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  • Academy of Management Annals

Past, Present and Future Research on Multiple Identities: Toward an Intrapersonal Network Approach

By: Lakshmi Ramarajan
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Abstract

Psychologists, sociologists, and philosophers have long recognized that people have multiple identities—based on attributes such as organizational membership, profession, gender, ethnicity, religion, nationality, and family role(s) and that these multiple identities shape people's actions in organizations. The current organizational literature on multiple identities, however, is sparse and scattered and has yet to fully capture this foundational idea. I review and organize the literature on multiple identities into five different theoretical perspectives: social psychological; microsociological; psychodynamic and developmental; critical; and intersectional. I then propose a way to take research on multiple identities forward using an intrapersonal identity network approach. Moving to an identity network approach offers two advantages: first, it enables scholars to consider more than two identities simultaneously, and second, it helps scholars examine relationships among identities in greater detail. This is important because preliminary evidence suggests that multiple identities shape important outcomes in organizations, such as individual stress and well-being, intergroup conflict, performance, and change. By providing a way to investigate patterns of relationships among multiple identities, the identity network approach can help scholars deepen their understanding of the consequences of multiple identities in organizations and spark novel research questions in the organizational literature.

Keywords

Networks; Research; Organizations; Identity

Citation

Ramarajan, Lakshmi. "Past, Present and Future Research on Multiple Identities: Toward an Intrapersonal Network Approach." Academy of Management Annals 8 (2014): 589–659.
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About The Author

Lakshmi Ramarajan

Organizational Behavior
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More from the Author
  • Nadine Vogel: Transforming the Marketplace, Workplace, and Workforce for People with Disabilities By: Lakshmi Ramarajan, Hannah Riley-Bowles and Michael Norris
  • Leading Change in Talent at L'Oréal By: Lakshmi Ramarajan, Vincent Dessain and Emer Moloney
  • Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn: The Power of Writing to Launch and Sustain a Movement (Abridged) By: Julie Battilana, Lakshmi Ramarajan and Michael Norris
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