Here's an article that shows that the collective intelligence of the group is positively correlated with the number of females in the group, largely because females are more socially sensitive (according to a social sensitivity measure).  Apparently, a group with more equally distributed conversational turn-taking has a higher collective intelligence than a group in which a few members dominate the interactions. 

Sarah Meerts

On Apr 26, 2011, at 8:34 AM, Sweet, Michael S wrote:

> Friends,
>  
> There is a TBL’er who was recently saying a few words to his department about TBL and was told that he was “was depressing female and minority participation by engaging in group learning.”
>  
> I don’t believe this charge has merit, and gave him a few reasons why, but he asks “Can you recommend a handful of representative articles (if there are such) on the dynamics of women and people of color in group learning environments (TBL or other)?”
>  
> Anyone got some at their fingertips?
>  
> -M