For decades, researchers have seen employee empowerment as the means to achieving a more committed workforce that would deliver better outcomes. The prior conceptual and descriptive research focused on structural empowerment, or workplace mechanisms for generating empowerment, and psychological empowerment, the felt empowerment. Responding to calls for intervention studies, this research experimentally tests the effects of structural empowerment changes, through different degrees of decision-making authority and access to customer-relationship information, on psychological empowerment and subsequent work-related outcomes. Using a virtual contact center simulation, crowdsourced workers responded to customer requests. Greater decision authority and access to customer-relationship information resulted in higher levels of psychological empowerment which in turn resulted in task satisfaction and task attractiveness outcomes among the crowdsourced customer service workers.

The primary purpose of this dissertation was to investigate the relationship between a team building (TB) intervention and the adherence behaviours of youth participating in a physical activity club. A preliminary study served to assess the appropriateness of a modified version of the Group Environment Questionnaire (GEQ, Carron, Widmeyer, & Brawley, 1985) for a youth sample (N =203), and the results revealed that the instrument appeared to be appropriate for this population. Participants for the main intervention study (N = 122) were high school students (Grades 9-12) participating in 10 rural, school-based exercise clubs. Individuals in five of the schools (n=65) were exposed to a TB intervention and individuals in the other five schools (n=57) served as the controls. Results were divided into examination of process and outcome variables. In terms of the process variables, results revealed that the five factors (group distinctiveness, group positions, group norms, communication/interaction, individual sacrifices) manipulated in the TB intervention significantly differentiated the two groups, Wilks Lambda (5) = .597, p<.001, and in the direction predicted. An examination of the outcome variables revealed that the TB factors added unique variance in predicting task cohesion (ATG-T, R2 Ä = .13 and GI-T, R2 Ä = .21). Finally, an examination of adherence outcomes revealed significant differences in attendance with TB group members attending more sessions than control group members, Wilks Lambda (1,98) = 3.07, p = .08, þ2 = .01. However, no significant difference was found in terms of drop-outs between the groups, t (8) = .54, p>.10. A secondary analysis also revealed a significant relationship between groups and group task satisfaction, with those in the TB group holding greater perceptions of group task satisfaction than those in the control group, Wilks Lambda (1, 97) = 11.69, p = .001, þ2 = .02. These findings provided preliminary support for TB as an effective group-based intervention to improve activity attendance in this population. Given this was the first study to examine the relationship between TB and youth adherence in an exercise setting, further research is recommended.

The primary purpose of this dissertation was to investigate the relationship between a team building (TB) intervention and the adherence behaviours of youth participating in a physical activity club. A preliminary study served to assess the appropriateness of a modified version of the Group Environment Questionnaire (GEQ, Carron, Widmeyer, & Brawley, 1985) for a youth sample (N =203), and the results revealed that the instrument appeared to be appropriate for this population. Participants for the main intervention study (N = 122) were high school students (Grades 9-12) participating in 10 rural, school-based exercise clubs. Individuals in five of the schools (n=65) were exposed to a TB intervention and individuals in the other five schools (n=57) served as the controls. Results were divided into examination of process and outcome variables. In terms of the process variables, results revealed that the five factors (group distinctiveness, group positions, group norms, communication/interaction, individual sacrifices) manipulated in the TB intervention significantly differentiated the two groups, Wilks Lambda (5) = .597, p<.001, and in the direction predicted. An examination of the outcome variables revealed that the TB factors added unique variance in predicting task cohesion (ATG-T, R2 Ä = .13 and GI-T, R2 Ä = .21). Finally, an examination of adherence outcomes revealed significant differences in attendance with TB group members attending more sessions than control group members, Wilks Lambda (1,98) = 3.07, p = .08, þ2 = .01. However, no significant difference was found in terms of drop-outs between the groups, t (8) = .54, p>.10. A secondary analysis also revealed a significant relationship between groups and group task satisfaction, with those in the TB group holding greater perceptions of group task satisfaction than those in the control group, Wilks Lambda (1, 97) = 11.69, p = .001, þ2 = .02. These findings provided preliminary support for TB as an effective group-based intervention to improve activity attendance in this population. Given this was the first study to examine the relationship between TB and youth adherence in an exercise setting, further research is recommended.

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