Exploring the potential of groupware for remote collaboration: a user study on remoteDecision-making

The popularity of remote work has increased dramatically after the COVID-19 pandemicdue to its flexibility and cost-effectiveness. Today, numerous professionalsemploy videoconferencing to perform their daily tasks in the workplace. However,the widespread adoption of videoconferencing has introduced several new challenges,particularly originating from the extended use of such tools. Existing literature reportsthat constant users of videoconferencing tools experience increased workload,fatigue, and decreased creative activity. Given the increased popularity of remotework and the challenges described, exploring alternatives to videoconferencing forremote work is crucial. This study examines groupware tools as a potential alternativeto videoconferencing to enhance remote collaboration.For this work, we developed a groupware application and conducted a comparativecase study with 60 university students to assess collaboration under three conditions:on-site collaboration, remote collaboration with videoconferencing, and remote collaborationwith groupware. According to post-task questionnaires, groupware providesa superior user experience for remote collaboration compared to videoconferencing.Task completion times varied among the conditions, with the on-sitecondition demonstrating faster task completion times than the remote conditions.Crucially, an analysis of the task responses suggests that groupware can effectivelysimulate the decision-making dynamics of on-site environments. Conversely, videoconferencingdemonstrated no such effect and negatively influenced the participants’decision-making processes.