Diversity Research in Organizational Studies
This section of the research guide represents research on diversity in organizations from the interdisciplinary field of organizational studies, including the sub-fields of organizational psychology, organizational sociology, business and management.
Studies on organizational diversity often focus on workforce diversity and specifically on diversity in teams. Both the benefits and challenges of diversity are discussed in the research literature; this guide is geared towards emphasizing beneficial outcomes. The positive impact of diversity on outcomes is referred to as the "value in diversity" hypothesis. Another common way to discuss positive impacts is by making the "business case" for diversity.
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Search Strategies: Scholarly Literature on Organizational Diversity
This section contains recommended databases and search strategies. Links to searches and RSS feeds from databases are included to show recently published articles.
PsycINFO
- PsycInfo (APA) This link opens in a new windowPsycINFO searches across the scholarly literature in the field of psychology and related social, behavioral, and health sciences. Look here for studies in organizational psychology.
Relevant PsycINFO subject classification terms include:
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RSS Feed for articles classified as "Diversity in the Workplace"
Newest articles
Sociological Abstracts
- Sociological Abstracts This link opens in a new windowProvides access to the international literature in sociology and related disciplines. Look here for studies in organizational sociology.
The Sociological Thesaurus subject classification term for diversity is "Cultural Pluralism." This search pairs the subject "Cultural Pluralism" with the keyword "Diversity" (not in the full text) along with a set of subject terms focused on organizations, workplaces, and teams.
(MAINSUBJECT.EXACT("Cultural Pluralism") OR NOFT("Diversity")) AND (MAINSUBJECT.EXACT("Workplaces") OR MAINSUBJECT.EXACT("Work Groups") OR MAINSUBJECT.EXACT("Sociology of Work") OR MAINSUBJECT.EXACT("Enterprises") OR MAINSUBJECT.EXACT("Corporations") OR MAINSUBJECT.EXACT("Teams") OR MAINSUBJECT.EXACT("Groups") OR MAINSUBJECT("Organization*"))
Web of Science
- Web of Science This link opens in a new windowMultidisciplinary index to the scholarly literature. Useful for organization studies research across disciplinary areas; focusing on selective and reputable scholarly journals.
This search searches for keywords (TS=) on diversity in organizations, workplaces, and teams; along with a set of terms to focus on literature geared towards discussion of positive outcomes. Literature from the hard sciences is excluded in order to reflect recent research from social sciences publications.
TS=(diversity) AND TS=(organizations OR workplace OR workforce OR teams OR "work group" OR "group process*" OR "group composition") AND TS=(creativity OR "problem solving" OR "decision making" OR performance OR "competitive advantage" OR competitiveness OR profit OR productivity OR innovation OR effectiveness OR "business case" OR "value in diversity" OR "value of diversity" OR "social justice" OR inclusion OR "bias reduction") NOT SU=("Life Sciences Biomedicine" OR "Physical Sciences" OR Technology)
Indexes=SSCI Timespan=All years
RSS Feed for newest Web of Science Articles
Recent Research
Woolley, Anita Williams, Christopher F. Chabris, Alex Pentland, Nada Hashmi, and Thomas W. Malone. "Evidence for a collective intelligence factor in the performance of human groups." Science 330, no. 6004 (2010): 686-688.
As measured by their ability to complete tasks, the collective intelligence of teams improves when women are included.
Scott, Kristyn A., Joanna M. Heathcote, and Jamie A. Gruman. 2011. “The Diverse Organization: Finding Gold at the End of the Rainbow.” Human Resource Management 50 (6): 735–55. https://doi.org/10.1002/hrm.20459.
Acker, J. (2006). Inequality regimes: Gender, class, and race in organizations. Gender & society, 20(4), 441-464.
Carnes, M., Devine, P. G., Manwell, L. B., Byars-Winston, A., Fine, E., Ford, C. E., ... & Palta, M. (2015). Effect of an intervention to break the gender bias habit for faculty at one institution: a cluster randomized, controlled trial. Academic medicine: journal of the Association of American Medical Colleges, 90(2), 221.
Creary, S. J., Caza, B. B., & Roberts, L. M. (2015). Out of the box? How managing a subordinate’s multiple identities affects the quality of a manager-subordinate relationship. Academy of Management Review, 40(4), 538-562.
Hall, E. V., Avery, D. R., McKay, P. F., Blot, J. F., & Edwards, M. (2019). Composition and compensation: The moderating effect of individual and team performance on the relationship between Black team member representation and salary. Journal of Applied Psychology, 104(3), 448-463.
