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Rating Performance or Contesting Status: Evidence Against the Homophily Explanation for Supervisor Demographic Skew in Performance Ratings

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  • Jone L. Pearce

    (The Paul Merage School of Business, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, California 92697)

  • Qiumei Jane Xu

    (College of Business and Management, Northeastern Illinois University, Chicago, Illinois 60625)

Abstract

We propose and test an argument in which the well-documented skew in supervisory performance appraisal ratings toward those with the same demography as themselves is better explained by the status contests than the reigning theory of homophily. We conduct the test in a field study of 358 supervisor–subordinate dyads in 10 organizations, using hierarchical linear modeling with various controls. We find that supervisors' ratings of subordinates' contextual and task performance only skew toward similar subordinates when supervisors' status is contested by a higher demographic status subordinate, as predicted by social dominance and status characteristics theories. None of the general homophily preference hypotheses is supported. This study provides a richer theory more consistent with the accumulating evidence about demography effects in organizations and demonstrates the value of head-to-head strong inference tests and status explanations for the field of organizational behavior.

Suggested Citation

  • Jone L. Pearce & Qiumei Jane Xu, 2012. "Rating Performance or Contesting Status: Evidence Against the Homophily Explanation for Supervisor Demographic Skew in Performance Ratings," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 23(2), pages 373-385, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:ororsc:v:23:y:2012:i:2:p:373-385
    DOI: 10.1287/orsc.1100.0585
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Fang Shuai, 2019. "Homophily Exclusion or Homophily Preference? The Influence of the Executive Identity of Nonexecutive Directors on the Focal Firm Executive Pay and Ordinary Employee Pay," Journal of Systems Science and Information, De Gruyter, vol. 7(6), pages 550-567, December.
    2. van Hoorn, Andr, 2016. "How are migrant employees manages? An integrated analysis," Research Report 16001-GEM, University of Groningen, Research Institute SOM (Systems, Organisations and Management).
    3. Balazs Szatmari & Dirk Deichmann & Jan van den Ende & Brayden G. King, 2021. "Great Successes and Great Failures: The Impact of Project Leader Status on Project Performance and Performance Extremeness," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(5), pages 1267-1293, July.
    4. Christopher C. Rosen & D. Lance Ferris & Douglas J. Brown & Yuanyi Chen & Ming Yan, 2014. "Perceptions of Organizational Politics: A Need Satisfaction Paradigm," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(4), pages 1026-1055, August.
    5. Ya-Ru Chen & Randall S. Peterson & Damon J. Phillips & Joel M. Podolny & Cecilia L. Ridgeway, 2012. "Introduction to the Special Issue: Bringing Status to the Table—Attaining, Maintaining, and Experiencing Status in Organizations and Markets," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 23(2), pages 299-307, April.
    6. Gokhan Ertug & Martin Gargiulo & Charles Galunic & Tengjian Zou, 2018. "Homophily and Individual Performance," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(5), pages 912-930, October.

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