An experimental investigation of the effects of group size in an electronic meeting environment

This research used a laboratory experiment to investigate the effects of group size on idea-generation performance and member satisfaction in an electronic meeting room in which computer-supported electronic communication replaced direct verbal communication. Three group sizes were studied: small (three-member), medium (nine-member) and large (18-member). The findings of this study contradict those of prior non-computer-supported idea-generation studies: in this electronic meeting environment, larger groups generated more ideas of greater quality, and were more satisfied than smaller groups.>