When do team members share? : the importance of openness to diversity and perceived ethnic similarity

Abstract

Globalization requires that organizations in a broad variety of sectors collaborate with individuals from different ethnic groups around the world (Harrison, Price, & Bell, 1998). Cross-cultural collaboration involves various processes including information sharing that are critical to tasks such as decision making, innovating, and problem solving (Homan, van Knippenberg, van Kleef, & De Dreu, 2007). This research examines the role of openness to diversity and perceived similarity on the relationship between surface-level ethnic diversity and information sharing. Results suggest that participants in the homogeneous ethnic condition shared more information than those in the heterogeneous condition. Findings also indicate that openness to diversity mediates the relationship between surface-level ethnic differences and information sharing across condition when individuals do not perceive other team members to be very similar. Implications from this research suggest that attitudes about diversity matter and can potentially help ethnically diverse teams to share information and overcome challenges to collaboration.

Notes

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Thesis Completion

2010

Semester

Summer

Advisor

Salas, Eduardo

Degree

Bachelor of Science (B.S.)

College

College of Sciences

Degree Program

Psychology

Subjects

Dissertations, Academic -- Sciences;Sciences -- Dissertations, Academic

Format

Print

Identifier

DP0022564

Language

English

Access Status

Open Access

Length of Campus-only Access

None

Document Type

Honors in the Major Thesis

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