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As a vital driver of team performance, cognitive diversity is of central interest to managers; however, the way in which cognitive diversity promotes superior team performance remains unclear. In this paper, we present a formal model that suggests the existence of the mediating effect
of alertness in this relationship. A quantitative method with multiple mediation models was applied to a sample of 1,020 members from 191 teams in China. Our results suggested that cognitive diversity had a significantly positive effect on team performance. Moreover, the mediating effects
of the 3 dimensions of alertness (information accumulation, information transformation, and information selection) were verified via a Sobel test. The implications of our findings, the limitations thereof, and possible directions for future research are discussed.

The growing research literature on cognitive diversity in teams has multidisciplinary and international relevance. However, the varied conceptual and operational definitions restrict theory development and comparisons of empirical results. The purpose of the present article is to provide guidance for the systematic study of cognitive diversity and team functioning. We demonstrate that organization of the literature is necessary and offer an organizing heuristic based on the stability of the cognitive diversity conceptualization. Using this framework, we review the empirical findings for the effects of cognitive diversity on team criteria. Then, we address methodological issues and describe the manners in which cognitive diversity has been composed to the team level. Following each section we offer summary findings, critique the state of the literature, and offer guidance for future research. There are opportunities for researchers to enhance precision in theory and measurement and for integration across disciplines.

According to the diversity-beats-ability theorem, groups of diverse problem solvers can outperform groups of high-ability problem solvers (Hong and Page 2004). This striking claim about the power of cognitive diversity is highly influential within and outside academia, from democratic theory to management of teams in professional organizations. Our replication and analysis of the models used by Hong and Page suggests, however, that both the binary string model and its one-dimensional variant are inadequate for exploring the trade-off between cognitive diversity and ability. Diversity may sometimes beat ability, but the models fail to provide reliable evidence of if and when it does so. We suggest ways in which these important model templates can be improved.

AbstractMany epistemologists endorse a view I call "evidence essentialism:" ifeis evidence ofh, for some agent at some time, then necessarily,eis evidence ofh, for any agent at any time. I argue that such a view is only plausible if we ignore cognitive diversity among epistemic agents, i.e., the fact that different agents have different—sometimes radically different—cognitive skills, abilities, and proclivities. Instead, cognitive diversity shows that evidential relations are contingent and relative to cognizers. This is especially obvious in extreme cases (from pathological to gifted agents) and in connection with epistemic defeat, but it is also very plausibly true of ordinary agents, and regarding prima facie justification.

AbstractInRisk, Uncertainty and Profit(RUP), Knight (1921) develops a theory of the firm that stresses the important role of entrepreneurial judgment for a firm's success. For Knight, entrepreneurial judgment is first and foremost the selection of 'proxy entrepreneurs' who are capable of making good judgments under uncertainty. In this sense, entrepreneurial judgment is essentially 'judgment of judgment'. An overlooked implication of Knight's position is the fact that it leads to an endorsement of distributed entrepreneurship and responsibility. We deem this a very modern idea that challenges a completely hierarchical understanding of the firm. Knight himself does not thoroughly examine the institutional implications of the analytical framework he sets up in RUP. In this paper, we summarize the 'philosophical vision' of Knight's framework and illustrate his rationale behind the distribution of entrepreneurship. We conclude the paper with a discussion of potential institutional implications by referring to the danger ofmonocultures, the additional value created bycognitively diverse teams, and the effectiveness ofventure capitalists.

This paper reports on a series of experiments designed to assess the impact of grouping decision makers by level of cognitive complexity on the outcomes they attain in crisis negotiations. The participants—University of Maryland undergraduates who took roles in a simulated international hostage crisis—used a computer decision support system and a controlled network environment for communications. The goal of the experiments was to better understand the dynamics that lead certain types of groupings to have greater success in negotiations, and that lead certain groups of adversaries to achieve more mutually beneficial outcomes such as compromise and agreement. The findings point to a positive relationship between the level of homogeneity in cognitive complexity among decision makers and the achievement of positive outcomes in crisis negotiations.

AbstractThe social epistemology of science would benefit from paying more attention to the nature of argumentative exchanges. Argumentation is not only a cognitive activity but a collaborative social activity whose functioning needs to be understood from a psychological and communicative perspective. Thus far, social and organizational psychology has been used to discuss how social diversity affects group deliberation by changing the mindset of the participants. Argumentative exchanges have comparable effects, but they depend on cognitive diversity and emerge through critical interaction. An example of a cognitive psychological theory is discussed that explains how mutual reasoning affects how we think, make decisions, and solve problems, as well as how cognitive biases may facilitate an efficient division of cognitive labor. These observations are compared with the existing results in the social epistemology of science. Moreover, I explicate the conceptual differences between the distributed and social processing of information. While argumentative exchanges belong to the latter domain, most existing simulations model distributed processing, which may compromise their real-world relevance and proper conceptual interpretation. However, I aim not to criticize the existing simulation methods but to promote an approach from the cognitive psychology of reasoning that complements the current use of organizational psychology and computer simulations by investigating a different set of mechanisms relating to similar phenomena of interest in the social epistemology of science.