And now for something completely different? The impact of group membership on perceptions of creativity

Authors' draft; final version published in Social influence; available online at http://www.informaworld.com/ Embargo until 1 July 2010A wealth of historical, cultural, and biographical evidence points to the fact that there is considerable variation in different people's judgments of creative products. What is creative to one person is deviant to another, and creative efforts often fail to be given the enthusiastic reception that their creators anticipate and think they deserve. Unpacking the roots of these discrepancies, this paper develops an analysis of creativity that is informed by the social identity approach. This analysis is supported by a review of previous research that points to the way in which perceptions of creativity are structured by both self-categorization and social norms (and their interaction). Further support for the analysis is provided by two experiments (Ns = 100, 125) which support the hypothesis that ingroup products are perceived to be more creative than those of outgroups independently of other factors with which group membership is typically correlated in the world at large (e.g., quality). The studies also indicate that this pattern is not simply a manifestation of generic ingroup bias since judgments of creativity diverge from those of both likeability (Experiment 1) and beauty (Experiment 2). The theoretical and practical significance of these findings is discussed with particular reference to innovation resistance and the “not invented here” syndrome.This research was supported by a grant from the Economic and Social Research Council (RES-062-23-0135)

Structuring reality through the faultlines lens: the effects of structure, fairness, and status conflict on the activated faultlines-performance relationship

We investigate how activated team faultlines represent an informal sensemaking structure through which teammates interpret their social reality. Constructed from inter-subgroup comparisons, activated faultlines likely result in status perceptions that are ambiguous or illegitimate. Thus, activated faultlines threaten the justice climate within the team, which drives status conflict, impairing team performance. We explore the effects of team structure clarity in providing certainty or legitimacy around status and structure, ameliorating the negative effect of activated faultlines on team justice climate. We tested our model using a multi-source (three sources), multi-wave cross-lagged design (four waves) on a sample of 271 employees and 41 leaders in 41 teams. We found that the negative relationship between activated faultlines and team performance was mediated by the team justice climate—status conflict causal chain. We also found that team structure clarity reduced activated faultlines negative effect on team justice climate. The results highlight the value of using team faultlines, the social identity approach, and justice theories to understand how diverse teams interpret their social reality that influences their performance. Furthermore, our research provides practical guidance to managers in building clear team structures that minimize the harmful effects of activated faultlines on justice perceptions and team performance.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

In search of income reference points for SLCA using a country level sustainability benchmark (part 1): fair inequality. A contribution to the Oiconomy project

Purpose: This paper is part 1 of our twin articles on income reference points for Social Life Cycle Assessment (SLCA). Preventative costs based LCA systems, such as the EcoCost system and the Oiconomy system, need targets (performance reference points) to determine the marginal preventative costs, the costs of the most expensive measure that globally needs to be employed to reach the target. To extend the EcoCost system for social issues, targets are required for issues like fair wages and fair inequality of wages, issues for which no agreed standard, no effect level or target exists. One way of setting targets is to take best practices as benchmark, e.g. the practices of a group of best performing countries. The purpose of this part 1 article is to first develop a well-founded benchmark group of the 20 % best performing countries and thereafter propose a well-founded target for the issue of inequality for preventative costs based SLCA, which can also serve as performance reference point for SLCA in general and for other uses. In part 2, for the same purposes and using the same benchmark group, we propose targets for fair minimum wages for every country. Methods: A benchmark group of countries for the setting of targets was determined by an assessment of available country performance indicators, based on 5 criteria. Thereafter, we derived a proposal for a maximum inequality ratio based on existing democratically determined inequality ratios in the benchmark group. Results and discussion: The Sustainable Society Index–Human Wellbeing proved the best indicator for a country benchmark for preventative cost-based SLCA. Using the average of maximum democratically determined income differences in a benchmark group of countries determined by this index, a performance reference point for SLCA for the issue of fair inequality was derived and proposed, resulting in a maximum ratio of income differences for governmental institutions of 14.1, for government ruled companies of 18.3 and for industry of a factor 23.8. Conclusions: It proved possible to derive a target for maximum inequality of wages, based on democratic choices in a benchmark group of the 20 % best performing countries. The target for governmental institutions may be called objective, and proposed augmentations for government ruled companies and industry, though value choices, seem reasonable for the consumer who requires prevention of all possible harm as consequence of his purchase choices and who, as a voter, contributes to governmental standards

Fortress of Democracy: Engaging Youngsters in Democracy Results in More Support for the Political System

The Radicalisation Awareness Network (a European Commission-sponsored initiative) included educational interventions teaching youth about democracy as a method to prevent radicalization. In two experimental studies (N = 228 and N = 225), effects of the interactive exhibition "Fortress of Democracy" were assessed. The exhibition led to an increase in knowledge about democracy, and bootstrap analyses showed an indirect effect of increased knowledge on, respectively, greater trust in the government and less support for ideology-based violence via more positive attitudes toward democracy (Study 1). Study 2 showed an increase in positive attitudes toward democracy (ethnic minority participants) and trust in the government (both ethnic minority and majority participants). During data collection, the Dutch government stepped down, reducing trust in the government and lessening positive attitudes toward democracy. This was restored by the exhibition. Results are discussed in terms of the strengths and limitations of preventing radicalization through educational interventions

Volwaardige arbeidsrelaties en inzetbaarheid in de Universitair Medische Centra

Dit artikel gaat over de eerste bevindingen van een onderzoek naar volwaardige arbeidsrelaties in de Universitair Medische Centra (UMC’s). Een volwaardige arbeidsrelatie houdt in dat medewerker en leidinggevende een goede dialoog voeren waarin zij afspraken-op-maat maken over werk en ontwikkeling (ook wel i-deals genoemd; Rousseau, 2005). Aanleiding voor de UMC’s om in te zetten op volwaardige arbeidsrelaties zijn demografische en technologische ontwikkelingen; de sociale partners in de UMC’s voorzien grote personeelstekorten en stijgende eisen aan (technologische) kennis, vaardigheden en motivatie van medewerkers. Daarom sloten zij een vernieuwende CAO af, waarin medewerkers een persoonlijk ontwikkelbudget krijgen en waarin zij een veranderingstraject in gang zetten, genaamd Idealoog. Idealoog bestaat uit ruim zeventig projecten ter stimulering van volwaardige arbeidsrelaties. Dit proces wordt gevolgd met onderzoek, waarvan dit artikel een eerste verslag doet. In de rest van deze inleiding beschrijven we eerst het Idealoog-project en daarna het onderzoeksmodel. Na methode en resultaten bespreken we wat de bevindingen betekenen voor vervolgonderzoek en HR-praktijken