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THE EFFECT OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE ON VIRTUAL TEAM
PERFORMANCE
A THESIS
Presented to
The Faculty of the Department of Economics and Business
The Colorado College
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree
Bachelor of Arts
By
Laura N. Davies
May 2011
THE EFFECT OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE ON VIRTUAL TEAM
PERFORMANCE
Laura N. Davies
May 2011
Economics
Abstract
Business has transformed drastically over the past several decades and teamwork is now
essential in almost every work environment. Working in teams requires a new set of soft
skills that help individuals perceive and relate to the emotions of themselves and others.
These types of skills, and others related to emotional processing, are called emotional
intelligence. As businesses transition to virtual work teams, there is a more pressing need
for emotional intelligence skills. Virtual teams suffer from a lack of trust, which
emotionally intelligent individuals may be able to restore. This paper investigated the
impact of emotional intelligence on virtual team performance using an experimental
design. Undergraduate students were sorted into high and low emotional intelligence
teams and performed the Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival Task using chat room
technology to simulate a virtual team. While the results of the study did not support the
hypothesis that emotional intelligence has a significant impact on the performance of
virtual teams, the study adds a new experimental design to the current literature basis and
provides unique insights for future research.
KEYWORDS: (Emotional Intelligence, Virtual Team, Trust, Wong and Law Emotional
Intelligence Test, Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival Task)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
1 INTRODUCTION 1
2 LITERATURE REVIEW 11
2.1 A Brief History of Emotional Intelligence..................................................... 11
2.2 Models of Emotional Intelligence…………………...................................... 14
2.2.1 The Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Model of Emotional Intelligence…….... 15
2.2.2 Daniel Goleman’s Model of Emotional Intelligence………………... 19
2.3 Selection of A Emotional Intelligence Scale ………………………..……... 21
2.4 Emotional Intelligence and Teams……......................................................... 22
2.5 Virtual Teams………………………………………………………………. 25
2.2.5 Virtual Team Trust………………………………………………….... 30
2.6 Conclusion …………………………………………………………………. 35
3 METHODS 36
3.1 Sample ……………………………………………………………………… 36
3.2 Measures ……………………………………………………………………. 37
3.2.1 Emotional Intelligence ……………………………………………… 37
3.2.2 Virtual Team Trust ………………………………………………….. 38
3.2.3 Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival Task ………………………... 39
3.3 Procedure…………………………………………………………………… 41
3.3.1 Emotional Intelligence Survey ……………………………………… 41
3.3.2 Virtual Team Experiment …………………………………………… 42
4 RESULTS 45
5 DISCUSION AND CONCLUSION 50

5.1 Limitations ………………………………………………………………… 54
5.1.1 Sample Population ………………………………………………….. 54
5.1.2 Sample Selection …………………………………………………… 55
5.1.3 Virtual Environment ………………………………………………... 56
5.2 Future Studies ……………………………………………………………... 57
5.3 Conclusion ……………………………………………………………….... 59
6 APPENDIX A 60
7 APPENDIX B 62
8 APPENDIX C 64
LIST OF TABLES
4.1 Participant Population ………………………..……………………………... 46
4.2 Team Emotional Intelligence Scores …………….………………………….. 47
4.3 Team Survival Task Scores ………………………………………………… 48

LIST OF FIGURES
1.1 Definitions of Emotional Intelligence Competencies ………..………………. 2
1.2 Virtual Team Life Cycle..…………………………………………………….. 8
2.1 The Four Branch Model of Emotional Intelligence ………...………………... 16
2.2 Daniel Goleman Emotional Intelligence Competencies ………….………….. 20
2.3 Group Emotional Intelligence Processes……………………………………… 24
2.4 Three Dimensional Virtual Team Model……………………………………... 26
2.5 Inputs-Processes-Outputs Model………………………………………………. 33

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to acknowledge my thesis advisor Alexandra Anna for all of her help and
moral support throughout my thesis process. Her patience and words of encouragement
were incredibly valuable to the completion of my thesis. I would also like to thank Van
Skilling for his financial support of this study, which significantly aided in the
recruitment of participants.
I would also like to thank the following individuals for their help throughout my
experiment process: Weston Taylor who helped solved all of my technology needs,
Larry Stimpert and Julie Chesley for their input on the development of my thesis
concept, Leslie and Garret Davies for their countless edits, Gretchen Wardell for her
continuous support throughout my senior year, My survey participants for their time
and interest in my results, and my friend Daniel Rheiner for his companionship in the
library and company during countless coffee breaks.

CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
Work life today is characterized by a growing need for team collaboration, faster
communication, more competition, and quick innovation. Succeeding in this new
business environment is no longer possible using general intelligence alone.1 Today’s
worker must go beyond traditional cognitive intelligence and use emotion based skills
to navigate an increasingly complex social work environment.
Salovey and Mayer fully defined the concept of emotional intelligence (EI) in
1990 as “a type of social intelligence that involves the ability to monitor the emotions of
the self and others and use the information to guide one’s thinking”.2 They subdivided
EI into four broad categories of perception, emotional facilitation of thinking, analyzing
emotions, and management of emotions.3
Goleman then expanded on this model and redefined emotional intelligence in
terms of the four clusters listed below in FIGURE 1.1. In 1995 he popularized the use
of such skills by applying research on emotional intelligence to the business sector.
1
Subhashini P., "The Intelligent Act of Emotions," ICFAI Journal of Soft Skills 2, no. 1 (2008): 23-28.
2
David R. Caruso and Peter Salovey, "Coaching for Emotional Intelligence: MSCEIT," in Psychometrics
in Coaching: Using Psychological and Psychometric Tools for Development London and Philadelphia:
Kogan Page; distributed by Ingram Publisher Services, LaVergne, Tenn, 2008), 151-170.
3
Mary Pat McEnrue and Kevin Groves, "Choosing among Tests of Emotional Intelligence: What Is the
Evidence?" Human Resource Development Quarterly 17, no. 1 (2006): 9-42.
1
2
FIGURE 1.1
Definitions of Emotional Intelligence Competencies

Cluster Competency Definition
A strong sense of one's self worth and
Self-Awareness Self-confidence capabilities
The guiding drive to meet an internal
Self-Management Achievement Orientation standard of excellence
Initiative Displays proactivity
Taking personal responsibility for own
Conscientiousness performance
Keeping disruptive emotions and
Self-Control impulses in check
Adaptability Being flexible and responding to change

Sensing the feelings and perspectives of
others, takes an active interest in their
Social Awarenss Empathy concerns
Social Skills Influence Wielding effective tactics for persuasion

Listening openly and sending convincing
Communications messages
Inspiring and guiding individuals and
Leadership groups
Conflict Management Negotiating and resolving disagreements

