Say No to Free Riding: Student Perspective on Mechanisms to

Reduce Social Loafing in Group Projects

Uthpala Samarakoon

, Asanthika Imbulpitiya

and Kalpani Manathunga

Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology, New Kandy Road, Malabe, Sri Lanka

School of Engineering, Computer and Mathematical Sciences, Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand

Keywords: Social Loafing, Free-riding, Project based Learning, Group Projects.

Abstract: Project based learning is a popular teaching method in Information Technology undergraduate programs

where students gain necessary skills and knowledge via a hands-on capstone project. Key learning gains from

such projects are problem-solving skills by applying theoretical knowledge while improving soft skills like

collaboration and communication. Students can improve critical thinking, learn to face challenging situations,

and build creative solutions for a desired problem as a group. Irrespective of all these benefits, social loafing

or simply free riding can be recognized as the key challenge in these group-based projects. Some students in

group projects put less effort on group work than when they work alone while surviving in the group and

taking credits for someone else’s work. This scenario leads to demotivation of hard-working members and lot

of group conflicts. Ultimately, social loafing affects the group performance while resulting with unsuccessful

projects and dissatisfied students. Seeking mechanisms for reducing social loafing in group projects is

becoming a vital and this research proposes set of mechanisms to reduce social loafing in IT group projects

and presents the students’ perspective on usefulness of each mechanism.

1 INTRODUCTION

Project based learning is a main teaching method in

undergraduate education regardless of the discipline.

This shifts traditional teacher centric education into a

student centric education. It’s quite a common

phenomenon that collaborative learning activities

such as Project based learning may leave room for

free riders or social loafers if correct scaffolding

mechanisms or precautions are not injected to the

process. So, reducing social loafing in group projects

is challenging. Due to varied reasons like lack of

skills and time, difficult curriculum matters, etc.

students tend to find shortcuts (i.e., easy ways) to pass

modules, rather than acquiring intended knowledge or

providing actual contributions. They may consider

group project as an opportunity to experience social

loafing and this leads to lot of group conflicts and

discouragement of hardworking group members.

Social loafing has become a regular practice among

Information Technology undergraduates too. It is

evident that the educators are required to implement

specific mechanisms to discourage students willing to

practice social loafing in group projects.

According to the common practices in

undergraduate Information Technology capstone

projects, the students are assigned to groups and each

group is assigned a task to achieve within a specific

time. Sometimes the groups are formed by the module

leader or sometimes students are free to group by

themselves. Finally, the group should come up with a

collective solution for the assigned problem while

asserting their effort and knowledge as a group. This

process might support the concepts of social loafing

if required scaffolding is not and lacks individual

assessments. Hence, this research finds out how

social loafing can be reduced in undergraduate

capstone projects during an Information Technology

undergraduate degree program. The study

recommends set of mechanisms to minimize social

loafing based on students’ and lecturers’ perspectives.

As Blumenfeld et al. (1991) stated, project-based

learning is engaging students in a real-world problem

to identify a solution which is considered as a

comprehensive approach to teaching. Many

researchers have discussed on using project based

leaning to enhance undergraduate education by

introducing project based learning into the curriculum

in different disciplines like Engineering,

198

Samarakoon, U., Imbulpitiya, A. and Manathunga, K.

Say No to Free Riding: Student Perspective on Mechanisms to Reduce Social Loaﬁng in Group Projects.

DOI: 10.5220/0010449701980206

In Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Computer Supported Education (CSEDU 2021) - Volume 1, pages 198-206

ISBN: 978-989-758-502-9

Environmental and Science education (Kanigolla et

al., 2014; Redshaw & Frampton,2014; Bilgin et

al.,2015). There are many advantages of project based

learning such as creativity, analytical skills and

provide opportunities for students to improve soft

skills like teamwork, time management and

leadership skills. Yet, there are some issues attached

to this approach like social loafing being one major

issue.

As Bell (2010) stated, project-based learning is an

innovative approach to learn critical strategies to

succeed and acquire skills needed to survive in the

twenty-first century. It directs students towards self-

learning through inquiry and encourage them to work

collaboratively to create projects that reflect their

knowledge. Further, project based learning helps to

increase technology skills of students while making

them professional communicators and skilled

problem solvers.

Social loafing is a behaviour where certain

students failing to contribute their fair share of effort

when compared to the other students of a group

(Aggarwal & O’Brien , 2008). In the past, several

researchers had started discussing on possible reasons

for social loafing or free riding in group projects. As

Synnott (2016) indicated the way of handling group

formation, group size and student misconceptions can

be some reasons for social loafing among students.

