and the preferences of the individuals involved can lead to the most effective outcomes. As we navigate the complexities of modern work environments, fostering a culture that values both collaboration and autonomy can help individuals and organizations thrive.

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The importance of teamwork (as proven by science)

Healthy teams enjoy benefits that go far beyond the company’s bottom line.

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5-second summary

• Research shows that collaborative problem-solving leads to better outcomes.
• People are more likely to take calculated risks that lead to innovation if they have the support of a team behind them.
• Working in a team encourages personal growth, increases job satisfaction, and reduces stress.

Anyone who thought the rise of distributed work would be the downfall of teamwork has probably changed their tune by now. The truth is, teamwork is more important than ever.

“The use of teams and collaboration expectations have been consistently rising,” says Dr. Scott Tannenbaum , a researcher and president of the Group for Organizational Effectiveness. “And when I say teams, I’m talking about all types of teams, whether it’s stable work teams [or] teams that now, in the current environment, are operating virtually.”

Teamwork is essential to a company’s success, says John J. Murphy, author of Pulling Together: 10 Rules for High-Performance Teamwork . “Each individual has unique gifts, and talents and skills. When we bring them to the table and share them for a common purpose, it can give companies a real competitive advantage.”

But here’s the real magic of teamwork: when done right, it has benefits that go far beyond boosting the company’s bottom line. (Learn about some classic models that can lead to stronger teamwork here .)

10 benefits of teamwork

1. teamwork enables better problem solving.

How to avoid groupthink on your team

Albert Einstein gets all the credit for discovering the theory of relativity, but the truth is that he relied on conversations with friends and colleagues to refine his concept. And that’s almost always the case.

“Behind every genius is a team,” says Murphy. “When people play off each other’s skills and knowledge, they can create solutions that are practical and useful.”

Science reinforces the idea that many brains are better than one. “We found that groups of size three, four, and five outperformed the best individuals,” says Dr. Patrick Laughlin a researcher at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. “[We] attribute this performance to the ability of people to work together to generate and adopt correct responses, reject erroneous responses, and effectively process information.”

Not everyone processes information in the same way. Some people like to jump into problem-solving mode immediately, while others prefer time to gather their thoughts and consider multiple options before making a contribution. Asking people to provide input asynchronously allows everyone the space to work in a way that’s comfortable for them.

2. Teamwork unlocks potential for innovation

According to Frans Johansson, author of The Medici Effect , some of the most innovative ideas happen at “the intersection” – the place where ideas from different industries and cultures collide.

“Most people think success comes from surrounding yourself with others that are like you,” says Johansson. “But true success and breakthrough innovation involves discomfort. Discomfort pushes you to grow. This is where difference of experience, opinion, and perspective come in. Diversity is a well-documented pathway to unlocking new opportunities, overcoming new challenges, and gaining new insights.”

Better together: 8 essential teamwork skills to master

A recent report from the consulting firm McKinsey & Company backs this up. It found teams made up of members from diverse backgrounds (gender, age, ethnicity, etc.) are more creative and perform better by up to 35 percent, compared to more homogeneous teams. Instead of looking at an issue from your individual vantage point, you get a 360-degree picture, which can lead to an exponential increase in ideas.

Research from Tufts University suggests that just being exposed to diversity can shift the way you think. A study on a diverse mock jury found that interacting with individuals who are different forces people to be more open minded, and to expect that reaching consensus will take effort.

3. Teamwork makes for happier employees

As part of our ongoing research on teamwork, we surveyed more than 1,000 team members across a range of industries and found that when honest feedback, mutual respect, and personal openness were encouraged, team members were 80 percent more likely to report higher emotional well-being.

Having happy employees is a worthwhile goal in itself, but the company benefits, too. Research from the University of Warwick in England suggests happy employees are up to 20 percent more productive than unhappy employees. And who couldn’t benefit from a happiness boost?

4. Teamwork enhances personal growth

Being part of a team can help you grow. “By sharing information and essentially cross-training each other, each individual member of the team can flourish,” says Murphy. You might discover new concepts from colleagues with different experiences. You can also learn from someone else’s mistakes, which helps you sidestep future errors.

You might even learn something new about yourself, says Dr. Susan McDaniel, a psychologist at the University of Rochester Medical Center and one of the guest editors of America Psychologist’s special edition on “ The Science of Teamwork .”

“We all have blind spots about our behaviors and strengths that we may be unaware of, and feedback from a team member can expose them,” she says. Recognizing these strengths and addressing the weaknesses can make you a better team member, and even a better person. “Maybe working in a team you’ll discover you could be a better listener. That’s a skill you can grow in, and then take home and use to improve your family interactions,” McDaniel points out.