Fuhrmann, C. N., Halme, D. G., O’Sullivan, P. S., & Lindstaedt, B. (2011). Improving graduate education to support a branching career pipeline: recommendations based on a survey of doctoral students in the basic biomedical sciences. CBE—Life Sciences Education, 10(3), 239-249.
Jin, M., Lee, J., & Lee, M. (2017). Does leadership matter in diversity management? Assessing the relative impact of diversity policy and inclusive leadership in the public sector. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 38(2), 303-319.
Kezar, A. (2007). Tools for a time and place: Phased leadership strategies to institutionalize a diversity agenda. The Review of Higher Education, 30(4), 413–439.
Lindsey, A. P. , Avery, D. , Dawson, J. F. , & King, E. B. (2017). Investigating why and for whom management ethnic representativeness influences interpersonal mistreatment in the workplace. Journal of Applied Psychology, 102 (11), 1545-1563.
Pittman, C. T. (2012). Racial microaggressions: The narratives of African American faculty at a predominantly White university. The Journal of Negro Education, 81(1), 82-92.
Rivera, L. A. (2012). Hiring as cultural matching: The case of elite professional service firms. American sociological review, 77(6), 999-1022.
Smith, D. G. (1995). Organizational implications of diversity in higher education. Diversity in organizations, 220-244.
Highly Cited and Influential Articles (Scholarly and Empirical Research)
Cox, Taylor H., Sharon A. Lobel, and Poppy L. McLeod. 1991. “Effects of Ethnic Group Cultural Differences on Cooperative and Competitive Behavior on a Group Task.” Academy of Management Journal 34 (4): 827–47. https://doi.org/10.2307/256391.
Hoffman, L. R., and N. R. F. Maier. 1961. “Quality and Acceptance of Problem Solutions by Members of Homogeneous and Heterogeneous Groups.” The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 62 (2): 401–7. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0044025.
Hoffman, L. Richard. 1959. “Homogeneity of Member Personality and Its Effect on Group Problem-Solving.” The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 58 (1): 27–32. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0043499.
Cox, Taylor H., and Stacy Blake. 1991. “Managing Cultural Diversity: Implications for Organizational Competitiveness.” The Executive; Ada 5 (3): 45. http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/ame.1991.4274465.
Herring, Cedric. 2009. “Does Diversity Pay?: Race, Gender, and the Business Case for Diversity.” American Sociological Review 74 (2): 208–24. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/000312240907400203.
Overviews: Background Information (Handbooks, Encyclopedias)
Gonzalez, Jorge A., and Azadeh Zamanian. 2015. “Diversity in Organizations.” In International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences, edited by James D. Wright, 2nd ed., 595–600. Oxford: Elsevier."Most diversity research addresses the implications of workplace diversity taking a social justice, legal compliance, or organizational performance standpoint. Social justice goals include the reduction of bias and discrimination, and the enhancement of inclusion in the workplace."
Hebl, Michelle R., and Derek R. Avery. 2013. “Diversity in Organizations.” In Handbook of Psychology, edited by Irving B. Weiner, 2nd ed., 677–97. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley."...potential benefits of diversity such as heighted creativity and decision making. ... Greater breadth of perspectives provides more range in the types of possible solutions generated when attempting to solve problems (i.e., greater creativity). In turn, having a broader array of implementable ideas may facilitate groups and organizations in arriving at higher quality decisions."
Fernandes, Catarina R., and Jeffrey T. Polzer. 2015. “Diversity in Groups.” In Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral Sciences, edited by Robert A. Scott and Stephen M. Kosslyn. Wiley."The Value‐in‐Diversity Perspective. ... members of diverse groups bring unique perspectives to the table, creating a larger pool of available information, skills, approaches, and networks. Diversity should thus produce constructive task conflict and debate, causing team members to explore alternative solutions and conduct more thorough analyses of the issues at hand. Such processes should eventually lead to more creativity, better decisions, and higher performance relative to homogeneous groups, in which members hold presumably redundant perspectives."- Laitin, David D., and Sangick Jeon. 2015. “Exploring Opportunities in Cultural Diversity.” In Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral Sciences, edited by Robert A. Scott and Stephen M. Kosslyn. Wiley."...diversity in beliefs and backgrounds is often functional, such that the very same heterogeneities that generate conflict can also produce large gains in economic productivity and improve performance in intellective tasks such as problem solving, innovation generation, and decision making. ... theoretical and experimental research on the productivity‐enhancing effects of diversity illustrate that groups composed of more dissimilar people are more creative, better decision makers, and superior problem solvers ... "
Phillips, Katherine W., Sun Young Kim-Jun, and So-Hyeon Shim. 2011. “The Value of Diversity in Organizations: A Social Psychological Perspective.” In Social Psychology and Organizations, edited by David De Cremer, Rolf van Dick, and J. Keith Murnig"Our goal here is to develop a better understanding of how and why diversity can be beneficial by integrating the apparently contradictory results from the literature on diversity in problem-solving teams and in organizations."