Shimazoe & Aldrich (2010) have introduced a three-

stage model to incorporate cooperative learning into

K-12 school environment. They further discuss on

group formation and development, introducing

factors for successful group processes and the way

these factors correspond with student complaints,

instructors’ roles and how these roles can best be

carried out. Singh et al. (2017) investigated the

impact of different types of conflicts in social loafing

perceptions within groups/teams.

Moreover, few researchers have introduced

different mechanisms to overcome social loafing

under different disciplines. Maiden & Perry (2011)

conducted a research at a business school in the UK

to reduce free riding using six different strategies.

Strong & Anderson (1990) suggested fifteen

recommendations for reducing free riding by students

in academic marketing group projects. With the

objective of identifying and reducing free riders in the

group, Davies(2009) introduced different

recommendations in creating groups, having an

ethnic mix of students, managing intrinsic and

extrinsic motivation and recognizing the effort.

Brooks& Ammons (2003) introduced a group

evaluation instrument to mitigate free-rider problems

and improve students' perceptions about groups and

group projects. Tong et. al (2017) introduced personal

devices (tablets) into group work in a computer

supported cooperative setup to mitigate free riders.

Lam (2015) determined the influence of

communication quality and task cohesion on social

loafing. Furthermore, the article discusses

instructional strategies that foster quality

communication to reduce loafing.

However, based on the preliminary exploration of

the literature very limited researchers have focused on

the social loafing aspect in IT related projects. When

the current education system evolves around student

centric environment it would be extremely valuable

for educators to figure out mechanisms to reduce the

social loafing in project-based learning and to achieve

expected learning outcomes successfully.

Prior to this work, authors proposed a framework

of 12 mechanisms to reduce social loafing in a

previously published work-in-progress paper

(Samarakoon & Imbulpitiya 2019). This work is

matured as a comprehensive follow up research

where the framework is implemented in real-class

settings to learn the successfulness of the proposed

mechanisms. The next sections of the paper reveal

the proposed mechanisms (as in Table 1), followed by

how those mechanisms are experimented in real

student class settings. Then the results section shows

an analysis of survey data carried out with

undergraduate students and lecturers. Finally, an

overall discussion is provided with detailed insights

from the study followed by concluding remarks and

future research directions.

2 METHODOLOGY

Sri Lanka Institute of Information Technology is a

leading degree awarding university in Sri Lanka. The

study was conducted with Second year, second

semester undergraduate students who follow

Information Technology group project at Sri Lanka

Institute of Information Technology. Considering the

masses in the classes (average 120 to 200 in a batch,

per year), social loafing was identified as a critical

factor over the years, especially in the group projects.

The main intension of this study is to explore the

effectiveness of set of mechanisms proposed to

reduce social loafing among group members.

Moreover, to identify which aspects are the most

effective in controlling free riding as per student’s

perspective.

A student group with 140 students taking

Information Technology Project as a module during

their second year second semester was selected for

Say No to Free Riding: Student Perspective on Mechanisms to Reduce Social Loaﬁng in Group Projects

199

this study. The students were asked to group into 5-8

member groups of their own and find a client for their

project as of their interest. Twelve distinct approaches

to minimize social loafing were introduced based on

the past experiences of social loafing incidents that

were identified among group members during

previous academic years. Then the approaches were

developed to implement those mechanisms and the

students were given all the instructions about new

evaluation approaches, scaffolding mechanisms

around the module that they must follow and task

distribution among members at the beginning of the

module. Figure 1 shows how students were engaged

in completing project activities collaboratively within

groups. The selected approaches and scaffolding

mechanisms were experimented during one semester

period.

Figure 1: Project groups engaging in group activities.

At the end of the project, a questionnaire was

distributed as an optional submission. The

questionnaire included five-point Likert scale

questions where each participant expressed how

much they agree or disagree with a particular

mechanism. 50 responses representing 18 project

groups were received and used in the analysis.

Moreover, lecturer experience was considered also to

evaluate the outcomes of these twelve approaches.

Table 1 shows the twelve different mechanisms that

were experimented for reducing social loafing among

members of IT group projects.

Table 1. Twelve mechanisms used to reduce social loafing

in IT group project.

No Mechanism

M1 Allowing students to select members for their

group by themselves reduce the ability of free

riding

M2 Allowing students to select client/project by the

group which interests them more rather than

assigned by the lecturer reduce the free riding.

