The Influence of Gender and Race in Fostering Innovation in Engineering Teams

这项研究考察了多样性和工程团队动力的相互作用如何影响工作场所的创新。研究人员应用分类细化模型(CEM)来调查为什么简单地将女性或种族/少数民族包括在工程团队中不会自动导致更大的创新。该模型协调了关于团队多样性和团队绩效的不一致文献，并解决了团队多样性何时以及如何与各种绩效指标(如创造力、创新、团队有效性和绩效)产生正相关的根本问题。这项研究通过明确地将团队多样性的类型与创新联系起来，同时检查团队动力学、团队小气候和团队认知，以突出促进或阻碍不同团队创新的因素，通过收集两年的数据来增加时间因素，并检查在该领域工作的工程师团队的多样性创新过程。调查人员将使用一些变量，如开发团队的价值、激进程度和数量？S在新兴技术中的专利。研究结果将通过确定特定的团队动力和促进不同团队实现创新目标的微气候来影响工程公司的组织实践。该项目是一项大规模的量化调查，将团队多样性和团队动力与团队绩效和创新指标(主要是专利)联系起来。这项研究将收集5,234名工程专业校友的数据，他们之前参与了一项由美国国家科学基金会资助的关于影响工程专业生涯持久性的背景障碍的纵向研究。它将调查四个研究问题：(1)必须具备哪些条件来促进/阻碍人口和信息多样化的团队产生创新的解决方案？(2)人口和信息多样化的团队产生创新解决方案的潜在机制是什么？(3)解释人口和信息多样化的团队、信息、讨论过程和创新之间的关系的潜在机制是什么？以及(4)在两年的研究期间，这些过程是如何变化的？CEM假设，影响多样性和创新之间关系的不是性别、种族多元化的团队和创新之间的直接关系，而是团队内部的因素和团队动力。研究人员将使用分层线性回归、中介分析和方差分析来检验这六个假设。该项目得到了ECR计划的支持，该计划强调STEM教育的基础研究，以产生该领域的基础知识。在基本、广泛和持久的关键领域进行投资：STEM学习和STEM学习环境，扩大STEM的参与，以及STEM劳动力发展。ECR支持积累强有力的证据，为理解、构建解释理论并提出干预和创新建议的努力提供信息，以应对STEM兴趣、教育、学习和参与方面的持续挑战。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The study examines how the interaction of diversity and engineering team dynamics impact innovation in the workplace. The investigators apply the Categorization Elaboration Model (CEM) to investigate why simply including women or racial/ethnic minorities on engineering teams does not lead automatically to greater innovation. The model reconciles the inconsistent literature on team diversity and team performance and addresses the fundamental question of when and how team diversity can have a positive relationship with various indicators of performance such as creativity, innovation, team effectiveness, and performance. The study adds to the research literature by explicitly linking types of team diversity with innovation; simultaneously examining team dynamics, team microclimate, and team cognition to highlight factors that facilitate or impede innovation in diverse teams; adding temporal elements by collecting data over a two-year period; and examining the diversity-innovation process among teams of working engineers in the field. Investigators will use variables such as the value, radicalness, and number of a development team?s patents in emergent technologies. The research findings will influence organizational practices within engineering firms by identifying specific team dynamics and microclimates that facilitate innovation goal achievement by diverse teams.The project is a large scale quantitative survey linking team diversity and team dynamics to team performance and metrics of innovation, primarily patents. The study will collect data from 5,234 engineering alumni who participated in a prior NSF funded longitudinal study about contextual barriers that impact persistence in engineering careers. It will investigate four research questions: (1) What conditions must be in place to facilitate/hinder demographically and informationally diverse teams to produce innovative solutions? (2) What are the underlying mechanisms by which demographically and informationally diverse teams produce innovative solutions? (3) What are the underlying mechanisms that explain the relationship between demographically and informationally diverse teams, information, discussion process, and innovation? and (4) How do these processes vary over the study period of two years? The CEM hypothesizes that it is not direct relationships between gender and racially diverse teams and innovation but factors within the team and team dynamics that influence the relationship between diversity and innovation. The investigators will use hierarchical linear regression, mediation analysis, and ANOVA to test the six hypotheses. The project is supported by the ECR program that emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that generates foundational knowledge in the field. Investments are made in critical areas that are essential, broad and enduring: STEM learning and STEM learning environments, broadening participation in STEM, and STEM workforce development. ECR supports the accumulation of robust evidence to inform efforts to understand, build theory to explain, and suggest intervention and innovations to address persistent challenges in STEM interest, education, learning and participation.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.