ABSTRACT
Shared knowledge is commonly supposed to be an important condition for effective collaborative problem solving. Following Newell and Simon's (1972) classic view of problem solving, we distinguish shared knowledge about the initial situation, the goals, and the operators. The kind and amount of prior shared knowledge was varied as an independent variable in four experimental conditions. Our results indicate that if collaborating partners have knowledge in common, their overall problem solutions are better than if they lack any kind of shared information. However, this effect seems to be mostly due to shared knowledge about initial situation and goals, as this leads to better solutions than shared knowledge about operators.
