Group diversity, diversity beliefs, and group processes in a design course for engineering students

Background: The engineering profession has changed dramatically, and engineers
today must work in diverse (multidisciplinary or international) groups.
As such, practice in diverse student groupwork can be beneficial to develop
all-round skillsets. However, simply mixing students with different backgrounds
into one group is not always effective in engineering group projects.
Purpose: This study investigates how a diverse student group composition is
related to group processes and, subsequently, group output, and also to see
whether students' positive diversity beliefs influence the relation between
diverse student group composition and group processes.
Method: Multilevel analyses were performed on 124 groups to analyze associations
between diversity in group compositions (nationality and gender diversity),
group processes (task elaboration, shared understanding of the task, and
trust in the group), and group outcomes (performance and satisfaction), at
both the individual and group level. Positive diversity beliefs were included as
moderators.
Results: We found negative group-level associations between nationality
diversity and shared understanding of the task and trust in the group. On the
individual level, we found students' relative positive diversity beliefs to be positively
associated with their perceptions of all group processes, which, in turn,
were positively associated with perceived group performance and satisfaction.
Conclusions: A student group with different nationalities may encounter
challenges in group processes, although we did not find direct implications for
group performance and group-level satisfaction. Individual student perceptions
of group processes were more clearly associated with outcomes than grouplevel
aggregates. To facilitate diverse student groupwork, educators need to
pay attention to and enhance students' awareness of the value of working in a
diverse group.