Building Bonds Nurturing instrumental relationships
Sensing the development needs of
Developing Others others and bolstering their abilities
Goleman suggests that up to 80% of a worker’s success today may be attributed to these
competencies.4 Businesses are currently working towards capitalizing on individuals’
emotional skills, which can have a significant impact on their bottom line.
4
Daniel Goleman, Emotional intelligence, (New York, NY England: Bantam Books, Inc, 1995)
3
Because emotional intelligence focuses on how a person uses their emotions as a
tool for interpersonal effectiveness in social environments, the benefits of high EI can
be seen in a variety of careers throughout different industries.5 An obvious application
of EI is in sales, where work is primarily focused on building relationships. In a study
examining forty-four Fortune 500 companies, sales people with higher emotional
intelligence produced twice the revenue of those with average and below average
scores.6
Establishing positive relationships is only one facet of emotional intelligence.
The ability to self-motivate also has a large impact on productivity in a wide array of
industries. For example, at a technology based company (not traditionally considered
an emotion rich industry), programmers demonstrating the top ten percent of emotional
intelligence levels developed software three times faster than other programmers in the
company.7
Utilizing EI has also been shown to reduce turnover costs. A Texas-based
Fortune 500 company switched from a personality assessment to emotional intelligence
assessment for candidate selection and saw a 67% increase in retention in their first
year. This helped them to reduce turnover costs, saving $32 million dollars.8
While these examples clearly illustrate the benefits of emotional intelligence in
the workplace, the application of EI to work teams is even more pressing. Over 68% of
Fortune 1000 companies use self-managed work teams and the use of teams only seems
5
James Thomas Kunnanatt, "Emotional Intelligence: The New Science of Interpersonal Effectiveness,"
Human Resource Development Quarterly 15, no. 4 (2004): 489-495.
6
ibid.
7
"Sharing Knowledge Through BP's Virtual Team Network," Harvard business review 75, no. 5 (1997):
152-153.
8
Steven Minkin, "Implementing Virtual Teams," Armed Forces Comptroller 53, no. 2 (2008): 32-34.
4
to be increasing in popularity.9 Additionally, when used effectively, groups are shown
to make smarter decisions than individuals 80% of the times, giving businesses that rely
heavily on teamwork a significant advantage.10
Research on teams has discovered that trust among members, a sense of group
identity, and group efficacy are three conditions that are essential to a groups success. 11
Literature speculates that individuals possessing higher levels of emotional intelligence
are better able to fulfill these qualities by being more effective at communicating and
empathizing with teammates.12
Goleman and Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso’s models of emotional intelligence
form much of the base for the research on EI and teams and have been used to varying
degrees to examine the effects of emotional intelligence on work teams. Shoo used two
of Goleman’s emotional intelligence factors to investigate their benefits to medical
teams and found evidence for increased cohesion, decreased conflict, and a rise in
collaborative efforts.13 In a similar study of service teams, understanding and managing
emotions was shown to positively correlate with measures of team performance.14
While these are not the exact terms that Goleman used, they are similar to his
definitions of self-awareness and self-management respectively.
9
Dennis J. Devine and Laura D. Clayton, "Teams in Organizations," Small Group Research 30, no. 6
(1999): 678.
10
Suzy Wetlaufer, "Safety in Numbers--and Wisdom Too," Harvard business review 79, no. 3 (2001):
10-10.
11
Vanessa Urch Druskat and Steven B. Wolff, "Building the Emotional Intelligence of Groups," Harvard
business review 79, no. 3 (2001): 80-90.
12
L. M. Prati et al., "Emotional intelligence, leadership effectiveness, and team outcomes," International
Journal of Organizational Analysis 11, no. 1 (2003): 21-40.
13
ibid.
14
Ann E. Feyerherm and Cheryl L. Rice, "Emotional intelligence and team performance: The good, the
bad and the ugly," International Journal of Organizational Analysis 10, no. 4 (2002): 343-362.
5
Further support of the positive effect of emotional intelligence on teams comes
from studies examining undergraduate and graduate students. In an examination of
undergraduate student study groups, self-awareness (one of Goleman’s emotional
intelligence clusters) was found to positively correlate with team effectiveness.15
Empathy, a component of social-awareness, was also shown to correlate with measures
of performance and cohesion.16
In addition to the general connection between team effectiveness and emotional
intelligence, the link between emotional intelligence, trust, and team effectiveness is
also being studied. Trust allows individuals to justify their decision to contribute to a
group and allows for a freer exchange of information and collaboration that is essential
to success.17 This connection is new to researchers but could have a profound impact
on the performance of work teams.
Barczak, Lassk, and Mulki examined the relationship between team emotional
intelligence and trust and found that emotional intelligence promoted team trust among
university student study groups.18 Druskat predicts similar results in her theory of team
effectiveness where she speculates that emotional intelligence helps build elements of
15
Peter J. Jordan and Neal M. Ashkanasy, "Emotional Intelligence, Emotional Self-Awareness, and Team
Effectiveness," in Linking emotional intelligence and performance at work: Current research evidence
with individuals and groups. (Mahwah, NJ US: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers, 2006), 145-
163.
16
Brigette Ann Rapisarda, "The impact of emotional intelligence on work team cohesiveness and
performance," International Journal of Organizational Analysis 10, no. 4 (2002): 363-379.
17
Lionel P. Robert Jr., Alan R. Dennis, and Yu-Ting Caisy Hung, "Individual Swift Trust and
Knowledge-Based Trust in Face-to-Face and Virtual Team Members," Journal of Management
Information Systems 26, no. 2 (2009): 241-279.
18
Gloria Barczak, Felicia Lassk, and Jay Mulki, "Antecedents of Team Creativity: An Examination of
Team Emotional Intelligence, Team Trust and Collaborative Culture CREATIVITY AND
INNOVATION MANAGEMENT ANTECEDENTS OF TEAM CREATIVITY," Creativity &
Innovation Management 19, no. 4 (2010): 332-345.
6
social capital among team members, including team trust.19 Heffernan et al. also
explored trust and emotional intelligence in the banking sector and found that both
factors contributed significantly to manager’s financial performance.20
This research highlights the growing potential of emotional intelligence in the
work place as well as some of the current methodological issues that are hindering the
validity of the concept. Unfortunately, varying terminology is used to investigate the
relationship between team effectiveness and emotional intelligence leaving
methodological gaps in the ability to compare emotional intelligence studies. While
this creates problems in the research, it does not detract from the importance of
investigating emotional intelligence and teams. Future studies must adhere to more
stringent standards of terminology in order to best examine the potential of emotional
intelligence to improve team effectiveness.
In order to be most effective in generalizing findings to the business realm,
another important element of work teams must also be considered. In the last decade
there has been an increased interest in virtuality, as the amount of information and
communication technologies (ICTs) has been rapidly increasing.21 Virtual teams,
defined as “a group of geographically distributed individuals who work
interdependently for solving problems and accomplishing tasks”, are utilizing ICTs to
communicate among team members.22 In a recent survey of 250 companies, more than
19
VANESSA URCH DRUSKAT and STEVEN B. WOLFF, "The Link between Emotions and Team
Effectiveness: how Teams Engage Members and Build Effective Task Processes," Academy of
Management Proceedings & Membership Directory (1999): L1-L6.
20
Troy Heffernan et al., "Relationship marketing: The impact of emotional intelligence and trust on bank
performance," International Journal of Bank Marketing 26, no. 3 (2008): 183-199.
21
C. Schmidt et al., "Analysis of Virtual Teams," MIBES Transactions 2, no. 1 (2008): 159-174.
22
Mona I. Dakrory and Hussein A. Abdou, "Virtual Teams Processes: A Conceptualization and
Application," Problems and Perspectives in Management 7, no. 3 (2009): 15-26.
7
two-thirds cited the growing importance of virtual teams and over 80% of the largest
companies agreed that virtual teams are the way of the future.23
Like emotional intelligence, virtual teams can also have a large impact on a
company’s bottom line. For example, over the course of 12 meetings with a ten-person
international team, a company could save upwards of $100,000 by meeting virtually
rather than relying on meeting in person. Virtual teams can also be much more
productive than traditional teams since a cross-continental work shift can expand a
team’s working hours from 12 to 24.24 Other benefits of virtual teams include access to
global talent, extending business to new geographic markets, and reducing carbon
footprints.25
However, virtual teams also face significant challenges. While virtual teams do
not work face-to-face like the teams in studies we have previously reviewed, they are
equally affected by challenges of team cohesion and performance. This is amplified by
the fact that virtual working removes most of the corporeal cues that have been essential
to traditional understanding of the social construct of emotion.26 Team members may
also encounter feelings of isolation stemming from the loss of face to face contact.27
These factors coupled with cultural differences and lack of group norms makes
establishing trust in a virtual environment a challenge.28
23
Bradley L. Kirkman et al., "The Impact of Team Empowerment on Virtual Team Performance: the
Moderating Role of Face-To-Face Interaction," Academy of Management Journal 47, no. 2 (2004): 175-
192.
24
Minkin, "Implementing Virtual Teams," 32-34.
25
Dakrory and Abdou, "Virtual Teams Processes: A Conceptualization and Application," 15-26.
26
Stephen Fineman, Sally Maitlis, and Niki Panteli, "Virtuality and emotion," Human Relations 60, no. 4
(2007): 555-560.
27
Barbara Sieben, "Doing research on emotion and virtual work: A compass to assist orientation,"
Human Relations 60, no. 4 (2007): 561-580.
28
Alf Crossman and Liz Lee-Kelley, "Trust, Commitment and Team Working: The Paradox of Virtual
Organizations," Global Networks 4, no. 4 (2004): 375-390.
8
The current research on virtual teams is limited and comprised primarily of
speculative models of virtual team’s life cycles. However, a few promising studies
indicate the importance of future research. In a study of Egyptian travel agents, Dakory
and Abdou found that the socio-emotional processes of virtual teams had a clear effect
on the team’s performance. These factors, shown in FIGURE 1.2, are closely related to
the needs of traditional teams and emotional intelligence could help specifically with
the development of trust.29
FIGURE 1.2
To contribute to the existing body of literature, the current study will examine
the effect of emotional intelligence on virtual team performance. Both fields are of
growing importance to the business community and there is a clear need for more
research to be done. The current study will use an experimental design, to contribute to
the body of literature that is heavily case study based. The subjects will be
undergraduate students obtained through a self-selection process. The experiment will
be conducted in two parts, drawing on previous methodology.
29
Dakrory and Abdou, "Virtual Teams Processes: A Conceptualization and Application," 15-26.
9
The first part of the experiment will be administering the Wong and Law
Emotional Intelligence Scale. This measure is shown to have good validity and is
designed specifically to be applied in an organizational setting. It is also grounded in
theory, as it was developed from Myers and Salovey’s model of emotional
intelligence.30 This will aid in clarifying terminology and ensure that the affects of
emotional intelligence are directly related to theory. The scores will be used to assess
individual levels of emotional intelligence and averaged to obtain a team emotional
intelligence score.
The second portion of the current study will be based on a study by Staples and
Zhao. Using audio conferencing and electronic chat tools, they had participants solve
the Johnson & Johnson Winter Survival Task and found no statistical difference in the
performance of virtual teams versus traditional face-to-face teams. The survival task is
particularly useful because it is reflective of collaboration challenges faced in the
business environment and should again help to generalize findings. It also provides two
performance measures, comparison to the expert answer and time until completion. 31
Based on the findings of previous research, there should be a positive
relationship between a team’s level of emotional intelligence and their performance on
the Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival Task. This relationship should be present in
both performance measures of the Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival Task. When
analyzing the individual components of emotional intelligence, research suggests that
managing emotions and the perception and appraisal of emotions should also show a
stronger positive relationship with performance levels.
30
McEnrue and Groves, "Choosing among Tests of Emotional Intelligence: What Is the Evidence?" 9-42.
31
D. Staples and Lina Zhao, "The Effects of Cultural Diversity in Virtual Teams Versus Face-to-Face
Teams," Group Decision & Negotiation 15, no. 4 (2006): 389-406.
CHAPTER II
LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter provides an overview of some current theories of emotional
intelligence, team emotional intelligence, and virtual teams. The first section provides
an overview of the history of emotional intelligence and the development of different
theories. It then compares the two most common models of emotional intelligence,
ability-based models and mixed models. Two emotional intelligence models will be
reviewed in detail. The first model is the Mayers-Salovey-Caruso model of emotional
intelligence and the second model is Daniel Goleman’s model of emotional intelligence.
The next section justifies the selection of an emotional intelligence measure for this
thesis. Finally, a review of group emotional intelligence and the importance of
emotional intelligence in establishing trust among team members is provided. The next
section defines the concept of a virtual team and reviews relevant literature on the
subject. One of the main problems with virtual teams, lack of trust among teammates,
is also reviewed. The final section concludes the chapter and discusses the link between
emotional intelligence and virtual team performance.
A Brief History of Emotional Intelligence
While the theory of emotional intelligence has only been around for the past few
decades, the notion that intelligence is comprised of more than IQ has been around for
centuries and has laid the foundation for the development of the current theory. Edward
10
11
Lee Thorndike introduced emotional intelligence to the realm of psychology in 1920 as
a type of social intelligence that provides humans the ability to understand and manage
each other and act wisely in human relations. However, in 1937 Thorndike paired with
Stern to review attempts to measure social intelligence and determined that while an
important part of intellect, the concept was too broadly defined to measure.1
It wasn’t until 1966 that Leunen first used the term “emotional intelligence” in a
paper on emotional intelligence and emancipation. This was the only use of the term
until the 1980’s when the theoretical structure of emotional intelligence began to
develop. In 1983 Howard Gardner developed the concept of “multiple intelligences”
and popularized the notion that intelligence encompasses several capabilities. He
grouped these different intelligences into seven components including interpersonal and
intrapersonal intelligences, which are closely related to today’s definition of emotional
intelligence. In the same year Reuven Bar-On began studying emotional intelligence in
his doctoral program at Rhodes University. Claude Steiner quickly followed with a
published article on emotional literacy in 1984. In 1985 John D. Mayer and Peter
Salovey began their research into emotional intelligence by collaborating on the relation
of cognition and affect.2
The 1990’s marked the development of emotional intelligence as a theory and an
array of definitions soon developed. In 1990 Peter Salovey and Jack Mayer introduced
the first emotional intelligence theory in an academic journal.3 They performed the first
empirical study of the concept but it was Daniel Goleman who popularized the concept
1
Parvesh K. Chopra and Gopal K. Kanji, "Emotional intelligence: A catalyst for inspirational leadership
and management excellence," Total Quality Management & Business Excellence 21, no. 10 (2010): 971-
1004.
2
ibid.
3
ibid.
12
with the first book on emotional intelligence, Emotional Intelligence: Why it Can
Matter More than IQ, in which he sought to connect emotional intelligence to the
physiology of the brain.4 The first assessment tool for emotional intelligence was
published in 1997 by Reuven Bar-On and measured “non-cognitive capabilities,
competences, and skills that influence one’s ability to succeed in coping with
environmental demands.” The same year Mayer and Salovey refined their definition of
emotional intelligence to include the perception, accessibility, regulation, and
understanding of emotions.5 In 1998 Goleman published his second book, Working
with Emotional Intelligence, in which he expanded his definition of emotional
intelligence to include 25 skills, abilities, and competencies. This book also marked the
first application of emotional intelligence to the workplace6.
Unfortunately, the flood of interest around the concept of emotional intelligence
in the past 20 years has created more confusion than clarity. The study of emotional
intelligence is still in the early stages and contending definitions need to be made more
precise.7 Researchers have debated the conceptualization and management of the
theory and have developed various definitions and models, which some would argue
invalidates the concept because it has become too broad.8 However, while there may be
varying definitions, there is still a substantial body of research that suggests emotional
intelligence may have a large positive impact on the way we think and do business.
4
William P. Ferris, "Demonstrating the challenges of behaving with emotional intelligence in a team
setting: an on-line/on-ground experiential exercise," Organization Management Journal 6, no. 1 (2009):
23-38.
5
Chopra and Kanji, "Emotional intelligence: A catalyst for inspirational leadership and management
excellence," 971-1004.
6
7
Ferris, "Demonstrating the challenges of behaving with emotional intelligence in a team setting: an on-
line/on-ground experiential exercise," 23-38.
8
Edwin A. Locke, "Why emotional intelligence is an invalid concept," Journal of Organizational
Behavior 26, no. 4 (2005): 425-431.
13
Models of Emotional Intelligence
There are two main types of emotional intelligence models, ability based models
and mixed models. Ability based models “assume that EI is a cognitive ability which is
not measured by standard intelligence tests and relates to reasoning and problem solving
in the emotional domain.”9 In contrast, mixed models of EI are concerned with
behavioral consistency manifested in specific traits, personality types, or behaviors such
as empathy, assertiveness and optimism. However, many of these components of
mixed models have already been studied outside of the emotional intelligence construct,
making the amount of overlapping concepts for mixed model EI much greater than that
of ability based models.10 This is because mixed models of EI incorporate a personality
framework and are a vaguer concept than ability based EI, which is more focused and
explicit to the constituent parts of EI.11 In addition to the theoretical differences, the
procedures used in their operational definitions are fundamentally different. Ability
based models are measured through maximum performance tests whereas mixed models
of emotional intelligence are measured predominately through self-report
questionnaires.12
In order to maintain clarity, this paper will outline the definitions of the two
most important emotional intelligence models, identify supporting research for each,
and make comparisons across models. According to Thompson, out of over 60 EI
9
Elizabeth J. Austin, "Measurement of ability emotional intelligence: Results for two new tests," British
Journal of Psychology 101, no. 3 (2010): 563-578.
10
John D. Mayer, Peter Salovey, and David Caruso, "Models of emotional intelligence," in Handbook of
intelligence. (New York, NY US: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 396-420.
11
K. V. Petrides, "On the dimensional structure of emotional intelligence," Personality and Individual
Differences 29, no. 2 (2000): 313.
12
K.V. Petrides and A. Furnham, "Trait emotional intelligence: behavioural validation in two studies of
emotion recognition and reactivity to mood induction," European Journal of Personality 17, no. 1 (2003):
39-57.
14
assessments, the Mayer Salovey Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test and the EI
Inventory (EI-360) designed by Goleman, Boyatzis, and McKee are the most useful.13
Their theories and emotional intelligence measures are reviewed below.
The Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Model of Emotional Intelligence
Salovey and Mayer developed an ability-based definition of emotional
intelligence first defined as “the ability to perceive emotion, integrate emotion to
facilitate thought, understand emotions, and regulate emotions to promote personal
growth.”14 They then developed this definition into a four-branch model of emotional
abilities that fall along a continuum from fundamental to developmentally complex.
Complex abilities, represented in branches 3 and 4 primarily, are those that are
integrated with multiple psychological subsystems such as goals and personality.15 The
branches are illustrated in FIGURE 2.1 and each branch can be separately measured to
determine differences in emotional ability. This model helped them to redefine and
narrow the definition of emotional intelligence to the “ability to monitor one’s own and
others’ feelings and emotions, to regulate them, and to use emotion based information
to guide thinking and action.”16 Most EI literature suggests that this is now the most
13
Nona Momeni, "The Relation Between Managers' Emotional Intelligence and the Organizational
Climate They Create," Public Personnel Management 38, no. 2 (2009): 35-48.
14
John D. Mayer and Peter Salovey, "What is emotional intelligence?" in Emotional development and
emotional intelligence: Educational implications. (New York, NY US: Basic Books, 1997), 3-34.
15
As cited in John D. Mayer, Peter Salovey, and David R. Caruso, "Emotional Intelligence: Theory,
Findings, and Implications," Psychological Inquiry 15, no. 3 (2004): 197-215.
16
Salovey, P., Bedell, B., Detweiler, J.B., and Mayer, J.D. (1999). Coping Intelligently, Emotional
Intelligence and the Coping Process. In C.R. Snyder (Ed.). Coping: The psychology of what works (pg.
141). New York: Oxford University Press.
15
accepted definition and other researchers such as Boyatzis and Goleman, Petrides, and
Bar-On all include parts of this definition in their own work.17
FIGURE 2.1
One of the most important aspects of their model is that it follows a framework
of traditional intelligence measures and has been shown to correlate with traditional
measures of intelligence.18 As such, it follows the three basic criteria for intelligence:
identifies actual mental performance, describes a set of related abilities that are distinct
from established intelligence, and reflects an ability that develops with age.19 The first
criterion, actual mental performance, means that the focus is placed on mental
performance rather than a person’s self esteem or preferred way of being.20 This
eliminates the inclusion of personality traits in the model which some argue have made