M3 Maintaining a moderate group size (not too

large groups) reduce the ability of free riding.

M4 Assign individual functionalities for each

member and give whole responsibility of that

component reduce the ability of free riding.

M5 Assign similar responsibilities (responsibility

of entire unit from design to testing) to all

members reduce the ability of free riding.

M6 Assess individual contribution of each member

in evaluations reduce the ability of free riding.

M7 Checking overall understanding of each

member about the project reduce the ability of

free riding.

M8 Conducting individual viva session reduce the

ability of free riding.

M9 Checking individual contribution in document

preparation reduce the ability of free riding.

M10 Regular group meetings with supervisor and

marking attendance reduce the ability of free

riding.

M11 Peer review (all students grade the contribution

of other members in the group confidentially)

reduce the ability of free riding.

M12 Lecturer involvement and supervision in task

distribution and group communication when

there are conflicts within the group reduce the

ability of free riding.

2.1 Implementation of Mechanisms

Allowing Students to Select Members for Their

Groups by Themselves. Students were asked to form

project groups by themselves rather than assigning

groups by the lecturers. The students were given the

chance to select members of their interest and the

expectation was to allow students to select members

with similar interests and values as their peers which

may lead to reduction of free riding.

Allowing Students to Select Client/Project by the

Group Which Interests Them More Rather than

Assigned by the Lecturer. The groups were asked to

select the client for their projects by themselves. The

intension was to allow students to select a project of

their interest, rather than assigning by the lecturer

randomly. The expectation was that when students

engage in something of their interest as a group, the

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members may not try to free-ride and give their fullest

support to succeed.

Maintaining a Moderate Group Size. Group size is

important when avoiding free riding. Too small

groups may increase the frustration of members, since

they must be responsible for huge workload of the

project. This may lead to free-riding attempts by

members. Also, too large groups would support free

riding too, since each individual has very small

responsibility. Therefore, moderate group size was

introduced (5 – 8 members) with the intension of

reducing social loafing attempt by students.

Assign Individual Functionalities for Each

Member and Give Whole Responsibility of That

Component Reduce the Ability of Free Riding.

Each member was assigned an individual

functionality and the whole responsibility of that

section was given to that member. This method makes

it difficult for a member to free ride because absence

of that component of the project will be clearly visible

and the whole responsibility lies with that particular

member.

Assign Similar Responsibilities (Responsibility of

Entire Unit from Interface Design to Database

Connectivity) to All Members. Each member of the

group was given similar responsibilities where each

member must complete from front-end and to back-

end (i.e., designing user interfaces, implement the

business logic and database connectivity) of the

respective function. In addition to that, every member

is required to generate one or more reports related to

their function (demonstrating information retrieval

aspects).

Assess Individual Contribution of Each Member

in Evaluations. The evaluation criterion was

member. The marks were allocated individually in

most of the evaluations to mitigate the attempt of free

riding. Group members face a series of evaluations

throughout the semester (e.g. initial product proposal,

prototype stage, final product presentation). Such

evaluations are assessed both individually and as a

group with more weight to individual contributions in

the assessment rubric.

Checking Overall Understanding of Each

Member about the Project. In all the evaluations,

members were asked questions related to the overall

project (e.g. “the main purpose of the product”, “what

is the business process”, “different user levels and

access privilege for different functionalities of the

system”, etc..). The intention was to check their

overall understanding about the project apart from

their individual component, which might be a good

indicator to identify free riders.

Conducting Individual Viva Session. Viva sessions

were introduced to measure individual contribution of

each member in the group. At the end of the

presentation, each member was asked product

implementation related questions from their software

program to assess whether they have the required

technical knowledge that they claim to have in their

respective portion allocated for them. The members,

who failed to explain most portions with related to

their own code, were noted as presenting the work

done by someone else after providing several

opportunities to explain themselves. Code based

questions vary from easy queries such as, “explain the

variable in line x”, “what does a particular line-of-

code mean” to difficult queries such as “what is the

result set returned in this specific API call?” or “how

the business logic is implemented in this function”.

Checking Individual Contribution In Document

Preparation. Project documentation is equally

important in an undergraduate capstone project.

Students were asked to mention a sub section

explaining the individual contributions of group

members when preparing various project documents

like project proposal, progress reports, final report

etc.. Also, the group leaders were advised to equally

assign different content sections of the documents

among members.

