Reflexivity in teams refers to the extent to which their members collectively reflect overtly on the way they work, communicate about the group’s objectives, projects, processes, the environment they work in, make changes according to current or anticipated circumstances. West (1996) identified team reflexivity as a key factor in the effectiveness of work teams. Despite its importance, team reflection is rarely investigated. Schippers, Den Hartog & Koopman (2007) have developed a self-report measure to investigate aspects of reflexivity, which focuses on team reflection in organisations and school management teams including reflection, adaptation and further related constructs. Reflection as such does not lead to change. Some adaptation need to occur as well. According to West (2000), adaptations carried out by the team lead to new information, which can lead to further reflection, planning, and adaptation as an iterative and ongoing process. Furthermore, Schippers, Den Hartog & Koopman (2007) expect feedback-seeking behaviour, the level of proactive personalities within the team, as well as the level of individual reflective learning styles within the team to be related to team reflexivity. Feedback-seeking as a behaviour that helps to obtain information to reflect on can be important to enable accurate and relevant reflection. The amount of feedback-seeking and the way the obtained information is handled by the team can be seen as an indicator of team reflexivity (West, Garrod and Carletta, 1997). The main aim of the present pilot study was to translate and adapt the questionnaire of Schippers, Den Hartog & Koopman (2007) to be used in student teams and to investigate the psychometric properties of the adapted measure in a sample of 79 students in 25 teams in the master programme in social pedagogy and special education. It is important for us to investigate team reflexivity in student teams using a reliable and valid measure, because reflexivity is an important determinant of team effectiveness with a high value and influence in quality of work for students both at the university during study time and later on in the practical field of social work. In the long run, and for further detailed research, we are - with regards to content aspects - interested in the results of the relations of team reflexivity with group-related and individual factors in order to get a broader understanding of reflexivity in student teams.

In addition to the 31 items to measure aspects of team reflection (Evaluation/learning and Discussing processes) in student teams adapted from Schippers, Den Hartog and Koopman (2007), we used the following two questionnaires: Self-Regulation Questionnaire (Carey, Neal & Collins, 2004), a 31-item instrument designed to measure the generalized ability to regulate behaviour in order to achieve desired future outcomes; and four dimensions of the Inventory for Academic Learning Strategies (Wild, 2000), designed to measure with 31 items strategies for elaboration, critical analysis, self-organisation, repetition. The items of all these self-report instruments are to be rated on a 5-point Likert scale. Furthermore we carried out qualitative interviews with the two university teachers of the students included in our study and interviewed Mrs. Schippers, one of the authors of the adapted measure, to enlarge our understanding of team reflexivity and to contribute to the interpretation of the results of the quantitative research.

The results of the reliability analyses at the item and scale level were satisfying. The correlation coefficients as indicators for the validity confirmed our expectations in relation to those of Schippers, Den Hartog & Koopman (2007). The components of reflexivity (Evaluation/learning and Discussing processes) were highly correlated and positive correlations with adaptation and feedback-seeking behaviour were found. Lower correlations were found with self-regulation and learning strategies at the individual level. The results of the study represent a first step towards establishing and measuring reflexivity as a team-level construct in students. Future research might be aimed at a broader understanding of team reflexivity in student teams and give us some hints and indications for interventions to improve aspects of reflexivity in teams. The implications of these results in tailoring didactic models for teaching at the university involving teamwork of students will be discussed.