17
Cary Cherniss, "Emotional intelligence: Toward clarification of a concept," Industrial and
Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice 3, no. 2 (2010): 110-126.
18
Kerry S. Webb, "Why Emotional Intelligence Should Matter to Management: A Survey of the
Literature," SAM Advanced Management Journal (07497075) 74, no. 2 (2009): 32-41.
19
John D. Mayer, David R. Caruso, and Peter Salovey, "Emotional intelligence meets traditional
standards for an intelligence," Intelligence 27, no. 4 (1999): 267-298.
20
ibid.
16
the concept of EI too broad and indistinguishable from already defined personality
traits. This model helps more narrowly define EI and focuses on ability rather than
traits that are an expression of EI, lending more support to the concepts validity.21
To verify such claims, Mayers, Salovey, and Caruso use the MSCEIT to test
their model of intelligence. By operationalizing EI as a set of abilities they found
emotional intelligence levels correlate moderately with verbal intelligence (r=.36),
factors of empathy (r=.33), and general intelligence factors, meeting the first and second
criteria for intelligence.22 In several follow up studies, they found that when compared
to adolescent scores, adults had higher general and branch level emotional intelligence
scores (r=.14), lending support for the last intelligence criteria. EI defined as an ability-
based intelligence also has an inherent philosophical appeal. If emotions can aid reason
and reason can influence emotions, we have the potential to increase our intelligence
through developing distinct emotional abilities.23
However, there are certain limitations to ability-based models that must be
considered. First, the ability based model is a model of a type of intelligence and is not
intended to be applied directly to workplace management theory. While certain EI
theories have made substantial claims about their importance in the workplace, ability
based models are intended to co-exist with, not replace, current management theories.
Additionally, ability based EI is more distinct from the Big Five Personality traits and
has higher correlations with general intelligence which lowers the incremental
21
John D. Mayer, Peter Salovey, and David R. Caruso, "Emotional Intelligence New Ability or Eclectic
Traits?" American Psychologist 63, no. 6 (2008): 503-517.
22
Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso, "Models of emotional intelligence," 396-420.
23
Peter Salovey and David A. Pizarro, "The value of emotional intelligence," in Models of intelligence:
International perspectives. (Washington, DC US: American Psychological Association, 2003), 263-278.
17
predictability of the test.24 Accordingly, ability based models will not reach the levels
of predictability that Goleman’s model claims. These models should contribute to a
greater understanding of the fundamentals of leadership and teamwork. While there has
been some data to support such claims, the study of ability based emotional intelligence
is still in its infancy and researchers are still working to develop extensive empirical
research to support the model’s predictive validity.25
The research that has been conducted using this ability-based model has
demonstrated good test-retest reliability, discriminant validity, and only moderate
correlation between major personality and intelligence scales.26 Rossen and Kranzler
found that EI explains a moderate to large amount of the unique variance for positive
relations with others after controlling for cognitive ability and the big five personality
factors.27 In a series of studies, Brackett et al. found that MSCEIT scores were
positively correlated with perceived social competence (defined as the ability to form
and maintain functional relationships).28 Additional studies by Lam and Kirby as well
as Cote and Miners found that general emotional intelligence contributes to individual
cognitive performance beyond the contributions of general intelligence alone.29
24
Jeffrey M. Conte, "A review and critique of emotional intelligence measures," Journal of
Organizational Behavior 26, no. 4 (2005): 433-440.
25
26
Irina Goldenberg, Kimberly Matheson, and Janet Mantler, "The Assessment of Emotional Intelligence:
A Comparison of Performance-Based and Self-Report Methodologies," Journal of personality assessment
86, no. 1 (2006): 33-45.
27
Eric Rossen and John H. Kranzler, "Incremental validity of the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional
Intelligence Test Version 2.0 (MSCEIT) after controlling for personality and intelligence," Journal of
Research in Personality 43, no. 1 (2009): 60-65.
28
Marc A. Brackett et al., "Relating Emotional Abilities to Social Functioning: A Comparison of Self-
Report and Performance Measures of Emotional Intelligence," Journal of Personality & Social
Psychology 91, no. 4 (2006): 780-795.
29
Stéphane Côté and Christopher T. H. Miners, "Emotional Intelligence, Cognitive Intelligence, and Job
Performance," Administrative Science Quarterly 51, no. 1 (2006): 1-28.Laura Thi Lam and Susan L.
Kirby, "Is Emotional Intelligence an Advantage? An Exploration of the Impact of Emotional and General
Intelligence on Individual Performance," Journal of Social Psychology 142, no. 1 (2002): 133-143.
18
Additionally, EI has been shown to be useful in determining individual success
as well as team success. In an exploratory study performed by Dulewiez and Higgs,
they found that as individuals rise within an organization, EI becomes more important.
More importantly, they found that emotional intelligence was also useful in group
settings. They suggest that EI is important in dealing with various company
stakeholders and with the growth of the internet these pressure groups are likely to
become more influential.30
Daniel Goleman’s Model of Emotional Intelligence
Daniel Goleman created a mixed model of emotional intelligence and defines
emotional intelligence in terms of competencies and skills that drive leadership
performance. His model was created from Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso’s early model
but incorporates additional personality traits such as persistence and zeal.31 His initial
model consisted of five main domains: knowing one’s emotions, managing emotions,
motivating one’s self, recognizing emotions in others, and handling relationships.32 In
his later book, Primal Leadership, Goleman condensed the model to four emotional
intelligence domains with specific competencies listed under each shown in FIGURE
2.2. 33
30
Victor Dulewicz and Malcolm Higgs, "Leadership at the Top: The Need for Emotional Intelligence in
Organizations," International Journal of Organizational Analysis 11, no. 3 (2003): 193-210.
31
Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso, "Emotional Intelligence New Ability or Eclectic Traits?" 503-517.
32
Goleman, "Emotional intelligence,"
33
Katie Dearborn, "Studies in Emotional Intelligence Redefine Our Approach to Leadership
Development," Public Personnel Management 31, no. 4 (2002): 523.
19
FIGURE 2.2
There are several benefits to this type of mixed EI model. The model is large in
scope and includes many elements that have face validity. Few would argue that
empathy, influence, and teamwork are not important skills in the work place. This also
helps the model gain support from leaders and human resources professionals as it
incorporates many of the elements thought to contribute to modern day workplace
effectiveness.
The main test used to assess Goleman’s model is the ECI-360. It is used to
measure EI of individuals in organizations, particularly managers. It uses a 360 degree
approach to data collection, making it more comprehensive than other emotional
intelligence tests.34 Lastly, one of the reasons why Goleman’s model and test have
34
Momeni, "The Relation Between Managers' Emotional Intelligence and the Organizational Climate
They Create," 35-48.
20
received such widespread attention is his claim that “emotional intelligence can be as
powerful, and at times more powerful, than IQ”.35
However, a closer look at the mixed EI model and its claims are needed before
an objective decision about the best EI model can be made. At the moment, IQ has
been shown to correlate at the r = .45 level with various criteria, suggesting that IQ
contributes to about 20% of life success. If Goleman’s statement about emotional
intelligence is true, that one single psychological entity could predict widespread
success at such levels, it would exceed any finding in a century of research in applied
psychology.36
While it is unlikely that such predictions are valid, part of the support for such
claims comes from the fact that traits included in the mixed model are also captured by
the five-factor model of personality and much of the existing research on leadership.
Additionally, the emotional competencies include not just traits and skills but outcomes
such as building bonds and political awareness. With such outcomes built in, it is easy
to see that the model would have large predictive validity.37
After reviewing the main models for ability and mixed models of emotional
intelligence it is clear that a mixed model of emotional intelligence does not offer many
new findings to the field of leadership or teamwork. While this mixed model may be
more easily applicable in a work setting, ability based models offer a new means to
understand how individuals manage their own and others emotions to produce results.38
Selection of an Emotional Intelligence Scale
35
36
37
ibid.
38
ibid.
21
BarOn developed the BarOn EQ-i measurement, which contains 133 items.
However, this model is not commonly used and there are few validation studies on the
measure. Additionally BarOn’s definition of emotional intelligence differs from that of
Mayer Salovey and Caruso and includes items not directly related to EI such as problem
solving and social responsibility. Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso’s newest emotional
intelligence measurement is the MSCEIT scale which is a valid and commonly used
emotional intelligence instrument.39 However, the test requires responses to more than
141 items and takes between 30-45 minutes to complete. There is also serious debate
over the validity of the consensus and expert scoring methods that the test uses. 40
Wong and Law developed a shorter measure of emotional intelligence called the Wong
and Law Emotional Intelligence Scael that is comprised of only 16 items but is still
based off of the theory of Mayers, Salovey, and Caruso.41 The current study will use
this measure of emotional intelligence.
Emotional Intelligence and Teams
The concept of emotional intelligence can have a significant impact on the
workplace but most work in organizations today is team based. Several important
trends have increased the complexity and importance of work group interactions. First,
organizations are relying more on groups of diverse experts to make increasingly
important and complex decisions. Second, these interdisciplinary teams are often self-
39
Chi-Sum Wong and Kenneth S. Law, "The effects of leader and follower emotional intelligence on
performance and attitude: An exploratory study," The Leadership Quarterly 13, no. 3 (2002): 243-274.
40
John D. Mayer et al., "Measuring emotional intelligence with the MSCEIT V2.0," Emotion 3, no. 1
(2003): 97-105.
41
Jahanvash Karim, "Examining the Factor Structure of Wong and Law's Emotional Intelligence Scale
with a Pakistani General Population Sample," IUP Journal of Organizational Behavior 9, no. 1 (2010):
32-44.
22
managed and may not even occupy the same physical space. Such trends place a
premium on effective information sharing, knowledge integration and collaboration.42
Researchers are now applying the concept of emotional intelligence to teamwork to help
groups perform more effectively.
Vanessa Druskat, one of the premier researchers on group emotional
intelligence, has identified three emotional competencies that create group emotional
intelligence: (1) awareness and regulation of individual group members’ emotions, (2)
awareness and regulation of group-level emotion (3) awareness and regulation of
emotion associated with cross-boundary activities.43 Individual and group emotional
intelligence help build group trust, group identity, and efficacy, which research
indicates are the three conditions essential to a groups effectiveness.44 In FIGURE 2.3
Druskat outlines how individual emotional intelligence builds group emotional
intelligence, which leads to the development of trust among team members.45
42
Steven B. Wolff et al., "The Link Between Group Emotional Competence and Group Effectiveness," in
Linking emotional intelligence and performance at work: Current research evidence with individuals and
groups. (Mahwah, NJ US: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers, 2006), 223-242.
43
ibid.
44
Druskat and Wolff, "Building the Emotional Intelligence of Groups," 80-90.
45
Vanessa Urch Druskat and Steven B. Wolff, "Group-Level Emotional Intelligence," in Research
Companion to Emotion in Organizations New Horizons in Management. Cheltenham, U.K. and
Northampton, Mass.: Elgar, 2008), 441-454.
23
FIGURE 2.3
Trust is one of the most important elements for teamwork and is based on
emotional bonds and perceived competencies of individual members. Goleman
incorporates trust into his model of emotional intelligence under the dimension of self-
management. In order to be emotionally intelligent, individuals must demonstrate that
they are trustworthy which develops a greater sense of trust in a group setting.46 In a
study by Spencer and Spencer, being able to demonstrate trust was a critical predictor of
managers’ success.47
46
ibid.
47
Amy A. Titus, "Competence at Work (Book)," Human Resource Development Quarterly 5, no. 4
(1994): 391-395.
24
Trust is also very important to interdisciplinary teams who by nature require
high levels of emotional intelligence for individuals of different backgrounds to perform
well together. In a study of health care professionals, diversity was shown to be both
helpful for gaining medical insight and a hindrance to the team by lowering job
satisfaction and raising conflict. Teams with higher levels of emotional security
(synonymous with trust in this article) were able to overcome emotional conflict and
performed most effectively.48 The chemical company KoSa, realized similar benefits
when their software and hardware employees began to work together. Once the two
teams established a relationship, they achieved performance 20 to 40 percent higher
than the target.49 Similar results were found in a study of undergraduate students.
Emotional intelligence levels were found to positively correlate to both cognitive and
affective team trust between students working together on a semester long class
project.50
Virtual Teams
Hertel et al. define virtual teams as teams in which members are geographically
dispersed and coordinate their work predominately with electronic information and
communication technologies.51 While this is only one of several definitions of virtual
teams, it encompasses all of the general assumptions about virtual teams on which
researchers have come to a consensus. The assumptions around virtual teams are a) that
48
Antoinette McCallin and Anita Bamford, "Interdisciplinary teamwork: Is the influence of emotional
intelligence fully appreciated?" Journal of nursing management 15, no. 4 (2007): 386-391.
49
Druskat and Wolff, "Building the Emotional Intelligence of Groups," 80-90.
50
Barczak, Lassk, and Mulki, "Antecedents of Team Creativity: An Examination of Team Emotional
Intelligence, Team Trust and Collaborative Culture CREATIVITY AND INNOVATION
MANAGEMENT ANTECEDENTS OF TEAM CREATIVITY," 332-345.
51
Guido Hertel, Susanne Geister, and Udo Konradt, "Managing virtual teams: A review of current
empirical research," Human Resource Management Review 15, no. 1 (2005): 69-95.
25
they consist of two or more persons b) they collaborate interactively to achieve common
goals c) at least one of the team members works at a different location, organization or
different time zone and d) they communicate and coordinate using electronic
communication.52
It is important to note that the last two aspects of virtual teams are dimensional
rather than dichotomized criteria for virtual teams.53 While extreme cases of teams
being completely geographically distributed and using only electronic communication
do exist, it is helpful to view virtuality as a continuum along which teams will vary to
different degrees. Griffith et al. developed a three-dimensional model of virtual teams
shown in FIGURE 2.4 which provides a graphic description of the different types of
virtual teams.
FIGURE 2.4
52
ibid.
53
ibid.
26
The x-axis of the model represents the amount of work that a team does with its
members across time or space. Teams that fall to the far right on this scale have very
few face-to-face interactions to accomplish work tasks. The y-axis of the model
represents the level of technological support used by the team. This can include any
type of information communication technology such as email, conference calling, etc.
used to accomplish a task. With the prevalence of phone and email in the work
environment to help accomplish tasks, it is unlikely for many teams today to accomplish
their goals using only face-to-face interactions. Most of today’s organizational teams
are likely to use a combination of both technological and face-to-face communication
methods. Lastly, the z-axis represents the physical distance between team members.
27
This includes the distribution of team members across both geographies and time
zones54.
These three dimensions separate the types of teams used in the work
environment into three distinct categories; pure face-to-face, pure virtual, and hybrid.
Pure face-to-face teams are depicted by the cube at the origin of the graph and as
mentioned above are rare in today’s work environment. Instead, the pure face-to-face
team serves as a comparison point to the most common type of team, the hybrid team.
These teams will deviate from the origin along one or more axes of the model and their
formation is often determined by the requirements of the team’s task. The last type of
team, pure virtual, is shown by the panel on the right separated from the cube. In this
model Griffith et al. are defining virtual teams as those who never meet face to face and
therefore must use some communication technology and are by definition
geographically distributed.55 This is consistent with Fiol and O’Conner, who suggest
that technological support and dispersion represent tendencies rather than definitional
attributes of virtual teams.56
The use of virtual teams can be evaluated at the individual and organizational
level. At the individual level, virtual teams may allow members’ greater flexibility,
more time control, and higher levels of responsibility. At the organizational level some
of the benefits of virtuality include around the clock work, speed and flexibility to meet
54
Terri L. Griffith, John E. Sawyer, and Margaret A. Neale, "Virtualness and Knowledge in Teams:
Managing the Love Triangle of Organizations, Individuals, and Information Technology," MIS Quarterly
27, no. 2 (2003): 265-287.
55
ibid.
56
C. M. Fiol and Edward J. O'Connor, "Identification in Face-to-Face, Hybrid, and Pure Virtual Teams:
Untangling the Contradictions," Organization Science 16, no. 1 (2005): 19-32.
28
market demands, reduced expenses for travel and office space, and the ability to staff
teams based on expertise rather than geographic preference.57
Another benefit is many virtual teams are comprised of interdisciplinary teams,
defined as a group of professionals from different disciplines who work together sharing
responsibility for collaborative decision-making.58 This is common because virtual
teams can overcome traditional membership selection boundaries such as proximity and
prior acquaintance and draw upon a larger network of knowledge sources. This allows
virtual team members to draw upon experiences and knowledge sources that may not be
available to pure face-to-face teams.59
However, the use of virtual teams is not perfect and there can be several
disadvantages to the use of virtual teams compared to traditional face-to-face teams.
The absence of visual information increases the social distance between participants
leading to a variety of problems.60 People are able to connect emotionally with one
another as the result of immediate interaction during face-to-face work, which is lost
when teams become virtual. Informal social cues such as body language can help
increase decision making ability, which is lost in the virtual environment.61
Additionally, the effectiveness of virtual teams often has mixed results.
Lipponen found in virtual collaboration situations that there were shorter discussion
57
Hertel, Geister, and Konradt, "Managing virtual teams: A review of current empirical research," 69-95.
58
McCallin and Bamford, "Interdisciplinary teamwork: Is the influence of emotional intelligence fully
appreciated?" 386-391.
59
Michael Workman, "Virtual Team Culture and the Amplification of Team Boundary Permeability on
Performance," Human Resource Development Quarterly 16, no. 4 (2005): 435-458.
60
Päivi Häkkinen, "What Makes Learning and Understanding in Virtual Teams So Difficult?"
CyberPsychology & Behavior 7, no. 2 (2004): 201-206.
61
Workman, "Virtual Team Culture and the Amplification of Team Boundary Permeability on
Performance," 435-458.
29
threads and lower participation rates among group members.62 Pillis and Furumo found
similar results in their study of virtual versus face-to-face team performance. Students
were split into three person virtual or face-to-face teams and asked to decide where to
open a new manufacturing plant based on previously provided information. Members
came up with individual answers and were then asked to reach a group consensus.
Results indicated that virtual teams communicated less, took longer to complete the
project, felt less trust and cohesion, and performed worse than face-to-face teams.63 If
virtual teaming is to succeed, there needs to be trust, technology alone is not enough.64
Virtual Team Trust
Maintaining trust is one of the most central elements to assuring virtual teams
perform well together. Trust is a critical element in enhancing organizational
cooperation and teams’ success. Trust allows individuals to justify their decision to
contribute and allows the collaboration and exchange of knowledge required for teams
to succeed.65
Virtual teams require high levels of trust to reduce the high levels of uncertainty
present in a technologically based environment.66 Trust among virtual team members is
defined as “the degrees of reliance individuals have on their remotely located team
members taken collectively as a group” and is comprised of three different types of
trust. The first type, personality-based trust, is developed through an individuals’
62
Marko Hakonen and Jukka Lipponen, "Procedural justice and identification with virtual teams: The
moderating role of face-to-face meetings and geographical dispersion," Social Justice Research 21, no. 2
(2008): 164-178.
63
Emmeline De Pillis and Kimberly Furumo, "Counting the Cost of Virtual Teams," Communications of
the ACM 50, no. 12 (2007): 93-95.
64
Charles Handy, "Trust and the Virtual Organization," Harvard business review 73, no. 3 (1995): 40-50.
65
Sirkka L. Jarvenpaa and Dorothy E. Leidner, "Communication and Trust in Global Virtual Teams,"
Organization Science 10, no. 6 (1999): 791-815.
66
ibid.
30
inherent disposition to trust others. In a virtual team this will have an immediate impact
on how much risk and reliance virtual team members are initially willing to accept. The
second type, institutional-based trust, is a function of an individuals’ belief in the
institutions norms and procedures. Lastly, cognitive trust develops between individuals
based on social cues and impressions.67
Trust, while essential to a virtual teams’ performance, can be hard to maintain.
Two key components of trust, risk and reliance, are amplified in a distributed work
setting. Different electronic communication habits and constraints, preconceived
notions about how teamwork should be accomplished, the demands of both local and
virtual obligations, and demands placed by virtual teammates all increase the risk of
team members not following through on assigned tasks. 68 These risks demand an even
higher level of reliance on teammates than traditional face-to-face teams. Traditional
nonverbal and social cues used to monitor such risk factors in face-to-face teams are
absent in a virtual setting and requires virtual team members to rely on other’s
behaviors and trust that they will not engage in social loafing.69
As deadlines approach for virtual teams, these risky behaviors often become
