Skilled and Unaware: The Interactive Effects of Team Cognition, Team Metacognition, and Task Confidence on Team Performance

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the independent and joint effects of objective and subjective measures of situation awareness on team performance. We propose that objective and subjective measures are types of metacognitive experiences, with objective measures capturing actual situation knowledge and subjective measures capturing perceived situation knowledge. These metacognitive experiences are theorized to work in tandem with task confidence to predict performance. Data were collected from 72 three-person teams working in a simulated task environment of emergency management teams. Objective situation awareness, subjective situation awareness, and task confidence were each measured through the Situation Awareness Global Awareness Technique, the Mission Awareness Rating Scale, and collective efficacy, respectively. Results showed that all three metacognitive experiences interacted in predicting team performance, such that task confidence strengthened the relationship between actual situation knowledge and performance when the team’s perceived situation awareness was low and weakened the relationship when the team’s perceived situation awareness was high. These results suggest that it is always important to have the necessary actual situation knowledge to complete a task, but there are times in which aspects of awareness in relation to judgments or feelings should be low in order to create the necessary drive to regulate one’s behavior.