How Exposure to Diversity Encourages Innovative Thought

Research that relies on large databases presents one obvious drawback: they need to provide evidence that diversity results in greater outcomes; they tend only to portray the relationship between diversity and performance. Yet, the studies on small groups with different racial backgrounds allow for some causal inferences. And once again, the results are unequivocal: diversity is advantageous for groups oriented towards innovation and development.

In 2006, Margaret Neale of Stanford University, Gregory Northcraft of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and I looked into the effect of racial diversity in small decision-making groups in an experimental setting where information sharing was necessary for group success.

Our subjects consisted of undergraduate students in business classes at the University of Illinois. We put them in three-person groups that could be all white, two whites, and one nonwhite and made them engage in a murder mystery session. While ensuring that all group members had the same information, we also made it possible for each member to possess crucial evidence that only they knew. To establish the identity of the murderer, each member of the group had to present every single piece of information possessed by them after discussions. Ethnically heterogeneous groups were far more advanced than ethnically homogenous groups. Being in the company of people who are like us encourages us to think that everyone believes the same thing and holds the same information. This is why all-white groups could not assimilate information to the effect that it would move their thoughts further, which is the enemy of creativity and innovation.

Other investigations have produced the same result. In 2004, Anthony Lising Antonio, a Stanford Graduate School of Education professor, and five colleagues from the University of California, Los Angeles, and other institutes published a study about race and opinion composition effects in small group discussions. More than 350 students: the number of respondents from three universities included in the study. Members of the group were given 15 minutes to discuss a social agenda issue, either child labor or the death penalty. The researchers wrote dissenting opinions presented to the groups as appropriate, one by a black and another by a white group member. Pro differential targeting: When a Black person opposed a white group's opinion, the group was more receptive to new ideas, creatively engaging in searching for solutions than when a white person opposed them.

We have learned that the point of view of a different person makes us work harder than when we hear from someone who resembles us. A year ago, researchers published a longitudinal study that followed the moral development of his students on 17 campuses over time who were instructed in a diversity class in their first year. The scrutiny brought the investigators to a convincing finding: those students, prepared from the beginning to face the negotiation of diversity, had graduated with complex moral reasoning skills. It was more pronounced among such students who were also of less academic proficiency.

This effect is not limited by race and gender. For instance, last year, management professors Denise Lewin Loyd from the University of Illinois, Cynthia Wang from Oklahoma State University, and Robert B. Lount, Jr. from Ohio State University and I conducted a study with 186 subjects where each subject declared their political affiliation as Democrat or Republican and then read a murder mystery and made a guess about the culprit. The subjects had to prepare for one of the group members and write an essay outlining their opinion on the matter. More importantly, in every case, we assured the subjects that their partner would disagree, but they had to compromise with the other person. Everyone was instructed to prepare for a meeting and try to convince the other members of the meeting. However, they were told that half had to convince someone from the opposite political party, whereas the other half was from the same party.

While engaging in the debate, Democrats who were informed a Democrat held conflicting views prepared more inadequately than Democrats who were told a Republican posited differing views. Republicans illustrate the same trend. Specific group–out–group conflicts stimulate more effort and energy in us to resolve them. Unlike uniformity, which saps us of initiatives and drains our energy, slackness websites do it differently. Therefore, it looks like diversity enhances the quality of scientific investigations.

In 2014, two researchers from Harvard University wanted to know which ethnic groups authored the biggest scientific journals. They used the Thomson Reuters Web of Science, seeking to find papers authored by ethnic minorities between t985 and 2008. It was noted that the papers that enjoy the attention of the audience, which means the text's worth and impact, contain more than one-ethnic society. In addition, papers with more than one author that are more substantial, related substantially more geographical areas, and concerned with more references all hold more varying ideas.

This essay was first published in Scientific American in 2014, and this article is based on the same research. The piece reviews and brings updated information by Katherine Phillips in 2017.