Past, present, and potential future of team diversity research: From compositional diversity to emergent diversity

Daan van Knippenberg and Julija N. Mell

Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 2016, vol. 136, issue C, 135-145

Abstract: We review research in team diversity to take stock of the current state of the science, the trajectory that led to this state, and a potential way forward that would lead to more integrative theory in diversity research. We outline how diversity research has developed into the current state of the science with growing consensus on key mediating processes in the diversity-performance relationship and growing consensus that this relationship is contingent on moderating influences. We see important challenges in moving the field forward in two key areas: first, in integrating diversity research with its emphasis on diversity in relatively stable attributes – trait diversity – with research in more state-like composition variables – state diversity; second, in integrating research in compositional diversity with research on emergent diversity – diversity in team interaction processes and team emergent states. We propose that meeting these challenges will result in more broad-ranging theory that has for instance the potential to bridge research in team diversity and individual-team dissimilarity (relational demography).

Keywords: Teams; Groups; Team composition; Group composition; Diversity; Team processes; Group processes; Group dynamics; Emergent states (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (17)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0749597816303193
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jobhdp:v:136:y:2016:i:c:p:135-145

DOI: 10.1016/j.obhdp.2016.05.007

Access Statistics for this article

Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes is currently edited by John M. Schaubroeck

More articles in Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().