essay on levels of organization

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Levels of Organization in Biology   Recently updated !

Biology, the study of life and living organisms, is a vast and complex field that covers a multitude of structures, systems, and processes. One fundamental aspect of biology is understanding how life organizes from the simplest to the most complex forms. This concept of hierarchical organization helps us comprehend the vast diversity of life, how different biological structures interact, and how they function both individually and collectively.

Why Understanding Organization is Important

Understanding the levels of biological organization assists in making sense of the complexity of life forms, their interactions, and their environments. It provides a framework for biologists to classify and study organisms. Also, it helps in understanding how different components of an ecosystem work together. This knowledge is essential for fields like medicine, environmental science, and genetics.

Levels of Organization in Biology

From the simplest to the most complex, the levels of organization in biology are: atoms, molecules, macromolecules, cells, tissues, organs, organ systems, organisms, populations, communities, and the biosphere. Eukaryotic cells (plants, animals, fungi) display all of these levels, while prokaryotic cells (bacteria and archaea) don’t have tissues, organs, or organ systems.

1. Atomic Level

• Examples: Atoms of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen
• This is the most basic level, involving the smallest units of matter that make up the chemical composition of living organisms.

2. Molecular Level

• Examples: Water (H 2 O), oxygen (O 2 ), carbon dioxide (CO 2 )
• Atoms join via chemical bonds and form molecules.

3. Macromolecular Level

• Examples: Proteins, DNA, RNA, cellulose
• Molecular subunits connect via covalent bonds (polymerize) and form large, complex organic molecules called macromolecules .

4. Cellular Level

• Examples: Cells (e.g., red blood cells, muscle cells, neurons)
• Cells are the basic units of life. Some exist independently in unicellular organisms, while others are part of a larger multicellular organism.
• Prokaryotes : Prokaryotic cells are unicellular organisms with simpler cell structures. They lack a nucleus and membrane-bound organelles. Examples include bacteria and archaea.
• Eukaryotes : There are both unicellular and multicellular eukaryotes. Their cells have a nucleus and other membrane-bound organelles like mitochondria, chloroplasts (in plants), and the endoplasmic reticulum. Examples include cells of animals, plants, fungi, and protists.

5. Tissue Level

• Examples: Epithelial tissue, muscle tissue
• Tissues are groups of similar eukaryotic cells that work together to perform a specific function.
• Prokaryotes : This level is not applicable as prokaryotes are usually unicellular.

6. Organ Level

• Examples: Heart, liver
• Organs are structures that consist of two or more types of tissues that work together to perform specific, complex functions.
• Prokaryotes : This level is not applicable.

7. Organ System Level

• Examples: Circulatory system, nervous system, digestive system, respiratory system
• An organ system is a group of organs that work together to perform major functions or meet physiological needs of the body.

8. Organism Level

• Examples: Humans, bacteria, plants
• An organism is an individual living entity that functions on its own.
• Prokaryotes : Single-celled organisms where the single cell constitutes the entire organism.
• Eukaryotes : Unicellular (like some algae and protists) or multicellular (like humans, animals, and plants).

9. Population Level

• Examples: A herd of elephants, a colony of ants, pride of lions
• A population is a group of organisms of the same species living in a specific geographical area and capable of interbreeding.
• Prokaryotes and Eukaryotes : Both types of organisms exist at these levels. Populations of prokaryotes or eukaryotes interact within communities, contribute to ecosystem functions, and are part of the biosphere.

10. Community Level

• Examples: Coral reef, rainforest
• A community is the collection of all the different populations that live together in an area.

11. Ecosystem Level

• Examples: Sahara Desert, Amazon Rainforest
• Ecosystems include all the living things in a given area, interacting with each other, and also with their non-living environments. In other words, an ecosystem includes both biotic and abiotic factors .

12. Biosphere Level

• Examples: Earth
• The biosphere is the global ecological system integrating all living beings and their relationships, including their interaction with the elements of the lithosphere, hydrosphere, and atmosphere.

Levels of Organization Glossary

Here’s a glossary of key terms related to the levels of organization in biology:

• Atom : The smallest unit of a chemical element, consisting of a nucleus surrounded by electrons.
• Molecule : A group of atoms bonded together.
• Macromolecule : A large molecule that forms from polymerization of smaller subunits.
• Cell : The basic unit of life; a small, self-contained unit enclosed by a membrane, capable of performing life-sustaining functions.
• Tissue : A group of similar cells that work together to perform a specific function in an organism.
• Organ : A part of an organism, typically self-contained and with a specific vital function, composed of different types of tissues.
• Organ System : A group of organs that work together to perform complex bodily functions.
• Organism : An individual living entity that can reproduce, grow, respond to stimuli, and maintain homeostasis.
• Population : A group of individuals of the same species living in a specific area, capable of interbreeding.
• Community : Different populations of various species living together and interacting in a defined area.
• Ecosystem : A biological community of interacting organisms and their physical environment.
• Biosphere : The global sum of all ecosystems, encompassing all living beings and their environment.
• Prokaryote : A microscopic single-celled organism without a nucleus, such as bacteria and archaea.
• Eukaryote : An organism consisting of cells that have genetic material within a distinct nucleus. Includes plants, animals, algae, fungi, protists.
• DNA (Deoxyribonucleic Acid) : A molecule that carries genetic instructions for the growth, development, functioning, and reproduction of all living organisms and many viruses.
• RNA (Ribonucleic Acid) : A nucleic acid present in all living cells that acts as a messenger carrying instructions from DNA for controlling the synthesis of proteins.

Critical Thinking Questions

Critical thinking questions are a great way to deepen understanding and encourage exploration beyond the basic concepts. Here are some thought-provoking questions related to the levels of organization in biology:

• Consider the differences between prokaryotic and eukaryotic organisms in this context.
• Think about genetic mutations or cellular damage and their potential impact.
• Reflect on the relationship between environmental factors and evolutionary adaptations.
• Examples could include overpopulation, extinction of a species, or introduction of an invasive species.
• For instance, consider the effects of a disease that affects a particular organ system.
• Discuss the significance of molecular biology or cellular biology in understanding complex biological systems.
• Explore the concept of ecological balance and its importance.
• Think about the implications of genetically modified organisms (GMOs).
• This could include topics like climate change, pollution, or deforestation.
• Consider specific examples such as disease treatment, habitat restoration, or wildlife conservation.
• Evans, F. C. (1956). “Ecosystem as basic unit in ecology”. Science . 123 (3208): 1127–8. doi: 10.1126/science.123.3208.1127
• Jordan, F.; Jørgensen, S. E. (2012). Models of the Ecological Hierarchy: From Molecules to the Ecosphere . ISBN 9780444593962.
• Solomon, Eldra P.; Berg, Linda R.; Martin, Diana W. (2002). Biology (6th ed.). Brooks/Cole. ISBN 0-534-39175-3.
• Wicken, J. S.; Ulanowicz, R. E. (1988). “On quantifying hierarchical connections in ecology”. Journal of Social and Biological Systems . 11 (3): 369–377. doi: 10.1016/0140-1750(88)90066-8

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Levels of Organization in Biology

Levels of organization are structures in nature, frequently identified by part-whole relationships, with things at higher levels being composed of things at the next lower level. Typical levels of organization that one finds in the literature include the atomic, molecular, cellular, tissue, organ, organismal, group, population, community, ecosystem, landscape, and biosphere levels. References to levels of organization and related leveled depictions of nature are prominent in the life sciences and their philosophical study, and appear not only in introductory textbooks and lectures, but also in cutting-edge research articles and reviews. In philosophy, perennial debates such as reduction, emergence, mechanistic explanation, interdisciplinary relations, natural selection, and many other topics, also rely substantially on the notion.

Yet, in spite of the ubiquity of the notion, levels of organization have received little explicit attention in biology or its philosophy. Usually the concept appears in the background as an implicit conceptual framework that is associated with vague intuitions. Attempts at providing general and broadly applicable definitions of levels of organization have not met wide acceptance. In recent years, several authors have put forward localized accounts of levels, and others have raised doubts about the usefulness of the notion as a whole.

Though there are many phrases that qualify ‘levels’ in philosophy, science, and everyday life, such as levels of abstraction, realization, being, analysis, processing, theory, science, or complexity, in this article we will focus only on levels of organization and debates associated with this concept. Other level-phrases will only be discussed insofar as they are relevant to this main topic.

1. The historical origins of the concept

2.1 the layer-cake account, 2.2 levels of mechanisms.

• 2.3 A “local maxima” account

2.4 Levels skepticism and deflationary accounts

3. levels as a fragmentary and heuristic notion, 4. reductionism, pluralism, and levels, 5. levels and downward causation, 6.1 levels and units of selection, 6.2 the hierarchy theory of evolution, 6.3 evolutionary transitions, 6.4 the evolution of complexity, 6.5 levels and experimental biological research, 6.6 levels and theory building in biology, 6.7 usage of levels in the education of biology, 7. concluding remarks, other internet resources, related entries.

When levels of organization are understood as belonging to the broader category of hierarchical depictions of nature, their history can be traced back to the early days of western science and philosophy. Aristotle suggested that living things could be arranged in a graded scale, starting from plants at the bottom and ending with humans at the top. This idea was further developed in Neoplatonism, and in Medieval times, it transformed into the idea of “the Great Chain of Being” (Lovejoy 1936). This Scala Naturae conveyed a hierarchical conception of the world: at the top, there is God, and at lower rungs, angels, humans, animals, plants, and so on. After the scientific revolution, more scientific hierarchical classifications of nature started to appear, the most famous ones being Linneaus’ taxonomical system and Auguste Comte’s hierarchy of the sciences (Comte 1830–1842 [1853]).

At the beginning of the twentieth century, several notions of “levels” began to circulate in the philosophical and scientific literature. Prominent among these was the idea of “levels of existence” (alternatively: “being”; “complexity”) developed by philosophers Samuel Alexander (1920: 3, 45) and Charles Dunbar Broad (1925), which figured prominently in the emergentist and emergent evolution literature of the 1920’s (Sellars 1926; McLaughlin 1992; Stephan 1999). This introduced a number of themes that have become germane to general levels-language. These themes include level-specific laws (Broad 1925: 77; cf. Woodger 1929) and the idea that ‘levels’ exhibit a tendency in nature towards increasing complexity (Sellars 1917: 224; cf. Needham 1937). Although most of these themes were severely underdeveloped and divorced from the cutting-edge work in the life sciences happening at the time (Needham 1937: 242 ff. 4), this tradition has been an influential historical source for explicating levels language in philosophy of mind (see the entries on emergent properties and supervenience ; McLaughlin 1992; Beckermann, Flohr, & Kim 1992; Kim 1999, 2002).

The roots of the contemporary notion of levels of organization and the associated hierarchical thinking are best linked to the efforts of organicist biologists of the early-mid twentieth century (for primers on the organicist movement, see Peterson 2014; Nicholson & Gawne 2015). Particularly important to the introduction and development of the levels concept were Joseph Woodger (1929; 1930), Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1928 [1933]; 1932), and Joseph Needham (1936b; 1937). These individuals were in turn influenced by Alfred North Whitehead’s philosophy (see, e.g., Whitehead 1929; Needham 1941).