5. Teamwork lowers the risk of burnout

6 ways to bounce back from burnout

A Gallup study of nearly 7,500 full-time employees found that 23 percent of employees feel burned out at work very often or always. Another 44 percent say they sometimes feel this way. What helps? Sharing the load.

Team members can provide emotional support to each other because they often understand the demands and stress of completing work even better than managers, says Ben Wigert, lead researcher for Gallup’s workplace management practice.

And managers are not off the hook! The study also found that knowing your boss has your back protects against burnout too.

6. Teamwork gives opportunities for growth

Collaboration in the workplace isn’t unlike teamwork on the baseball diamond. When the pitcher and outfielders each excel at their individual roles, the team has a better chance of winning.

Off the playing field, that idea is more important than ever. Changes in technology and increased globalization mean that organizations are facing problems so complex that a single individual simply can’t possess all the necessary knowledge to solve them, says Wigert. When team members use their unique skills to shine in their own roles, it creates an environment based on mutual respect and cooperation that benefits the whole group, notes Murphy.

7. Teamwork boosts productivity

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Learn more about how the Atlassian platform can help your team work better together.

Getting a pat on the back from the boss can boost an employee’s motivation, but receiving kudos from a team member may be even more effective.

The TINYpulse Employee Engagement and Organizational Culture Report surveyed more than 200,000 employees. Participants reported that having the respect of their peers was the #1 reason they go the extra mile at work.

8. Teamwork allows for smarter risk-taking

When you work alone, you might be hesitant to put your neck on the line. When you work on a team, you know you have the support of the entire group to fall back on in case of failure. That security typically allows teams to take the kind of risks that create “Eureka!” ideas.

But here’s one place where size does matter. The most disruptive ideas often come from small teams, suggests recent research in the journal Nature , possibly because larger teams argue more, which can get in the way of coming up with those big ideas.

Wharton Business School researchers also discovered that small is the secret to success: they found that two-person teams took 36 minutes to build a Lego figure while four-person teams took 52 minutes to finish — more than 44 percent longer.

There’s no definitive ideal small team size, but consider following Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’ two-pizza rule : no matter how large your company gets, teams shouldn’t be larger than what two pizzas can feed.

9. Teamwork yields fewer mistakes

If your team has good energy – you encourage and inspire each other, and you have fun together – you’ll feel less stressed, says Murphy. “Studies show that stress makes us stupid, and leads us to make more mistakes,” says Murphy.

Of course, the converse is also true: when your team feels less frazzled, you’ll make fewer errors. That’s worth keeping in mind, especially if you’re one of the 61 percent of workers who cite work as a significant source of stress .

10. Teamwork sparks creativity

Stale solutions often come out of working in a vacuum. When people with different perspectives come together in group brainstorms, on the other hand, innovative ideas can rise to the surface – with one caveat. Research shows this can only happen when communication within the team is open and collaborative, notes Wigert. The most creative solutions can only come up when there’s a level of trust that lets team members ask ‘stupid’ questions, propose out-there ideas, and receive constructive criticism.  

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• Teamwork Essay

Essay on Teamwork

The word ‘teamwork’ means working together as a team to achieve a particular goal. Humans are social animals. We tend to stick together and work alongside others in almost every phase of life. Be it in an office or home, everyone has his responsibilities to meet. Performing these responsibilities every day makes us a part of the team we are in. Upon doing their assigned work with proper coordination, a team always wins in achieving its goal.

Teamwork can be seen in a company, in the agricultural field, or any environment, you can name. Even the animals also perform as a team to survive in this competitive world. Cheetahs hunt together, wild dogs stay together avert danger, bees make their hives being united, and so on. It means that the success of a team depends on the performance of each member. They are called teammates.

In a team, there is a hierarchical system where one leads the others to follow. The leader has more experience than the other teammates. It is his experience that helps him to lead a team with proper supervision. If you look at an organisation, you will find that leaders show the path to the teammates to follow and complete their respective assignments. Every assignment is a small piece to a big puzzle. This puzzle will only take the right shape when all the pieces fall in the right place. Hence, the contribution of each team member is extremely crucial for the success of a team.

As time changed, the hierarchical system transformed. With the increase and diversification of responsibilities, the structure of a team changed drastically. It helps the companies to designate work and distribute the load. This helps in the proper management of workflow. As a person gains experience, he moves up the ladder and holds a more responsible position in the team.

