Lisa Troyer Reef Youngreen University of Iowa
How do unpopular views enhance group creativity? Unpopular, minority views (i.e., those held by a numerical minority in a group) have the potential to incite innovation by catalyzing new ways of thinking about issues. In contrast, majority views engender a narrow focus on routine ways of thinking about issues. Yet, merely presenting a minority view may not be sufficient to ensure that it is influences how other group members think about the issues. This begs the question, "Under what conditions do minority views become more influential?" This project addresses this question. Prior research shows that status affects influence. Those who are more socially respected and esteemed (i.e., those with higher status) are more influential than lower-status people. Presenting unpopular viewpoints, however, can be met with criticism, leading the individual voicing the minority view to be de-valued by group members and thus lose status. Existing research demonstrates that group members value their social status, and seek to avoid any actions that may result in a loss of social status. Consequently, integrating these two independent insights suggests an interesting paradox. On the one hand, higher status group members may influence others to think in more creative ways than lower status members by espousing minority views. On the other hand, group members are likely to refrain from espousing a minority view, since the negative evaluations that are likely to result will generate a loss of status for them. This project explores this paradox through an experiment designed to test (1) how social status affects the impact of a minority view on creativity in groups, and (2) how the expression of a minority view by a group member affects the member's social status in the group. This experiment, conducted at the University of Iowa's, Center for the Study of Group Processes, examines group problem solving in ways not previously explored by integrating two existing lines of social psychological research. Insights on minority influence have been primarily developed in the field of psychology, while insights on status and influence have been primarily developed in the field of sociology. The cutting-edge integration represented in this project is an important and novel step in research on group problem solving. It advances sociological knowledge of group processes by investigating how psychological processes related to minority influence (which contribute to creativity in groups) are impacted by status processes that affect social influence.
Broader Impacts. This project has clear broader impacts and social benefits. At a time when our world faces difficult problems like a surge of terrorist attacks, security issues, and disease containment, groups are being charged with finding optimal solutions while avoiding catastrophic missteps in problem solving. Creating groups that can find the best possible solutions to these problems requires understanding how important social dynamics like status and minority influence operate. This research promises to move us toward this understanding. The integration of sociological and psychological insight will forge opportunities for more interdisciplinary research on group problem solving. This integration will be facilitated through the dissemination of the study results in journals and conferences relevant to both sociologists and psychologists. Additionally, the project involves the participation of female undergraduate research assistants, providing an important opportunity to engage women in scientific research and provide them with training in experimental methods of social psychological research. Furthermore, since status processes are central to this project, this research will suggest strategies for effectively incorporating members of lower-status, under-represented groups in problem solving and for ensuring that minority viewpoints are heard and considered, irrespective of their source.