Organicism (alternatively “organismal” or “organismic” biology) did not designate a clearly-defined group or movement, but rather a loosely-threaded confluence of scientists and philosophers distributed among many disciplines and across Europe and the Americas. The organicists (like the emergentists) were in part responding to the dispute between the mechanists and the neovitalists of the early twentieth century. The mechanists held that biological phenomena were “nothing over and above” their physico-chemical components, meaning that biological phenomena can in principle, and eventually will, be exhaustively accounted for in chemical or physical terms (Loeb 1912; 1916). They also argued that biological phenomena, though seemingly complex, are fundamentally similar to machines (Loeb 1912; 1916; see also G. Allen 2005: 264; Bechtel & Richardson 1993 [2010: 17]; Nicholson 2012: 160). Neovitalists such as Hans Driesch and Henri Bergson rejected these ideas, arguing that living things cannot be explained solely based on their physico-chemical components, and that biological phenomena therefore must involve non-physical forces or entities. The organicists sought to offer a “third way” into the mechanist-vitalist dispute that served as a middle ground between the austerity of the mechanists and the extravagance of the neovitalists (Peterson 2014: 286; Nicholson & Gawne 2015: 358).

Three major tenets of organicism were particularly congenial to the development of the levels concept. Firstly, the central preoccupation of organicist thought with organization laid down a foundation for levels thinking (cf. Nicholson & Gawne 2015: 364). For the organicists, organization marked the decisive feature for demarcating living phenomena from non-living physico-chemical phenomena (e.g., Woodger 1929: 290–1; von Bertalanffy 1928 [1933: 48]; Needham 1936b: ch. 1). Unlike the neovitalists, however, the organicists did not hold organization to be inscrutable, but rather an important explanandum of biological study (Nicholson & Gawne 2015: 365). Moreover, living organisms exhibited a hierarchical ordering among their distinct parts (Woodger 1930: 8; von Bertalanffy 1932: 83; Needham 1936b: ch. 5; see also Nicholson & Gawne 2015: 366). This combined nicely with the focus on organization as the major explanandum of biology in that the series of elements that compose different organisms required specific and contextualized treatment. This in turn complemented another main tenet of the organicists, namely the autonomy of biology as a natural science (cf. Nicholson & Gawne 2015: 366–7).

The levels concept proved to be a linchpin of these main tenets. Joseph Woodger, combining these features, thus expresses the basic thinking behind levels of organization:

Two principal factors appear to have been responsible for the failure to take organization seriously in biology. First there is the vague belief that only atoms and molecules are ‘real’, and secondly the incautious use of the notion of chemical composition. Also the biological entities are found to be composite in the same sense, and moreover, some of the relata in the relation of composition in the physico-chemical objects are also relata in the biological objects. But the analysis of organisms as carried out by biologists reveal other relata in mutual relation of composition in a different sense , i.e., not in chemical composition, e.g., the organism is analysable into organ-systems, organs, tissues, cells and cell-parts. There is a hierarchy of composing parts or relata in a hierarchy of organizing relations. These relations and relata can only be studied at their own levels (cf. the quartz crystal) and not simply in terms of the lower levels . (Woodger 1929: 292–293, emphasis modified; see also Bertalanffy 1932: 100–101; Needham 1937 [1943: 234])

Unlike the emergentists’ “levels of existence”, the hierarchical view expounded by the organicists emphasized differentiating the many distinct classes of matter’s possible forms to accommodate the diversity in biological entities. This in turn led them to posit many more levels in the world than the four ‘super levels’ of the emergentists (the physical the chemical, the vital, and the mental), and also implied an increase in complexity as more levels of organization were brought to bear on treating living systems. Woodger again remarks:

If the parts [of an organism] were homogeneous then we should be able to call them units and there would only be one level of organization. But if each part were itself composed of parts forming in each an organized system, then clearly we should have two levels of organization and if the composing sub-parts of the first organization were intrinsically only numerically different we could speak of two homogeneous levels of organization. If, however, the sub-parts were intrinsically different then the first-order parts would be different and we should have a heterogeneous type of organization. By carrying out this process of subdivision further we could obtain very complex types of organization exhibiting a hierarchy of successive levels. And if now we consider one of the higher living organisms it is evident at once that its organization will belong to one of these heterogeneous hierarchical types. (Woodger 1929: 298)

This idea that levels of organization of organization form “nested” compositional hierarchies where there are wholes at higher levels and their components at lower levels, and the components themselves can be further decomposed into parts, remains one of the core features of the notion of levels of organization up to this day.

In the aftermath of organicism, development of the levels concept splintered into different intellectual trajectories, with little overall theoretical or conceptual coherence. One direction of development flowed through the framework of general systems theory (von Bertalanffy 1950, 1968), and particularly through so-called hierarchy theory (Whyte, Wilson, & Wilson 1969; Weiss 1971; Pattee 1973). General systems theory sought to construct isomorphisms between laws of different scientific fields based on their generic system properties (von Bertalanffy 1950: 136), but nonetheless continued to emphasize the hierarchical part-whole structure of systems (von Bertalanffy 1968). ‘Levels of organization’ in this tradition was ultimately given secondary consideration to the articulation of system-generic properties and laws. Similarly, in hierarchy theory, ‘levels’ tended to be treated as derivative of the more general notion of a hierarchy, or the ordering of a system into nested subsystems (Simon 1962 [1996: 184–5]; see also Weiss 1971). Hierarchy and levels alike continued to be treated as generic structures of systems of all stripes (see also T. Allen & Starr 1982; O’Neill et al. 1986). However, one important distinction to come out of this tradition was the distinction between levels of composition and levels of control (Simon 1962; Pattee 1973). The former speaks to the nested compositionality typically identified with levels of organization, while the latter refers to the idea that higher levels impose constraints on the processes at lower levels, for example by limiting the degrees of freedom of the system at a lower level (Pattee 1973: 85; see also Umerez 2021).

Other early attempts at clarifying the concept of levels were carried out by individual researchers working alone on similar or related issues, such as reduction or multilevel selection. Mario Bunge (1960; 1977), Marjorie Grene (1969; 1987), and William Wimsatt (1976a; 1981; 1994) each developed several ground-laying observations concerning levels. Bunge (1960) remarks on the plethora of meanings the term can possess, then offers a long taxonomy of nine different meanings of the term “levels”, ranging from the innocuous (levels as degrees or quantity, as in ‘levels of stress’) to the sense of nature being ordered into an evolutionary series, with several corollary senses of levels falling between (such as degrees of complexity). In his 1977 paper, Bunge goes further, offering a set-theoretic treatment of levels, and claiming that the leveled structure of the natural world is what renders natural phenomena intelligible to us (Bunge 1977: R82). Grene (1969) also discusses the polysemic nature of the term “hierarchy”, and later (1987) distinguishes between two notions of hierarchy, one falling under a mixed notion of levels as composition and control, and the other exemplifying phylogenetic ranks. Wimsatt’s work will be considered in more detail below in section 2.3 .

2. Philosophical accounts of levels of organization

A recurring motif in the literature on levels of organization is to lament the haphazard or unreflective way in which terms such as ‘hierarchy’ or ‘levels’ are applied, and to call for more precise analyses (e.g., Beckner 1974; Bunge 1977; Grene 1987; Korn 2002; Valentine & May 1996). However, until recently, developing substantial theories or accounts of levels of organization has only occurred sparingly in the literature. In this section, we first discuss three major accounts put forward in philosophy of science to clarify or posit what exactly levels of organization are. These are Paul Oppenheim and Hilary Putnam’s “layer-cake” account, the mechanist account developed and advocated by Carl Craver (2007: ch. 5; 2015) and William Bechtel (2008: ch. 4), and William Wimsatt’s “local maxima” account (1976a; 1994). After these, we also go through recent skeptical approaches to the idea of levels of organization.

In the classic paper “The Unity of Science as a Working Hypothesis” (1958; see also the entry The Unity of Science ), Oppenheim and Putnam (hereafter O&P) put forward a system of levels that became very influential, and is still implicitly present in many references to levels. This “layer-cake” model comprises three components. First, their conception of levels was comprehensive , meaning they wished to subsume all instances of where one could talk of ‘levels’ into their account. Second, O&P posited that levels are related via compositional relations that are structured in a stepwise fashion. That is, all constituents of the objects of study of one branch of science, or, the branch’s “universe of discourse”, are exhaustively related as wholes to the parts located at the next adjacent lower level, and as themselves parts to the constituents occurring at the next adjacent higher level. This component is probably most responsible for the “layer-cake” moniker. Finally, O&P presumed a strict correspondence between the constituents comprising a level and the predicates and theories linked with these constituents, meaning that levels of science neatly map onto levels of nature, so that for each level in nature there is corresponding science or theory and vice versa (Craver 2007: 174–175; Brigandt 2010: 304–305).

O&P’s usage of ‘levels’ can be broken down into two roles within their framework. The first concerns their use of ‘levels’ in their explication of reduction, i.e., microreduction, which in turn aided in articulating their thesis of unity of science (1958: 5–6). In this framework, O&P suggest ordering the branches of sciences so that the major potential reductions standing between the current situation and unified science can be identified. For this purpose, they propose six “reductive levels” (1958: 9): Social groups; (Multicellular) living things; Cells; Molecules; Atoms; Elementary particles. The branch of science with the things of a given level as its universe of discourse is a potential “microreducer” of a branch with the things of the next higher level as its universe of discourse (O&P 1958: 9).

O&P’s second use of levels is to capture a natural epistemic ordering of the sciences:

The idea of reductive levels employed in our discussion suggests what may plausibly be regarded as a natural order of sciences . For this purpose, it suffices to take as ‘fundamental disciplines’ the branches corresponding to our levels. It is understandable that many of the well-known orderings of things have a rough similarity to our reductive levels, and that corresponding orderings of sciences are more or less similar to our order of 6 ‘fundamental disciplines’. (O&P 1958: 28, emphasis added)

This shows that O&P assumed that the structure of the sciences follows the structure of nature. Though they acknowledge the numerous precedents to this hierarchical ordering of the sciences (e.g., Comte’s pyramid of the sciences, 1958: 28), O&P considered their layer-cake account to be superior to these other “intuitive” senses of the order of sciences, since the existence of levels themselves are grounded in the stepwise, compositional continuity of nature.

The problems with the layer-cake account have been well-documented (Craver 2007: 172–6; Kim 2002; Potochnik & McGill 2012; Rueger & McGivern 2010). For one thing, if we look at contemporary science, the strict correspondence between levels and scientific fields breaks down immediately: Fields such as cognitive neuroscience span multiple levels, and the level of multicellular organisms is studied by a plethora of different scientific disciplines (Craver 2005; Bechtel 2008: 145). Likewise, the exhaustive stepwise condition on compositional relations between natural constituents, requiring that entities at one level are composed of only entities at the next lower level, is largely a caricature (e.g., Kim 2002): think of blood, nominally a tissue-level phenomenon, which is directly composed by molecular constituents such as vitamins and water without adjacent-level constituents, e.g., cells, playing any intermediary role. Finally, and most importantly, the layer-cake account aspires to a comprehensive notion of ‘levels’ that is wildly at odds with the way that ‘levels’ is actually used in science. Scientists often operate with a much more limited definition of the levels concept that either (a) is restricted to a specific and local context (see section 2.2 ) or (b) makes room for exceptions to what ‘levels’ expresses (see section 3 ). Many biological sources in fact are completely aware that levels do not capture a completely uniform reality, and sometimes remark on important exceptions to the rules that are laid down by the levels concept. This is most prominently seen when referring to “organisms” in a piecemeal way so as to capture both multicellular and unicellular forms of life (Mader 2010: 2).

