Diversity of Thought is What Matters for Decision Making Advantages

Lots of studies of intellectual diversity suggest it helps with decision making. Conversely, one might argue, if all the members of a team, a company, a community or a group have the same points of view, then there really is not much diversity of thought, and the advantage of diversity is lost. That likely is true no matter the amount of gender, race, culture or other forms of physical diversity within groups that think the same. 

It’s the thinking; the intellectual diversity, that really matters. 

Study / Source	Researchers	Key Insight on “Diversity of Thought” for Problem-Solving	Year	Source
“Groups of diverse problem solvers can outperform groups of high-ability problem solvers”	Lu Hong & Scott E. Page (U. Michigan)	Cognitive-heuristic variety in a group beats sheer individual ability; “diversity trumps ability.”	2004	pnas.org
The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools, and Societies	Scott E. Page (U. Michigan / Santa Fe Institute)	Formal models and real-world cases show perspective/heuristic diversity improves prediction, innovation, and collective accuracy.	2007	muse.jhu.edu
“How Diversity Makes Us Smarter” (Scientific American)	Katherine W. Phillips (Columbia Business School)	Exposure to socially or cognitively different others makes groups more diligent, creative, and accurate.	2014	scientificamerican.com
“Likes Attract: The Sociopolitical Groupthink of (Social) Psychologists”	Richard E. Redding (Chapman U.)	Lack of ideological diversity in psychology skews research agendas and peer review; calls for broader viewpoint inclusion.	2012	journals.sagepub.com
Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln	Doris Kearns Goodwin (historian)	Lincoln’s intentionally ideologically mixed cabinet generated vigorous debate and better wartime strategy.	2005	ft.com
“Diversity in Teams: A Two-Edged Sword”	Katherine Y. Williams & Charles O’Reilly (Stanford)	Functional/cognitive diversity boosts creativity on non-routine tasks but can raise conflict—management practices determine net benefit.	1998 – 1999	psychologicalscience.org
“Political Diversity Will Improve Social Psychological Science”	Jonathan Haidt, José Duarte & Lee Jussim	Reviews evidence that viewpoint homogeneity fosters confirmation bias; argues political diversity strengthens methodology and theory.	2015	pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
“Getting Unusual Suspects to Solve R&D Puzzles” (Harvard Business Review)	Karim R. Lakhani & Lars B. Jeppesen	Crowdsourcing to outsiders with varied backgrounds solves R&D problems stumping in-house experts—illustrates value of cognitive distance.	2007	hbr.org