Getting together to get ahead : a social identity approach to women's mentoring initiatives

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Evaluating three criteria for establishing cue-search hierarchies in inferential judgment

The authors identify and provide an integration of 3 criteria for establishing cue-search hierarchies in inferential judgment. Cues can be ranked by information value according to expected information gain (Bayesian criterion), cue-outcome correlation (correlational criterion), or ecological validity (accuracy criterion). All criteria significantly predicted information acquisition behavior; however, in 3 experi-ments, the most successful predictor was the correlational criterion (followed by the Bayesian). Although participants showed sensitivity to task constraints, searching for less information when it was more expensive (Experiment 1) and when under time constraints (Experiment 2), concomitant changes in the relative frequency of acquisition of cues with different information values were not observed. A rational analysis illustrates why such changes in the frequency of acquisition would be beneficial, and reasons for the failure to observe such behavior are discussed

Opting out or pushed off the edge? The glass cliff and the precariousness of women's leadership positions

The glass cliff refers to the phenomenon whereby women are overrepresented in leadership roles associated with high risk and an increased chance of failure. Research into the glass cliff has focused on documenting the existence of the phenomenon and understanding the psychological processes that contribute to the appointment of women to precarious positions. This paper summarises this research and extends it by examining the implications that glass cliff positions have, both for the women who occupy them and for the organisations in which they exist. The gender-stress-disidentification model suggests that glass cliff positions are inherently stressful, and lead women to experience a reduced sense of organisational identification. This, in turn, has important implications for organisations in terms of reduced commitment and increased turnover. Taken together, the research presented here offers an alternative analysis of women's increasing disaffection with the workplace, which takes into account gender differences in workplace experience

Responding to group-based discrimination: The impact of social structure on willingness to engage in mentoring

In two studies we examined women's willingness to engage in mentoring as a function of the perceived pervasiveness of gender discrimination and the appraised legitimacy of discrimination. In line with predictions, and confirming predictions from social identity theory, we found that perceiving discrimination against women to be illegitimate enhanced willingness to engage in mentoring when discrimination was seen to be pervasive compared to rare. In contrast, when gender discrimination was appraised as more legitimate, pervasiveness of discrimination attributions did not influence willingness to engage in mentoring. Study 2 provided evidence that the interactive effect of pervasiveness and legitimacy is explained by the extent to which mentoring is conceived of as support for collective goals. The results bring to the fore the impact of perceptions of the social context on women's responses to career-development initiatives