The account of “levels of mechanisms” introduced by Bill Bechtel (2008) and Carl Craver (2007) has in recent years become a standard view of levels in philosophy of neuroscience. The context of this account is the more general paradigm of “new mechanism” (see the entry Mechanisms in Science ). In levels of mechanisms, there are mechanisms at higher levels and their components at lower levels. The mechanistic account proposes a contextualized conception (as opposed to the comprehensive conception of the layer-cake) that articulates levels in terms of constitutive parthood within a mechanism (Craver 2007: 188–189; Kaplan 2015: 20; see also Cummins 1975 for an early expression of this idea). This approach offers several advantages over the layer-cake account: For one thing, it abandons the goal of providing a global or comprehensive understanding of levels that applies homogeneously to all systems in nature. Instead, the aim is to construe levels in a scientifically informed manner whereby level demarcations only make sense on case-based grounds (see also Love 2012 for a local approach to levels that is not explicitly tied to the notion of a mechanism). The mechanistic account also completely eschews any tidy correspondence between the structure of the natural world and the structure of the natural sciences: Levels of mechanisms are levels in nature , and there is no straightforward mapping from these levels to theories or fields of science (Craver 2007: 176). Finally, the mechanistic account of levels supports a positive account of pluralistic, multilevel explanation that emerges as an alternative to accounts of reductionism in biology (Craver 2005; cf. Brigandt 2010: 297).

More specifically, levels of mechanisms have been defined as follows:

In levels of mechanisms, the relata are behaving mechanisms at higher levels and their components at lower levels. … The interlevel relationship is as follows: X ’s Φ-ing is at a lower mechanistic level than Ψ-ing if and only if X ’s Φ-ing is a component in the mechanism for S’s Ψ-ing. Lower level components are organized together to form higher-level components. (Craver 2007: 189) Within a mechanism, the relevant parts are … working parts—the parts that perform the operations that enable the mechanism to realize the phenomenon of interest. These may be of different sizes, but they are distinguished by the fact that they figure in the functioning of the mechanism. It is the set of working parts that are organized and whose operations are coordinated to realize the phenomenon of interest that constitute a level. (Bechtel 2008: 146)

So far, these characterizations suggest that there are just two levels, the level of the mechanism and the level of its components. However, when we take into account that a component can also be mechanism in itself, this picture is expanded into a multilevel hierarchy: The components of that nested mechanism then form a third level, which is two levels lower than the overall mechanism (Bechtel 2008: 147). This mechanistic decomposition can be repeated as many times as necessary; there is no a priori limit to the number of levels in a mechanism.

The standard example of levels of mechanisms is the case of spatial memory and long-term potentiation (LTP; Craver 2007: 165–170). In the spatial memory mechanism, four levels of mechanism can be identified: the level of spatial memory, the level of spatial map formation, the cellular-electrophysiological level, and finally the molecular level. Entities at each lower level are components in the higher-level mechanism. For example, an NMDA receptor at the molecular level is a component of the LTP mechanism at the cellular level, and the LTP mechanism is in turn a component of the hippocampal mechanism of memory consolidation (at the level of spatial map formation). The hippocampal mechanism of memory consolidation then contributes to the overall mechanism at the level of spatial memory, which is the highest level and involves, for example, behavioral tasks (e.g., navigating a maze).

Levels of mechanisms share some key features with the traditional idea of levels of organization: They are by definition compositional, entities at higher levels are typically larger than entities at lower levels, and levels of mechanisms can potentially amount to local peaks of regularity and predictability (Craver 2007: 190; see next section). However, levels of mechanisms are far more limited and minimalistic than any other extant approaches to levels of organization. First of all, as already mentioned, levels of mechanisms can only be identified on a case-by-case basis, and different mechanisms can have entirely different levels. For example, the set of levels in the mechanism of protein folding is very different from the levels in the spatial memory mechanism.

Moreover, even within one mechanism, the question whether two items are at the same or different levels often has no well-defined answer. This is due to the fact that levels are defined solely in terms of direct part-whole (or component-mechanism) relationships. For example, NMDA receptors and synaptic vesicles are components of the cellular LTP mechanisms, and thus can be said to be at the same level. The components of NMDA receptors in turn include things such as glutamate binding sites and glutamate ions, whereas the components of synaptic vesicles include things such as transport proteins. However, as glutamate binding sites and transport proteins are neither components of one another nor direct components in the same (sub)mechanism, they are neither at the same level nor at different levels (Bechtel 2008: 147). The question how they are related levels-wise has no answer in the mechanistic framework. What this means is that even within a specific mechanism, levels of mechanisms do not form horizontal layers that span across the mechanism, but rather small islands formed by the working parts of a (sub)mechanism. Another implication is that even identical things (e.g., NMDA molecules) within the same overall mechanism are often not at the same level (Eronen 2013). Craver (2015) has suggested that the whole idea of being “at the same level” is in fact unimportant or even meaningless in the context of levels of mechanisms; it is sufficient that there is a clear sense in which mechanisms are at a higher level relative to their components (and the components are at a lower level relative to the mechanism as a whole), and this does not require that the components or mechanisms also form horizontal levels.

A further problem that the mechanistic account shares with the layer-cake account is that it is embedded within a conceptual framework where ‘levels’ are defined in terms of other technical terms that are more foundational in that framework (Brooks 2017). The layer-cake account was originally embedded in Oppenheim and Putnam’s overarching project of arguing for the unity of science, and their understanding of ‘levels’ was in part conceived to explicate how microreduction works. The mechanistic account for its part is embedded within the New Mechanism’s program of explicating mechanistic explanation and mechanisms; since “levels of mechanisms” largely overlap with technical terms that define what a mechanism is, it is a legitimate question what distinct notion of ‘levels’ results at all that is not directly derivable from the notion of a mechanism (cf. Eronen 2013).

In this light, it is clear that levels of mechanisms are only distantly related to earlier attempts at elucidating levels in the life sciences, and have many features that we intuitively would not associate with the idea of levels (Eronen 2015). However, this is compatible with the idea that the relationships of mechanistic composition that levels of mechanisms track are as such crucially important for understanding and explaining biological organization.

Several authors have recently defended a “flat” view of the levels in mechanisms (Bechtel 2017; Bickle, De Sousa, & Silva 2022; Craver, Glennan & Povich 2021; Fazekas 2022). For example, Peter Fazekas (2022) suggests that what we call mechanistic “levels” just identify modules, or sets of interacting units, within a causal network. In this view, there are no ontologically distinct levels in mechanisms at all, mechanisms are just extremely complex systems of interacting parts all at one “level”. Bechtel (2017) and Craver et al. (2021) put forward a similar flat interpretation of mechanistic levels, but argue that this is compatible with the original non-reductive commitments of the mechanistic approach (see also section 4 ). For further attempts at expanding or developing the notion of levels of mechanisms, see Bertolaso & Buzzoni (2017), Harbecke (2015) and Kaiser (2015).

2.3 Wimsatt’s “local maxima” account

Both the layer-cake and the mechanistic approach to levels aim at defining levels in the sense of giving at least necessary conditions for what constitutes a level. William Wimsatt (1976a; 1994) takes a different approach and sets out to characterize the key features that levels of organization typically (but not necessarily) exhibit across different instances. Originally, an important background motivation for Wimsatt was to understand and characterize claims about “higher-level” entities and phenomena that are ubiquitous in biology and social sciences (Wimsatt 2021). The philosophical discussions in the 1970s were focused on strong reductionism or eliminativism (see the entry on Reductionism in Biology ), which seemed inadequate to capture the way many scientists perceived the organization of nature (Wimsatt 2021). Inspired by the work of Simon (1962 [1996]), Wimsatt set out to develop a “tropical rainforest ontology” in contrast to a Quinean “desert ontology”, and levels played a central role in this account. First, according to Wimsatt, levels are compositional and form nested hierarchical structures, so that wholes at lower levels function as parts at higher levels. Second, levels of organization are a

deep, non-arbitrary, and extremely important feature of the ontological architecture of our natural world, and almost certainly of any world which could produce, and be inhabited or understood by, intelligent beings . (Wimsatt 1994 [2007: 203])

A further feature of levels of organization is that they are

constituted by families of entities usually of comparable size and dynamical properties, which characteristically interact primarily with one another . (Wimsatt 1994 [2007: 204])

A helpful metaphor that Wimsatt uses to illustrate this is that we can think of theories or models of specific levels as sieves of different sizes that sift out things with the appropriate size and dynamical properties (Wimsatt 1976a: 237). Thus, theories at the level of organisms sift out roughly organism-sized things that are capable of reproduction and primarily interact with each other.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly,

[l]evels of organization can be thought of as local maxima of regularity and predictability in the phase space of alternative modes of organization of matter . (1976a: 209; see also 1976a: 238)

This point is “the closest that [Wimsatt] will come to a definition” (1976a: 209), and requires some explanation. The idea is roughly that patterns and regularities that can be used as a basis for prediction and explanation are found clustered around certain scales, and such clusters indicate levels of organization. Thus, if we plot regularity and predictability against (size) scale, then levels of organization will appear as peaks in the plot (see Figure). The entities that we find at these “local maxima” will exhibit stable regularities in virtue of the criteria (size, rate, dynamic properties, etc.) with which they are grouped into levels, and these regularities can also serve as the basis for reliable predictability. Moreover, levels of organization comprise “the most probable states of matter” (1976a: 239), meaning that if we could vary the initial conditions, under a range of conditions natural selection or other selection processes would result in the same levels (Wimsatt 1976a: 238–239). For example, if the level of molecules is a level of organization in Wimsatt’s sense, then there should be a peak in regularity and predictability at the scale(s) where molecules are located, and molecules should be the most probable mode of organization of matter under a range of conditions.

Figure 1.  Wimsatt's levels of organization. Based on Wimsatt (1976a: 240), created in 1973; used with permission. [An extended description of figure 1 is in the supplement.]

Wimsatt points out many other features that levels may have: For example, processes at higher levels tend to happen at slower rates than processes at lower levels, higher level properties are typically multiply realized by lower level properties, and higher-level causal relationships are dynamically autonomous in the sense of being largely independent of what happens at lower-levels. What differentiates levels will also vary between instances, and may include part-whole distinctions, the magnitudes of forces by which things interact, or, pragmatically, considerations of size of different constituents.

Importantly, Wimsatt also argues that in contexts where part-whole relationships become too complex, such as in many biological systems, levels of organization break down, and in these cases a more appropriate organizational notion is perspective (Wimsatt 1994 [2007, 227]). Perspectives are (incomplete) accounts of systems based on a set of variables, and in contrast to levels, need not have any part-whole structure. For example, we can approach organisms from anatomical, physiological or genetic perspectives, each perspective coming with a proprietary set of variables. When even the boundaries of perspectives start to break down, and it is no longer clear to which perspective a problem belongs to, we are facing what Wimsatt calls a causal thicket . According to Wimsatt,

neurophysiological, psychological, and social realms are mostly thickets, which are only occasionally well-ordered enough for local problems to be treated as perspectival or level-relative problems. (Wimsatt 1994 [2007: 239])

Griesemer (2021) presents a more epistemic reading of these notions: When scientists first approach a complex system, they encounter it as a causal thicket, but they then proceed to “prune” it, first to perspectives and then (possibly) to levels.

By including so many caveats and possible but not necessary characteristics of levels, Wimsatt makes his account extremely versatile and wide in scope, but at the same time open to charges of vagueness or inconsistency (cf. Craver 2007: 182–183). It contains a multitude of criteria that levels could but do not necessarily have to satisfy, so that almost any set of entities that are in some respect similar to one another could be said to form a level. Moreover, the individual criteria as such also raise many questions. For example, how should we understand the “local maxima of regularity and predictability”? What kinds of regularities should we include—only causal generalizations, or also regularities describing associational or compositional relations (Craver 2007: 182–183)? How do we count or estimate the number of regularities on a given scale? How do these peaks match with the other proposed criteria, such as the part-whole organization of levels?

