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Constraints, Competencies, or Choices? How Lay Theories of the Gender Gap Impact Diversity Support
No full textResistance to diversity initiatives can undermine their effectiveness. I advance insight into diversity support by identifying lay theories about why the gender gap persists. I identify three gender gap lay theories, which differ in the implied locus and control women have over the gap. These attributions shape women’s perceived responsibility, which, in turn, undermines diversity initiative support. Attributing the gap to organizational barriers is positively associated with diversity support because it implies the causes are external and uncontrollable by women. Attributing the gap to dispositional factors (e.g. traits) is negatively associated with diversity support because it implies the causes are internal to women (but not necessarily controllable). Finally, attributing the gap to women’s personal choices is negatively associated with diversity support because it implies the causes are both internal to and controllable by women; thus, it is most undermining overall. I test these ideas in five multi-method studies, which generally support my theory. I also find gender gaps are attributed to personal choice more than racial gaps are. Overall, this project suggests that, beyond demographics and ideology, sensemaking about the causes of gender inequality and, in particular, the belief that it is due to personal choice, significantly undermines diversity support
The relative effects of a scandal on member engagement in rites of integration and rites of passage: evidence from a child abuse scandal in the Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia
Full text linkOrganizational research has documented that scandals lead to negative aggregate stakeholder reactions. There is little reason to believe, however, that the effects of a scandal are homogenous across different types of engagement. We therefore compare the effects of a scandal on member engagement in two types of rites at normative organizations: rites of integration and rites of passage. Rites of integration focus on the community, celebrate organizational values, and help strengthen organizational identification; they are thus enacted more by core members. Rites of passage focus on the individual, celebrate transition between social roles, and require only occasional engagement; they are thus enacted by core and peripheral members. Because of these differences, we hypothesize that a normative organization’s implication in a scandal affects rites of passage more negatively than rites of integration, but that this effect depends on scandal prevalence among neighboring organizations, organizational age, and organizational size. We test our hypotheses in the context of a child abuse scandal in the Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia. Using yearly parish-level data from 1990 to 2010, we find that a parish’s implication in the scandal was associated with a larger decline in rites of passage (marriages, baptisms, and funerals) than in rites of integration (mass attendance). This difference was reversed with the increase in scandal prevalence. Furthermore, rites of integration were more resilient than rites of passage at older and larger parishes. To help rule in the plausibility of our organization-level theory, we present a simulation grounded in individual-level polling data from the context
Diversity Project - Cognitive Diversity in Asset Management
No full textNew study by Professor Alex Edmans finds cognitive diversity can give investment teams a significant edge – but only if managed well. In 2024, the Diversity Project invited academics from around the world to submit research proposals to explore any linkage between cognitive diversity and the performance of investment teams. We stressed that we wanted to know what the evidence showed, not work backwards from any conclusion we might hope to see. We commissioned Professor Alex Edmans for this important research. The original common-sense goals behind diversity initiatives – to improve decision-making, mitigate the risk of groupthink, hire and develop the best people and give all talent a fair shot – have been lost amidst a politicised battle. Rather than discuss differences thoughtfully or objectively, debaters are divided along ideological lines. Professor Edmans’ new research reclaims this debate by considering the evidence. For the purpose of this research, Cognitive Diversity has been defined as the range of expertise, experience, perspectives, preferences, traits and ways of thinking within a team. It can arise from differences in educational background, professional background, life background, cognitive style or personality and demographics
Unexpected defaults: the role of information opacity