more apparent and create reneging and incongruence. A study performed by Piccoli
and Ives examined these behaviors and found that as deadlines approach and virtual
teams are under pressure to perform, these behaviors significantly lower teams trust
67
Saonee Sarker, Joseph S. Valacich, and Suprateek Sarker, "Virtual Team Trust: Instrument
Development and Validation in an IS Educational Environment," Information Resources Management
Journal 16, no. 2 (2003): 35.
68
Gabriele Piccoli and Blake Ives, "Trust and the Unintended Effects of Behavior Control in Virtual
Teams," MIS Quarterly 27, no. 3 (2003): 365-395.
69
Jeanne M. Wilson, Susan G. Straus, and Bill McEvily, "All in due time: The development of trust in
computer-mediated and face-to-face teams," Organizational Behavior & Human Decision Processes 99,
no. 1 (2006): 16-33.
31
levels.70 Another study found that virtual teams also start at a disadvantage, with
significantly lower levels of trust than face-to-face teams. This is representative of the
traditional view on trust, which states that because of the risks listed above and a lack of
a shared history, levels of initial trust in virtual teams are low.71
However, virtual teams are not always at a significant disadvantage. High levels
of trust have been observed in temporary virtual teams and the initial stages of virtual
team formation.72 This initial trust has been coined “swift trust” and several studies are
proving that there may be hope for virtual teams after all. Jarvenpaa discovered high
levels of swift trust in a study of seventy-five virtual teams.73 A year later, in a case
study of global virtual teams, Jarvenpaa and Leider found that virtual teams that
experience swift trust are better capable of managing the uncertainty, complexity, and
demands of the virtual environment.74 This type of trust can be developed “ex ante”
among individuals with no prior history and helps team members deal with the risks of
the virtual environment.75
Two factors contribute to the development of swift trust, stereotyping and
predisposition to trust. Team members place other team members into categories based
on general characteristics such as gender, organizational role, or profession and make
trust judgments based on their experiences with each category. Such stereotyping
allows individuals to make snap judgments about their teammates’ trustworthiness
70
Piccoli and Ives, "Trust and the Unintended Effects of Behavior Control in Virtual Teams," 365-395.
71
Wilson, Straus, and McEvily, "All in due time: The development of trust in computer-mediated and
face-to-face teams," 16-33.
72
Robert Jr., Dennis, and Hung, "Individual Swift Trust and Knowledge-Based Trust in Face-to-Face and
Virtual Team Members," 241-279.
73
Sirkka L. Jarvenpaa, Kathleen Knoll, and Dorothy E. Leidner, "Is Anybody Out There?" Journal of
Management Information Systems 14, no. 4 (1998): 29-64.
74
Jarvenpaa and Leidner, "Communication and Trust in Global Virtual Teams," 791-815.
75
Robert Jr., Dennis, and Hung, "Individual Swift Trust and Knowledge-Based Trust in Face-to-Face and
Virtual Team Members," 241-279.
32
without having to gather a history of their behavior. This factor is then compounded by
an individual’s predisposition to trust which will raise or lower their level of swift trust
towards all team members.76
A study of undergraduate students using virtual teams supports the influence of
these two factors. They found that initial feelings of trust between team members were
based on category-based judgments and predisposition for trust and that these two
factors serve as the basis for the additional feelings of trust developed from information
about teammate’s behavior. They also found that the two initial factors of swift trust
have different levels of influence on initial feelings of trust. Disposition to trust had a
greater influence on the formation of swift trust than category based judgments.77
Examining the team process may be the best way to understand how to improve
levels of trust in virtual teams. The most common model of life cycles for virtual teams
is the inputs-processes-outputs model developed by Powell, Piccoli, and Ives shown in
FIGURE 2.5.78 The input variables are the compositional characteristics of a virtual
team such as knowledge, skills, size, technology, etc. These will be addressed in the
survey design portion of the current study.
76
ibid.
77
ibid.
78
Gabriele Piccoli, Anne Powell, and Blake Ives, "Virtual teams: Team control structure, work processes,
and team effectiveness," Information Technology & People 17, no. 4 (2004): 359-379.
33
FIGURE 2.5
The team processes portion of the model focuses on how teams actually achieve their
goals. The socio-emotional process refers to the development of relationships among
team members and serves as the glue that binds teams together and allows them to
accomplish tasks. Trust has been noted as a determining factor of teams’ effectiveness
and can diminish the adverse impact of geographic distribution on psychological
intimacy.79 As cited above, emotional intelligence can have a direct impact on the level
of trust among team members, which could have a direct impact on the performance
and satisfaction of virtual teams. One of the only studies currently investigating this
relationship is a dissertation Hart that examines the relationship between trust,
emotional intelligence, and perceived virtual team effectiveness. His study found that
79
Luis L. Martins, Lucy L. Gilson, and M. T. Maynard, "Virtual Teams: What Do We Know and Where
Do We Go From Here?" Journal of Management 30, no. 6 (2004): 805-835.
34
there was not a relationship between emotional intelligence, virtual team trust, and
perceived team effectiveness. 80 The current study will try and extend upon Harts
research and explore the relationship between group emotional intelligence, virtual team
trust, and virtual team performance.
Conclusion
So far, this thesis has reviewed different types of emotional intelligence, their
impact on the development of trust in a team setting, and how it can have a positive
impact on virtual teams who struggle with problems of trust. While the links between
emotional intelligence and teams, emotional intelligence and trust, and virtual teams
and trust have been established, the relationship between emotional intelligence and
virtual teams has not yet been extensively explored. In the next chapter the current
study will attempt to bridge the gap in the literature to see if a positive relationship can
be observed between levels of emotional intelligence and virtual team performance in
an experimental setting.
80
Gregory S. Hart, "The effectiveness of virtual teams: An investigation of the relationship between trust
and emotional intelligence in the pharmaceutical industry" (Ph.D. diss., ProQuest Information &
Learning, 2009),
CHAPTER III
METHODOLOGY
The purpose of this chapter is to identify the methods that were used to explore
the relationship between emotional intelligence levels and virtual team performance.
First, this chapter discusses the sample population used in the study. Next the chapter
reviews the measures employed in the experiment. Finally, the chapter reviews the
procedure used for the experiment, which is divided into two parts: an initial online
survey used to screen participants for emotional intelligence levels and a second in
person experiment used to assess virtual team performance.
Sample
Current undergraduate students at Colorado College participated in this study.
The sample for the first portion of the study, the emotional intelligence survey, included
263 participants. Sixty-nine participants were male and 179 were female. The sample
for the second portion of the survey was recruited through student email address, which
participants had provided. A total of 192 participants were emailed and asked to
participate in the second portion of the study. Forty-five students responded (a 23.44%
response rate) and 40 completed the second portion of the experiment. Of these
students, nine were male and 31were female.
35
36
Measures
Emotional Intelligence.
The first portion of this experiment was the administration of the Wong and Law
Emotional Intelligence Scale. The scale is a brief 16 item emotional intelligence scale
based on the emotional intelligence model of Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso and is broken
down into four similar subscales.1 This was combined with a definition of emotional
intelligence developed by Davies et al. to produce a new emotional intelligence scale.2
“The scales are labeled: Self-Emotional Appraisal (SEA), the ability to understand
one’s emotions and express them naturally; Others Emotional Appraisal (OEA), the
ability to perceive and understand the emotions of other people; Regulation of Emotion
(ROE), the ability to regulate one’s emotions; and lastly Use of Emotions (UOE), the
ability to make use of one’s emotions by directing them towards constructive activities.3
Preliminary psychometrics suggests that the scale is a reliable and valid self-
report emotional intelligence measure.4 The overall scale score is reliable (=.78) and
predictive of job performance and satisfaction. Law, Wong, and Song found that the
scale was correlated with, but distinct from the Big Five Personality, supporting the
scale’s construct validity. They also found that the scale was a good predictor of job
performance, accounting for more than 10% of the variance in peer ratings of
1
Karim, "Examining the Factor Structure of Wong and Law's Emotional Intelligence Scale with a
Pakistani General Population Sample," 32-44.
2
Kenneth S. Law, Chi-Sum Wong, and Lynda J. Song, "The Construct and Criterion Validity of
Emotional Intelligence and Its Potential Utility for Management Studies," Journal of Applied Psychology
89, no. 3 (2004): 483-496.
3
Karim, "Examining the Factor Structure of Wong and Law's Emotional Intelligence Scale with a
Pakistani General Population Sample," 32-44.
4
ibid.
37
performance.5 The Wong and Law Emotional Intelligence Scale is also one of the only
publicly available measures of EI developed specifically for use in an organizational
setting.6 This was of particular importance to this study because the subjects were
simulating organizational work teams and the research goal (e.g., enhanced virtual team
performance) is of primary interest to organizations.
Since its introduction several researchers have used the Wong and Law
Emotional Intelligence Scale in an organizational setting. Sy, Tram, and O’Hara found
that it predicted job performance and satisfaction and Kafetsios and Zampetakis found
that emotional intelligence is significantly impacted by positive and negative affect at
work.7 This test has also been used in a group setting as well to look at the differences
in negotiating styles of high and low emotional intelligence individuals. Der Foo et al.
found that having high emotional intelligence individuals on a team resulted in higher
objective gain and a more positive negotiating experience.8 This experiment will also
apply the Wong and Law Emotional Intelligence scale in a group setting to assess the
difference in performance of groups negotiating to reach a consensus.
Virtual Team Trust
Sarker and Sarker developed the original measure of virtual team trust in 2003
to measure three different bases of trust; personality-based, institutional-based, and
5
Law, Chi-Sum Wong, and Song, "The Construct and Criterion Validity of Emotional Intelligence and
Its Potential Utility for Management Studies," 483-496.
6
Daniel S. Whitman et al., "Testing the second-order factor structure and measurement equivalence of
the Wong and Law Emotional Intelligence Scale across gender and ethnicity," Educational and
Psychological Measurement 69, no. 6 (2009): 1059-1074.
7
Thomas Sy, Susanna Tram, and Linda A. O'Hara, "Relation of employee and manager emotional
intelligence to job satisfaction and performance," Journal of vocational behavior 68, no. 3 (2006): 461-
473.Ricardo Chiva and Joaquín Alegre, "Emotional intelligence and job satisfaction: the role of
organizational learning capability," Personnel Review 37, no. 6 (2008): 680-701.
8
Maw Der Foo et al., "Emotional Intelligence and Negotiation: the Tension between Creating and
Claiming Value," International Journal of Conflict Management 15, no. 4 (2004): 411-429.
38
cognitive trust. Personality based trust develops during infancy and is the general
propensity to trust others. Institutional approaches to trust suggest that individuals have
expectations about how others will act in current and future interactions that will affect
their level of trust. Lastly, cognitive trust is trust that develops as individuals get to
know each other and gain more information about their behaviors.9
The initial instrument was designed for and validated with students but Walters
modified the instrument and adapted it to an organizational setting. This modified
instrument consists of 32 items measured on a 4-point Likert scale. It has coefficient
ratings ranging from α =.75 to .94. Research on the use of this scale is limited but
growing. Walters used a modified version of this trust scale in her dissertation and
found a strong relationship between trust and perceived team effectiveness.10 Hart used
the same virtual team trust measure in his dissertation on the effectiveness of virtual
teams. His results echoed Walters’ findings that virtual team trust is positively related
to perceived team effectiveness.11 This study will attempt to expand upon Hart’s
findings by investigating if trust is a moderating factor in the relationship between
emotional intelligence and virtual team performance. It will also expand the use of the
virtual team trust scale in two ways; investigating the relationship between trust and
actual virtual team performance and the application of the virtual team trust scale
outside of a dissertation.
Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival Task
9
Sarker, Valacich, and Sarker, "Virtual Team Trust: Instrument Development and Validation in an IS
Educational Environment," 35.
10
Kimberly K. Gehrke Walters, "A study of the relationship between trust and perceived effectiveness in
virtual teams" (Ph.D. diss., ProQuest Information & Learning, 2005),
11
Hart, "The effectiveness of virtual teams: An investigation of the relationship between trust and
emotional intelligence in the pharmaceutical industry,"
39
This task was used to assess how well teams would perform on a task in the
virtual environment. The exercise is designed to look at the process by which groups
make decisions.12 Participants are provided a scenario in which they have crash-landed
in the Minnesota woods in January. The pilot and co-pilot have died and they are stuck
in dense woods surrounded by lakes and rivers. While escaping the plane 12 items were
salvaged. Participants must rank the items in order of importance for their survival.
In this exercise participants must make a crucial decision of whether to stay at
the plane crash site or travel to the nearest town before ranking their survival items,
making the task more complex. The task is made even more challenging because some
of the 12 items cater to each decision (the compass for traveling and the canvas for
staying).13 This basic decision drastically influences the groups ranking but is a crucial
judgment because “an attempt to walk out would mean almost certain death from
freezing and exhaustion”.14
Miner used the Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival task to examine the
effectiveness of individual versus group performance. He found that when groups
pooled their resources and came up with solutions to the task different from the
individual solutions they had created, the group outperformed the individuals.15 Silver,
Cohen, and Crutchfield used the same task with both face-to-face and virtual teams to
examine differences in group status effects. This is one of the first applications of this
12
David W. Johnson and Frank P. Johnson, Joining together: Group theory and group skills (4th ed.),
(Englewood Cliffs, NJ US: Prentice-Hall, Inc, 1991)
13
Frederick C. Miner Jr., "Group versus Individual Decision Making: An Investigation of Performance
Measures, Decision Strategies, and Process Losses/Gains," Organizational Behavior & Human
Performance 33, no. 1 (1984): 112-124.
14
Johnson and Johnson, "Joining together: Group theory and group skills (4th ed.),"
15
Miner Jr., "Group versus Individual Decision Making: An Investigation of Performance Measures,
Decision Strategies, and Process Losses/Gains," 112-124.
40
task to the virtual realm and they found that in general, teams that worked face-to-face
provided more positive feedback and generated more ideas than virtual teams.16 The
current study will apply the Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival Task in a strictly
virtual setting and determine if emotional intelligence can help teams generate more
productive results.
Procedure
The current study took place in two parts. The first part was a survey that
assessed emotional intelligence levels and the second portion of the study was a
simulation of group decision-making in virtual teams.
Emotional Intelligence Survey
Colorado College students were recruited to complete a brief survey on
emotional intelligence. The survey was designed using Colorado College’s Qualtrics
online survey software. The survey contained 16 questions concerning emotional
intelligence, two demographic questions, and one question allowing participants to enter
information to be contacted for the second portion of the experiment. (See APPENDIX
A for a full copy of the survey.)
The survey was accessible through an online link and was distributed through
three different avenues. The first method of distribution utilized various Colorado
College listservs including; the economics major’s listerv, Delta Gamma listserv, Kappa
Kappa Gamma listserv, the student digest listserv and class listservs of three economics
professors. The second method used the social networking tool Facebook to distribute
16
Steven D. Silver, Bernard P. Cohen, and James H. Crutchfield, "Status differentiation and information
exchange in face-to-face and computer-mediated idea generation," Social psychology quarterly 57, no. 2
(1994): 108-123.
41
the link through individual’s status updates. The final distribution method was in
personal administration of the surveys on a single night in the library. These three
different distribution methods were used to try and generate as large a sample size as
possible.
Once the survey results were collected participant who gave permission to be
contacted regarding the second portion of the experiment were sorted into high and low
emotional intelligence groups based on a median split. These participants were then
emailed individually to request their participation in the experiment portion of the
study.
Virtual Team Experiment
Participants were recruited to participate in the study through email and gave
their preference for one of five time slots. Each group was made up of five students.
This number was selected for two reasons. First, the teams were kept small to minimize
social loafing, defined as the tendency for individuals to withhold contributions in a
group setting. Individuals in smaller teams contribute more because their perception of
responsibility is higher.17 Because this study investigates team performance in a virtual
setting where social loafing is more prevalent, it was important to keep the feeling of
responsibility high by limiting team size. Secondly, a low number of participants,
typically four, have been used in previous emotional intelligence and virtual team
experiments. Instead of using four participants this survey used five to make coming to
a consensus slightly more challenging.
17
"Team Size, Dispersion, and Social Loafing in Technology-Supported Teams: A Perspective on the
Theory of Moral Disengagement," Journal of Management Information Systems 27, no. 1 (2010): 203-
230.
42
Participants were provided a free lunch or dinner for their participation and
were entered into a raffle to win one of five $50 gift certificates. Up to two teams were
working in the computer lab at a time. The experiment took place in a computer lab in
the bottom of a natural science building at Colorado College. The room contained four
rows of computers all facing one direction, with eight computers in each row. The rows
were divided in two so that four computers were placed on each side. The participants
were randomly assigned to one of five computers. There were two participants per row,
and each was sitting on a different side of the classroom.
Once participants were assigned to their computer they were required to
complete the Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival Task. Each participant was given
up to ten minutes to read the survival scenario and complete his or her individual
ranking of the survival items. This was an arbitrary time limit given to participants to
ensure efficient use of the subject’s time. The object of the individual rankings of the
survival items was to familiarize participants with the task and to provide the beginning
points of discussion. While participants were given ten minutes to complete this task,
no participant used the full time allotted.
Once each participant completed their individual rankings they began the group
task. Participants were read a set of instructions about completing the group task and
then asked to turn on their computer monitors and use a virtual chat room created by the
host chatzy.com. The participants were given code names Participants One through
Five and were unaware of which code name corresponded to which participant.
Participants were allowed to use free form discussion to come to a group
consensus on the ranking of the twelve survival items. Once the group had come to a
43
consensus on the ranking of items, each member typed “FINISHED” into the chat room
to reflect their agreement. Based on a previous study by Miner, it was estimated that it
would take the groups an average of 45 minutes to complete the Winter Survival Task.18
Participants were then debriefed and provided an expert answer key for the survival
task. (See APPENDIX B for all relevant Johnson and Johnson Survival Task Materials.)
They were then dismissed and given a follow-up email with a survey link asking
about their experience. This survey contained the virtual team trust scale and an
assessment of the participants experience with virtual teams. There was only a 60%
response to this survey so the virtual team trust scale was not used in the analysis of
results in this study. (See APPENDIX C for a copy of the full survey.)
18
CHAPTER IV
RESULTS
This chapter will describe the demographics of the survey participants and the
results of three independent samples t-tests performed to analyze the results of the
experiment described in chapter 3.
The initial survey measured the emotional intelligence level of 263 Colorado
College students. Sixty-nine participants were male and 179 were female. The age
range was as follows: 0.4% were under 18, 8.0% were 18, 15.6% were 19, 25.1% were
20, 29.3% were 21, 14.1% were 22, and 2.7% were 23 or older. Of these 263
participants, 219 participants filled out the online survey and 206 completed the survey
resulting in a response rate of 94%. An additional 46 students completed paper versions
of the study that were distributed in the library. Of the 94% of participants that
completed the online survey, 78.08% provided their email address for further contact
(171 participants). Of those that completed the paper survey, 45.6% gave their email
address (21 participants).
The students who responded were then sorted into high and low emotional
intelligence groups using a median split (M = 5.425). Students with a score below
5.425 were placed in the low emotional intelligence group and students above 5.425
were placed in the high emotional intelligence group. There were 69 students in the low
emotional intelligence group and 194 students in the high emotional intelligence group.
44
45
These students were then contacted to participate in the second portion of the
experiment through email.
The sample size for the first portion of the study was intentionally large to
account for an expected low response rate to the email solicitation. Forty-five students’
responded (23.44% response rate) and 40 completed the second portion of the
experiment. A depiction of the number of participants in each section of the study is
provided in TABLE 1.1. Of these students, nine were male and 31were female. There
was little concern over the gender composition of the virtual teams as many studies
have cited emotional intelligence is comparable across genders.1 Similarly, team
member satisfaction and cohesion in virtual teams is shown not to vary across gender.2
TABLE 4.1
Experiment Number of Response