These worries are to some extent alleviated by taking into account an important background idea in Wimsatt’s approach: Levels of organization and the entities that occupy them should be robust , meaning that they should be detectable, measurable, derivable, definable, and so on, in a variety of independent ways (1981 [2007: 63–4]; 1994 [2007: 210]). In other words, they should exhibit redundancy between independent means of accessing, detecting or defining them, and therefore should not depend on any single criterion or defining feature. Thus, if levels of organization are robust, the choice of criteria, or the problems of some individual criterion, will not be crucial. However, the extent to which there are such robust levels of organization in nature remains an open question. What is clear is that Wimsatt’s account of levels of organization is still highly relevant and continues to serve as the backdrop for informed discussions of levels (see, e.g., the articles in the collection Brooks, DiFrisco & Wimsatt 2021b; and DiFrisco 2021 for a process-based account of levels that is explicitly Wimsattian in character).

Despite the familiarity of scientists and philosophers with the levels concept, calls for its dismissal or de-emphasis in the scientific lexicon are increasingly common (Eronen 2013; Guttman 1976; Ladyman & Ross 2007; Potochnik 2017; 2021; Potochnik & McGill 2012; Rueger & McGivern 2010; Thalos 2013). For one thing, nature may simply be too messy to fit any layer-cake style picture. Consider as an illustration the putative level of “organisms”. Blue whales and yeast cells are both clearly organisms and thus should nominally be located at this level, but each comprises radically different kinds of entities with radically different properties (Potochnik & McGill 2012). Moreover, but when we consider the next lower level, namely the one indicated by the components of these organisms, the picture of levels as neat horizontal layers breaks down completely. The components of blue whales include things such as organs, tissues and cells, whereas yeast cells are composed of things like the cell membrane, nucleus and mitochondria (cf. Potochnik & McGill 2012). Furthermore, the whale is in part composed of various symbionts, including gut bacteria which are at the same time components of the whale and organisms in themselves. Thus, the components of different kinds of organisms do not form any homogeneous “level”.

These problems are not just due to the difficulties of defining what an organism is. Similar issues arise when we consider the components of cells, such as the cell membrane and mitochondria, and especially their subcomponents (e.g, lipid molecules and the outer mitochondrial membrane respectively): they exhibit too much heterogeneity to form neat levels (Eronen 2021). Moreover, the same kinds of things can be parts in very different higher-level wholes: For example, hydrogen ions are components of the lipid molecules that make up cell membranes, but they can also be free-standing components in the oxidative phosphorylation mechanism that involves the cell membrane as another component (Bechtel 2008: 147).

More generally, Potochnik and McGill (2012; see also Potochnik 2021) argue that ‘levels’ imposes a radically false, rigid uniformity onto nature, and identify these problems with the basic idea of the levels concept itself:

Indeed, the very notion of stratified levels depends on not only the ubiquity, but also the uniformity, of part-whole composition. For strata to emerge, atoms must always compose molecules, populations must always compose communities, and so forth. But the uniformity of composition needed for stratified levels simply does not exist . (2012: 126; emphasis added; see also Guttman 1976: 113; Thalos 2013: 10)

This comprehensive, uniform rigidity in turn undermines other features attributed to levels of organization. One of these features is the supposed epistemic merit (or fault) inherently exhibited by natural constituents due to their position at a particular level (Potochnik & McGill 2012: 129–30; Potochnik 2021). For instance, reductionists frequently argue that molecular-level explanations are generally more secure, more fundamental, or otherwise superior to explanations citing higher-level structures like chromosomes or cells (and conversely, anti-reductionists claim that higher-level constituents are often necessary for producing adequate explanations). However, as has been pointed out by many authors, blanket attributions of significance like these are deeply misleading (see section 4 ). One reason for this is that particular levels exhibit epistemic merit only in regard to what is being investigated. As such, what is taken to be the relevant level will shift depending on what structures or processes comprise the focus of scientists’ investigative tasks, and hence no level will have inherent or principled epistemic superiority. Moreover, epistemic products like explanations and theories in biology rarely exhibit a monolevel structure, but rather include multiple levels simultaneously (e.g., Schaffner 1993: 97–8, 387; Mitchell 2003: 147; Craver 2007).

The basic conclusion that Potochnik and other levels skeptics draw from this is the following. The levels concept precludes a sophisticated discussion of philosophical and scientific issues by imposing an overly simplistic representation of science and nature. So, although perhaps no one would deny the attractiveness of ‘levels’ in seeking to make complex natural systems tractable to analysis, depicting these systems using the concept seems to do far more harm than good. Burton S. Guttman is very clear on this, arguing that “if it is stated in any but the sloppiest and most general terms, [the concept of levels] is a useless and even misleading concept” (Guttman 1976: 112). Similarly, Miriam Thalos colorfully names “the conceit of levels” before stating that “the notion of levels provides no useful philosophical ideas whatsoever” (Thalos 2013: 13).

This levels-skepticism also possesses a more constructive side. Several authors have suggested replacing or reinterpreting levels talk in terms of other concepts (Eronen 2015; Noble 2012; Potochnik & McGill 2012; see also P.S. Churchland & Sejnowski 1992; McCauley 2009; Rueger & McGivern 2010). The motivation behind this “deflationary” approach (Eronen 2013) is that the problems associated with levels of organization can be avoided if more well-defined notions are applied instead. For instance, the notion of scale arguably does not lead to the same kinds of problems as the notion of levels of organization. All that is needed for arranging things on a scale is measuring some quantitative property of those things. Scales also have the advantage of being entirely continuous, while levels require placing things at distinct and discrete positions in the hierarchy (Potochnik & McGill 2012). The scale that is the most obviously relevant one in this context is the size scale, which is based on how big things are: Organisms are usually (though not always) bigger than cells, which are bigger than molecules, which are bigger than atoms, and so on.

However, the time scale is also crucially important for understanding biological organization (Simon 1962; DiFrisco 2017). Time scale can refer to the rate at which a process occurs, but also to the frequency of a process, or to the rate of interactions between processes or entities, all of which are relevant scales in the context of biology (Baedke 2021). For example, interactions between organisms (e.g., sexual reproduction) take place at much slower rates than interactions between cells (e.g., synaptic communication), which again are slower than interactions between molecules (e.g., receptor binding). The idea of ordering biological processes based on time scale has a long history, going back at least to organicism (see section 1 ; Baedke 2021). Understanding levels in terms of scales is also consistent with the idea that at some scales we may find peaks of regularity or predictability (Wimsatt 1994 [2007]), or clusters of causal relationships (Potochnik & McGill 2012). Besides scales, also other notions have been proposed to replace levels, such as networks (Potochnik 2021; see also Bechtel 2017) or explanatory styles (Potochnik & Sanches Oliveira 2020).

Although these skeptical and deflationary approaches, where the notion of levels is reduced or deflated to more well-defined concepts, ostensibly increase conceptual clarity, they may not be sufficient for accounting for the role of levels of organization in biological theory and practice (see also section 6 ). For example, the cellular level is a canonical level organization, but cells come in many different sizes, and it is hard to identify a size (or time) scale that would play a similar role as the notion of a cellular level. Moreover, skepticism regarding specific philosophical conceptions of levels, such as layer-cake-style levels or levels of mechanisms, leaves open the possibility that more piecemeal or context-specific approaches to levels may still be useful.

In the wake of skeptical arguments against the levels concept, recent work on the notion has sought to address the pessimistic appraisals outlined in the previous section by rejuvenating the discussion surrounding levels. One key component in reestablishing the potential of levels for philosophical insight has been to address the gap between philosophical expectations placed upon the concept in skeptical treatments, and the usage dynamics informing scientific applications of the concept (Brooks 2021b; see also DiFrisco 2017 and Brooks, DiFrisco & Wimsatt 2021a).

In particular, philosophical expectations placed upon accounts of levels tend to depart from scientific applications of the concept both in characterizing how the levels concept is used and in the motivations behind applying the concept in scientific contexts. This is especially visible in the way that levels are conceptualized by critics. For instance, Potochnik characterizes the objectionable consequences of the levels concept as stemming from “the very idea” of levels (2017: 170), where this “very idea” takes the concept to impose (i) universality of composition, (ii) uniform relations between putative levels, and (iii) total discreteness of level-bound units (2017: 170; see also Potochnik & McGill 2012: 126). Similarly, Thalos claims that to even postulate a leveled ontology is to be committed to a reductionist “master ontology” grounded in physics from which all other higher levels derive (2013: 7).

Both of these characterizations rest on attributions to the levels concept stemming from philosophical sources rather than scientific usage of the concept. For one thing, Potochnik’s idea of levels seems to presume a layer-cake conception, an account that has few contemporary advocates and whose fidelity to science has arguably always at least been questionable. Likewise, the commitment to a reductionist ontology purported by Thalos rests decidedly on the further postulation of reductionist physicalism, a stance to which the levels concept is at best neutral (see section 6 ). Though these sources for making levels intelligible as an object of criticism may enjoy intuitive appeal widely in play in general philosophy of science and philosophy of mind, it is plausible that assessing the merits (and demerits) of the concept requires extraction from base intuition and exposure to further scientific-philosophical scrutiny (Brooks, DiFrisco, & Wimsatt 2021a).

For these reasons, efforts to rejuvenate levels and their significance have turned to different sources to enable scientific input into the conceptualization of levels. One important consequence of this has been the rejection of any neat and tidy definition or unitary account of levels, instead treating the concept within multiple facets of reconstruction that scientific usage engenders. That is, engaging with the notion is seen as a widely open-ended endeavor (Brooks 2021a).

One such front of approaches to levels focuses on the roles of the concept in scientific reasoning. For instance, Brooks and Eronen (2018) locate a heuristic element within usage of levels of organization. In this approach, instead of focusing primarily on what levels are ontologically speaking, or attempting to give a unitary definition of levels, the focus is to recover first the significance attributed to levels when applied in science (and parts of philosophy of biology). In particular, depicting biological systems requires emphasizing some details over others, as incorporating all details of an investigated system is not possible due to the cognitive and physical constraints placed on human agents (in line with the focus on heuristic reasoning). Thus, scientific uses of levels involve descriptive abstractions figuring into the decisions researchers make in selecting features of a system intended for the attending analysis. A second use Brooks and Eronen identify concerns the postulation of levels as guiding scientific inquiry in that different putative levels, though perhaps not well-characterized at the outset, serve as points of departure for new fields of inquiry in laying out landscapes of problems and questions that lie in front of these fields (such as systems biology in the 2000s). Eronen (2021) identifies a further heuristic in the basic idea that in levels of organization “similar things are composed of things that are similar to one another”, which may often work as an abstraction. For example, both proteins and genes (at a higher level), which are similar in important ways, are composed of monomers such amino acids and nucleotides (at a lower level), which are again similar to one another in important ways.

This being said, the heuristic approach offers an incomplete account of levels, an intentional feature meant to invite further work on the notion. The heuristic approach thus seeks to capture some minimal features that a more committed body of work should account for. A core motivation of this approach is to construct a rapprochement between advocates of the levels concept and more skeptical theorists (see, however, Potochnik 2021 for criticism of the heuristic approach). Particularly, supporters of the heuristic approach argue that a more nuanced appraisal of the levels concept aids to reveal its flexibility and usefulness in science. Most especially, it emphasizes that, like other heuristics, the concept may work in some contexts but not in others. Such scattered records of success, failure, and neutral accomplishments are in turn “mundane to scientific concepts in general” (Brooks & Eronen 2018: 41).

