Our Publications

Towards understanding the characteristics of successful and unsuccessful collaborations: a case-based team science study
Love, H.B., Fosdick, B., Cross, J. E., Suter, M., Egan, D., Scofidio, E., Fisher, E.R.
Scientific breakthroughs for complex, large-scale problems require a combination of contributory expertise, disciplinary expertise, and interactional expertise, or socialized knowledge. There is, however, little formal recognition of what expertise is important for team success, and how to evaluate different types of contributions. This is problematic for the field of the Science of Team Sciences (SciTS). Funding is increasing for team science globally, but how do we know if teams are collaborating in meaningful ways to meet their goals? Many studies use bibliometric and citation data to understand team development and success; nevertheless, this type of data does not provide timely metrics about collaboration. This study asks: Can we determine if a team is collaborating and working together in meaningful ways in a process evaluation to achieve their goals and be successful in an outcome evaluation, and if so, how? Click to Read the Full Abstract

Science facilitation: navigating the intersection of intellectual and interpersonal expertise in scientific collaboration
Craven, A. E., Jones, M.S., Ngai, C., Zarestky, J., Love, H.B.
Today’s societal challenges, such as climate change and global pandemics, are increasingly complex and require collaboration across scientific disciplines to address. Scientific teams bring together individuals of varying backgrounds and expertise to work collaboratively on creating new knowledge to address these challenges. Within a scientific team, there is inherent diversity in disciplinary cultures and preferences for interpersonal collaboration. Such diversity contributes to the potential strength of the created knowledge but can also impede progress when teams struggle to collaborate productively. Facilitation is a professional practice-based form of interpersonal expertise that supports group members to do their best thinking. Click to Read the Full Abstract

The impact of gender diversity on scientific research teams: a need to broaden and accelerate future research
Love, H. B., Stephens, A., Fosdick, B. K., Tofany, E., & Fisher, E. R.
Multiple studies from the literature suggest that a high proportion of women on scientific teams contributes to successful team collaboration, but how the proportion of women impacts team success and why this is the case, is not well understood. One perspective suggests that having a high proportion of women matters because women tend to have greater social sensitivity and promote even turn-taking in meetings. Other studies have found women are more likely to collaborate and are more democratic. Both explanations suggest that women team members fundamentally change team functioning through the way they interact. Yet, most previous studies of gender on scientific teams have relied heavily on bibliometric data, which focuses on the prevalence of women team members rather than how they act and interact throughout the scientific process. In this study, we explore gender diversity in scientific teams using various types of relational data to investigate how women impact team interactions. Click to Read the Full Abstract

Teaching Team Science: The Key to Addressing 21st Century Global Challenges
Love, H.B., Cross, J. E., Fosdick, B., Scofidio, E., and Dickmann, E.
To solve complex 21st-century global challenges, universities must prepare students to be competent team members. This article presents results from analysis of data collected at a university in four types of undergraduate sociology classrooms using mixed-methods, including social network analysis, student reflections, and an alumni survey. Results showed that learning is a social process. Compared with traditional lecture, fixed teams, and interacting teams, opportunistic collaboration is the most effective structure in teaching team learning through fostering communication, support, and learning networks. Post-secondary education should endorse opportunistic collaboration learning practices to prepare students for workplace success in a global economy.

How does your team make decisions? Do you vote? Does the loudest voice usually win? Does everyone on the team generally feel heard? Does your team have a charter to provide guidance? Or maybe there is often just silence and the team assumes agreement?

Interpersonal relationships drive successful team science: an exemplary case-based study
Hannah B. Love, Jennifer E. Cross, Bailey Fosdick, Kevin R. Crooks, Susan VandeWoude & Ellen R. Fisher
Scientists are increasingly charged with solving complex societal, health, and environmental problems. These systemic problems require teams of expert scientists to tackle research questions through collaboration, coordination, creation of shared terminology, and complex social and intellectual processes. Despite the essential need for such interdisciplinary inter-actions, little research has examined the impact of scientific team support measures like training, facilitation, team building, and expertise. The literature is clear that solving complex problems requires more than contributory expertise, expertise required to contribute to afield or discipline. It also requires interactional expertise, socialised knowledge that includes socialisation into the practices of an expert group. These forms of expertise are often tacit and therefore difficult to access, and studies about how they are intertwined are nearly non-existent. Click to Read the Full Abstract

Is cultivating reciprocal learning the gold standard for high impact pedagogies?
Hannah B. Love, Rodolfo Valdes-Vasquez, Svetlana Olbina, Jennifer E. Cross & Mehmet E. Ozbek
High Impact-Practices (HIPs) have been found to improve student engagement and retention, increase civic engagement, and enhance learning outcomes. Research on HIPs shows that combining multiple HIPs into a course, also known as hybrid HIPs, are more impactful than individual HIPs, and that community engagement and service-learning pedagogies are especially impactful when combined with other HIPs. The purpose of this study was to assess whether different levels of hybrid HIP combinations produced similar or different outcomes for students, as assessed by reciprocal learning. Click to Read the Full Abstract
Select Presentations
“The Significance of Intervention on Team Development and Process”, Conference on the Science of Team Science, Galveston, TX: 2018
“Including graduate students in interdisciplinary research.” Science of Team Science (SciTS) Conference, Phoenix, AZ: 2016
“Connecting Research Methods and Successful Teams”, International Science of Team Science Conference, Clearwater, FL: 2017
“Using Social Network Analysis to Manage and Foster Effective Interdisciplinary Academic Science Teams.” International Network for Social Network Analysis Sunbelt Conference, Utrecht, Netherlands: 2018
“Using SNA to Predict the Success of Interdisciplinary Scientific Teams.” 56th International Congress of the Americanists, Salamanca, Spain: 2018



Team Science Awards
Science of Team Science (SciTS) Poster Presentation Award, Science of Team Science Conference, Lansing, MI. “Successful process evaluation provides insight into team development and goal attainment: The science of team science”
Science of Team Science (SciTS) Meritorious Contribution Award for Emerging Scholar Poster Presentation, Science of Team Science Conference, Galveston, TX. “The Central Role of Women in the Development Process and Outcomes of Scientific Teams.”
Social Change Scholarship, Colorado State University. “How the Engagement of Scientific Interdisciplinary Teams Creates Social Change.”
Highest achievement in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Graduate Student Symposium, Colorado State University. “Including Graduate Students in Interdisciplinary Research.”
Featured Podcasts

Human Resource Development Masterclass
In this episode of HRD Masterclass, Dr. Hannah Love (Divergent Science, LLC), Dr. Alina M. Waite (Indiana State University), and Dr. Jill Zaresky (Colorado State University discuss the relationship between HRD and STEM. Listen to the podcast here.
