Proceedings of The 8th International Conference on Applied Research in Management, Business and Economics
Year: 2024
DOI:
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Causes of Death Consensus Task: A Teaching Activity for Individual and Team Decision-Making
Dr. Carrie S. McCleese, Brandon A. Maclin
ABSTRACT:
The purpose of the present research is to design an activity for classroom use when teaching organizational behavior concepts related to individual and team decision making. We modified Taylor’s (1988) causes of death consensus task involving ratings of the frequency of specific causes of death. Specifically, using updated data on U.S. causes of death prior to COVID (CDC, 2021), we designed an activity for students asking them to rank order their opinions of the most common causes of death. Activity instructions ask students to complete their rankings first individually and as then as a group in order to compare individual and group error relative to actual rankings based on the most up-to-date data provided by the CDC. We provide instructions for educators and facilitators to administer the activity as well as suggestions for guiding classroom discussion. We believe this is a useful and engaging activity for demonstrating organizational behavior concepts in high school, college, or university settings. The consensus activity developed in the present study may also be used for organizational purposes, such as an ice breaker or team-building activity. Areas for future research will be discussed.
keywords: college, education, high-school, management, rater errors