The Biological Foundations of Organizational Behavior

Stephen M. Colarelli, Richard D. Arvey, Stephen M. Colarelli, Richard D. Arvey

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9780226127293
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

In recent years, evolutionary psychology and behavioral genetics have emerged as prominent theoretical perspectives within the social sciences. Yet despite broad levels of commonality between the disciplines—including an emphasis on adaptation, evolved mechanisms that guide behavior, and consequences of mismatch between these mechanisms and novel environments—studies that apply these perspectives on social behavior to organizations remain relatively rare. The Biological Foundations of Organizational Behavior brings together contributors who shed light on the potential that behavioral genetics and evolutionary psychology offer for studies of organizational behavior. In addition to examining the extant literature integrating these disciplines and organizational behavior, the book reconsiders a wide range of topics through the lens of biology within organizational behavior, including decision making, leadership and hierarchy, goals and collective action, and individual difference. Contributions also explore new areas of potential application and provide a critical assessment of the challenges that lie ahead. With accessible insights for scholars and practitioners, The Biological Foundations of Organizational Behavior marks a promising step forward in what is increasingly perceived to be an underdeveloped area of organizational behavior.

ONE

Introduction: Biology and Organizational Behavior

Stephen M. Colarelli and Richard D. Arvey*

It has been more than two hundred years since Charles Darwin’s birth, and his theory of evolution by natural selection has had an incalculable impact on science and society. A majority of nonscientists (except in the United States) and virtually all scientists in industrialized countries now regard all life as the product of evolution by natural selection (Miller, Scott, and Okamoto 2006). Prior to Darwin, from Aristotle to the nineteenth century, people believed that forms of life were created whole in a matter of moments and never changed. Darwin turned all this on its head, showing that life forms evolve and change over eons of time.¹ What Newton and Einstein did for the way we think about space, time, and matter, Darwin did for the way we think about life and time. Darwin’s theory did more than change our epistemology of life: it had a tremendous scientific and practical impact. Together with Mendel’s discovery of the mechanism of inheritance (genetics), the theory of evolution by natural selection shaped the modern life sciences—biology, medicine and pharmacology, genetics, and neuroscience.² In addition to exponential advances in plant genetics, basic research in both evolutionary biology and genetics has yielded equally remarkable advances in animal husbandry, medicine, and pharmacology (Carroll et al. 2003; Dekkers and Hospital 2002). While startling results from these theories (such as animal cloning) make headlines, many practical advances go unnoticed because, like the air we breathe, they are all around us.

Given the impact of biology on so many areas of science and the economy, it seems odd that modern genetics and the theory of evolution by natural selection have had such a small impact on the study of organizational behavior (OB). In four leading journals in OB from the years 2005 through 2012, we found just six articles with biological, evolutionary, or genetic orientations.³ Although the literature on occupational stress and occupational health refers to biological mechanisms of stress, there is little mention of evolution and genetics (Ganster and Rosen 2013), despite the obvious linkages (e.g., Hadany et al. 2006; Hoffman and Parsons 1993). Likewise, the organizational literature on sex differences eschews biological explanations (Powell 2010), something that most biologists would most certainly find strange.

We are biological creatures, and therefore our biological makeup influences our behavior—not entirely, but most certainly in important ways. Organizational scholars are missing a significant piece of the puzzle by overlooking biological mechanisms. Just as other social sciences have benefited by incorporating a biological perspective, the field of OB can benefit by incorporating a biological perspective into its theoretical and research toolkits. We are not claiming to know precisely how biological factors may influence theory and research in OB or that we can draw a blueprint of the biological implications for management practice. But, given the evidence, it would be prudent to take stock of what we do know about biology and behavior in organizations and to begin to think about biology’s potential relevance for management practice.

WHY SO LITTLE BIOLOGY IN ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR?