Arrange Regular Group Meetings with

Supervisor and Mark Attendance. The projects

groups were asked to meet the supervisor/lecturer in-

charge of the project every fortnight and mandated all

members to be present at the meetings. The

attendance of members was recorded and considered

during the final project evaluations.

Peer Review (All Students Grade the Contribution

of Other Members in the Group Confidentially).

Students were asked to grade their colleagues in the

group confidentially. Each student was asked to grade

their colleagues in the group based on their

contribution to the project and whether they have

Say No to Free Riding: Student Perspective on Mechanisms to Reduce Social Loaﬁng in Group Projects

201

completed the tasks assigned to them on time. A

Google form was used to gather data related to peer-

review. The responses and comments given by peers

were used to identify free riders, if any.

Lecturer Involvement and Supervision in Task

Distribution and Group Communication When

There Are Conflicts within the Group. If any group

conflicts were identified during the period of project,

lecturers were closely monitoring the group and all

the formal communication among group members

were done under the guidance and supervision of the

lecturer.

All required instructions related to project work

and evaluation criteria were given to all the students

at the beginning of the project. At the end of the

project the students’ experience and their perspective

on the mechanisms used for reducing free riding were

collected via a questionnaire. The students’ scores

were taken for each mechanism used and scoring was

based on a five-point Likert scale ranging from

‘strongly disagree’ to ‘strongly agree’. 50 students

answered the questionnaire, and the answers were

analysed to get a better understanding about most

effective mechanisms according to the student

perspective.

Also, number of complaints against the free-

riding effect were also logged and compared with the

previous years. Finally, lecturers' perspectives and

experiences were gathered using interviews and

discussion to come up with a final decision.

3 RESULTS

Students’ ratings for each mechanism to reduce free

riding were analysed to get the overall idea of

students’ perspective on social loafing and reducing

mechanisms. The percentages were calculated for

each scale and the collated results are indicated in

figure 2.

As per results most of the students (70%) strongly

agree that assessing individual contribution of each

member in evaluations (M6) and checking overall

understanding of each member about the project (M7)

helps to reduce social loafing among group members

in IT group projects.

Additionally, M4 - assigning individual

functionalities for each member and giving whole

responsibility of that part (66%) and conducting

individual viva sessions, i.e., M8 (60%) are also

strongly approved by most of the students as

successful mechanisms. Least number of students

(14%) identified peer-review (M11) as a successful

mechanism for reducing social loafing.

Furthermore, peer-review was rated as the highest

strongly disagreed (6%) and disagreed (16%)

mechanism among the other mechanisms by the

students. The neutral student count (36%) also high

for this mechanism.

When considering disagreed student counts, peer-

review has the highest count (16%) while Lecturer

involvement in supervision in task distribution and

group communication when there are conflicts within

the group has 14% disagreed student.

Figure 2: Student's Perspective on Mechanisms to Reduce Social Loafing.

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Figure 3: Summarised Student Responses on Approaches.

All the other mechanisms have less than 7%

disagree percentage. None of the students strongly

disagreed for seven mechanisms out of twelve.

Moreover, none of the students disagreed or strongly

disagreed for mechanisms like maintaining a

moderate group size, assess individual contribution of

each member in evaluations and conducting

individual viva sessions.

The figure 3 shows the summarized results of

students’ perspective on approaches used. Here both

agreed and strongly agreed responses were

concatenated as the students confirming that the

proposed approach is successful and same goes for

disagree and strongly disagree. Neutral responses

were considered separately.

According to the results, both M6 and M7 have

the highest (98%) approval by students for reducing

social loafing. Then students had selected M3 (96%),

M4 and M8 (94%) and M5 (92%) respectively. The

next highest agreed approaches are M12 (84%) and

M2 (80%). Mechanism 9 and 10 had moderate

approval rates as 78% and 76%. Mechanism 1 has

considerably low percentage (68%) compared to

others. The lowest approval is for mechanism 11

which is 42%.

When considering disagreed percentages,

mechanism 11 (22%), and mechanism 12 (14%) have

higher disagreed percentages than other approaches.

All the other percentages are low than 10%. Out of

those M1, M2, M4, M5 and M10 have similar

disagreed percentage of 6%. M7 and M9 have low

percentages of 2% and 4%. None of the students

disagreed for M3, M6, and M8 where the percentage

indicated as 0% and is the lowest.

