Complaining: Who? Why? So What?

A Vision for the Research Stream

 

This line of research will likely lead to multiple papers, so it’s treated not as a single publication, but as a research stream. Below is more information on the available data and possible research papers/

 

Measures of complaining:

1. Peer-evaluated
   1. Post-project survey:

Would you rate this person as someone who complained, was grumpy, showed irritation?

1= Complained a lot, 5=Never complained

 

1. Self-reported:

Post-project survey:

Have things ever gone so bad in your team (conflicts, lack of participation of your team members) that you had to complain or ask for help from your professor or X-Culture admin?

1. I never experienced problems in my team bad enough to have to complain and ask for help from my professor or X-Culture admin (1)
2. Only once things have gotten so bad that I had to complain and ask for help from my professor or X-Culture admin (4)
3. 2 or 3 times things have gotten so bad that I had to complain and ask for help from my professor or X-Culture admin (5)
4. Things went wrong regularly, and I had to complain to my professor or X-Culture admin many times (6)

 

Weekly:

• Do you enjoy working with the people on your team? (0=not at all, 100=very much)
• Is everything clear, you know what to do and how to proceed?
• How motivated are you to continue working on the project with your team?
• Do you believe your team can develop a high-quality report?

 

Weekly:

5. Open-ended comments (classified for 1=contain a complaint, 0=don’t contain a complaint)

 

1. Coaching records:
   Administrative records of if and when the student submitted complaint reports to the Coaching program, and if so, what was the nature of the complaint.

 

 

 

Possible papers on complaining

 

Paper 1: International Rankings on Complaining

 

RQ1: Do students from some countries complain more?

Result: A ranking of countries based on the rate of complaining observed in the national samples.

 

RQ2: If there are international differences in the complaining rate, what explains them?

 

Possible country-level predictors:

• Wealth (GPD/capita)
• Equality (Gini, Gender equality)
• Culture (Power distance, Masculinity/Feminity, Individualism/Collectivism)
• Historic context (former colony/colonizer)
• Corruption
• Freedom (civil, political, business)
• Religion, religiosity

 

Paper 2: Personal Characteristics that Predict Propensity to Complain

 

RQs:
Who are the people who complain more?
Why do some people complain more than others?

 

Possible predictors:

• Demographics:
  • Age
  • MBA/Undergraduate
  • Work experience
  • Managerial experience
  • International/domestic student
  • Gender
    • Men vs. women overall
    • Men vs. women in different cultures (men vs. women in the U.S. versus men vs. women in countries with more pronounced gender roles, such as in the Middle East or Asia)

 

• Skills/Competencies
  • EQ
  • CQ
  • IQ
  • Technical skills
  • English proficiency

 

 

Paper 3: Profiles/Typologies of Complainers

 

This could be part of the previous paper, but can be carved out into a separate study.

 

RQs:
Who is a “typical” complainer?

What are the characteristics/personality profiles of people who complain a lot?

How those who complain are different from those who don’t?

 

• Is it demographics or personality?
• Are those who complain a lot of high-achievers, work hard, and are annoyed that the rest of their team is not keeping up, and this is why they complain?
• Or are those who complain a lot are just grumpy losers who are never happy, don’t do much, and just complain?
• Or are there distinct types of complainers, each with their own personality profile and reasons to complain>

 

Paper 4: The Role of Instructor in Promoting/Restricting Complaining?

 

The rate of complaining seems to vary by instructor. In some classes, everyone complains all the time. In others, nobody ever complains.

Could the instructors play a role?

Could it be that the way the instructor sets the course, the students are constantly dissatisfied and see challenges are problems worth complaining about vs. the way that the students see challenges as learning opportunities to enjoy, rather than reasons to complain?

 

Possible predictors:

• Instructor’s teaching philosophy
• % of the course grade allocated to X-Culture
• Grade structure (% allocated to peer evaluations vs. report quality vs. weekly effort)
• Online vs. face-to-face course format
• Class size
• Instructor’s strictness/leniency in grading
• Professor’s research productivity
• Professor’s rank (TA, lecturer, assistant, associate, full)
• # of times the professor participated in X-Culture
• Overall student performance in the professor’s course
• The subject the professor teaches
• Whether or not the students/university pays for X-Culture

 

 

Paper 5: The Culture of Entitlement in Higher Education and Its Effect on Complaining

 

In the past few decrease, we’ve seen an increase in university tuition fees in some countries (e.g., the U.S., the U.K.). At the same time, we’ve seen the trend towards “grade inflation”. Apparently, in the 1970’s, the average grade in a typical course in the U.S. was “C”. Today it’s “A-“.

 

One theory is that as the universities depend on student tuition ever more and collect ever-larger revenues, the students, who often pay tens of thousands of dollars a year, see themselves more as paying customers who are to be pleased, not as grateful students who came to the university to learn from professors.

 

Accordingly, we can hypothesize that the rate of complaining will be higher among the students are “more expensive” universities.