Full text linkBond defaults are undesirable yet natural outcomes of risky investments. What is also crucial but hitherto underexplored is the unexpectedness of defaults. We develop a parsimonious measure of default unexpectedness and highlight its economic importance by demonstrating that unexpected defaults are associated with unfavorable recovery outcomes and adverse price changes in peer firm bonds. We then examine how default unexpectedness relates to information opacity. We find that firms with opaque financial reporting and weak voluntary disclosure experience more unexpected defaults. Defaults also occur more unexpectedly when the external information environment is opaque—when rating agencies disagree on a firm’s credit risk and when the media coverage is low. We further report evidence on a specific case in which transparent firms suffer unexpected defaults—when creditors’ run incentives are particularly high. Overall, our paper introduces default unexpectedness as an economically relevant construct, offers a tractable measure, and highlights the role of transparency in mediating this phenomenon
The impact of perceived strength in the war of attrition
No full textIn a war of attrition a player's perceived strength is the distribution describing beliefs about her valuation. Small asymmetries in strength have a large effect: in the unique equilibrium of a game with a deadline the war ends quickly (instantly, as the deadline becomes infinite) with a concession by the (perceived) weaker player. The ranking of strength compares hazard rates in the upper tails of the distributions of beliefs; greater uncertainty about a player tends to give her more strength. The results also hold if techniques other than a deadline are used to obtain a unique equilibrium
Physician, know thyself: Applying brand management principles to professional identity in academic medicine
No full textContext: A career in medicine is a journey of countless opportunities, challenges and choices. Determining the “right” decision for any given career choice ultimately must come from within; thus, a clear understanding of a physician's core professional identity is critical. Existing conceptualizations of professional identity within medicine focus primarily on medical training; however, it is clear that professional identity evolves throughout one's career. We propose the use of brand management principles as a novel means of understanding and expressing a physician's evolving professional identity throughout their career. Methods: We propose a conceptual framework for managing academic physician professional identity based upon brand management principles derived from marketing and consumer research literature. The four key framework elements include brand identity (“Who am I?”), brand delivery (“What actions do I choose to present myself to others”), brand experience (“How are my actions experienced by others?”) and brand image (“How do others see me?”). Successful management of one's brand starts with understanding the core professional brand identity, then determining the best way to deliver this identity through specific actions experienced by target audiences (e.g., patients, collaborators, colleagues, employers, learners, promotion committees, etc.), and ends with the target audience having a clear and compelling brand image that reflects the underlying professional identity. Alignment of these components results in an array of benefits; misalignment can result in feelings of burnout or career stalling. Conclusions: We contend that physicians can and should see themselves as their own unique brand. Though often confused with naked self-promotion, developing a professional brand is an identity exploration and reflection experience that allows individuals to better control the course of their careers. A strong personal brand has numerous practical applications; three key examples presented herein include navigating promotion through the professoriate, managing one's reputation and achieving professional fulfilment
Affective And Cognitive Underpinnings of Moral Condemnation When News of Transgressions Goes Viral
Full text linkWhen news of a transgression goes viral, people hear about it repeatedly from different news sources and individuals. How does this repeated exposure affect moral judgments of the transgression? We test a new theoretical model proposing that moral condemnation is influenced by competing affective and cognitive processes. Repeated exposure to the same information about a transgression dampens people’s emotional responses, which can reduce moral condemnation (an affective-desensitization process). However, repeated exposure from multiple sources also signals that the transgression is receiving widespread negative attention, which can increase moral condemnation (a cognitive infamy-inference process). These processes’ net effect will depend on how strongly repetition dampens affect vs. signals infamy. Five preregistered experiments (N = 3,939) test our model. Participants rated corporate transgressions to which they had or had not been repeatedly exposed from three sources (news outlets or individuals). Experiments 1 and 2 measured affective reactions, infamy inferences, and moral judgments, finding mediational support for our model. In Experiment 2, and two supplemental experiments, repetition reduced moral condemnation, suggesting that affective desensitization was the dominant process. Experiment 3 was designed to strengthen the infamy process by highlighting over a million negative reactions to each repeatedly seen transgression; consistent with our model, infamy no longer reduced moral condemnation but continued to dull affective reactions, suggesting that affective desensitization and infamy-inference processes offset one another. By documenting these countervailing processes, our research deepens understanding of when, why, and how viral transgressions may impact public opinion and moral outrage