Portion Participants Male Female Rate
Emotional
intelligence Survey 263 69 179 n/a
Email Solicitation 192 34 158 73%
Virtual Team
Experiment 40 9 31 21%
Students who responded were placed in one of eight virtual teams based on their
availability. There were four high emotional intelligence teams and four low emotional
intelligence teams. Each team was comprised of five students. Once students were
assigned to teams of five, a group emotional intelligence score was created using an
1
Justin Newland and Salil Mehta, "The Role of Gender in Emotional Intelligence Competencies: An
Empirical Investigation of French, German and US Business Students," Proceedings for the Northeast
Region Decision Sciences Institute (NEDSI) (2009): 290-295., Whitman et al., "Testing the second-order
factor structure and measurement equivalence of the Wong and Law Emotional Intelligence Scale across
gender and ethnicity," 1059-1074.
2
Stephanie M. Bryant, Susan M. Albring, and Uday Murthy, "The effects of reward structure, media
richness and gender on virtual teams," International Journal of Accounting Information Systems 10, no. 4
(2009): 190-213.
46
average of all five participants’ emotional intelligence scores. A table of the team’s
emotional intelligence scores is provided in TABLE 4.2.
TABLE 4.2
Team Emotional Intelligence Score

Low 1 4.788
Low 2 4.513
Low 3 4.600
Low 4 4.713
High 1 5.825
High 2 5.963
High 3 5.988
High 4 5.913
An independent samples t-test was used to see if there was a significant
difference in the emotional intelligence of the high and low groups. There was a
significant difference in emotional intelligence abilities between the high emotional
intelligence (M = 5.92, SD = .07) and low emotional intelligence (M = 4.65, SD = .12)
groups; t(6) = -18.00, p<.01.
The next portion of the experiment was designed to compare the scores of the
high and low emotional intelligence teams on the Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival
Task. A table of each teams ranking to the Johnson and Johnson Winter Survival Task
is provided in TABLE 4.3. The quality of the team’s decision is determined by
comparing the team score to an expert score derived from the consensus of multiple
survival experts. This study used the same method as Miner (1984) and computed the
team’s score by determining the summed absolute difference between the group ranking
47
and the expert ranking provided by Johnson and Johnson.3 The lower the summed
differences scores between the group and expert rankings, the better the group’s
performance4.
TABLE 4.3
Ranking Low 1 Low 2 Low 3 Low 4 High 1 High 2 High 3 High 4

