Paradoxes and Dual Processes: A Review and Synthesis

• Date: 01 April 2019
• Author: Eugene Sadler‐Smith,Josh Keller
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/ijmr.12200
• Published date: 01 April 2019

International Journal of Management Reviews, Vol. 21, 162–184 (2019)

DOI: 10.1111/ijmr.12200

Paradoxes and Dual Processes: A Review

and Synthesis

Josh Keller and Eugene Sadler-Smith1

School of Management, University of New South Wales, Australia, and 1Surrey Business School, University of

Surrey, Guildford, UK

Corresponding author email: e.sadler-smith@surrey.ac.uk

Paradox and dual-process theories are used by management and organization re-

searchers in studying a variety of phenomena across a wide range of management

sub-fields. Cognition is a focal point of both of these theories. However, despite their

growing importance and shared areas of inquiry, these two theories have developed

largely in isolation from each other. To address this lack of integration, the authors

conducted a review and synthesis of relevant aspects of the paradox and dual-process

literatures.Focusing bidirectionally on how paradoxtheory informs dual-process theory

and how dual-process theory informsparadox theory, they highlight the ‘nestedness’ of

intuition and analysis in paradox (a paradoxwithin paradoxical thinking). On the basis

of the review and synthesis, they identify four themes (epistemological and ontologi-

cal assumptions in the relationship between intuition and analysis; psychological and

psychometric issues in the relationships between intuition and analysis; managers’ ex-

periences of tensions between intuition and analysis; managers’ approachesto tensions

between intuition and analysis) and introducean integrative framework that assimilates

these two perspectives and sets out an agenda for future research and implications for

management.

Introduction

In this paper, we review and analyse relevant as-

pects of dual-process and paradox literatures. From

our review and analysis, we synthesize an integrative

framework that shows how the relationships between

the dual processes of intuition and analysis shape the

way in which managers make sense of and respond

to paradoxes both in their business environment and

in their own thinking processes. We discuss the mul-

tiple levels involved in shaping the relationship be-

tween paradox and dual processes and focus attention

on the ‘nestedness’ of intuition and analysis within

paradoxical thinking. To address these issues, we re-

view and synthesize paradox and dual-process liter-

atures. Our focus is not to provide a comprehensive

review of each, as there are excellent extensive re-

views elsewhere(e.g. Chaiken and Trope 1999; Evans

and Stanovich 2013; Schad et al. 2016; Stanovichand

West 2000), instead we examine dual-process theory

through a paradox lens, while simultaneously exam-

ining paradox through a dual-process lens.

Our review and synthesis of these two litera-

tures makes several contributions. First, we con-

tribute to paradox research by expanding its scope

to encompass explicitly, in dual-processing terms,

the micro-foundations of paradox as they manifest

in underlying cognitive tensions experienced in man-

agerial decision-making. Second, the study of the

paradox of intuition and analysis has the potential

to offer insights not only on the general cognitive

micro-foundations of organizational paradox,b ut also

on paradoxical thinking and paradoxical mindsets

across diverse domains, including strategy, human re-

sources, entrepreneurship and innovation. Third, we

contribute to the managerial and organizational cog-

nition literature by conceptualizing the relationship

between intuition and analysis in terms of paradox

theory, and thereby contribute to debates about the

dynamics of dual-processing. The paper is structured

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Paradoxes and Dual Processes 163

as follows: (1) background; (2) method and structure;

(3) overviews of paradox theory and dual-processing

theory; (4) themes from the review; (5) integrative

framework; and (6) practical implications and future

research.

Background

Our review is relevant because managers today must

navigate their way through volatile, uncertain, com-

plex and ambiguous situations where competing de-

mands are pervasive and persistent (e.g. Jay 2013;

Jules and Good 2014; Papachroni et al. 2015; Smith

2014; Waldman and Bowen 2016). A growing num-

ber of management scholars have adopted a paradox

lens to address important issues that emanate from

this managerial challenge, ranging from how to ‘ex-

plore and exploit’ (Andriopoulos and Lewis 2009;

Raisch et al. 2009) to how to ‘cooperate and compete’

(Bengtsson and Raza-Ullah 2016; Gnyawali et al.

