Focus: Moving beyond labels, shared mental models, the "Diversity Gap" and advanced psychometrics (McDonald's Omega).
1. The Transdiagnostic Revolution & Neurobiological Mechanisms
This cluster reflects the newest, groundbreaking shift within psychiatry and neuroscience: abandoning rigid, discrete labels in favor of a spectrum-wide, transdiagnostic approach to the brain.
The transdiagnostic approach and brain systems
- Astle et al. (2022); Fletcher-Watson (2022) — The transdiagnostic revolution in neurodevelopmental disorders; foundational for moving beyond classic pigeonholing.
- Apperly et al. (2024) — The N+4 model for a transdiagnostic approach to neurodiversity in population studies.
- Ashinoff & Abu-Akel (2021) — Hyperfocus: in-depth research into this underexamined but crucial attentional mechanism.
- Goldberg (2023) — Insights into neurodiversity from purely neuroscientific perspectives.
Identity, intersectionality and (self-)diagnosis
- Doyle (2020) — The biopsychosocial model of neurodiversity in the workplace.
- Cobbaert et al. (2024) — Neurodivergence viewed through the lens of intersectionality (the crossing of unique identity characteristics).
- Fellowes (2024); Overton et al. (2023); Lewis (2021) — The validity, mechanisms and barriers around adult (self-)diagnosis and identification on the autism spectrum.
- Kroll et al. (2024) — The positive impact of identity-affirming approaches for neurodivergent individuals.
2. The Cognitive Architecture of Teams: Mental Models & Group Complexity
This theme unravels the invisible gears of the team: how do different brains synchronize their information flows and build a shared understanding?
Team Shared Mental Models
- Uitdewilligen et al. (2023) — How the complexity of a team's mental model affects information search and performance trajectories over time.
- van Rensburg, Santos & de Jong (2023) — How shared tenure and goal interdependence shape the perception of shared mental models in dyads.
- Santos et al. (2021) — Deploying concept-mapping interventions to longitudinally improve shared cognition and adaptive team performance.
Group complexity and synergy
- Coman & Fodor (2022) — Antecedents and consequences of cognitive complexity in groups (conceptual review).
- Curșeu, Meslec, Pluut & Lucas (2015) — Cognitive synergy in groups and how decision-making competencies flow from the group to the individual.
- Curșeu & Pluut (2018) — Absorptive capacity and the external search for information within teams.
- Cikara (2021) — The causes and consequences of "coalitional cognition" (how brains form coalitions and activate group thinking).
3. Cognitive Diversity, Knowledge Flows and Team Creativity
This cluster examines the direct impact of cognitive diversity on innovation and creativity, and the necessary behavioral conditions (such as knowledge sharing).
The ROI of diversity and the "Diversity Gap"
- van Rijswijk, Curșeu & van Oortmerssen (2024a) — Your own systemic and integrative review of cognitive and neurodiversity in groups (the anchor point of your dissertation).
- Sulik, Bahrami & Deroy (2022) — The Diversity Gap: when and under which specific conditions diversity actually adds value to knowledge creation.
- Van Knippenberg, De Dreu & Homan (2004) — The classic Categorization-Elaboration Model (CEM) on the interaction between diversity and information processing.
- Mello & Rentsch (2015); Meslec & Curșeu (2013) — The fine line of cognitive distance in multidisciplinary teams (too close or too far apart harms group rationality).
Creativity, innovation and knowledge sharing
- Coursey et al. (2019) — Connecting divergent and convergent processes in collaborative creativity (the role of expertise levels and elaboration processes).
- Men et al. (2019); Mathuki & Zhang (2022); Rahmi & Indarti (2019) — The necessity of a safe team climate and active knowledge sharing to unlock the creative potential of cognitive diversity.
- Mitchell, Nicholas & Boyle (2009) — The role of openness to cognitive diversity in the creation of new knowledge.
4. Team Effectiveness, Motivation, Cohesion and Trust
This theme covers the social-psychological and motivational "glue" needed to make a team with high cognitive diversity work together effectively.
Cohesion and collective effectiveness
- Beal et al. (2003) — The meta-analytic classic that sharply clarifies the relationship between group cohesion and performance.
- Tasa, Taggar & Seijts (2007) — The development of collective efficacy in teams from a multilevel and longitudinal perspective.
- Aubé & Rousseau (2005) — The role of task interdependence and supportive behavior in the goal orientation and effectiveness of teams.
- Chen & Kanfer (2024); Kozlowski & Ilgen (2006) — Leading review works on the future of motivation in and of teams, and optimizing work groups.
- Dirks & Ferrin (2001) — The indispensable role of trust in organizational settings.
5. Inclusive HRM Policy & Advanced Research Methodology
This crucial cluster operationalizes neurodiversity into sustainable strategic HR management and provides the hard statistical and psychometric justification of your data.
Sustainable HRM policy and practice cases
- van Rijswijk, Curșeu & van Oortmerssen (2024b) — Your own empirical study: neurodivergence and boundary spanning as predictors of social skills and the diversity climate.
- Hennekam & Follmer (2024); Rollnik-Sadowska & Grabinska (2024) — Reviews and future agendas for embedding neurodiversity within sustainable strategic human resource management.
- Bruyère & Colella (2023); Yadav & Lenka (2020) — Handbooks and systematic reviews on the opportunities and management of diversity in the modern workplace.
- Zolyomi et al. (2018); Dugan, Kamps & Leonard (1995); Kamps et al. (1995) — Case studies and interventions (such as Scrum or cooperative learning) for neurodiverse teams in education and practice.
- Scott et al. (2015); Walker, Samya Sri & Murphy (2024) — Success factors for employment (including within high-security psychiatric institutions).
- Sassa et al. (2023) — Systematic review of the Scrum framework as a structuring methodology.
Advanced statistics, psychometrics and methodological biases
These are the sources with which you demonstrate the methodological integrity of your quantitative analyses and seal them against reviewer criticism.
- Hayes (2022) — The absolute bible of mediation, moderation and conditional process analysis (the basis for complex regression models).
- Hayes & Coutts (2020) — The methodological shift to using McDonald's Omega instead of Cronbach's alpha for reliability estimates.
- Siemsen, Roth & Oliveira (2010) — Crucial work on Common Method Bias (CMB) in regression models with linear, quadratic and interaction effects.
- James, Demaree & Wolf (1984) — Estimating inter-rater reliability ($r_{wg}$) within groups, with and without a response range.
- Dong et al. (2021) — The development and validation of a specific scale for cognitive diversity.
- Allen, Iliescu & Greiff (2022) — The methodological justification and validity of "single item" measures in psychology.
- Teachman (1980) — The calculation of population diversity and indices for qualitative variation (such as Teachman's entropy index).