Prithviraj Chattopadhyay

Organizational Actions in Response to Threats and Opportunities

In this study, we tested a model in which threats and opportunities lead directly to different organizational actions and compared it to a model in which organizational characteristics moderate organizational actions taken in response to threats and opportunities. To better understand these effects, we differentiated the dimensions of threat and opportunity associated with the threat-rigidity hypothesis from the dimensions associated with prospect theory. In this study, threats had the main and moderated effects predicted from the literature, but opportunities did not.

Determinants of Executive Beliefs: Comparing Functional Conditioning and Social Influence

Executive beliefs influence strategic decision making in organizations, and thus they ultimately influence organization performance. The factors that might determine upper-echelon executive beliefs, however, have received scant empirical attention; certainly, little is known about their relative influence. In contrast to the oft-asserted influence of functional experiences, our results indicate that beliefs held by upper-echelon executives are better explained with an alternate theoretical model based on social influence. Our pattern of results indicates support for the argument that beliefs are socially reproduced through interaction among executives.

Identifying the Ingroup: A Closer Look at the Influence of Demographic Dissimilarity on Employee Social Identity

Relational demography researchers have constructed models based on social identity theory and self-categorization theory, without fully incorporating their theoretical and empirical richness. We rectify this omission by constructing a model that includes key concepts from these theories and that predicts whether employees will identify with a particular demographic category or with their workgroup, or both. Propositions derived examine whether demographic dissimilarity will positively or negatively influence employee social identity.

Examining the effects of work externalization through the lens of social identity theory.

This study examines whether dissimilarity among employees that is based on their work status (i.e., whether they are temporary or internal workers) influences their organization-based self-esteem, their trust in and attraction toward their peers, and their altruism. A model that is based on social identity theory posits that work-status dissimilarity negatively influences each outcome variable and that the strength of this relationship varies depending on whether employees have temporary or internal status and the composition of their work groups. Results that are based on a survey of 326 employees (189 internal and 137 temporary) from 34 work groups, belonging to 2 organizations, indicate that work-status dissimilarity has a systematic negative effect only on outcomes related to internal workers when they work in temporary-worker-dominated groups.

The Asymmetrical Influence of Sex Dissimilarity in Distributive vs. Colocated Work Groups

Data from 101 Australian research scientists were used to examine the relationship between sex dissimilarity and work group identification, and task and emotional conflict. Based on social identity and self-categorization theories, these relationships were argued to vary between men and women, and between colocated and distributive work groups. Women reported lower levels of work group identification and higher levels of task and emotional conflict in conjunction with higher levels of sex dissimilarity. Men reported lower levels of task conflict in conjunction with higher levels of sex dissimilarity. No parallel effects on identification or emotional conflict were observed. Sex dissimilarity was found to have a stronger influence on work group identification, and task and emotional conflict in colocated work groups than in distributive work groups.

Extra-role behaviors among temporary workers: how firms create relational wealth in the United States of America

We examine temporary workers’ differential extra-role behaviors (ERBs) towards their client and employer; if this varied with the motivation of the worker for being temporary, whether these ERBs are affected by firms’ relationship management practices; and whether the ERBs aimed at the client and the employer impact subsequent outcomes. Results showed that temporary workers’ motivations are differentially related to agency and client directed ERBs. Agency ERBs were related to longer tenure with the agency, while client ERBs were associated with faster wage growth and more hours worked per week. Organizational relationship management practices elicit different client and agency directed ERBs.

Do Differences Matter? Understanding Demography-Related Effects in Organisations

This paper reviews a stream of research that examines the processes underlying effects related to demography and demographic differences. Three broad areas of research are discussed: (i) research examining whether differences in functional experience have an effect on how individuals view and interpret situations, (ii) research that examines whether and how dissimilarity in terms of demographic characteristics such as functional background, race, sex and age influences interpersonal dynamics and individual attitudes and behaviours, and (iii) research examining if effects related to work status dissimilarity parallel those of other demographic variables. We conclude with a discussion of avenues for future research, and managerial implications of this research.

Affective Antecedents of Intuitive Decision Making

Although the use of intuition in managerial decisions has been documented, many questions about the intuitive process and its antecedent stages remain unanswered, in particular the role of affective traits and states. The study reported in this article investigates whether decision makers who are more attuned to own emotions and experience a particular mood have an easier access to intuition. Our findings indicate that emotional awareness has indeed a positive effect on the use of intuition, which appears to be stronger for women. Surprisingly, positive and negative mood seem to influence intuition according to their intensity rather than positive/negative distinction.

Hearts and minds Integrating regulatory focus and relational demography to explain responses to dissimilarity

We develop a theoretical framework to explain why individuals respond differently to dissimilarity from their coworkers. We draw on regulatory focus theory to explore how chronic regulatory motivations cause individuals to view dissimilarity in terms of potential gains or losses. We use this argument to explain the mixed findings in previous research. We also use regulatory focus theory to predict individuals’ cognitive and affective responses to dissimilarity, and consequently to outcomes like relationships with coworkers, altruism, conflict in workgroups, and withdrawal from the workgroup. Finally we use regulatory focus theory to explore how situational features like the diversity climate of the organization and whether the focal individual is a token in the workgroup shape their responses to dissimilarity by triggering different regulatory motivations. Taken together our motivational model of relational demography provides an overarching framework for understanding how attributes of the individual and the situation predict how they will respond.

One foot in each camp: The dual identification of contract workers

Abstract The Society of Australasian Social Psychologists meeting held at Coolum, Queensland was attended by 150 social psychologists from Australia, New Zealand, Japan, USA, The Netherlands, and Belgium. One hundred and ten papers were organised into 11 symposia and several thematic sessions. Dr John Duckitt, University of Auckland, delivered the keynote address on ‘Personality, Worldview, and Prejudice.’ In addition a preconference for postgraduate students and new faculty was attended by 40 students. This preconference involved a morning session on publishing in social psychology taken by a panel of Professors Cynthia Gallois, Pat Noller, and Mike Hogg (The University of Queensland), Professor Mike Innes (Murdoch University), and Associate Professor Kip Williams (University of New South Wales). The afternoon session comprised two parallel streams on ‘Prejudice and Tolerance’ and ‘Social Dilemmas.’ The first was organised by Professor Mike Hogg (The University of Queensland) and involved contributions f...