Psychological Safety Dynamics -- Two Opposed Loops¶
Run the Psychological Safety Dynamics Diagram Fullscreen
About This MicroSim¶
This causal loop diagram shows two opposing reinforcing loops. R1 (Safety Flywheel) is the productive loop: perceived psychological safety increases willingness to speak up, which exposes errors in discourse, which creates group error-correction opportunities, which raises learning outcome quality (with delay), which reinforces the belief that speaking up pays off. R2 (Threat-Load-Underperformance Trap) is the corrosive loop: group-membership salience raises threat concern, which loads working memory, which lowers performance, which confirms stereotype beliefs, which raises more threat concern. The cross-link from confirmation of stereotype belief to perceived psychological safety (negative) shows how the corrosive loop starves the productive one.
Diagram Details¶
graph LR
PPS["Perceived Psychological Safety"]:::r1 -->|"+"| WSU["Willingness to Speak Up"]:::r1
WSU -->|"+"| EED["Error Exposure in Discourse"]:::r1
EED -->|"+"| GEC["Group Error-Correction Opportunity"]:::r1
GEC -->|"+ with delay"| LOQ["Learning Outcome Quality"]:::r1
LOQ -->|"+"| PPS
GMS["Group-Membership Salience"]:::r2 -->|"+"| TC["Threat Concern"]:::r2
TC -->|"+"| WML["Working-Memory Load"]:::r2
WML -->|"−"| POT["Performance on Task"]:::r2
POT -->|"−"| CSB["Confirmation of Stereotype Belief"]:::r2
CSB -->|"+"| TC
CSB -->|"−"| PPS
R1[" R1: Safety Flywheel -- reinforcing, productive "]:::looplabel
R2[" R2: Threat-Load-Underperformance Trap -- reinforcing, corrosive "]:::looplabel
classDef r1 fill:#4A90D9,stroke:#2C5F8A,color:#fff
classDef r2 fill:#E8795A,stroke:#C0392B,color:#fff
classDef looplabel fill:none,stroke:none,color:#555,font-size:12px