No abstract

Research Question Whether and how women directors influence firms' engagement in socially responsible business practices and social reputation among diverse stakeholders is unclear due to conflicting empirical evidence, the lack of a coherent theory linking these variables, and inattention to the national contexts in which these relationships occurs. Research Findings Results from our meta‐analysis of 87 independent samples suggest that, while generally positive, the female board representation–social performance relationship is even more positive in national contexts when boards may be more motivated to draw on the resources that women directors bring to a board (i.e., among firms operating in countries with stronger shareholder protections) and in contexts where intra‐board power distribution may be more balanced (i.e., in countries with higher gender parity). Theoretical Implications Future studies should more attentively examine how firms' institutional contexts enhance or mitigate the relationship between women's representation on boards and corporate social performance. Our findings also highlight the need for a comprehensive understanding of the social performance‐related knowledge, perspectives, and values that men and women bring to boards. Practitioner/Policy Implications Our results suggest that, to enhance any benefits of diversity for corporate social performance, efforts be directed at holding boards more accountable toward diverse stakeholders and improving the status of women in society and in the workforce.

Although many scholars and practitioners are interested in understanding how to motivate individuals to be more creative, whether and how rewards affect creativity remain unclear. We argue that the conflicting evidence may be due to differences between studies in terms of reward conditions and the context in which rewards are offered. Specifically, we examine 5 potential moderators of the rewards-creative performance relationship: (a) the reward contingency, (b) the extent to which participants are provided information about their past or current creative performance, (c) the extent to which the reward and context offer choice or impose control, (d) the extent to which the context serves to enhance task engagement, and (e) the extent to which the performance tasks are complex. Using random-effects models, we meta-analyzed 60 experimental and nonexperimental studies (including 69 independent samples) that examined the rewards-creativity relationship with children or adults. Our results suggest that creativity-contingent rewards tend to increase creative performance-and are more positively related to creative performance when individuals are given more positive, contingent, and task-focused performance feedback and are provided more choice (and are less controlled). In contrast, performance-contingent or completion-contingent rewards tend to have a slight negative effect on creative performance.

Although increased board independence is a commonly offered solution to curbing corporate misconduct, scholars have expressed skepticism about its effectiveness, and empirical evidence is mixed. We argue that the relationship between board independence and corporate misconduct is likely nuanced—and may vary by the type of independence (e.g., independence on the whole board or on the audit committee) and by national context. We conducted a meta-analysis of 135 studies spanning more than 20 countries. We find that the board independence–corporate misconduct relationship (a) is generally negative, (b) varies based on the implementation form that independence takes on (i.e., independence of the whole board, on the audit committee, or between the roles of CEO and board chair), and (c) is more strongly negative in countries with less corruption. We advance corporate governance theory and research by demonstrating that the popular governance practice of increasing board independence must both account for the manner in which independence is implemented and consider the powerful influence of firms’ broader societal context to clearly understand its effect. Further, based on our review of the literature, we uncover opportunities for the advancement of corporate governance and corporate misconduct research.

Extensive research suggests when and how anxiety has debilitating or facilitating effects on routine cognitive tasks or motor tasks. However, research examining anxiety's relation to performance on creative tasks such as divergent thinking and artistic tasks is less conclusive despite a rather substantial literature. The authors' meta-analytic investigation of 59 independent samples finds that anxiety is significantly and negatively related to creative performance. In addition, the findings provide insights into factors such as task complexity, type of task (i.e., figural or verbal), and type of anxiety (i.e., state or trait) that moderate the relationship between anxiety and creativity-all of which are consistent with the idea that anxiety and creativity present competing cognitive demands. In addition to identifying gaps in the literature such as the need for research using a two-component model of anxiety in relation to creativity, the authors' results have practical implications for those seeking to increase individual creativity.