The development and testing of the psychological and behavioural resources model of team flow in project teams

This thesis explores the development and testing of a psychological and behavioural resources model of team flow (PBrTF) in project teams, which is a tool to promote team effectiveness, proposing that team efficacy and CZPD act as psychological and behavioural resources of team flow and that these three team level phenomena share a positive, mutually reinforcing relationships. Four studies were implemented to achieve the above-mentioned research objectives. The first study describes how team efficacy and CZPD interact to promote the emergence of team flow using a qualitative approach. The second study tests the scalability of the CZPD questionnaire, which resulted a 16-item unidimensional scale representing five aspects of an effective self-organising peer-learning entity. The third study validates the cross-time dimensional stability of the all four scales. The fourth study tests the cross-time reciprocal relationships between team efficacy, CZPD and team flow. This study also tests whether team flow antecedents mediate the effects of team efficacy and CZPD on team flow. The results partially support the PBrTF model, showing that team efficacy and CZPD share a mutually reinforcing relationship over time. CZPD predicts the emergence of team flow and this effect is completely transmitted to team flow by team flow antecedents. Contrary to the prediction of the PBrTF model, however, team flow does not predict CZPD. This result raises a practical challenge to the widely accepted conceptualisation of team flow and team efficacy and potentially the theorisation of the PBrTF model and suggests that team efficacy and team flow might do each other a disservice. The conclusion of the thesis discusses the implications of the study results and the potential contribution of the PBrTM model to enhance team effectiveness in project teams