 

This study will test if the rate of complaining is affected by:

 

• University rank
• Tuition fees
• Private vs. public status of the university
• Program (and cost): MBA vs. EMBA vs. Undergraduate

 

 

Paper 6: Antecedents and Consequences of Complaining in Teams

 

RQ:
Do teams where students complain a lot perform better or worse?

Does that complaining help or hurt team performance?

Do students who complain perform better?

 

Team level:

Measures:

• Team’s average complaining rate (average across all team members)
• Presence of a complainer on the team (the max complainer on the team, a presence of a team member who complains a lot, or the max rate of complaining among the team members)

 

Does the complaining rate, or the presence of a complainer on the team, affect:

• Quality of the report produced by the team
• Average team satisfaction
• Conflicts in teams
• Average peer evaluations
• Communication frequency
• Team cohesion
• Team climate

 

Individual-level:

Do students who complain a lot show better performance in terms of:

• Peer evaluations
• Team satisfaction
• Identification with the team

 

Causality:

 

This study might also consider different causalities.

• Does complaining lead to conflicts, dissatisfaction, and lack of team cohesion?
• Or do people complain when there are conflicts, dissatisfaction, and low cohesion?
• Which is the cause and which is the effect? Or is it a self-reinforcing spiral?

 

 

Paper 7: The Choice of Communication Tools on Complaining in Teams

 

One of the frequently-observed problems in GVTs is that the team members do not develop close interpersonal ties, often do not see their team members are friends, but only as “faceless” contractual partners.

 

Theoretically, when the team members limit their communication to email, they have few opportunities to get to know their team members as “persons” to develop friendly relationships. In contrast, when the team members use live video for communication, they have a higher chance of becoming friends. In turn, social tighs, friendly relationships will inhibit complaining. People will be less likely to complain to authorities about friends than about “faceless” contractual partners.

 

Thus, it could be hypothesized that in teams where team members rely more on live communication, complaining will be lower. The specific measures could include:

 

• Use of email vs. live text chat vs. live video calls for communication
• Non-task related communication that aid friendship development (about hobbies, movies, music, etc.
• Frequency of communication in general
• Closeness among team members
• Acquaintanceship level

 

 

Paper 8: COVID-19 and Complaining

 

Since we have data on complaining behavior for several semesters, we might want to see if the lockdowns and stress caused by COVID-19 increased complaining behavior or not.

To what extent?

Across the board, or the effect is moderated by personal and national factors?

Do personal circumstance (e.g., loss of job due to COVID-19) play a greater role than national situation (lockdown rules, changes in the academic schedule, etc.)?

 

Complaining: Who? Why? So What?

A Vision for the Research Stream

 

This line of research will likely lead to multiple papers, so it’s treated not as a single publication, but as a research stream. Below is more information on the available data and possible research papers/

 

Measures of complaining:

1. Peer-evaluated
   1. Post-project survey:

Would you rate this person as someone who complained, was grumpy, showed irritation?

1= Complained a lot, 5=Never complained

 

1. Self-reported:

Post-project survey:

Have things ever gone so bad in your team (conflicts, lack of participation of your team members) that you had to complain or ask for help from your professor or X-Culture admin?

1. I never experienced problems in my team bad enough to have to complain and ask for help from my professor or X-Culture admin (1)
2. Only once things have gotten so bad that I had to complain and ask for help from my professor or X-Culture admin (4)
3. 2 or 3 times things have gotten so bad that I had to complain and ask for help from my professor or X-Culture admin (5)
4. Things went wrong regularly, and I had to complain to my professor or X-Culture admin many times (6)

 

Weekly:

• Do you enjoy working with the people on your team? (0=not at all, 100=very much)
• Is everything clear, you know what to do and how to proceed?
• How motivated are you to continue working on the project with your team?
• Do you believe your team can develop a high-quality report?

 

Weekly:

5. Open-ended comments (classified for 1=contain a complaint, 0=don’t contain a complaint)

 

1. Coaching records:
   Administrative records of if and when the student submitted complaint reports to the Coaching program, and if so, what was the nature of the complaint.

 

 

 

Possible papers on complaining

 

Paper 1: International Rankings on Complaining

 

RQ1: Do students from some countries complain more?

Result: A ranking of countries based on the rate of complaining observed in the national samples.

 

RQ2: If there are international differences in the complaining rate, what explains them?

 

Possible country-level predictors:

• Wealth (GPD/capita)
• Equality (Gini, Gender equality)
• Culture (Power distance, Masculinity/Feminity, Individualism/Collectivism)
• Historic context (former colony/colonizer)
• Corruption
• Freedom (civil, political, business)
• Religion, religiosity

 

Paper 2: Personal Characteristics that Predict Propensity to Complain

 

RQs:
Who are the people who complain more?
Why do some people complain more than others?