In an organisation, the top-level comprises the managers who have immense experience in a particular field. With their experience and expertise, they control the productivity and outcome of a team. The middle-level managers carry on the orders given by the top level. This personnel has less experience than the top-level but more than the lower level of the team. The lower level comprises the frontline soldiers who execute what they have been ordered.

If you look at a family, there is no such level distribution. This distribution is done in a different way. The parents are those who take care of all the other family members. The rest of the members do their own work as assigned. This is where cooperation comes into the picture. If any of the family members do not cooperate with the rest, the entire system will crumble eventually.

Teamwork is extremely important. Whether it is a small business or a huge organisation, teamwork is important. The prime elements of teamwork are coordination and cooperation. Every element in a team will need to coordinate and cooperate with the rest of the team so that the workflow is maintained aptly. All the members should understand the importance of teamwork and contribute to it as per the directions given. A well-coordinated team is more productive. The outcome is extremely constructive. Companies design a team by filling the positions with the most suitable team players with apt experience in their particular fields.

Working as a team also makes new relationships. People come close to others and bond. They learn the strengths and weaknesses of others. In fact, we all start to bridge the gap and find our complementary strengths to cover the weaknesses of the others. This is how a team functions. We all should understand the importance of a team and stick to the values to give the best and contribute to a beautiful outcome.

 Short Essay On Teamwork

Teamwork means to work together with several people to achieve a goal that is common to all. We can say that teamwork is crucial for the functioning of an organisation. Without teamwork an organisation or company won’t be able to achieve its goals on time and this can lead to loss of energy and manpower. Every organisation or company has a division of many teams which perform specific tasks and without it the functioning of the organisation or company may get disrupted which will ultimately hinder the achievement of success and the goals set by them. This can affect the organisation or company and even the people working there. Every organisation or firm has a different hierarchy of teamwork too where the workload is evenly divided. This helps in maintaining the work balance and also equality among the members. Every team has a team leader or an expert that guides the whole team with their prior knowledge or experience. Humans are social beings and we are surrounded by one another in every stage of our life whether it is in home, school or office. All of us have certain goals and responsibilities we aim to achieve. All of this makes us part of the team. When we are assigned some work, then with proper coordination and planning we can always achieve the goal easily.

Teamwork can be seen in many environments. For example, it can be seen in the company, agricultural field and many other places. In wildlife, we can see how animals hunt together to capture their prey, this is to achieve their food and their source of survival. This is achieved by teamwork. We can also consider the examples of honeybees that live in a social organisation where each type of honeybee has different work to do and all perform together as a team for sustaining their hive. Thus, we can see examples of teamwork everywhere and we can understand how imperative it is to achieve goals.

FAQs on Teamwork Essay

1. Where can you find examples of Teamwork?

You will find teamwork anywhere in the world. Even in the deepest part of a jungle, you will find ants finding their ways to survive by sticking together as a team. The hyenas also stay together and even muster the courage to steal food from a pride of lions. We have also heard many fables and stories related to teamwork. The pigeons flew away with the trap and let the bird-catcher feel distressed. This would not have happened if the birds did not unite and use their cumulative strength to get rid of the catcher.

2. What makes a Team strong?

The team comprises members with different levels of experience. It is the diversity of experience and strengths each team member has that makes a team stronger. In a team, the different strengths make a cumulative strength and deliver unity. The team members complement each other’s weaknesses and emerge as a formidable unit to overcome all the hurdles on the way. The two most important elements of a team are coordination and cooperation. When all cooperate and coordinate with the rest, the team becomes one single entity.

3. Why Teamwork is important?

Not everyone is adept at handling all kinds of work. Hence, a team is formed to meet with different responsibilities at different levels. This is why a team is formed where every member is designated with particular responsibilities. This makes a team very important for achieving success. It also boosts the confidence among all team members and let everyone do the part perfectly. This is why teamwork is important. 

4. What is the importance of teamwork? Explain?

Teamwork is important all over the world. It is important in a small business or a big organisation too. In our schools, we can see sports which can be won only by teamwork and effort. We saw how the mentors told us about teamwork and how important it is to achieve goals. Teamwork also improves the relationships between people working in the team which can motivate the people to work together and harder. This can lead to a high chance of getting successful.

5. Why is teamwork important for success?

Teamwork is always said to be the key to success. That is because when we work together as a team then it helps us learn from one another and also improves our knowledge. This in turn, makes us more creative, increases our knowledge and we can also expand a new skill set. When the team works towards a certain goal then this motivates everyone towards learning from one another and also having creative ideas which can be lacking when one works in solitude.