Using the heuristic appraisal of levels as a springboard, a more systematic reconstruction of the levels concept in scientific reasoning points to a “fragmentary approach” whereby more overarching usage profiles begin to take shape. Brooks (2021a) for instance articulates two such profiles associated with the levels concept in scientific usage. One of these profiles identifies the levels concept as a tool ( sensu Griffiths & Stotz 2008; Feest 2010) that scientists use to, for example, construct material inferences in specific experimental systems and to aid in providing projectibility to these inferences by conferring generality to the structures and processes involved. This profile of usage arguably captures practical scientific work operative in research articles published for specialist researchers. A second usage profile associated with levels appears as a kind of “doctrinal” notion in the vein of cell theory or the germ theory of disease. This profile draws its inspiration from the notion of doctrine, in the sense of something that is widely taught or adhered to, and is visible in scientific textbooks (see section 6.7 ) and in broad statements of position by grant-funding agencies and major theoretical works in biology. That is, the notion of levels of organization comprises a core theoretical component in the edifice of biology in serving to introduce or advocate for a basic view of biological science. Both of these usage profiles, seen as tool and doctrine, complement each other in conferring (i) fine-grained content to the concept in specific instances (tool) and (ii) general warrant to the notion as an established confluence of insights acquired throughout history (doctrine). Moreover, both suggest a unifying rationale to the notion, identified in its potential ability to structure scientific problems (Brooks 2021b).

As we saw above, Oppenheim and Putnam introduced their highly influential view of levels in the context of the reductive unity of science, and Wimsatt’s account was partly motivated by the need to respond to reductionism. Up to this day, levels have continued to play an important role in debates on reductionism (see the entry Reductionism in Biology ). Questions of reductionism are often explicitly formulated in terms of levels: Do higher level properties, theories, or explanations reduce to lower level ones?

In the classical Nagelian account (Nagel 1961), reduction amounts to deriving a theory that is to be reduced from a more fundamental theory on the basis of two conditions: deducibility and connectability (see the entry Scientific Reduction ). The standard example is the reduction of thermodynamics to statistical mechanics. Nagel thought that from the laws of statistical mechanics one an derive the laws of thermodynamics (deducibility), with the help of “bridge principles” that connect the terms of these two theories (connectability; Nagel 1961: ch. 11; Schaffner 1967).

Nagel’s original approach to reduction has been criticized from many angles, but in the present context, the most relevant criticism is that the classical model ignores the distinction between interlevel and intralevel reductions in science (Wimsatt 1976a; 1976b; McCauley 1996). Intralevel (or successional) settings involve competing theories within a particular science and within a particular level, for example the phlogiston theory and the caloric theory of heat. Interlevel settings, on the other hand, involve theories at different levels of organization that thereby have differing explananda, terminology and methodology: for example, cognitive psychology and molecular neuroscience. Nagel’s model in its classic form treats these different contexts equally. For this and many other reasons (see, e.g., Walter & Eronen 2011), it is widely agreed that the Nagelian model fails to reconstruct reductive relations as they appear in actual science (Wimsatt 1976b; 1979), and that the model in its original form is inapplicable to actual biological cases (Kaiser 2012).

Problems of the Nagelian model led to the development of alternative accounts based on the same basic idea, which actively incorporated the idea of levels into their framework (Hooker 1981; P.S. Churchland 1986; Schaffner 1993; Bickle 1998; 2003). This culminated in the “New Wave” model of reduction, where intertheoretic relations form a continuum ranging from complete elimination to retentive Nagel-style reduction (Bickle 1998). For a summary of this model, see the entry Scientific Reduction §2.6.

Other accounts of reduction also countenance the levels concept, albeit in different ways. In his “ruthless” account of reductionism, Bickle (2003) abandons the idea of reduction progressing stepwise from level to level, and argues that cellular and molecular neuroscience can directly replace psychology (see also Barwich 2021). If one can intervene onto the molecular level to change variables at the behavioral level, then, Bickle contends, one has discovered the “genuine” causal mechanism for those variables (Bickle 2003). Here ‘levels’ figure into ruthless reductionism as useful fictions, where intermediary levels such as tissues, organs, and the like provide a scaffolding for emerging molecular-level explanations. These intermediary levels exhibit “merely” heuristic value, only in the service of constructing behavior-to-molecules reductions (Bickle 2003: 130). Recently, Bickle has defended an even stronger and explicitly “levels-less” version of reductionism, where levels no longer have even a heuristic role (Bickle et al., 2022).

A different reconceptualization of reduction is offered by Hüttemann and Love (2011), who note that part-whole reduction in particular has become a widely-endorsed alternative to the Nagelian framework (see also Brigandt 2013: 77). They put forward compositionality and causality as two aspects of reductive explanation (Hüttemann & Love 2011: 4), which are both expressed in levels-laden language. Compositionality, for instance, is couched in ‘levels’ in that the very notions of part and whole in biological contexts correspond to respectively lower- and higher-level status (cf. Kaiser 2015, 192; Winther 2006). Kaiser (2015) goes further than this approach in claiming that a “lower-level character” is a necessary condition for an explanation to even be considered reductive (2015: 188).

The idea of levels has also figured prominently into arguments for antireductionism and pluralism. In his classic treatise, Philip Kitcher (1984) elevates the level concept to a centerpiece of the antireductionist position. According to Kitcher, the reductionist aspiration of reducing classical Mendelian to molecular genetics will not pan out because molecular constituents do not capture the causal relations between Mendelian constituents (e.g., chromosomes) and heritable traits. Importantly, Kitcher grounds this in the structure of the world as captured by the levels concept:

Anti-reductionism construes the current division of biology not simply as a temporary feature of our science stemming from our cognitive imperfections but as the reflection of levels of organization in nature . (1984: 371, emphasis modified; Rosenberg [1985: 119] makes a similar statement)

Elevating the levels concept even further, Kitcher makes levels (of the layer-cake variety) part of the conception of antireductionism itself, concluding that

to the extent that we can make sense of the present explanatory structure within biology—that division of the field into subfields corresponding to levels of organization in nature—we can also understand the antireductionist doctrine. (Kitcher 1984: 373)

In a more recent defense of antireductionism, Robert McCauley (1996; 2007) expands on the intra-interlevel distinction to plead for a multilevel explanatory pluralism between higher- and lower-level theories. McCauley targets the New Wave model where intertheory relations result in a spectrum of consequences, ranging from identity to elimination, for higher-level theories (P.M. Churchland 1979; P.M. Churchland and P.S. Churchland 1990; Bickle 1998). He argues that a single spectrum of reductive consequences misrepresents the nature of intertheory coevolution. Intralevel reductions, focusing on reduction in terms of replacement, do not capture the historical dynamics involved in evaluating interlevel cases, and elimination is virtually nonexistent in interlevel cases. Moreover, eliminating or reducing higher-level theories would also undermine the status of the higher-level’s scientific institutions (McCauley 1996). As this rarely happens, and attributing epistemic, ontological, or methodological superiority to the lower levels is at best a claim that needs to be substantiated, the New Wave model appears to be wildly at odds with actual scientific practice. According to McCauley, we observe intertheoretical coevolution instead, where higher-level theories can offer lower-level theories criteria for external coherency, evidential constraints, and novel problem solving strategies (McCauley 1996).

Other arguments for pluralism also take their start from levels of organization. Sandra Mitchell (2003), for instance, argues for integrative pluralism that is suggested by the multilevel and multicomponential “ontology of complex systems” (2009: 109). The basic idea of integrative pluralism falls out of the fact that biological systems evolve in a contingent manner, thus setting the stage for multilevel evolutionary scenarios (Mitchell 2003). This in turn highlights the preponderance of ‘emergent properties’ in biological systems, which appear at novel levels of organization out of the interactions of simpler components. Both of these factors inflate the overall number of explanatory sources that could contribute to explaining a given phenomenon (2003; 2009). Consequently, discovering unilateral causes for complex phenomena will not be forthcoming (2003, 160). Likewise, Ingo Brigandt (2010; 2013) emphasizes the pursuance of investigation at multiple levels of organization as a fact about scientific practice, but also as cause to articulate the localized significance of explanatory contributions to particular problems, as in the case of evo-devo explanations.

This kind of multilevel pluralism is also defended by the supporters of the New Mechanism (Bechtel 2008; Craver 2005, 2007; Brigandt 2010: 297; see also Mechanisms in Science ). As McCauley (2007) points out, mechanistic explanation can be seen as explanatory pluralism “writ small”: In each localized mechanistic context, several levels (understood as levels of mechanisms) are needed to fully explain the phenomenon. However, authors such as Fazekas (2022), Fazekas and Kertész (2011), and Soom (2012) argue that the commitments of New Mechanism are in fact incompatible with robust antireductionism.

Levels of organization have traditionally provided the framework for the debate on downward causation, where the question is whether higher-level entities or properties can exert causal influence on lower-level ones (e.g., Bechtel 2008; Campbell 1974; Emmeche et al. 1997; 2000; Kim 1992; 1999; Craver & Bechtel 2007). The idea of downward causation is closely connected to emergentism, and is often seen as one of its core tenets (Emmeche et al. 1997; 2000; Kim 1999; see also the entry Emergent Properties ). Examples of putative downward causation include psychological states causing physical behavior, the activity of an organism causing changes in the tissues and cells of that organism, and cell-level processes such as synaptic communication causing molecular changes. On the one hand, downward causation seems prima facie to be common or even ubiquitous in experiments and explanations in the life sciences, and many scientists and philosophers consider it to be an important feature of nature (Campbell 1974; Ellis 2008; Love 2012; Noble 2012). On the other hand, in philosophy downward causation has often been approached with skepticism (e.g., McLaughlin 1992; Kim 1992; 1999; 2005; Craver & Bechtel 2007).

Although the discussion on downward causation relies heavily on the notion of levels, this notion itself has not received much explicit attention in this context. However, to what extent downward causation is possible or plausible crucially depends on what notion of levels is assumed (Eronen 2021). Most of the critics of downward causation have in mind causation across compositional levels, where a whole exerts causal influence on its own parts. This is also what is at stake in the influential discussion of Craver and Bechtel, who apply the framework of levels of mechanisms to analyze top-down causation (Bechtel 2008; Craver & Bechtel 2007; Craver 2015).

Craver and Bechtel argue that genuine top-down or downward causation does not exist; there are just normal same-level causal relationships that sometimes have “mechanistically mediated” effects downward in the mechanism. What is meant by “mechanistically mediated” is that changes in the higher levels of the mechanism immediately result in changes in the lower levels of the mechanisms due to the constitutive relationship between the higher-level mechanism and its lower-level components. Mechanistically mediated effects may have the initial appearance of downward causation, but the relationship between the mechanism and its components is constitutive, not causal, and therefore mechanistically mediated effects are not causal.

To clarify this, consider the example of Hal’s glucose metabolism (Craver & Bechtel 2007: 559–560). Hal is playing tennis, and as he keeps running around and swinging the racket, the cells in Hal’s body start taking in and using more glucose. It seems that the cause of the increase in Hal’s glucose metabolism at the cellular level is Hal playing tennis, which suggests causation from a higher level (the level of the whole organism playing tennis) to a lower level (the cellular level). However, according to Craver and Bechtel, this would violate one central assumption regarding causation, namely that causes must be distinct from their effects, and must occur prior to the effects. Instead, they see this as just regular same-level causal relationships at the cellular level: Nerve signals to the muscle cells cause a cascade of events that results in increased glucose metabolism. Hal’s tennis playing activity is partly constituted by these cellular mechanisms, and this constitutive relationship is responsible for the appearance of downward causation. As Hal starts to play, there are changes in these mechanisms, but only in virtue of them partly making up the tennis playing activity.