1 Clothes Clothes Lighter Canvas Compass Clothes Lighter Clothes
2 Steel Wool Compass Steel Wool Whiskey Clothes Compass Newspaper Compass
3 Newspaper Map Canvas Lighter Axe Steel Wool Clothes Map
4 Compass Canvas Chocolate Compass Map Canvas Steel Wool Canvas
5 Axe Shortening Compass Clothes Steel Wool Shortening Canvas Newspaper
6 Shortening Gun Map Newspaper Lighter Whiskey Compass Whiskey
7 Canvas Newspaper Clothes Axe Newspaper Newspaper Chocolate Lighter
8 Chocolate Axe Gun Shortening Canvas Chocolate Axe axe
9 Gun Whiskey Whiskey Gun Gun Axe Pistol Shortening
10 Whiskey Chocolate shortening Chocolate Chocolate Gun Shortening Chocolate
11 Map Lighter Newspaper Map Whiskey Map Whiskey Pistol
12 Lighter Steel Wool Axe Steel Wool Shortening Lighter Map Steel Wool
Low 1 Low 2 Low 3 Low 4 High 1 High 2 High 3 High 4

Total Score 32 52 38 44 46 36 24 56
Time 36 min 24 min 28 min 43 min 30 min 23 min 28 min 13 min
When scores on the Winter Survival Task were compared between the low
emotional intelligence (M = 41.50, SD = 8.54) and high emotional intelligence groups
(M = 40.50, SD = 13.69) no significant difference was found; t(6)=.12, p = n.s. The
same result was found when time until completion was compared between the high (M
= 23.50, SD = 7.60) and low (M = 32.75, SD = 8.46) emotional intelligence groups;
t(6)= 1.63, p = n.s. Because results were not significant the data was examined for
3
Miner Jr., "Group versus Individual Decision Making: An Investigation of
Performance Measures, Decision Strategies, and Process Losses/Gains," 112-124.
4
Jordan and Ashkanasy, "Emotional Intelligence, Emotional Self-Awareness, and Team
Effectiveness," 145-163.
48
outliers. Using box-plot graphs it was determined that there were no outliers in the
group’s performance time or survival task score. While significant results were not
found, the mean time of completion for high and low emotional intelligence groups may
be worth noting. The mean time for completion of high emotional intelligence groups
was much lower than that of the low emotional intelligence groups. A larger sample
size should be used (this study had n=8) to determine if there is an affect of emotional
intelligence on performance time.

