What we can gain from losses

Organizations often promote diversity by touting the benefits people can enjoy from collaborating across boundaries. The present research, however, suggests that organizations may be better served by representing those positive outcomes as the losses people would suffer by neglecting cross-group collaboration. Three studies test the prediction that employing the latter, loss-focused frame would increase willingness to collaborate with outgroup members to a greater extent than the former, gain-focused frame. It was further predicted that the effect would emerge primarily for those people who believe that cross-group collaboration is a somewhat (rather than not at all, or extremely) risky prospect. When perceptions of risk are extremely low, I argue that there is nothing to deter individuals from pursuing cross-group collaboration, so any message about its benefits (regardless of framing) is likely to produce near-maximal willingness to collaborate. A different, though functionally equivalent problem should emerge for those who believe cross-group collaboration is extremely risky. High-risk perceivers may be so skeptical of diversity's benefits that they perceive neither the gain nor loss of those benefits to be compelling. For medium risk perceivers, however, evaluations of diversity's costs and benefits are more equivocal, enabling framing to exert a significant influence. By increasing the judgmental weight given to cross-group collaboration's positive outcomes, and by making salient the threat of losing those benefits, the loss frame should be uniquely able to substantially increase willingness to collaborate with outgroup members. Evidence from the present research provides support for the hypotheses regarding low and medium risk perceivers, and is inconclusive regarding the framing effect for high risk perceivers.