This approach is appealing, but faces several challenges. First, it has been argued that there are no clear methods of distinguishing between causal and constitutive relationships in mechanisms (e.g., Leuridan 2011); if this is correct, there seems to be no reason to posit that “mechanistically mediated” effects are non-causal. Second, the idea of “normal” intralevel causation is problematic in the framework of levels of mechanisms. As we have seen in section 2.2 , the idea of “being at the same level” has little if any significance in this framework, so same-level causation cannot be the default or normal type of causation. The idea seems to be rather that there is no causation from a mechanism as a whole to the components of that same mechanism, but this is just one very specific form of downward causation, and how other forms should be treated is left open in this account (Eronen 2013). Third, it is not clear whether higher-level causal processes in mechanisms can be distinct from causal processes at lower levels of the mechanism—if not, there are no higher-level causal processes that could have mechanistically mediated effects downwards in the mechanism to begin with (Fazekas & Kertész 2011; see also Fazekas 2022; Craver et al. 2021).

Although levels of mechanisms have been prominent in recent philosophical discussions, a far more common way of approaching downward causation in the biological literature has been to explicate it in terms of higher-level constraints or boundary conditions. The idea is that the behavior of lower-level things is constrained by the higher-level whole that they are a part of, and therefore explaining the behavior of these lower-level things is not possible exclusively at the lower level, but requires appealing to higher-level factors (e.g., Bishop 2008; Campbell 1974; Ellis 2008; Emmeche et al. 1997; 2000; Green 2018; 2021; Kistler 2009; Noble 2012; Pattee 1973; Sperry 1969). In a classic article, Donald Campbell expressed this idea as follows: “processes at the lower levels of a hierarchy are restrained by and act in conformity to the laws of the higher level” (Campbell 1974: 180). For example, according to Noble (2012), the higher-level cellular property of membrane potential constrains the activity of ion channels at a lower level, and this amounts to downward causation. Similarly, Green (2018; 2021) argues that properties of tissue structure (e.g., resistance) set boundary conditions for the propagation of action potentials, resulting in a form of downward causation.

These cases do not seem to involve causation across compositional levels, that is, causation from a whole to its own parts: for instance, the membrane potential and the ion channels do not stand in a part-whole relationship (Woodward 2021). Instead, the underlying notion of levels seems more akin to scales (as is also explicitly stated by Noble 2012 and Green 2021). More generally, Woodward (2021) has argued that (downward) causation should not be seen as involving things (such as wholes and their parts) as relata, but rather variables, such as a variable representing the membrane potential, and a variable representing whether an ion channel is open or closed. When downward causation and levels are understood in this way, the worry that the causes are not sufficiently distinct from their effects in downward causation seems to dissolve, as the higher-level variables (e.g., membrane potential at a higher scale) are clearly distinct from the lower-level effect variables (e.g., the ion channels at a lower scale; see Woodward 2021 for more).

6. Levels in biological theory and usage

Besides the more philosophical debates discussed above, levels of organization also play an important conceptual role in biological research and theory. Interestingly, this growing body of literature on levels in biology has (until recently) been almost entirely disconnected from the debates on levels in philosophy of science discussed above.

In the debate on levels of selection (Lewontin 1970; Brandon 1982), the hierarchical organization of nature into levels is an important background assumption, as the aim is to find out at which level(s) of the biological hierarchy natural selection is taking place (Griesemer 2001; Okasha 2006). Although Darwin’s original account was focused on evolution at the level of organisms, the conditions for natural selection can be formulated abstractly without referring to any specific kinds of entities, which allows for natural selection to operate at any level where the conditions are satisfied (Griesemer 2001; Lewontin 1970). Since the 1970s, the debate on levels of selection has kept on growing and extending to different areas, though no precise consensus has been reached. Positions range from the gene-centered view, where natural selection is taken to operate almost exclusively at the level of genes (e.g., Dawkins 1976; Williams 1966), to the pluralistic multilevel selection theory, which allows for natural selection to operate on any level of the biological hierarchy where we find the right kind of units (e.g., Sober & Wilson 1998; Wilson & Wilson 2008). For more on the levels of selection debate, see Okasha (2006) and the entry Units and Levels of Selection .

In this debate, the notion of levels of organization is typically used as a background notion, the exact meaning of which is left implicit, or illustrated with just a list of standard levels (Eronen & Ramsey forthcoming; Griesemer 2005). A notable exception is Okasha (2006), who puts forward a proposal for understanding levels of organization in natural selection. Okasha considers the hierarchical organization of nature to be one of the key factors that give rise to the levels-of-selection problem, and takes as a starting point the traditional picture where cells are nested within organs and tissues, which in turn are nested within organisms, and at yet higher levels we find groups, colonies, and so on (Okasha 2006: 10). However, Okasha observes that this standard picture is inadequate, as it is not clear which levels should be included in the context of levels of selection. Therefore, following McShea (2001) and Sober and Wilson (1998), Okasha argues that the entities at a level should interact in a way that affects their individual fitness (usually defined in terms of the number of offspring an individual produces). In other words, fitness-affecting interactions among parts is taken as a defining feature that distinguishes genuine levels from arbitrary or nonrelevant sets of parts. In addition, according to Okasha we need to rule out entities such as tissues and organs from genuine levels (of selection). To this end, he proposes (referring to McShea 2001) that entities at a level should be homologous with organisms in a free-living state, either extant or extinct. For example, the cells that compose organisms interact with each other and are homologous to free-living unicellular organisms, and therefore constitute a level in this account.

This proposal has been criticized for being too restrictive: (Eronen & Ramsey forthcoming): Most importantly, if we include the homology requirement, it is not clear how things like genes or groups of organisms could be seen as levels of selection, as they do not seem to be homologous with extant or extinct organisms. As an alternative, Eronen and Ramsey propose to characterize levels of selection directly in terms of fitness-affecting interactions (or some notion that plays a similar role, such as evolutionary individuality): A level is formed by any entities that are sufficiently similar and engage in fitness-affecting interactions. This results in a very deflationary, case-specific and localized conception of levels of selection, and conceptually detaches levels of selection from the broader idea of levels of organization. In general, the relationship between levels of selection and levels of organization remains a topic that requires further philosophical attention (see also section 6.5 ).

A different approach to the interplay of levels and evolution is provided by the “hierarchy theory of evolution” developed by Niles Eldredge and colleagues (Eldredge 1985; Eldredge & Salthe, 1984; Eldredge et al. 2016; Salthe 1985; Vrba & Eldredge 1984; see also Eldredge et al. 2016). In this theoretical framework, levels and hierarchies are taken synonymously to be fundamentally important ontological features of nature:

Biological evolutionary theory is ontologically committed to the existence of nested hierarchies in nature and attempts to explain natural phenomena as a product of complex dynamics of real hierarchical systems. (Tëmkin & Eldredge 2015: 184)

In the hierarchy theory of evolution, a distinction is made between two types of hierarchies and the corresponding levels (Eldredge 1996; Vrba & Eldredge 1984): The ecological and the genealogical hierarchy. In both kinds of hierarchies, higher-level things are formed through specific interactions among lower-level things. In the ecological hierarchy, these interactions are exchanges of matter and energy, such as consuming and gathering resources, and in this hierarchy, we find things such as cells, organisms, and ecosystems. In the genealogical hierarchy, the defining activity through which levels are formed is the transmission of information through replication, and the hierarchy includes things such as cells, organisms, demes and species. (Note that cells and organisms appear in both hierarchies, but in the ecological hierarchy they are seen as interactors, whereas in the genealogical hierarchy they are seen as replicators.) Work on this hierarchy theory of evolution is ongoing (see, e.g., Eldredge et al. 2016; Tëmkin 2021).

The issue of evolutionary transitions is closely connected to the debates on levels of selection and levels of organization. Here the focus is on the emergence of new levels of organization through evolutionary processes (Buss 1987: ch. 5; Griesemer 2001; Maynard Smith and Szathmáry 1995; Okasha 2006). The background idea is that the complex hierarchical organization of nature that we observe today must itself be a result of evolution, and therefore requires an evolutionary explanation. For example, somehow prokaryotes evolved to eukaryotic cells, single-celled organisms evolved to multicellular organisms, individual animals evolved to colonies, and so on (see also section 6.5 ). In their highly influential book, Maynard Smith and Szathmáry (1995) proposed that the characteristic feature of major evolutionary transitions is that entities that were capable of replicating independently before the transitions are only capable of replicating as parts of higher-level wholes after the transitions (see also Buss 1987). For example, after a single-celled organism has evolved into a multicellular organism, the cells of the organism can no longer replicate independently of the organism as a whole.

Detailed models of these processes of evolutionary transitions have been developed, such as the evolutionary transitions of individuality (ETI) account of Michod (1999; 2005). The basic idea of this model is that evolutionary transitions involve a decline in the fitness of individuals (e.g., cells as they engage in cooperative behavior) and a corresponding increase in the fitness of the collectives that they form (e.g., multicellular organisms). This eventually results in fitness being completely transferred to the collectives, which thereby form a new level of organization (see also Bourrat 2015 for criticism and discussion).

Levels of organization are also invariably tied to discussions of complexity in biology. One of the most prominent appearances of levels in the investigation of complexity occurs in observations of the apparent increase in structural hierarchies in organisms over evolutionary time. This increase of “nestedness”, where parts become located within other systems, appears to be a clear trend in the history of life (McShea 1996; 2001). Daniel McShea (2001) points to three examples of this trend, including the origin of eukaryotic cells from prokaryotes via endosymbiosis, the emergence of multicellular organisms, and the appearance of colonies formed by multicellular individuals. Yet it is not clear what precise relationship exists between levels of organization and complexity, and the explication of complexity remains an important task in its own right. On this point, though there exists no consensus among biologists, the two clearly inform each other.

Beginning with complexity, several measures for complexity have been proposed, many of which are intimately tied with the idea of levels. For instance, John Tyler Bonner (1988: 220) draws attention to the relations of size and complexity, identifying a trend in the upper limit of body size and an increase in complexity. This overall trend accompanies both actual increases as well as decreases in body sizes over evolutionary time. Bonner entertains two measures of complexity, including (1) the correlation of body size and number of cell types, and (2) the relation between genome size and number of cell types. Although he (and later researchers) concluded that there is no clear pattern indicating that the increase in the number of genes in a genome is accompanied by an increase in cell types, the former correlation appears to recover robust inference patterns, and has become a mainstay of informing uses of complexity (Valentine, Collins, & Meyer 1994; Valentine 2002; McShea 2021). Another proposed measure of complexity, offered by Hinegardner, and Engleberg (1983), characterizes the notion in terms of the minimal description necessary to capture the system’s behavior. These two approaches are related (Valentine, Collins, & Meyer 1994), though have not been systematically integrated. Finally, McShea (2021) summarizes and contrasts “horizontal” complexity, understood approximately as the number of cell types, and “vertical” complexity, which refers to the number of hierarchical partitionings (understood as nestedness) that are found within a system.