CHAPTER V
DISCUSION AND CONCLUSIONS
The purpose of this chapter is to connect the results from the previous chapter to
the emotional intelligence and virtual team literature base. It will begin by reviewing
the results found in this study and offering insight into why the findings did not support
the original hypothesis. Then this chapter will discuss how the design of the current
study contributes to the growing body of literature on emotional intelligence and virtual
teams. Finally, it will review limitations of the current study and propose directions for
future research.
Contrary to this study’s hypothesis, our research suggests emotional intelligence
does not have a significant effect on the performance of virtual teams on the Johnson
and Johnson Winter Survival Task. Both the time until completion on the Johnson and
Johnson Winter Survival task and the score of the ranked items did not differ
significantly between teams with high and low emotional intelligence. As such, it is
unclear whether the emotional intelligence level of groups can significantly increase
performance in a virtual team setting.
This result was unexpected. Previous studies on group emotional intelligence
have found several instances of emotional intelligence enhancing performance such as
emotional intelligence enhancing team cohesion and patient outcomes among nursing
49
50
teams and group cohesion and performance in business teams.1 In a study similar to the
current study, Jordan et al. found that undergraduate teams with high average emotional
intelligence levels performed better than teams with low average emotional intelligence
on a group task. 2
There may be two main reasons why the results of the current study were not
supportive of the hypothesis. First, the study had a very low sample population. Only
eight groups were used in the study, four for high emotional intelligence and four for
low emotional intelligence. This sample may not have been reflective of the greater
population and may have been too small to show a significant difference between
groups. A future study should use a larger sample size to determine if emotional
intelligence could have significantly impacted team performance. For example, in a
similar study on group decision making performed by Miner, sixty-nine groups
comprised of four students each were used3. Additionally, this sample size is much too
small to make the results generalizable to the virtual team population. The United
States Labor Department reported in 2001 that 19 million people worked from home or
another location and that the number would continue to grow.4 A sample of 40 college
students is not generalizable to such a large population.
Another problem may have been the type of task used to assess team
performance. Hiltz et al. used a similar survival task with face-to-face and virtual teams
but analyzed the task in terms of communication units and instances of agreement to
1
McCallin and Bamford, "Interdisciplinary teamwork: Is the influence of emotional intelligence fully
appreciated?" 386-391.
2
Jordan and Ashkanasy, "Emotional Intelligence, Emotional Self-Awareness, and Team Effectiveness,"
145-163.
3
4
Kirkman et al., "The Impact of Team Empowerment on Virtual Team Performance: the Moderating
Role of Face-To-Face Interaction," 175-192.
51
compare communication styles between virtual and face-to-face teams.5 Miner also
used the Winter Survival Task in a group setting but used it to compare the
effectiveness of group versus individual decision making.6 The Johnson and Johnson
Winter Survival task is frequently used in a group setting but it is typically used to
assess communication rather than team performance.
While it requires critical thinking and problem solving skills, it may not be the
best task to help establish the link between virtual team performance and emotional
intelligence. Its use in this study does not lend itself to analyzing team performance.
Instead, the current findings instead imply that emotionally intelligent individuals are no
better at surviving in the woods than less emotionally intelligent individuals.
Although results were not supportive of the hypothesis, there are still interesting
insights that can be gained from this study. There was a large difference in the mean
completion time of the high (M = 23.50) and low (M = 32.75) emotional intelligence
groups. There are two possible explanations for this finding. The first explanation is
that the 13 minute completion time of one of the high emotional intelligence groups
significantly lowered the average completion time of the four groups. However, while
this time did lower the average score, the time was not shown to be an outlier within the
data, and the range of completion times for the high emotional intelligence group (13 to
30 minutes) was still lower than the range for the low emotional intelligence groups (24
to 43 minutes). Future studies may want to explore the amount of time it takes high
5
Starr R. Hiltz, Kenneth Johnson, and Murray Turoff, "Experiments in group decision making:
Communication process and outcome in face-to-face versus computerized conferences," Human
Communication Research 13, no. 2 (1986): 225-252.
6
52
emotional intelligence groups versus low emotional intelligence groups to reach a
decision as the primary performance measure.
A second explanation is that groups with higher emotional intelligence engage
in less conflict behaviors. In several studies cited by Jordan and Troth (2004) groups
with higher emotional intelligence have been shown to have less conflict behaviors and
more cooperation.7 A larger sample size should be used in future studies to determine
if emotional intelligence has a significant impact on the completion time of the Johnson
and Johnson Winter Survival Task.
The current study is also useful because of its contribution to the growing body
of emotional intelligence and virtual team research. Most studies examining emotional
intelligence in a group setting average the participants’ emotional intelligence scores
and compare them to the team’s performance on a variety of tasks. Results from these
studies may be a reflection of the most emotionally intelligent individual in a group
rather than a group with overall high emotional intelligence competencies. A study
performed by Korman et al. found that the emotional intelligence of a team leader is
significantly related to the presence of group emotional intelligence.8 The current study
avoided this problem by pre-screening individuals for emotional intelligence and did
not designate a group leader in order to understand the effects of overall increased
group emotional intelligence.
This study also contributes to the research on different emotional intelligence
measures. Using the Wong and Law Emotional Intelligence Scale the current study
7
Jordan and Ashkanasy, "Emotional Intelligence, Emotional Self-Awareness, and Team Effectiveness,"
145-163.
8
Elizabeth Stubbs Koman and Steven B. Wolff, "Emotional intelligence competencies in the team and
team leader: A multi-level examination of the impact of emotional intelligence on team performance,"
Journal of Management Development 27, no. 1 (2008): 55-75.
53
found that there was a significant difference between teams with high and low levels of
emotional intelligence. This helps support the construct validity of the scale because it
measures actual differences in emotional intelligence of high and low emotional
intelligence groups. This is also one of the first applications of the Wong and Law
Emotional Intelligence scale to the virtual team environment, providing an opportunity
for a new application of the emotional intelligence concept in a work setting. While
results of this study were not supportive of the hypothesis its face validity suggests that
studying emotional intelligence in the virtual setting is still worth exploring.
Lastly, the current study has also furthered the body of literature on virtual
teams. One of the only other studies linking emotional intelligence and virtual teams is
a dissertation study by Hart.9 This study extends upon his research by examining the
impact of emotional intelligence on actual performance measures of virtual teams rather
than perceived team effectiveness.
Limitations
In addition to the primary challenges listed above, the current study had
additional limitations that should be examined in future research. The additional
limitations reviewed in the current study are the sample population demographics, the
selection processes used, and the creation of a virtual environment.
Sample Population.
9
Hart, "The effectiveness of virtual teams: An investigation of the relationship between
trust and emotional intelligence in the pharmaceutical industry,"
54
One of the biggest limitations of this study is the sample population. The
participant population used was Colorado College students due to their accessibility to
the researcher. The Wong and Law Emotional Intelligence Scale is designed to be
applied in an organizational setting and while the study tried to mimic the realities of a
virtual work team, the findings would be more generalizable if real work teams were
used. Most participants were also female. While emotional intelligence and virtual
team satisfaction and cohesion are comparable across gender, 77.5% female team
members are not reflective of a general work group.10
Lastly, the age of the sample population is a limitation to this study. Emotional
intelligence is shown to increase with age and the sample population used here is in
early adulthood. Emotional intelligence may have a more significant effect on virtual
team performance if an older population is used. Additionally, the younger sample used
in this study may be more familiar with technology than an older population which may
have increased performance time on the winter survival task. Future studies should
utilize participants with a wider age range and level of comfort with technology of to
determine if age has a significant effect on performance measures.
Sample Selection
This thesis may also have been limited by the method of obtaining participants.
A sizable portion of the population was recruited through the Colorado College
Economics and Business department and these participants may have had more
experience working in a team setting than the average student. Additionally, because
10
Whitman et al., "Testing the second-order factor structure and measurement equivalence of the Wong
and Law Emotional Intelligence Scale across gender and ethnicity," 1059-1074., Bryant, Albring, and
Murthy, "The effects of reward structure, media richness and gender on virtual teams," 190-213.
55
participants were recruited primarily over the web, they may have already been more
familiar with technology than the average individual and therefore better able to
navigate the challenges of a virtual environment.
Virtual Environment
Lastly, due to researcher constraints, the simulation of a virtual environment was
limited. Participants were not permitted to look or speak to each other during the
experiment but were located in the same room, placing this team low on the physical
distance dimension of Griffith et al.’s virtual team model.11 While the level of technical
support and time spent apart on this task were high (100% in both cases), this team is
classified as a hybrid team rather than a purely virtual team. Being in the same room
may have provided more social cues to participants than a purely virtual team and this
extra “richness” may have influenced the team’s performances. Future studies should
try and create a completely virtual environment for teams to work in. Placing each
participant in a different room by themselves would be one good way to modify the
design of the current study to simulate a completely virtual team.
Future Studies
The literature and empirical research on emotional intelligence and virtual teams
is still growing and more research is needed to explore these concepts fully. Based on
the limitations reviewed above the current study proposes the following directions for
future research.
11
Griffith, Sawyer, and Neale, "Virtualness and Knowledge in Teams: Managing the Love Triangle of
Organizations, Individuals, and Information Technology," 265-287.
56
The link between emotional intelligence and virtual teams has been neglected or
received very little attention in the literature. Due to the increasing frequency of work
teams being utilized in a virtual setting, future studies exploring emotional intelligence
in a group setting should take virtual teams into consideration when designing their
experiments.
The type of emotional intelligence measure used should also be modified in
future studies. The current study used a self-report measure of emotional intelligence.
While the scale used had been created for an organizational setting, improving the
ability to generalize findings, measures of self-report reflect participant’s personal
views and opinions of their abilities rather than a concrete measure of their ability.
Studies examining the impact of different types of emotional intelligence measures
(trait versus ability specifically) and their predictability of virtual team performance are
needed. Because the design of the current study was focused on performance measures
of virtual teams rather than perceived performance, ability-based models such as the
MSCEIT which measures actual emotional intelligence abilities may be well suited for
a follow up study. This would also ensure that teams have higher actual emotional
intelligence abilities rather than higher perception of their abilities.
Future studies should also investigate age and its relationship to emotional
intelligence and virtual team performance. As shown by Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso,
emotional intelligence like any other intelligence increases with age.12 It would be
interesting to explore whether older teams with higher emotional intelligence would
perform better in a virtual team setting than younger emotionally intelligent teams. The
level of familiarity with virtual environments may also be impacted with age. Younger
12
Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso, "Emotional Intelligence New Ability or Eclectic Traits?" 503-517.
57
generations who have grown up learning how to express themselves in a virtual setting
may perform better regardless of emotional intelligence levels. Older generations, who
have experience with technology being primarily transactional, may have more trouble
navigating the virtual environment. Future studies should use teams comprised of
several different age groups to determine if level of familiarity with virtual expression
has an effect on virtual team performance.
Future studies should also investigate the link between emotional intelligence
and virtual team performance when moderated by trust. While this study attempted to
measure trust tendencies using the virtual team trust scale, the response rate of
participants was too low for the data to be incorporated. Future researchers should
administer the virtual team trust scale directly after the team completes its task to ensure
every participant’s level of trust is measured. This would also eliminate the possibility
of participants’ level of trust being influenced significantly by reflection time.
Lastly, further investigation into virtual team performance measures is also
needed. Most current research examines the perceived performance of the team
through satisfaction scales or peer reviews but little attention has been paid to actual
performance metrics. Future studies have at least two options for examining actual
performance in a virtual team setting. Future studies could incorporate more real world
work teams who are tasked with project completion to further explore performance in
the virtual environment. If student participants are more accessible to the researcher, a
performance task such as a business case study could be used. Case studies typically
reflect real-world business challenges and can still require group discussion and
consensus to reach a solution.

