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Berg et al.: Social Support Congruence Among Team Members

Summary: Study of 303 participants in 53 teams showing that the congruence between social support provided and received — not merely the volume of support — predicts meeting citizenship behavior. The surprise finding: low-low congruent support produces the highest citizenship behavior, while high-high congruence produces the lowest. Relations-oriented verbal behavior drives this effect via perceived support congruence as mediator.

Sources: Raw/berg-et-al-2024-social-support-congruence-among-team-members-a-cubic-response-surface-analysis.pdf

Citation: Berg, A.-K., Schulte-Seitz, E.-M., & Kauffeld, S. (2025). Social support congruence among team members: A cubic response surface analysis. Small Group Research, 56(2), 239–276. https://doi.org/10.1177/10464964241298605

Last updated: 2026-05-10

What the study did

Berg, Schulte-Seitz, and Kauffeld (Technische Universität Braunschweig, Small Group Research 2025) video-recorded 53 real team meetings at German universities and research institutions, coding all verbal behavior with the act4teams scheme (27,560 behavioral units). After each meeting, participants (N=303, 58% female, mean age 30.5) completed a network-style support matrix — rating how much support they perceived giving to and receiving from each team member — plus a meeting citizenship behavior (MCB) scale.

The central statistical method is cubic polynomial regression with response surface analysis (RSA): a third-order extension (9 coefficients) that goes beyond the standard quadratic RSA to test asymmetric and level-dependent congruence effects — specifically whether the consequence of giving ≈ receiving differs across low, medium, and high exchange levels.

Theoretical framework

The study fuses two traditions:

Person–group fit (P–G fit) — compatibility between an individual and their team. The relevant sub-type here is needs–supply fit: the degree to which one’s need for support is met by the support the team actually supplies. Congruence (not merely quantity) determines fit.

Basic Psychological Needs theory (Ryan & Deci) — individuals need relatedness, autonomy, and competence satisfied. Support exchanges can fulfill all three, but incongruent exchanges undermine them. This is the mechanism linking congruence perceptions to behavioral outcomes.

The study explicitly frames social support as a two-way paradox: providing support costs resources even while receiving gains them, so the net effect on an individual depends on the ratio of the two — i.e., congruence.

Key constructs

Perceived support congruence — the alignment between how much support a team member perceives themselves providing vs. receiving. Operationalized via the polynomial block variable derived from the two predictor scores (provided: x; received: y).

Meeting citizenship behavior (MCB) — discretionary, proactive engagement during meetings: speaking up, volunteering, arriving prepared, contributing ideas. Measured with Baran et al.’s (2012) 8-item scale (α=.79).

Verbal behaviors (act4teams coding, Gerpott et al. 2019 categories):

  • Relations-oriented: praise, recognition, encouraging participation
  • Task-oriented: problem-solving, task monitoring, knowledge sharing
  • Change-oriented: goal-setting, voicing interest in change, action planning

What they found

Congruence → MCB (H1a): Supported. The rising ridge cubic level-dependent (RRCL) model fit the data best (AICc weight=0.73 vs. 0.04 for the full unconstrained cubic). Support congruence significantly predicts MCB: R²=.15.

H1b (higher congruence = more MCB): Not supported — and reversed. The level-dependent effect (b̂₆=0.139, p<.01) shows a cubic pattern: when both provided and received support are low (low-low congruence), MCB is highest. When both are high (high-high), MCB is lowest. The linear rising ridge (û₁=0.099, p<.001) captures the main positive trend; the cubic term captures the reversal at the high end.

Verbal behaviors → support congruence (H2): Only relations-oriented behaviors predict the support congruence block variable (b=0.001, p<.05; H2a supported). Task- and change-oriented behaviors do not (H2b, H2c not supported).

Verbal behaviors → MCB (H3): Relations-oriented (p<.01) and change-oriented (p<.05) both significantly predict MCB. Task-oriented does not (H3b not supported).

Mediation (H4): Support congruence mediates only the relations-oriented → MCB path (ab=0.005, 95% CI [0.001, 0.009]; H4a supported). No mediation for task- or change-oriented.

The counterintuitive level-dependency finding

Team members in low-low congruent support contexts — where both provision and receipt are low — show the most meeting citizenship behavior. The authors’ interpretation: when the support exchange system is thin, team members strategically invest in MCB to jumpstart resource circulation (consistent with Patterer et al., 2023, who show that low-reciprocity individuals shift effort to other domains). High-high congruent members, by contrast, may be depleted from the very resource exchanges that satisfied their needs — exhaustion from extensive helping (Gabriel et al., 2018).

This challenges the simple BPN prediction (more need satisfaction → more motivation → more citizenship). The pattern suggests a compensation dynamic: MCB is partly driven by resource seeking, not just resource having.

The role of relations-oriented verbal behavior

Only relations-oriented talk — praise, recognition, pulling others into the conversation — reaches through to support congruence perceptions and thence to MCB. Task-talk (information, problem-solving) and change-talk (vision, innovation) do not create this perception of balanced support exchange, possibly because they can feel like performance pressure rather than genuine relational acknowledgment. This implies that the psychosocial resource channel (relatedness need) is the operative one, not the informational or instrumental channel.

Practical implications

  • Managers and facilitators should actively foster relations-oriented communication in meetings — not just task-talk.
  • Team check-ins that make support reciprocation visible may break low-reciprocity equilibria.
  • High-support-exchange teams may paradoxically need monitoring for exhaustion effects even when morale seems high.
  • Video-based feedback tools (act4teams) can help teams develop awareness of their verbal behavior patterns.

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