Page 67 - Discrimination at Work The Psychological and Organizational Bases

RIORDAN, SCHAFFER, STEWART
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Because relational demography theory focuses on the individual's re­
actions to being similar or different from his/her workgroup on personal
characteristics, it is commonly thought to be a direct test of the impact of
diversity on individuals. To date, much of the research on relational de­
mography within groups has focused on outcomes such as organizational
commitment, turnover, job satisfaction, group cohesiveness, group com­
munication, and perceptions of rewards, such as advancement opportuni­
ties (e.g., Jackson et al, 1991; Riordan & Shore, 1997; Tsui et al, 1992; Zenger
& Lawrence, 1989). The theoretical foundation of relational demography
suggests that being different than others can negatively affect an individ-
ual's attitudes and behaviors. For example, Wagner, Pfeffer, and O'Reilly
(1984) found that within top management teams, managers who differed
in age from the others were more likely to leave the organization. Similarly,
Chatman and Flynn (2001) found that newcomers to workgroups (tenure
dissimilarity to others) perceived work group norms as less cooperative
than veteran group members.
Because relational demography theory suggests that demographic dis­
similarity has negative effects on individuals, it is logical that perceptions of
discrimination and exclusionary behaviors would be promixal outcomes
of relational demography within groups. Yet, little research has actually
examined the impact of relational demography within groups on discrimi­
nation type outcomes such as racism and sexism. The purpose of this chap­
ter, therefore, is to review the relational demography literature through the
lens of discrimination.
We first briefly review the basic theoretical premises of relational de­
mography theory. We then propose a model by which to examine relational
demography through the lens of discrimination. Through this model, we
give consideration to the factors and outcomes that accompany relational
and group sources of discrimination and suggest directions for future re­
search on relational demography and discrimination.

RELATIONAL DEMOGRAPHY THEORY
Five interrelated theoretical perspectives have been used to explain re­
lational demography in the workplace context. The first two are Byrne's
(1971) similarity-attraction paradigm, and Schneider's (1987) attraction-
selection-attrition model. The third is the collective set of perspectives
encompassing both social identity and self-categorization theories (Hogg
& Terry, 2000). The final two perspectives are the value-in-diversity and
tokenism hypotheses. The following sections briefly review these five pers­
pectives and, where appropriate, note their relationship to discriminatory