4 DISCUSSION

4.1 Student Perspective on the Impact

of Selected Mechanisms

The analysed survey results show that most of the

selected mechanisms are successful on reducing free

riding in IT capstone group projects according to the

students’ perspective. The following table (Table 2)

shows the impact of selected approaches to reduce

social loafing from highest to lowest according to the

students’ experience in group work. As per students,

two approaches were recommended as most effective

for reducing social loafing in group projects. Those

are assessing individual contribution of each member

in evaluations and checking the overall understanding

of each member about the project.

All the evaluations were designed in such a way

that each member in the group was individually

assessed as explained in the above methodology

section too. Here each member was evaluated mainly

based on their assigned tasks and were individually

questioned the way they achieved the desired output.

The contributions of each member were analysed, and

marks were given accordingly. As per students, this

helped to reduce free riding in the project, since the

students knew that they would be assessed

individually. If the part assigned to them is not

Say No to Free Riding: Student Perspective on Mechanisms to Reduce Social Loaﬁng in Group Projects

203

completed for some reason, it is very much visible

and that directly affects marks of that particular

member.

Table 2: Impact of Approaches to Reduce Social Loafing,

as per Student Perspective.

Viva sessions was conducted for each member to

check their overall understanding of the project. This

mechanism was another successful method to identify

free riders. Such mechanisms were validated by the

students as to cause maximum impact on reducing

free riding.

From the remaining mechanisms, students

identified another four mechanisms as above 90%

impact level. Those are maintaining a moderate group

size (not too small or too large groups), assign

individual functionalities for each member and give

whole responsibility of that part, conducting

individual viva session and assign similar

responsibilities (responsibility of entire unit from

design to implement testing) to all members.

Students assume that maintaining a moderate

group size tends to reduce free riding. At the

beginning of the IT project the students were asked to

make groups of 5 to 8 members on the contrary to the

10-member groups in previous years. The main

reason behind this design decision was, when the

group size is too high, it allows members to free ride

since the individual responsibility is less. On the other

hand, very low group size gives very high workload

to a single member and it may also lead members to

outsource their work. Due to that maintaining a

moderate group size was considered as the best way

to make all members work equally in the groups

without free riding attempts. Each member was

assigned with an individual functionality and the

whole responsibility of that component was given to

that member. This allows students to feel their own

responsibility and they are aware that they will be

very much visible if they did not complete the part

assigned for them. When members have shared

responsibilities, some students may try to free ride

since they know that someone else will complete their

part on behalf of them. Instead, each member should

feel the responsibility in the project.

Viva sessions were conducted individually to

check individual contribution of each member.

Programming related questions were asked from each

member to check whether they have actually

completed their component by themselves. Also, each

member was assigned similar responsibilities from

front end to back end. Each member was asked to

design interfaces of the functionality assigned to them

and internal coding. They were asked to involve in

managing the database, handling records related to

their functionality. Finally, all of them must involve

in system integration and testing. This approach

reduces the ability of free riding for a particular

member and the free riding attempt become very

much visible if occurred. Also, students cannot

compare workload of other members and complain

about heavy workload, due to equal work distribution.

Therefore, assigning similar responsibilities reduced

attempts of free riding as per student perspective.

As per students, lecturer involvement in

supervision in task distribution and group

communication when there are conflicts within the

group and allowing students to select client/project by

the group itself which is interested in them rather than

assign by the lecturer also having a considerable

impact (around 80%) on reducing free riding.

Lecturers carefully monitored the groups submitted

free riding complaints and involved in group

communication. The leaders of those groups were

asked to copy all the emails to lecturers that they

Mechanism Agreed

(%)

Assess individual contribution of each

member in evaluations

98%

Checking overall understanding of each

member about the project

98%

Maintaining a moderate group size (not too

large groups)

96%

Assign individual functionalities for each

member and give whole responsibility of

that part

94%

Conducting Individual viva session 94%

Assign similar responsibilities

(responsibility of entire unit from design to

testing) to all members

92%

Lecturer involvement in supervision in task

distribution and group communication

when there are conflicts within the group

84%

Allowing students to select client/project

by the group itself which is interested in

them rather than assign by the lecturer

80%

Checking individual contribution in

document preparation

78%

Regular group meetings with supervisor

and marking attendance

76%

Allowing students to select members for

their group by themselves

68%

Peer review (All students grade the

contribution of other members in the group

confidentially)

42%

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exchanged among group members regarding task

distribution and submission deadlines. So, the free-

riding members got to know that they were closely

monitored, and that approach helped to reduce

attempt of further free riding. Also, members of the

groups were given the freedom to select a project

from their own rather than assigning by the lecturer.