6. Why is teamwork considered effective?

It can be quite exhausting when we have to do tough work all by ourselves. It can lead to delays and also reduce our productivity. However, in a team, everyone has a common goal and shares similar visions and this can motivate the members present in the team. This leads to divided workload and also helps everyone to perform their best naturally.  Thus, teamwork is considered effective as it helps achieve goals easily and on time.

7. What is top level teamwork?

There are certain hierarchies that are related to teamwork where the workload is divided to different hierarchies so that only one part of the team is not working towards the goal alone. Top level hierarchy is the highest level of teamwork hierarchy present in the organisation or firm. This is the level where the team members set the goals that are needed to be achieved by the organisation or firm. They work towards increasing profits for the firm or organisations. Furthermore, they focus on understanding the needs and queries of the consumers of their organisation’s products or services.

8. What is the middle level of teamwork?

There are different hierarchies when we talk about teamwork and each group has different work and goals to achieve. Middle level hierarchy is the second level in an organisation or firm which comes after the top level hierarchy. It is mostly composed of supervisors and managers. They mainly work on the objectives or goals set by the top level team members and allot these goals to the employees or members working in the organisation or firm. They regularly check the work being done by the team members, supervises them and check whether the deadlines are met or not.

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• 22 October 2024

Journals with high rates of suspicious papers flagged by science-integrity start-up

• Richard Van Noorden

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By analysing citations and authors’ publication records, Argos identifies ‘high risk’ papers that warrant further investigation. Credit: bernie_photo/Getty

Which scientific publishers and journals are worst affected by fraudulent or dubious research papers — and which have done least to clean up their portfolio? A technology start-up founded to help publishers spot potentially problematic papers says that it has some answers, and has shared its early findings with Nature .

The science-integrity website Argos, which was launched in September by Scitility, a technology firm headquartered in Sparks, Nevada, gives papers a risk score on the basis of their authors’ publication records, and on whether the paper heavily cites already-retracted research. A paper categorized as ‘high risk’ might have multiple authors whose other studies have been retracted for reasons related to misconduct, for example. Having a high score doesn’t prove that a paper is low quality, but suggests that it is worth investigating.

The papers that most heavily cite retracted studies

Argos is one of a growing number of research-integrity tools that look for red flags in papers. These include the Papermill Alarm , made by Clear Skies, and Signals, by Research Signals, both London-based firms. Because creators of such software sell their manuscript-screening tools to publishers, they are generally reluctant to name affected journals. But Argos, which is offering free accounts to individuals and fuller access to science-integrity sleuths and journalists, is the first to show public insights.

“We wanted to build a piece of technology that was able to see hidden patterns and bring transparency to the industry,” says Scitility co-founder Erik de Boer, who is based in Roosendaal, the Netherlands.

By early October, Argos had flagged more than 40,000 high-risk and 180,000 medium-risk papers. It has also indexed more than 50,000 retracted papers.

Publisher risk ratings

Argos’s analysis shows that the publisher Hindawi — a now-shuttered subsidiary of the London-based publisher Wiley — has the highest volume and proportion of already-retracted papers (see ‘Publishers at risk’). That’s not surprising, because Wiley has retracted more than 10,000 Hindawi-published papers over the past two years in response to concerns raised by editors and sleuths; this amounts to more than 4% of the brand’s total portfolio over the past decade. One of its journals, Evidence-based Complementary and Alternative Medicine , has retracted 741 papers, more than 7% of its output.

Argos risk-score ratings flag more than a thousand remaining Hindawi papers — another 0.65% — as still ‘high risk’. This suggests that, although Wiley has done a lot to clean up its portfolio, it might not have yet completed the job. The publisher told Nature that it welcomed Argos and similar tools, and had been working to rectify the issues with Hindawi.

Source: Argos.

Other publishers seem to have much more investigation to do, with few retractions relative to the number of high-risk papers flagged by Argos (publishers might have already examined some of these papers and determined that no action was necessary).

The publishing giant Elsevier, based in Amsterdam, has around 5,000 retractions but more than 11,400 high-risk papers according to Nature ’s analysis of Argos data — although all of these together make up just more than 0.2% of the publisher’s output over the past decade. And the publisher MDPI has retracted 311 papers but has more than 3,000 high-risk papers — about 0.24% of its output. Springer Nature has more than 6,000 retractions and more than 6,000 high-risk papers; about 0.3% of its output. ( Nature ’s news team is independent of its publisher.)

