Categories in Context: Exploring the Determinants of Category Viability

Socially shared categories are sources of conformity and stability for organizational phenomena, but categories also emerge, change, and fall out of use. To better understand why some categories are more or less viable–able to function effectively as a boundary object–we provide a framework for analyzing category viability as a function of a category’s context and content. In particular, we highlight the importance of the distinctiveness and coherence of categories, and identify threats of fragmentation, alienation, attenuation, and absorption that occur when the distinctiveness or coherence of a category shift away from a category’s zone of viability. We further suggest several factors that moderate category distinctiveness and coherence, and describe the implications of our framework for studies on the role of categories.