Technical Communication Quarterly Apr 2021

“Dude, that Sucks”: Examining Scrum’s Influence on Empathy in Student Teams

Erin Friess University of North Texas ; Chris Lam University of North Texas

Abstract

The role of empathy in student team collaborations in technical and professional communication has been understudied. In this mixed methods study, we assess how Scrum affects both student perceptions of empathy and student use of empathetic strategies. We found that students who used Scrum considered themselves to be no more empathetic than students who did not use Scrum. However, a discourse analysis revealed that students who used Scrum deployed significantly more empathetic strategies than students who did not use Scrum.

Journal
Technical Communication Quarterly
Published
2021-04-03
DOI
10.1080/10572252.2020.1803413
CompPile
Open Access
Closed
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  3. Friess (2025)
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  4. Fuller et al. (2024)
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  5. Rea et al. (2024)
    Cultivating Empathic Engineering Design through UX Pedagogy: Challenges and Insights
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  1. Feuer et al. (2023)
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  2. Friess (2023)
    Scrum in Classroom Collaborations: A Quasi-Experimental Study
    Journal of Business and Technical Communication

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