Three Essays on the "Dark Side" of Teams

My dissertation consists of three essays on the dark side of teams. My first essay presents a model of social capitals influence on team member conformity and deviance. First, I propose that social capital within a team facilitates the creation of team mental models. Second, I propose that the saliency of team mental models, due to the strength of an organizations culture, the level of bureaucracy within an organization, and the level of justice from an organization, influences team members to conform to or deviate from team norms and larger normative standards (e.g. organizational norms). Lastly, I propose that conformity (deviance) increases, maintains, or decreases social capital across organizational levels.Using 209 team members representing 51 teams in 13 organizations, my second essay helps explain the positive associations found in prior research between the level of deviance within a group and the level of deviance of individual group members. I find that individual expectations of deviant team member behavior partially mediate this relationship, while shared expectations of deviant team member behavior within a team partially mediate the relationship between the level of deviance within a team and individual expectations of deviant team member behavior. I also find that one dimension of social capital positively moderates the relationship between shared expectations and individual expectations.Using a sample of 1,708 team members in 292 team-based establishments, my third essay examines the relationship between team member stress, and team autonomy in the form of team decision making, team leader appointment, and team responsibility. I also examine the relationship between stress, and intrateam interdependence in the form of team member interdependency and team-based job rotation. I further examine whether the relationships between team design and stress are mediated by team member job demands and job control. I find that an increase in job demands indirectly mediates the positive relationships between team decision making and team responsibility, and stress. I also find that a decrease in job demands indirectly mediates the negative relationship between team-based job rotation and stress.