Much of OB is still dominated by what Tooby and Cosmides (1992) call the “standard social science model” (SSSM), and this has slowed the acceptance of biological perspectives. The SSSM holds that most of the variation in human behavior is due to culture and socialization, and that humans are unique among species in that biological and instinctual constraints play a relatively small role in their behavior. The SSSM is evident in theories of sex differences (e.g., Hyde 2007), learning and training (e.g., Luthans 1975; Meichenbaum 1977), organizational culture (e.g., Schein 1985), and newcomer socialization (Ashkanasy, Wilderom, and Peterson 2003; Feldman and Bolino 1999). Cognitive psychology (which also views the mind as highly malleable, fallible, and shaped primarily marily by cultural inputs) has had a powerful impact on OB in many areas—ranging from individual and organizational learning (Crossan et al. 1995) to planning and decision making (Choo 1998).

The SSSM’s prominence in the social sciences began in the early twentieth century and, though diminished, persists today. The SSSM arose from a confluence of intellectual and social trends: the rise of the social sciences and debates about how they could improve society, social Darwinism and its antagonists, intellectual turf battles in anthropology, and the rise of behaviorism in psychology. At the same time there were heated debates about the causes of, and solutions to, social problems and economic inequality. In one camp were the reformers, attributing social problems to the environment and advocating social and economic changes to remedy these problems. In the other camp were social Darwinists and eugenicists. Social Darwinists (a label popularized by the historian Richard Hoffsteader in the 1940s) refers to scholars who equated survival of the fittest with socioeconomic status, took a laissez-faire approach to social policies, and did not support social welfare programs. They felt that aiding those in need would violate a fundamental biological law (Richards 1987). Eugenics (a term coined by Francis Galton) advocated selective breeding as a means to improve society (e.g., see Brookes 2004).

These were not fringe movements led by crackpots; they were popular social philosophies articulated by prominent intellectuals and academics (e.g., Yerkes at Harvard; Thorndike at Columbia; William Graham Sumner at Yale) who, unfortunately, did not understand evolutionary theory and genetics. For example, equating survival of the fittest with socioeconomic status reveals a misunderstanding of Darwinian fitness. Fitness in the classical Darwinian sense refers to the number of offspring surviving to reproductive age, not one’s standing in the pecking order. By the 1930s the intellectual tide began to turn against the social Darwinists and eugenicists, and this trend continued until the late twentieth century—so that any evolutionary perspective on human nature became tainted by association. The wrongheaded association of evolutionary theory with social Darwinism and eugenics constricted discourse and scientific progress in evolutionary approaches in the social sciences, and these associations still influence the thinking of some management and OB scholars.

Another reason that management scholars may be hesitant to embrace a biological perspective is that biology may seem uncontrollable. Management, on the other hand, implies control. Managers are supposed to plan and manipulate organizations to achieve the desired results. Management scholars may believe that biological factors are inherently unmanageable because they are more or less fixed and therefore less amenable to change (Sewell 2004). However, this is not necessarily the case. Consider aging. People grow old; aging is an inevitable biological process. However, understanding the nature of that biological process enables us to have some effect on how quickly we age. We know that aging is caused by the body’s loss of ability to repair routine (and nonroutine) cell damage. Taking care of our health will minimize cell damage and can slow down the aging process. Quitting smoking, eating sensibly, and exercising all affect cell health and can keep people youthful longer. Most scholars in any field, we presume, believe in using medical interventions based on modern biological science because they implicitly accept the causal connection between biology and health and the efficacy of treatments based on that knowledge. The same logic applies to organizationally relevant biological factors. So why not accept that biological factors also influence people’s behavior in organizations and that the use of that knowledge can positively influence the management of people in organizations?

A biological perspective on OB is simply part of the universe of information that managers can use in making decisions about organizational design and goals (Richerson, Collins, and Genet 2006; Tooby, Cosmides, and Price 2006). Biological knowledge is another level of knowledge for managers and management scholars. Managers (or anyone else who works in an organization) will be empowered by a deeper understanding of biological influences and motivations. If biology provides useful insights about how people respond to dominance hierarchies (Nicholson 1998) or leaders (Van Vugt, Hogan, and Kaiser 2008), about what types of environments are most compatible with the human animal (Foley 2005), or about the products or services to which people are most likely to respond positively (Colarelli and Dettman 2003; Miller 2009), then it can be a useful addition to the manager’s and management scholar’s toolkit.