These characterizations of complexity and their relations to levels, like many discussions concerning the latter, leave much room for continued discussion and further scholarship. For one thing, though it appears clear that complexity and levels remain intimately related, the authors summarized above are not without discrepancies regarding the importance, or even place, of levels of organization in talking about complexity. For example, Bonner (1988) sets out his investigation by noting that it is not levels per se that is of interest but rather how levels themselves come into existence. Relatedly, McShea (2001) notes that levels of organization are a “secondary theme” (ibid., 406) to notions of nested hierarchies in biology and measuring complexity.

Although the levels concept may at first glance appear an abstract idea poised orthogonally to empirical matters (or interpretations thereof), the constituents of nature that the concept orders also comprise targets of experimental investigation. In this way, the levels concept can be conceptualized not only as local maxima of regularity and predictability, but also as local maxima of observability and manipulability. Here we describe several experimental practices where levels play an important role, focusing on observation and manipulation.

Tracking the various objects and processes occurring at different scales of nature is a centerpiece to conducting observations and observational studies in biology. That these constituents then also frequently make up central units of study for biology (molecules, cells, tissues, organs, and so on) is one notable element of the levels concept’s basic expression (Wimsatt 1994; 2021). The systematicity of these constituents’ relationships is an especially noteworthy consequence of reasoning with the levels concept: When we shift between scale resolutions (be it temporal or spatial), different units of study can be identified and investigated. Oftentimes, the units generically involved in an area of research (molecules, cells, tissues) are basically known, but their specific dynamics comprise targets for further study and characterization (Brooks 2021b).

In addition to observational techniques, experimental manipulation of different scale-bound units is another hallmark of daily practices in biological research. Here the levels concept contributes to our basic reasoning of these practices by aiding our efforts in testing hypotheses and building explanations. In this vein, Alan Love (2021) argues that applying the levels concept is not merely a matter of abstract representation, but also of articulating well-defined experimental targets in laboratory settings. Love considers examples such as mixed cell aggregates, a well-established and classical experimental technique where tissues are first physically separated into their constituent cells, mixed together in a medium, and then segregate and regrow into tissue aggregates of similar cell-type (see especially Moscona 1959). Such targets of manipulation, Love reasons, align with the explicit aims of researching biologists to describe, predict, and explain biological phenomena such as morphogenesis (and biological development in general; see Love 2021: 139).

As the example of mixed cell aggregates implies, observation and manipulation co-occur in experimental settings: Tissues (higher level) are physically separated into individual cells (lower level) and placed in a medium (that is, are manipulated), and their subsequent behavior is observed and measured. Such transitions to and from higher and lower levels demonstrate the structuring capacities of the levels concept for interpreting the significance of experimental efforts. Consider another example from experimental evolution (for a primer see, e.g., Kawecki et al. 2012), where the transition from cellular to multicellular individuals is experimentally induced in different species of unicellular life. In one experiment, Ratcliff, Denison, et al. (2012) induced multicellular snowflake-like clusters in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae using a simple selection regime (i.e., gravity; multicellular clusters sink more quickly in a medium, and were collected after various intervals and placed in a new medium). These clusters began reproducing via post-division adhesion (rather than aggregation) across several generations, thus creating its own novel life history (reproducing uniclonal clusters rather than aggregates containing individual cell genomes), developing a division of labor among cell constituents (see also Simpson 2012), and even exhibiting regulation of cluster phenotype behavior, seen in the emergence of programmed cell death in individual cells unable to contribute to the supracellular individual (see also Ratcliff, Fankhauser, et al. 2015; Herron et al. 2019).

Focusing on the practical and experimental significance of levels of organization also stands to contribute to the philosophical discourse on levels more generally. Love (2021), for instance, argues that the practices of working biologists in manipulating levels warrant an inference from successful practice to scientific metaphysics, thereby supporting a “modest realism” regarding levels of organization.

The insights and hypotheses based on leveled thinking, in combination with manipulations and observations performed in the lab, provide one instance of synthesis between conceptual and practical matters of investigation. This synthesis often results in conceptually guided and empirically driven theory. Explicitly attending to different levels and the distinct scale-relative dynamics supports hypothesis and theory building by making intelligible the scale-bound practices of observation and motivating manipulation of well-defined targets in manifestly complex systems.

Instances of such synthesis are widely available in contemporary and twentieth century biological science. For example, conceptualizing cancer as primarily a tissue-level disease (albeit with multiple levels playing roles) has long been closely connected to interpreting and reinterpreting laboratory findings based on a leveled conceptual landscape. Already in the 1930s, organicist biologists were hypothesizing that cancer be understood as deviations in tissue competence that disrupt maintenance of healthy tissue, enabling uncontrolled growth (Waddington 1935; Needham 1936a; see also Abercrombie, Heaysman, & Karthauser 1957; Sonnenschein & Soto 1998). More recent conceptually guided work on cancer has reiterated this insight, with many postulating that cancerous growth comprises a reversal from the multicellular state to the unicellular state, amounting essentially to a dissolution of a tissue by disrupting tissue-level forces (Chen et al. 2015; see also Trigos et al. 2018). This transition from multicellular to unicellular directly mirrors the experimentally induced emergence of multicellular individuals described in the previous section, a pattern noted by the authors above in the case of the snowflake yeast clusters (Ratcliff, Denison, et al. 2012).

Another example of synthetic theory involving levels more generally concerns the dynamics of collective behaviors in tissue. Busby and Steventon (2021) argue that “tissue tectonics”, that is, tissue-level mechanical forces and associated timing, provide a mechanism for coordinating morphogenetic events across multiple levels of organization (see also Xi et al. 2019; Zinner, Lukonin, & Liberali, 2020). One striking example of tissue tectonics concerns the sliding of tissue sheets containing populations of cells within the respective sheets, which allows intercellular signaling to occur between these populations, thus enabling a crucial timing event to induce changes in cell states. One key feature of such examples is the preponderance of claims that causality free moves between levels via concrete interactions, both in “upward” and “downward” fashions (Busby & Steventon 2021; Zinner, Lukonin, & Liberali 2020; see also section 5 ).

The concept of levels of organization plays a prominent role as a pedagogical resource in the education of biology. Beginning with the notion’s ubiquitous presence in textbooks and other introductory statements in biology (see Schneeweiß & Gropengießer 2019 for a review; examples include, e.g., Begon, Townshend & Harper 2006; Lobo 2008; Mader 2010; Urry et al. 2016; O’Neill et al. 1986), depictions of levels often dominate the first few pages of major biology textbooks with large centerfold illustrations stretching across whole pages. In this capacity, the levels concept serves as an organizational principle that communicates basic themes of the study of biology to aspiring scientists early in their training (Brooks 2023).

Figure 2. Diagram of levels of organization from General Biology (Boundless), §1.8 ; CC BY-SA 4.0

Some of the usage patterns one finds in support of these basic themes within contemporary textbooks include, e.g., (i) the apparent preponderance of emergence in living systems, (ii) the need to be aware of the relative success of reductive and non-reductive, “systemic” approaches to analyzing biological phenomena, and (iii) the need to actively embed choices of investigation within appropriate methods that are more-or-less useful at different scale resolutions. These uses, present already in early historical textbook references to levels, in turn has been offered as a partial explanation for the rapid uptake of the concept in the textbook literature in the mid-twentieth century.

The efforts of Eugene P. Odum (see especially Odum 1959; 1963; cf. Odum 1953) in particular imbued the levels concept with a fundamental character attached to the study of the life sciences. In his two successful series of textbooks Fundamentals of Ecology (five editions) and Ecology (two editions), the levels concept was foundational to the structure of the books themselves, following the different scale-bound units of ecology. This “levels approach” in turn was applied as a means of teaching students to search for “distributive adequacy” in the investigative practices of scientists (Brooks 2023). That is, Odum presented one core lesson of the levels concept to be that no one level was privileged over others in delivering the “right” answer to a given scientific question. Instead, investigating multiple levels would be needed to adequately gather results that would satisfactorily answer scientific questions.

Figure 3. Levels of organization diagram redrawn from Odum 1971, 5.

To be sure, while scientific textbooks often only allude to cutting-edge science, preferring to display established knowledge accessible to novices, this already enables viewing the levels concept as exhibiting usefulness for later stages of scientific training, particularly when seen as a scientific doctrine (see Brooks 2021a: 47–50, for a discussion). Specifically, and especially when viewed with the motivation to teach students “how to think like a biologist” (Urry et al. 2016), the centrality of the levels concept in textbooks can be seen as representative of the expressive power of the concept in reconstructing scientific reasoning.

In addition to active usage as an organizing principle in textbooks, the levels concept has also attracted increasing attention from scientific educators for improving and innovating new learning and teaching strategies in biology. Noting the concept “as central to the study and practice of science” (1999: 3), Wilensky and Resnik argue that focusing on the levels concept as a pedagogical device is “critically important to the understanding of many scientific phenomena and many foundational philosophical questions” (1999: 17; see also Jördens et al. 2016). More recently, Knippels and Waarlo (2018) have reviewed the implementation of the so-called “yo-yo strategy” in biology classrooms as one explicit means of applying the levels concept to introduce and “promote coherent conceptual understanding of various biological phenomena” (Knippels & Waarlo 2018: 1). The yo-yo strategy, characterized as a “heuristic of systems thinking” (ibid.), was explicitly developed to aid grasping complicated biological phenomena (such as Mendelian genetics or biological issues associated with understanding sickle cell anemia), for which more linear forms of learning face difficulties in securing student comprehension (see Knippels & Waarlo 2018 for a discussion). This strategy works by first localizing the contributions of different leveled components to primary units of the system (e.g., organism, cell, molecule), and then shifting “up and down” between these units to gather insight into the specific contributions that each unit expresses for more general biological lessons. A related approach to implementing levels into active learning strategies has been developed by Schneeweiß and Gropengießer (2022; see also Schneeweiß, Mölgen, & Gropengießer 2022). Their “zoom map” encourages students to not only explore different levels of organization in the construction of explanations, they also place a marked emphasis on interacting with the units perched at various levels to encourage learning how different levels contribute to answering different questions posed of the same phenomenon.

Although ‘levels of organization’ has been a key concept in biology and its philosophy since the early twentieth century, there is still no consensus on the nature and significance of the concept. In different areas of philosophy and biology, we find strongly varying ideas of levels, and none of the accounts put forward has received wide acceptance. However, emerging work on levels of organization suggests that the insights garnered from the concept are far from exhausted.

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• Xi, Wang, Thuan Beng Saw, Delphine Delacour, Chwee Teck Lim, and Benoit Ladoux, 2019, “Material Approaches to Active Tissue Mechanics”, Nature Reviews Materials , 4: 23–44. doi:10.1038/s41578-018-0066-z
• Zinner, Marietta, Ilya Lukonin, and Prisca Liberali, 2020, “Design Principles of Tissue Organisation: How Single Cells Coordinate across Scales”, Current Opinion in Cell Biology , 67: 37–45. doi:10.1016/j.ceb.2020.07.004

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Contributions by the second author, Daniel S. Brooks, were funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG, project number: BR 6487/1-1).

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Organization and Structure

Welcome to the Purdue OWL

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There is no single organizational pattern that works well for all writing across all disciplines; rather, organization depends on what you’re writing, who you’re writing it for, and where your writing will be read. In order to communicate your ideas, you’ll need to use a logical and consistent organizational structure in all of your writing. We can think about organization at the global level (your entire paper or project) as well as at the local level (a chapter, section, or paragraph). For an American academic situation, this means that at all times, the goal of revising for organization and structure is to consciously design your writing projects to make them easy for readers to understand. In this context, you as the writer are always responsible for the reader's ability to understand your work; in other words, American academic writing is writer-responsible. A good goal is to make your writing accessible and comprehensible to someone who just reads sections of your writing rather than the entire piece. This handout provides strategies for revising your writing to help meet this goal.