2006) to how to be ‘global and local’ (Marquis and

Battilana 2009). As revelations about the paradoxes

that managers face have multiplied, paradox theory

has emerged to provide a set of constructs, principles

and relationships to explain how paradoxes operate

within and across contexts and for exploring their im-

plications for management research and practice (see

Schad et al. (2016) for a review). At the micro-level,

it is important to understand how managers process

information in order to respond to problems and take

decisions (Hodgkinson and Starbuck 2008; Simon

1987).

In studying how individuals process information,

psychologists have long examined the comple-

mentary dual cognitive competencies of analysis

and intuition; these are often referred to as ‘dual

processes’ or ‘dual systems’ (Hodgkinson and

Sadler-Smith 2018). Dual-process theories model

human thinking in terms of two fundamentally

different information-processing systems: a fast,

automatic ‘System 1’ whose operations are typified

by intuition; and a slow, controlled ‘System 2’ whose

operations are typified by analysis (Gilovich et al.

2002; Kahneman 2003, 2011; Schneider and Shiffrin

1977; Shiffrin and Schneider 1984; Sloman 1996;

Smith and DeCoster 2000). The core mechanisms of

this dual-process model – which in effect, signifies

‘two minds in one brain’ (Evans 2003) – were

originally conceptualized as two separate and seem-

ingly oppositional systems (Shiffrin and Schneider

1984). Recently, however, increasing attention has

been accorded by psychologists and management

researchers to the interactions between System 1

and System 2 processing (e.g. Evans 2010; Evans

and Stanovich 2013; Hodgkinson and Sadler-Smith

2018). The simultaneously contradictory yet interre-

lated nature of the relationship between intuition and

analysis is highly suggestive of a paradox.

Most recently, scholars have begun to apply a

paradox lens at the micro-level to investigate how

managers think and, specifically, how managers use

intuition and analysis when processing information

(e.g. Calabretta et al. 2017; Dameron and Torset

2014; Hodgkinson and Sadler-Smith 2018). The

application of paradox theory in this context is based

on the premise that the interrelationship between

intuition and analysis is a source of tension; paradox

theory provides insights into how managers respond

to and use this tension. However, the integration of

paradox theory with relevant theories of information-

processing from the behavioural and psychological

sciences, particularly dual-process theory, is limited

currently. This is despite the salience of cognition

as a central tenet in paradox theory (Keller and

Chen 2017a,b) as exemplified by the prevalence of

paradox-specific concepts that address how managers

think about and engage with paradoxes in their work,

including ‘paradoxical frames’ (e.g. Hahn et al. 2014;

Keller et al. 2017; Miron-Spektor et al. 2011; Smith

and Tushman 2005), ‘paradox mindsets’ (e.g. Miron-

Spektor et al. 2018) and paradox management tactics

(e.g. Leung et al. 2018). Also, paradox theorists

assert that the way managers think about paradoxes

influences whether they are aware of paradoxes

(Sharma and Good 2013; Smith and Lewis 2011),

how they cope with paradoxes (Lewis 2000; Vince

and Broussine 1996), and even whether paradoxes

exist (Clegg et al. 2002). Fur ther integration between

paradox and dual-process theories is needed.

Method and structure

The process of selecting studies in reviewing,compar-

ing, integrating and synthesizing literatures involves

several stages (Macpherson and Jones 2010; Tranfield

et al. 2003); the stages in our review and synthesis of

paradox and dual-process literatures were as follows.

Weinitially reviewedpublished articles in the EBSCO

Business Source Complete database in a search cov-

ering the years 1988–2018 (search terms ‘intuition’

AND ‘analysis’ and ‘intuition’ AND ‘paradox’; title,

abstract, topic and author-supplied keywords). The

year 1988 was chosen because it was the year after

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