INCORPORATING BIOLOGICAL EXPLANATIONS INTO ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR

Advancing Theory

A biological understanding of human behavior is very much a part of modern science now, making it all the more timely for management and OB scholars to incorporate biological influences into their work. A biological explanation will help us to identify mechanisms that account for regularities in organizational behavior. The addition of biological theory and research to OB will increase its explanatory and predictive power by providing a meta-theoretic foundation.

OB is an interdisciplinary field, and adding a biological lens should encourage broader interdisciplinary collaboration. Interdisciplinary collaboration among biologists and social scientists is becoming increasingly important as we learn more about the biological mechanisms that influence human behavior (Cacioppo et al. 2000). A deeper interdisciplinary understanding of the physiological and neurological mechanisms (and their adaptive functions) can augment our ability to enhance learning, engineer suitable environments, and integrate technology with the human body and mind.⁴ Furthermore, biology and evolutionary psychology can help bring a strong comparative perspective to OB. How is the organization of human groups similar to the organization of groups in other species? What might be common mechanisms? How do we differ?

Consider sex differences. Although men and women share many physiological and psychological similarities, they also differ (Geary 1998). Evolutionary and biological perspectives can help identify the differences that are salient in organizational settings, and this can have positive effects for women (Colarelli, Spranger, and Hechanova 2006). One well-documented result of not taking sex differences into account is the increase in anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries among women. The past twenty years have witnessed dramatic increases in women’s participation in organized athletics (Women and Sport Commission 2012), but adjustments in training and technique to compensate for anatomical differences have been insufficient. Because the female femur angles more sharply at the knee than the male femur, women’s ACLs may be more affected by excess strain, which can result in devastating injuries. Such injuries are less likely, however, if training practices and techniques are adjusted for this difference (Hutchinson and Ireland 1995). Studying sex differences in leadership, one finds human groups dominated by male leaders. In other social species, however (bonobos, elephants, hyenas, wild horses), females are the leaders. What are the contextual or biological mechanisms that lead to female leadership in those species? What are the characteristics of female leadership in those species, and what implications might this knowledge have for understanding leadership in human organizations?

Advancing Practice

Interventions are much more likely to work when they are based on an accurate view of human nature. If our fundamental assumptions about human nature or human systems are inaccurate, interventions based on those assumptions are likely to be ineffective. To use an example from psychiatry, almost no progress was made in treating autism, depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia when the understanding and treatment of these illnesses were based on Freudian theories. The causal mechanisms that Freudians proposed (e.g., unconscious conflict, bad parenting) were incorrect. Major advances in treating these illnesses occurred only after scientists began to gain an accurate understanding of the mechanisms (psychological and biological) that cause these illnesses (Charney and Nestler 2004). For example, Bruno Bettelheim, a neo-Freudian, argued that cold (what became known as “refrigerator”) mothers caused autism (Bettelheim and Sylvester 1950). Bettelheim’s prescription for “curing” autism, therefore, was family therapy, principally directed at improving mothering. Not only was his causal explanation incorrect and his treatment ineffective, but his treatment had a devastating effect on many well-meaning and good mothers—making them feel personally responsible for their child’s autism. We now know that a complex of genetic and other biological factors causes autism (Morrow et al. 2009; Sutcliffe 2009) and that training women to be “better mothers” will have no effect. Other approaches, based on a more accurate understanding of the etiology of the illness, are more appropriate (Gaines et al. 2010).

A better biological understanding of people’s behavior in organizations should also improve the design and execution of organizational interventions. An evolutionary and biologically based understanding should increase the probability of designing successful interventions. Organizational interventions will not succeed if they are based on an inaccurate understanding of human nature.

WHY THIS BOOK?

Biology needs to be a part of the conversation in OB. Our aim is to provide a conceptual and empirical underpinning so that biology can become a full and recognized part of the levels of analysis in OB. The purposes of this book, therefore, are to (1) start a dialogue bet...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Copyright
• Title Page
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• 1. Introduction: Biology and Organizational Behavior
• Genetics, Individual Differences, and Work Behavior
• Physiology and Organizational Behavior
• Evolution and Organization
• Challenges Ahead
• Notes
• Contributors
• Index