 

Possible predictors:

• Demographics:
  • Age
  • MBA/Undergraduate
  • Work experience
  • Managerial experience
  • International/domestic student
  • Gender
    • Men vs. women overall
    • Men vs. women in different cultures (men vs. women in the U.S. versus men vs. women in countries with more pronounced gender roles, such as in the Middle East or Asia)

 

• Skills/Competencies
  • EQ
  • CQ
  • IQ
  • Technical skills
  • English proficiency

 

 

Paper 3: Profiles/Typologies of Complainers

 

This could be part of the previous paper, but can be carved out into a separate study.

 

RQs:
Who is a “typical” complainer?

What are the characteristics/personality profiles of people who complain a lot?

How those who complain are different from those who don’t?

 

• Is it demographics or personality?
• Are those who complain a lot of high-achievers, work hard, and are annoyed that the rest of their team is not keeping up, and this is why they complain?
• Or are those who complain a lot are just grumpy losers who are never happy, don’t do much, and just complain?
• Or are there distinct types of complainers, each with their own personality profile and reasons to complain>

 

Paper 4: The Role of Instructor in Promoting/Restricting Complaining?

 

The rate of complaining seems to vary by instructor. In some classes, everyone complains all the time. In others, nobody ever complains.

Could the instructors play a role?

Could it be that the way the instructor sets the course, the students are constantly dissatisfied and see challenges are problems worth complaining about vs. the way that the students see challenges as learning opportunities to enjoy, rather than reasons to complain?

 

Possible predictors:

• Instructor’s teaching philosophy
• % of the course grade allocated to X-Culture
• Grade structure (% allocated to peer evaluations vs. report quality vs. weekly effort)
• Online vs. face-to-face course format
• Class size
• Instructor’s strictness/leniency in grading
• Professor’s research productivity
• Professor’s rank (TA, lecturer, assistant, associate, full)
• # of times the professor participated in X-Culture
• Overall student performance in the professor’s course
• The subject the professor teaches
• Whether or not the students/university pays for X-Culture

 

 

Paper 5: The Culture of Entitlement in Higher Education and Its Effect on Complaining

 

In the past few decrease, we’ve seen an increase in university tuition fees in some countries (e.g., the U.S., the U.K.). At the same time, we’ve seen the trend towards “grade inflation”. Apparently, in the 1970’s, the average grade in a typical course in the U.S. was “C”. Today it’s “A-“.

 

One theory is that as the universities depend on student tuition ever more and collect ever-larger revenues, the students, who often pay tens of thousands of dollars a year, see themselves more as paying customers who are to be pleased, not as grateful students who came to the university to learn from professors.

 

Accordingly, we can hypothesize that the rate of complaining will be higher among the students are “more expensive” universities.

 

This study will test if the rate of complaining is affected by:

 

• University rank
• Tuition fees
• Private vs. public status of the university
• Program (and cost): MBA vs. EMBA vs. Undergraduate

 

 

Paper 6: Antecedents and Consequences of Complaining in Teams

 

RQ:
Do teams where students complain a lot perform better or worse?

Does that complaining help or hurt team performance?

Do students who complain perform better?

 

Team level:

Measures:

• Team’s average complaining rate (average across all team members)
• Presence of a complainer on the team (the max complainer on the team, a presence of a team member who complains a lot, or the max rate of complaining among the team members)

 

Does the complaining rate, or the presence of a complainer on the team, affect:

• Quality of the report produced by the team
• Average team satisfaction
• Conflicts in teams
• Average peer evaluations
• Communication frequency
• Team cohesion
• Team climate

 

Individual-level:

Do students who complain a lot show better performance in terms of:

• Peer evaluations
• Team satisfaction
• Identification with the team

 

Causality:

 

This study might also consider different causalities.

• Does complaining lead to conflicts, dissatisfaction, and lack of team cohesion?
• Or do people complain when there are conflicts, dissatisfaction, and low cohesion?
• Which is the cause and which is the effect? Or is it a self-reinforcing spiral?

 

 

Paper 7: The Choice of Communication Tools on Complaining in Teams

 

One of the frequently-observed problems in GVTs is that the team members do not develop close interpersonal ties, often do not see their team members are friends, but only as “faceless” contractual partners.

 

Theoretically, when the team members limit their communication to email, they have few opportunities to get to know their team members as “persons” to develop friendly relationships. In contrast, when the team members use live video for communication, they have a higher chance of becoming friends. In turn, social tighs, friendly relationships will inhibit complaining. People will be less likely to complain to authorities about friends than about “faceless” contractual partners.

 

Thus, it could be hypothesized that in teams where team members rely more on live communication, complaining will be lower. The specific measures could include:

 

• Use of email vs. live text chat vs. live video calls for communication
• Non-task related communication that aid friendship development (about hobbies, movies, music, etc.
• Frequency of communication in general
• Closeness among team members
• Acquaintanceship level

 

 

Paper 8: COVID-19 and Complaining

 

Since we have data on complaining behavior for several semesters, we might want to see if the lockdowns and stress caused by COVID-19 increased complaining behavior or not.

To what extent?

Across the board, or the effect is moderated by personal and national factors?

Do personal circumstance (e.g., loss of job due to COVID-19) play a greater role than national situation (lockdown rules, changes in the academic schedule, etc.)?