Diversity and creativity in organizations

Diversity of information and perspectives is a key resource for individuals and teams in their creative efforts. In this chapter, we take stock of the state of the science in behavioral research on the relationship between diversity and creativity (including innovation). The bulk of this research concerns team diversity and its influence on team creativity and innovation, but there is also a more modest set of studies concerning the influence of team diversity and diversity in individuals’ social network on individual creativity. We conclude that the evidence by and large is well aligned with the theoretical framework provided by the categorization-elaboration model. Building from that conclusion, we also identify the importance of more programmatic future research that explicitly builds on an overarching theoretical framework and that in doing so bridges individual and team levels of analysis.