Optimal distinctiveness research mainly relied on self-reports and fixed experimental treatments

Evidence

Existing research supports the idea that people prefer memberships in distinctive social groups (e.g., Leonardelli & Brewer, 2001; Pickett, Silver, & Brewer, 2002), but this work is based primarily on people’s subjective reports of their existing group memberships and does not examine how group formation processes are shaped by the needs for inclusion and distinctiveness. Furthermore, tests of ODT have often been limited to experimentally heightening the need for either inclusion or distinctiveness (e.g., Pickett et al., 2002) and have not been able to precisely examine the patterns of behavior that emerge at varying levels of the needs for inclusion and distinctiveness. Finally, these tests of ODT generally hold variables such as status constant, and thus we know relatively little about how the needs for inclusion and distinctiveness play out in the context of other competing motives (e.g., self-esteem). — Roderick M. Kramer, Geoffrey J. Leonardelli, Robert W. Livingston, Social Cognition, Social Identity, and…, 831

Categorization

• SEED: The methodological gaps — subjective reports, single-dimension treatments, constant status — point to an essay about how simulation methods reveal dynamics self-report studies miss.