Chain retraction: how to stop bad science propagating through the literature

In response to requests for comment, all of the publishers flagged as having the greatest number of high-risk articles say that they are working hard on research integrity, using technology to screen submitted articles, and that their retractions demonstrated their commitment to cleaning up problematic content.

Springer Nature says that it rolled out two tools in June that have since helped to spot hundreds of fake submitted manuscripts; several publishers noted their work with a joint integrity hub that offers software which can flag suspicious papers. Jisuk Kang, a publishing manager at MDPI in Basel, Switzerland, says that products such as Argos can give broad indications of potential issues, but noted that the publisher couldn’t check the accuracy or reliability of the figures on the site. She adds that the largest publishers and journals would inevitably have higher numbers of high-risk papers, so that the share of output is a better metric.

The publishing brands with the greatest proportions of high-risk papers in their portfolios are Impact Journals (0.82%), Spandidos (0.77%) and Ivyspring (0.67%), the Argos figures suggest. Impact Journals tells Nature that, although its journals have experienced problems in the past, they have now improved their integrity. The publisher says that there were “0% irregularities” in its journal Oncotarget over the past two years, owing to the adoption of image-checking tools such as Image Twin, which have become available only in the past few years. Portland Press, which has 0.41% of high-risk papers in its portfolio, says that it has taken corrective action, bringing in enhanced stringency checks.

Journal risk ratings

Argos also provides figures for individual journals. Unsurprisingly, Hindawi titles stand out for both the number and proportion of papers that have been retracted, whereas other journals have a lot of what Argos identified as high-risk work remaining (see ‘Journals at risk’). By volume, Springer Nature’s mega-journal Scientific Reports leads, with 450 high-risk papers and 231 retractions, together around 0.3% of its output. On 16 October, a group of sleuths penned an open letter to Springer Nature raising concerns about problematic articles in the journal.

Paper-mill detector put to the test in push to stamp out fake science

In response, Chris Graf, head of research integrity at Springer Nature, says that the journal investigates every issue raised with it. He adds that the proportion of its content that has been highlighted is comparatively low given its size.

Journals with particularly large gaps between the number of retracted works and potentially suspect papers include MDPI’s Sustainability (20 retractions and 312 high-risk papers; 0.4% of its output) and Elsevier’s Materials Today Proceedings (28 retractions and 308 high-risk papers; 0.8% of its output). Elsevier’s Biomedicine & Pharmacotherapy has the highest proportion of high-risk papers — 1.61% of its output.

“The volume of fraudulent materials is increasing at scale, boosted by systematic manipulation, such as 'paper mills' that produce fraudulent content for commercial gain, and AI-generated content,” says a spokesperson for Elsevier, adding that in response “we are increasing our investment in human oversight, expertise and technology”.

Argos’s creators emphasize that the site relies on open data collected by others. Its sources include the website Retraction Watch, which maintains a database of retracted papers — made free through a deal with the non-profit organization CrossRef — that includes the reasons for a retraction, so that tools examining author records can focus on retractions that mention misconduct. The analysis also relies on records of articles that heavily cite retracted papers , collated by Guillaume Cabanac, a computer scientist at the University of Toulouse, France.

Although Argos also follows analysts that focus on networks of authors with a history of misconduct, other research-integrity tools also flag papers on the basis of suspicious content, such as close textual similarity to bogus work, or ‘tortured phrases’, a term coined by Cabanac, when authors make strange wording choices to avoid triggering plagiarism detectors.

What makes an undercover science sleuth tick? Fake-paper detective speaks out

“Both approaches have merit, but identifying networks of researchers engaged in malpractice is likely to be more valuable,” says James Butcher, a former publisher at Nature-branded journals and the Lancet , who now runs the consultancy Journalology in Liverpool, UK. That is because AI-assisted writing tools might be used to help fraudsters to avoid obvious textual tells, he says. Butcher adds that many major publishers have built or acquired their own integrity tools to screen for various red flags in manuscripts.

One of the trickiest issues for integrity tools that rely mostly on author retraction records is correctly distinguishing between authors with similar names — an issue that might skew Argos’s figures. “The author disambiguation problem is the single biggest problem the industry has,” says Adam Day, founder of Clear Skies.

De Boer, who formerly worked at Springer Nature, says that anyone can create an account to access Argos for free, but Scitility aims to sell a version of the tool to big publishers and institutions, who could plug it directly into their manuscript-screening workflows.

Butcher applauds the Argos team’s transparency. “There needs to be more visibility on journals and publishers that cut corners and fail to do appropriate due diligence on the papers that they publish and monetize,” he says.

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-03427-w

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