ABSTRACT
The study of small group communication focuses on the exchange of messages among three or more mutually interacting individuals.2 The origins of this research subfi eld are amorphous and traverse many cognate disciplines (Gouran, 1999). Early interest in small group communication emerged from the pioneering work of sociologists like Kurt Lewin (1947, 1951) and Robert Freed Bales (1950), as well as psychologists like Raymond Cattell (1948, 1951a, 1951b). Lewin’s work on group dynamics, for example, paved the way for decades of small group communication research that focused on the infl uence of group participation and interaction on member’s attitudes and behaviors (Hirokawa et al., 1996a). Bales’ development of the method of interaction analysis provided small group communication researchers with a reliable and systematic tool for empirically studying communication processes in small group settings (Gouran, 1999). Cattell’s work on group synergy called to our attention the need for small group communication scholars to focus not only on the task dimensions of group communication, but also on the social aspects of it, in understanding productivity and performance of groups (Salazar, 1995).