Jackson, Susan E., and Aparna Joshi. 2011. “Work Team Diversity.” In APA Handbook of Industrial and Organizational Psychology, Vol. 1, edited by Sheldon Zedeck, 651–86. APA Handbooks in Psychology. Washington DC: American Psychological Association."The scholarly evidence confirms what employers already know—diversity seems to be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it can bring with it interpersonal conflict, loss of social cohesion, and greater employee turnover. On the other hand, it can spur innovation and improve decision making." Provides background on diversity concepts and a literature review of "empirical research on the consequences of work team diversity" including affective and attitudinal responses, behavioral processes, and performance.
Nkomo, Stella. 2016. “Workplace Diversity.” In The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology, edited by George Ritzer. Malden, MA: Blackwell Pub."Some studies have shown that diverse workgroups make better decisions than homogeneous groups ... cultural differences among organization members are recognized as sources of skill and insight that can have a direct impact on the organization's core tasks. Efforts were made to change the view of diversity from being a problem to being a positive feature in workplaces and to make a business case for workplace diversity. There has been a proliferation of scholarship to empirically link different forms of diversity to the bottom line..."
Overviews: Literature Review Articles
Knippenberg, Daan van, and Michaéla C. Schippers. 2006. “Work Group Diversity.” Annual Review of Psychology 58 (1): 515–41. http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.58.110405.085546.
"Work group diversity, the degree to which there are differences between group members, may affect group process and performance positively as well as negatively. Much is still unclear about the effects of diversity, however. We review the 1997–2005 literature on work group diversity to assess the state of the art and to identify key issues for future research. This review points to the need for more complex conceptualizations of diversity, as well as to the need for more empirical attention to the processes that are assumed to underlie the effects of diversity on group process and performance and to the contingency factors of these processes."
"...evidence also links diversity to higher social integration and group identification (identification reflects self-categorization), and lower relational conflict..."
"...At the core of the information/decision-making perspectives lies the notion that work group diversity may be associated with differences in information, knowledge, and perspectives, and that this diversity may benefit group performance..."
Mannix, Elizabeth, and Margaret A. Neale. 2005. “What Differences Make a Difference? The Promise and Reality of Diverse Teams in Organizations.” Psychological Science in the Public Interest 6 (2): 31–55. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1529-1006.2005.00022.x.
"As the workplace has become increasingly diverse, there has been a tension between the promise and the reality of diversity in team process and performance. The optimistic view holds that diversity will lead to an increase in the variety of perspectives and approaches brought to a problem and to opportunities for knowledge sharing, and hence lead to greater creativity and quality of team performance. However, the preponderance of the evidence favors a more pessimistic view: that diversity creates social divisions, which in turn create negative performance outcomes for the group. ...
We are cautious to note, however, that this does not at all imply that integration and diversity for reasons of equal access and opportunity are not appropriate, desirable, and necessary. In addition, we know that equal access and opportunity are still a long distance off and that the glass ceiling is still alive and well (Catalyst, 2005; Meyerson & Fletcher, 2000). We applaud diversity initiatives that reduce discrimination and increase access to career opportunities. However, we also applaud efforts to understand how the increased diversity of organizations and work teams affects work processes and performance. To implement policies and practices that increase the diversity of the workforce without understanding how diverse individuals can come together to form effective teams is irresponsible. Our aim here is to provide such a roadmap, based on the current state of knowledge about the consequences of diversity, broadly defined."
Willoughby, Katherine, and Charles O’Reilly. 1998. “Demography and Diversity in Organizations: A Review of Forty Years of Research.” In Research in Organizational Behavior: An Annual Series of Analytical Essays and Critical Reviews, edited by Barry M. Staw and L. L. Cummings, 20:77–140. Research in Organizational Behavior. Greenwich, CT: JAI Press Inc.