58
Conclusion
While the results of this study were not supportive of the hypothesis, the
importance of emotional intelligence in the virtual environment should not be
overlooked. As the prevalence of virtual work teams continues to grow there will be an
increased need to simulate the emotional connection experienced in a face-to-face
environment. Although the current study did not contribute to emotional intelligence
and virtual team literature with conclusive results its importance should not be
overlooked. The innovative design of the study and its integration of two important
bodies of literature have opened the doorway for new ways to explore both topics.
While the impact of emotional intelligence is inconclusive, the principles of being
aware of yourself and others emotions and actions should be a part of any virtual team’s
practice.
APPENDIX A
WONG AND LAW EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE SCALE (WLEIS)
All questions are answered on a 7-point Likert scale with the following responses:
Strongly disagree, Moderately disagree, Slightly disagree, Undecided, Slightly agree,

Moderately Agree, Strongly agree
Questions 1-4 Address the Self-Emotional Appraisal (SEA)
1. I have a good sense of why I have certain feelings most of the time.
2. I have a good understanding of my own emotions.
3. I really understand what I feel.
4. I always know whether or not I am happy.
Questions 5-8 address Others’ Emotion Appraisal (OEA)
5. I always know my friends’ emotions from their behavior.
6. I am a good observer of others’ emotions.
7. I am sensitive to the feelings and emotions of others.
8. I have a good understanding of the emotions of people around me.
Questions 9-12 Address the Use of Emotion (UEO)
9. I always set goals for myself and then try my best to achieve them.
10. I always tell myself I am a competent person.
11. I am a self-motivated person.
12. I would always encourage myself to try my best.
Questions 13-16 address the Regulation of Emotion (ROE)
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13. I am able to control my temper and handle difficulties rationally.
14. I am quite capable of controlling my own emotions.
15. I can always calm down quickly when I am very angry.
16. I have good control of my own emotions.

APPENDIX B
JOHNSON AND JOHNSON WINTER SURVIVAL EXERCISE SCENARIO
You have just crash-landed in the woods of northern Minnesota. It is 11:32a.m.
in mid-January. The light plane in which you were traveling crashed on a lake. The
pilot and co-pilot were killed. Shortly after the crash the plane sank completely into the
lake with the bodies inside. No passengers are injured and you are all dry.
The crash came suddenly, before the pilot had time to radio for help or inform
anyone of your position. Since your pilot was trying to avoid a storm, you know that
the plane was considerably off course. The pilot announced shortly before the crash
that you were twenty miles northwest of a small town that is the nearest known
habitation.
You are in a wilderness area made up of thick woods broken by many lakes and
streams. The snow depth varies from above the ankles in windswept areas to knee-deep
where it has drifted. The last weather report indicated that the temperature would be -
25 degrees Fahrenheit in the daytime and -40 at night. There is plenty of dead wood
and twigs in the immediate area. You are dressed in winter clothing appropriate for city
wear – suits, pantsuits, street shoes, and overcoats.
While escaping from the plane, the several members of your group salvaged
twelve items. Your task is to rank these items according to their importance to your
survival, starting with the number one for the most important item and ending with 12
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for the least important one. The number of passengers is the same as the number of
persons in your group and the group has agreed to stick together.
JOHNSON AND JOHNSON WINTER SURVIVAL SCENARIO ITEMS
1. Ball of steel wool
2. Newspapers (one per person)
3. Compass
4. Hand Ax
5. Cigarette Lighter (without fluid)
6. Loaded .45-caliber pistol
7. Sectional air map made of plastic
8. 20-ft by 20-ft piece of heavy-duty canvas
9. Extra shirt and pants for each survivor
10. Can of shortening
11. Quart of 100-proof whiskey
12. Family-sized chocolate bar (one per person)

APPENDIX C
MODIFED VIRTUAL TEAM TRUST INSTRUMENT
Questions 1-4 address personality-based trust.
All questions are answered on a 5-point Likert scale with the following responses:
Strongly disagree, Disagree, Neither agree nor disagree, Agree, Strongly agree
1. I believe that remote team members tell the truth about the limits of their knowledge.
2. I believe that remote team members can be counted on to do what they say they will
do.
3. I believe that remote team members are honest in describing their experience and
abilities.
4. I believe that remote team members have high skills and ability.
Questions 5-13 address cognitive-based trust.
5. From the contents of our discussion group, I believe that my remote team members
were excited about our work.
6. From the contents of our discussion group, I believe that my remote team members
were serious about our work.
7. From the tone of the discussion group, I believe that my remote team members were
excited about our work.
8. From the tone of the discussion group, I believe that my remote team members were
serious about our work.
9. The responses from my remote team members are mature and professional.
10. I believe that I can depend on remote team members who are familiar with different
communication technologies.
11. My remote team members are humorous and enthusiastic, and seemed excited about
working together.
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12. My remote team members were dependable.
13. My remote team members’ goal is to do a good job.
Questions 14-21 address team satisfaction.
14. I feel the team has been effective in reaching its goals.
15. I feel the team met its objectives.
16. I feel the team completed its work on time.
17. There is a respect for individuals in the team.
18. I feel the members of the team value my input.
19. Team morale was high in the team.
20. I enjoyed being a member of this team.
21. In the future, I would be interested in participating in another virtual team.
Questions 22-25 are descriptive questions.
22. What is your gender?
Responses: Male, Female
23. In general, how comfortable are you using a computer?
Responses: Well Above Average, Above Average, Average, Below Average, Well
Below Average
24. In the past year, how many teams have you participated in where all team members
were based in the same location?
Responses: None, 1-3, 4-6, 7-8, 8+
25. In the past year, how many teams have you participated in where some team
members dispersed across different locations.
Responses: None, 1-3, 4-6, 7-8, 8

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THE EFFECT OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE ON VIRTUAL TEAM

The Faculty of the Department of Economics and Business

The Colorado College

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree

5 DISCUSION AND CONCLUSION 50

4.1 Participant Population ………………………..……………………………... 46

4.2 Team Emotional Intelligence Scores …………….………………………….. 47

4.3 Team Survival Task Scores ………………………………………………… 48

1.1 Definitions of Emotional Intelligence Competencies ………..………………. 2

1.2 Virtual Team Life Cycle..…………………………………………………….. 8

2.1 The Four Branch Model of Emotional Intelligence ………...………………... 16

2.2 Daniel Goleman Emotional Intelligence Competencies ………….………….. 20

2.3 Group Emotional Intelligence Processes……………………………………… 24

2.4 Three Dimensional Virtual Team Model……………………………………... 26

2.5 Inputs-Processes-Outputs Model………………………………………………. 33

library and company during countless coffee breaks.

communication, more competition, and quick innovation. Succeeding in this new

business environment is no longer possible using general intelligence alone.1 Today’s

to navigate an increasingly complex social work environment.

EI into four broad categories of perception, emotional facilitation of thinking, analyzing

emotions, and management of emotions.3

Goleman then expanded on this model and redefined emotional intelligence in

of such skills by applying research on emotional intelligence to the business sector.

Definitions of Emotional Intelligence Competencies

Adaptability Being flexible and responding to change

Social Skills Influence Wielding effective tactics for persuasion

Conflict Management Negotiating and resolving disagreements

competencies.4 Businesses are currently working towards capitalizing on individuals’

Because emotional intelligence focuses on how a person uses their emotions as a

be seen in a variety of careers throughout different industries.5 An obvious application

of EI is in sales, where work is primarily focused on building relationships. In a study

Establishing positive relationships is only one facet of emotional intelligence.

industries. For example, at a technology based company (not traditionally considered

Utilizing EI has also been shown to reduce turnover costs. A Texas-based

Fortune 500 company switched from a personality assessment to emotional intelligence

While these examples clearly illustrate the benefits of emotional intelligence in

to be increasing in popularity.9 Additionally, when used effectively, groups are shown

heavily on teamwork a significant advantage.10

Literature speculates that individuals possessing higher levels of emotional intelligence

empathizing with teammates.12

Goleman and Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso’s models of emotional intelligence

of Goleman’s emotional intelligence factors to investigate their benefits to medical

collaborative efforts.13 In a similar study of service teams, understanding and managing

emotions was shown to positively correlate with measures of team performance.14

definitions of self-awareness and self-management respectively.

Further support of the positive effect of emotional intelligence on teams comes

from studies examining undergraduate and graduate students. In an examination of

undergraduate student study groups, self-awareness (one of Goleman’s emotional

intelligence clusters) was found to positively correlate with team effectiveness.15

Empathy, a component of social-awareness, was also shown to correlate with measures

of performance and cohesion.16

In addition to the general connection between team effectiveness and emotional

on the performance of work teams.

factors contributed significantly to manager’s financial performance.20

This research highlights the growing potential of emotional intelligence in the

validity of the concept. Unfortunately, varying terminology is used to investigate the

relationship between team effectiveness and emotional intelligence leaving

methodological gaps in the ability to compare emotional intelligence studies. While

stringent standards of terminology in order to best examine the potential of emotional

intelligence to improve team effectiveness.

In order to be most effective in generalizing findings to the business realm,

communication technologies (ICTs) has been rapidly increasing.21 Virtual teams,

defined as “a group of geographically distributed individuals who work