Then the students found projects of their interest and

all the members selected their functions through

group discussions. This increased the student interest

on the project and the responsibility. They all worked

hard to deliver the project to their client at the end of

the time.

Checking individual contribution in document

preparation (78%) and regular group meetings with

supervisor and marking attendance (76%) were

placed in the average level of impact by the students.

All the members in the group were asked to involve

in document preparation and they were given the

responsibility of an individual section. At the end of

each document, students were asked to mention their

individual contribution. As students’ perspective this

helps to reduce free riding to some extent. The reason

could be that the document preparation is only a small

part of the project. Regular group meetings with

supervisor tend to reduce free riding by forcing

students to work. Otherwise they cannot explain their

progress and contribution to the supervisor at the

meetings. Also, marking attendance is another

method to reduce this problem. Students who do not

participate for most of the meetings can be identified

using attendance and lecturers can pay more attention

on them.

Allowing students to select members for their

groups by themselves was given a low impact (68%)

by the students. In the questionnaire some students

criticized the approach of allowing students to form

their own groups. As the reason they mentioned that

smart students group with each other usually and

students with average or low skills are remained to

group among themselves. As per their perspective,

such groups find it difficult to progress with project

work and due to that reason students tend to free-ride.

Out of all twelve approaches, peer review is given the

lowest impact which is 42% by the student. As the

reason, the researchers assume that according to the

Sri Lankan culture and values, students in a group

may not compliant against their friends in a group.

Sometimes they may think that it might even lead to

group conflicts. So according to them, taking peer

review may be not a good method to reduce free

riding. This approach might be successful in another

country within different cultural values where

students show their actual feelings and experience.

4.2 Lecturer Perspective on Free

Riding and Reducing Mechanisms

As per lecturers’ perspective, free riding is a big

problem in group projects. This leads lot of group

conflicts as well as makes a discriminating situation

for hardworking students. Hardworking students

become less motivated and finally it would badly

affect for successful completion of the projects.

Therefore, as per lecturers, finding proper

mechanisms to reduce free riding is very important.

According to the lecturers' experience, the

numbers of free riding complaints were reduced after

applying the aforementioned mechanisms. They

found only two free riding complaints from two

groups and those were too under control after close

monitoring. Also, they were able to identify free

riders as early as possible which gave them the chance

to take corrective actions like issuing warnings and

close monitoring, etc. As another approach they

suggested to not to mix regular students those who

take the module for the first time with those who are

repeating the module. They have seen that, in most of

the situations, repeat students in the group maintain

minimal communication and involvement in the work

with other members and try to free ride. From past

experiences it was identified that, most of the free

riding complaints were noticed in these mixed

groups. But one student gave an opposite idea on this

matter in the survey where he/she suggested not to

group only repeating students together. Sometimes

most of the members in repeating groups may not

work and the hardworking students in those groups

may find it difficult to carry out the work. So that

approach may have both pros and cons.

5 CONCLUSIONS

Social loafing is recognized as a key problem

affecting fair assessments of individuals and

successful completion of undergraduate capstone

projects. After studying existing literature on

handling students’ group projects in undergraduate

courses in this paper, authors proposed a set of

mechanisms to be followed to mitigate social loafing.

Moreover, this research reports the experience of

adapting these mechanisms to the curriculum of

Information Technology Project module. During the

experimentation stage, students’ perspective was

studied further and analyzed which provided some

valuable insights to group work from student

viewpoint. The overall discussion of the paper

Say No to Free Riding: Student Perspective on Mechanisms to Reduce Social Loaﬁng in Group Projects

205

presents the most effective mechanisms for reducing

free riding. Furthermore, the lecturer experience and

insights were also taken into consideration. The

evidence presented showed that most of the proposed

mechanisms are positive and successful in reducing

free riding among members of IT group projects.

Allowing students to form their own groups and

peer review were not much recommended by

students. However, these techniques may be

successful in a different culture, which could be an

interesting factor to explore. Similarly, Sri Lankan

students could be exposed to the benefits of peer

reviewing and incorporate further mechanisms to

make peer reviewing an enjoyable constructive

approach in this framework. As future work aligned

to this research line, it would be insightful to study

further on possible group formation techniques and

the impact of those. Constraint-based grouping or

using Artificial Intelligent systems to optimize group

formation are few areas that could be explored to see

if optimized groups would reduce free-riding.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This study was conducted at Sri Lanka Institute of

Information Technology, Sri Lanka and we would

like to express our gratitude to management, all the

lecturers, non-academic staff and students those who

have involved in this study.

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