"It is now accepted wisdom that a major challenge facing managers in the next century will be an increasingly diverse workforce. But what conclusions can be drawn from the research on demography and diversity about meeting this challenge? Is there, as some researchers suggest, a "value in diversity", or, as suggested by others, does diversity make group functioning more difficult? The purpose of this paper is to provide a systematic review of the literature on organizational demography and diversity as it applies to work groups and organizations. We review over 80 studies relevant for understanding the effects of demography as it applies to management and organizations. Based on this review, we summarize what the empirical evidence is for the effects of diversity and suggest areas for further research."
Milliken, Frances J., and Luis L. Martins. 1996. “Searching for Common Threads: Understanding the Multiple Effects of Diversity in Organizational Groups.” The Academy of Management Review; 21 (2): 402–33. https://doi.org/10.2307/258667
"In this article, we review and evaluate recent management research on the effects of different types of diversity in group composition at various organizational levels (i.e., boards of directors, top management groups, and organizational task groups) for evidence of common patterns. We argue that diversity in the composition of organizational groups affects outcomes such as turnover and performance through its impact on affective, cognitive, communication, and symbolic processes."
"The results of research on heterogeneity in groups suggests that diversity offers both a great opportunity for organizations as well as an enormous challenge. On the one hand, some research suggests that more diverse groups have the potential to consider a greater range of perspectives and to generate more high-quality solutions than less diverse groups..."
Overviews: Books
Additional titles may be found by searching in the library catalog, for example, by using the subject classification diversity in the workplace.
Cultural Diversity in Organizations by Call Number: HM 131 .C7491 1993ISBN: 1881052192Publication Date: 1993Winner of the 1994 George R. Terry Book Award given by the National Academy of Management to "the book judged to have made the most outstanding contribution to the advancement of management knowledge." "In this book, I have assembled learnings from ten years of teaching, research, and consulting related to cultural diversity in organizations," writes Taylor Cox. "My objective is to provide a comprehensive text that would be useful as an aid for teaching, organization development, and scholarship." The result is a major advance in our understanding of cultural diversity and its effects on organizational behavior and performance.
Creating the Multicultural Organization by Call Number: HF 5549.5 .M5 C6881 2001ISBN: 0787955841Publication Date: 2001(Also available as an e-book)
As the war for talent rages on, organizations are seeking proven methods for leveraging diversity as a resource. Creating the Multicultural Organization challenges today's organizations to stop "counting heads for the government" and begin creating effective strategies for a more positive approach to managing diversity. Using a model outlined in his earlier works, Taylor Cox Jr.--an associate professor at the University of Michigan Business School and president of his own consulting firm--shows readers the many practical and innovative ways that top organizations such as Alcoa effectively address diversity issues to secure and develop the talent that they need in order to succeed. A University of Michigan Business School Series Book.
The Diversity Scorecard by Call Number: HF 5549.5 .M5H88 2004ISBN: 0750674571Publication Date: 2011(Also available as an e-book)
'The Diversity Scorecard' is designed to provide step-by-step instructions, worksheets and examples to help diversity executives and managers analyze and track the impact of their diversity initiatives to mobilize the organization for strategic culture change. Diversity is not a program; it is a systemic process of organizational change that requires measurement for organizational improvement and success. Measuring the progress and results of diversity initiatives is a key strategic requirement to demonstrate its contribution to organizational performance.
Diversity at Work: The Practice of Inclusion by ISBN: 9780470401330Publication Date: 2013Diversity at Work: The Practice of Inclusion How can organizations, their leaders, and their people benefit from diversity? The answer, according to this cutting-edge book, is the practice of inclusion. Diversity at Work: The Practice of Inclusion (a volume in SIOP's Professional Practice Series) presents detailed solutions for the challenge of inclusion--how to fully connect with, engage, and empower people across all types of differences.
Handbook of Workplace Diversity by ISBN: 9780761944225Publication Date: 2006"By assembling an international cast of contributors from all walks of research life, Professors Prasad, Pringle and Konrad successfully broaden the scope of scholarly discourse on workplace diversity. This stimulating volume considers how to define this fuzzy construct, what "differences" are more important than others, and how to make best use of alternative research methods at different levels of analysis. It reviews what we have learned about workplace diversity along several important dimensions (e.g., gender, race, ethnicity, weight, sexual orientation, disabilities, class), and it offers useful recommendations for how to conduct future research that will expand our knowledge of the implications of diversity for individuals, marginalized groups, work organizations, and societies'" - Gary N Powell, Professor of Management, University of Connecticut
