Sources of Legitimation and their Effect on Decision Routines: An Experiment

• In Event: 029 - Regular Session. Group Processes

Abstract

An underlying and often taken for granted process in the creation of a social structure is legitimation - the process by which a social object is adhered to, deferred to, or supported even in the absence of obvious incentives to do so. A formal theory, which draws from theories of legitimation, expectation states theory, and institutional theory tests three sources of legitimation: a referential belief structure about expertise and leadership, authorization by a superordinate, and endorsement by group. The main questions addressed in this research are: 1) how different sources of legitimation make groups more or less hierarchical; and 2) how the different sources of legitimation make group routines more or less flexible. Predictions were based on theoretical derivations specifying that sources of legitimation vary in strength and their effects additive and cumulative. The 2x2 experimental design manipulates two sources of legitimation – authorization and endorsement – to be either consistent or inconsistent with the referential belief structure. Forty eight groups interacted over time on two very different tasks. Group interactions were videotaped, transcribed, and coded for various measures of hierarchy and group routines. Authorization and endorsement demonstrated independent effects, but rarely were they cumulative. Authorization appeared to be redundant with the referential structure; endorsement was often a stronger source of legitimation, but may have created instability. Groups that were more hierarchical were less likely to change their routines, even when faced with a very different task from the ones in which the routines were developed.

Authors

• Anna Johansson, Harvard University

• Bianca Nicole Manago, Indiana University