Note that this resource focuses on writing for an American academic setting, specifically for graduate students. American academic writing is of course not the only standard for academic writing, and researchers around the globe will have different expectations for organization and structure. The OWL has some more resources about writing for American and international audiences here .

Whole-Essay Structure

While organization varies across and within disciplines, usually based on the genre, publication venue, and other rhetorical considerations of the writing, a great deal of academic writing can be described by the acronym IMRAD (or IMRaD): Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion. This structure is common across most of the sciences and is often used in the humanities for empirical research. This structure doesn't serve every purpose (for instance, it may be difficult to follow IMRAD in a proposal for a future study or in more exploratory writing in the humanities), and it is often tweaked or changed to fit a particular situation. Still, its wide use as a base for a great deal of scholarly writing makes it worthwhile to break down here.

• Introduction : What is the purpose of the study? What were the research questions? What necessary background information should the reader understand to help contextualize the study? (Some disciplines include their literature review section as part of the introduction; some give the literature review its own heading on the same level as the other sections, i.e., ILMRAD.) Some writers use the CARS model to help craft their introductions more effectively.
• Methods: What methods did the researchers use? How was the study conducted? If the study included participants, who were they, and how were they selected?
• Results : This section lists the data. What did the researchers find as a result of their experiments (or, if the research is not experimental, what did the researchers learn from the study)? How were the research questions answered?
• Discussion : This section places the data within the larger conversation of the field. What might the results mean? Do these results agree or disagree with other literature cited? What should researchers do in the future?

Depending on your discipline, this may be exactly the structure you should use in your writing; or, it may be a base that you can see under the surface of published pieces in your field, which then diverge from the IMRAD structure to meet the expectations of other scholars in the field. However, you should always check to see what's expected of you in a given situation; this might mean talking to the professor for your class, looking at a journal's submission guidelines, reading your field's style manual, examining published examples, or asking a trusted mentor. Every field is a little different.

Outlining & Reverse Outlining

One of the most effective ways to get your ideas organized is to write an outline. A traditional outline comes as the pre-writing or drafting stage of the writing process. As you make your outline, think about all of the concepts, topics, and ideas you will need to include in order to accomplish your goal for the piece of writing. This may also include important citations and key terms. Write down each of these, and then consider what information readers will need to know in order for each point to make sense. Try to arrange your ideas in a way that logically progresses, building from one key idea or point to the next.

Questions for Writing Outlines

• What are the main points I am trying to make in this piece of writing?
• What background information will my readers need to understand each point? What will novice readers vs. experienced readers need to know?
• In what order do I want to present my ideas? Most important to least important, or least important to most important? Chronologically? Most complex to least complex? According to categories? Another order?

Reverse outlining comes at the drafting or revision stage of the writing process. After you have a complete draft of your project (or a section of your project), work alone or with a partner to read your project with the goal of understanding the main points you have made and the relationship of these points to one another. The OWL has another resource about reverse outlining here.

Questions for Writing Reverse Outlines

• What topics are covered in this piece of writing?
• In what order are the ideas presented? Is this order logical for both novice and experienced readers?
• Is adequate background information provided for each point, making it easy to understand how one idea leads to the next?
• What other points might the author include to further develop the writing project?

Organizing at the sentence and paragraph level

Signposting.

Signposting is the practice of using language specifically designed to help orient readers of your text. We call it signposting because this practice is like leaving road signs for a driver — it tells your reader where to go and what to expect up ahead. Signposting includes the use of transitional words and phrasing, and they may be explicit or more subtle. For example, an explicit signpost might say:

This section will cover Topic A­­ and Topic B­­­­­.

A more subtle signpost might look like this:

It's important to consider the impact of Topic A­­ and Topic B­­­­­.

The style of signpost you use will depend on the genre of your paper, the discipline in which you are writing, and your or your readers’ personal preferences. Regardless of the style of signpost you select, it’s important to include signposts regularly. They occur most frequently at the beginnings and endings of sections of your paper. It is often helpful to include signposts at mid-points in your project in order to remind readers of where you are in your argument.

Questions for Identifying and Evaluating Signposts

• How and where does the author include a phrase, sentence, or short group of sentences that explains the purpose and contents of the paper?
• How does each section of the paper provide a brief summary of what was covered earlier in the paper?
• How does each section of the paper explain what will be covered in that section?
• How does the author use transitional words and phrases to guide readers through ideas (e.g. however, in addition, similarly, nevertheless, another, while, because, first, second, next, then etc.)?

WORKS CONSULTED

Clark, I. (2006). Writing the successful thesis and dissertation: Entering the conversation . Prentice Hall Press.

Davis, M., Davis, K. J., & Dunagan, M. (2012). Scientific papers and presentations . Academic press.

Levels of Organization

Living things are highly organized and structured, following a hierarchy that can be examined on a scale from small to large. The atom is the smallest and most fundamental unit of matter. It consists of a nucleus surrounded by electrons. Atoms form molecules. A molecule is a chemical structure consisting of at least two atoms held together by one or more chemical bonds. Many molecules that are biologically important are macromolecules, large molecules that are typically formed by polymerization (a polymer is a large molecule that is made by combining smaller units called monomers, which are simpler than macromolecules). An example of a macromolecule is deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) (Figure 1), which contains the instructions for the structure and functioning of all living organisms. See the section of your textbook about the chemistry of biological molecules for more information.

Some cells contain aggregates of macromolecules surrounded by membranes; these are called organelles. Organelles are small structures that exist within cells. Examples of organelles include mitochondria and chloroplasts, which carry out indispensable functions: mitochondria produce energy to power the cell, while chloroplasts enable green plants to utilize the energy in sunlight to make sugars. All living things are made of cells; the cell itself is the smallest fundamental unit of structure and function in living organisms. This requirement is one of the reasons why viruses are not considered living: they are not made of cells. To make new viruses, they have to invade and hijack the reproductive mechanism of a living cell; only then can they obtain the materials they need to reproduce. Some organisms consist of a single cell and others are multicellular. Cells are classified as prokaryotic or eukaryotic. Prokaryotes are single-celled or colonial organisms that do not have membrane-bound nuclei; in contrast, the cells of eukaryotes do have membrane-bound organelles and a membrane-bound nucleus.

In larger organisms, cells combine to make tissues, which are groups of similar cells carrying out similar or related functions. Organs are collections of tissues grouped together performing a common function. Organs are present not only in animals but also in plants. An organ system is a higher level of organization that consists of functionally related organs. Mammals have many organ systems . For instance, the circulatory system transports blood through the body and to and from the lungs; it includes organs such as the heart and blood vessels. Organisms are individual living entities. For example, each tree in a forest is an organism. Single-celled prokaryotes and single-celled eukaryotes are also considered organisms and are typically referred to as microorganisms.

All the individuals of a species living within a specific area are collectively called a population. For example, a forest may include many pine trees. All of these pine trees represent the population of pine trees in this forest. Different populations may live in the same specific area. For example, the forest with the pine trees includes populations of flowering plants and also insects and microbial populations. A community is the sum of populations inhabiting a particular area. For instance, all of the trees, flowers, insects, and other populations in a forest form the forest’s community. The forest itself is an ecosystem. An ecosystem consists of all the living things in a particular area together with the abiotic, non-living parts of that environment such as nitrogen in the soil or rain water. At the highest level of organization, the biosphere is the collection of all ecosystems, and it represents the zones of life on earth. It includes land, water, and even the atmosphere to a certain extent.

Unless otherwise noted, images on this page are licensed under CC-BY 4.0  by  OpenStax .

Text adapted from: OpenStax , Concepts of Biology. OpenStax CNX. May 25, 2017 https://cnx.org/contents/[email protected]:gNLp76vu@13/Themes-and-Concepts-of-Biology

Principles of Biology Copyright © 2017 by Lisa Bartee, Walter Shriner, and Catherine Creech is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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A New Look at ‘Levels of Organization’ in Biology

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• Published: 24 October 2019
• Volume 86 , pages 1483–1508, ( 2021 )

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[T]here is merit to the claim that much problem solving effort is directed at structuring problems, and only a fraction of it at solving problems once they are structured. Herbert Simon 1977 , 310.

Despite its pervasiveness, the concept of ‘levels of organization’ has received relatively little attention in its own right. I propose here an emerging approach that posits ‘levels’ as a fragmentary concept situated within an interest-relative matrix of operational usage within scientific practice. To this end I propose one important component of meaning, namely the epistemic goal (sensu Ingo Brigandt) motivating the term’s usage, which recovers a remarkably conserved and sufficiently unifying significance attributable to ‘levels’ across different instances of usage. This epistemic goal, to provide structure to scientific problems, delegates tasks whose execution generates the term’s expressed content in a given instance. This treatment of levels does not diminish the concept’s general importance to science, but rather allows for its use in, and usefulness for, scientific practice to be better contextualized to particular tasks encompassing varying breadths of activity.

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Introduction: Organization as a Scientific Blind Spot

In Search of Organization Laws: A New Way of Doing Science? (The Uprising of Systemic Attitude)

Levels of Organization in Evo-Devo

Hereafter simply ‘levels’, unless otherwise specified; I assume here but will not argue for now, that ‘levels of organization’ possesses its own distinct identity among other “level” labels in that (i) ‘levels’ possesses definite cognitive boundaries (which I touch upon in Sect.  2 with respect to stratification, complexity and organization), (ii) ‘levels’ has its own distinct history in science, and (iii) ‘levels’ comes with its own distinct challenges.

I do believe, however, that these questions are deeply connected, and will return to some upshots for a conception of the nature of levels in the conclusion.

Before proceeding, I should specify two caveats: I do not mean to claim (i) that this is the only EG of the levels concept, nor (ii) that the EG of structuring scientific problems is held solely by the levels concept. The first caveat should be rather straightforward. Concerning the second, it is clear that this EG is a generic motivation surely shared or possessed by other scientific concepts. This for some may threaten the putative centrality of the levels concept in science and philosophy within its domain of application. I offer two reasons to downplay this threat. First, I believe we can be fully content with ‘levels’ sharing this EG with other concepts: ‘Levels’ is, after all and among other things, one among many organizing principles in the natural sciences. Second, and in this spirit, recovering any stable significance to the levels concept should count as progress towards excavating its widespread influences in the scientific literature. I will argue below, after all, that this EG can be shown to be extremely conserved across different uses of the levels concept.

Using this basic distinction, Craver suggests we start thinking of “levels” as “ primarily features of the world rather than as features of the units or products of science”, and that thinking of “levels” in terms of “sciences and theories” is “derivative upon” these ontological structures ( 2007 , 177, fn; emphasis added). I cautiously agree with this sentiment, but strongly conditionalize my approach to ‘levels’ by separating what scientists express when using the term from what status the content expressed by ‘levels’ possesses. In this way I wish to explicitly make room for considering the significance of ‘levels’ in science for instances (a) where ‘levels’ refers primarily to epistemic constituents, or (b) where ‘levels’ does not in fact successfully refer to “ontic structures” in nature. My agreement with Craver’s sentiment is more along the lines that when scientists use ‘levels’, they take it to mean that nature recovers at least some of the content we express with levels, though this doesn’t have to be the case.

This perspective does not exclude more ontologically-oriented questions (“What are levels of organization?”), and in fact arguably clears the way for a more adequate answer into such questions. I return to this in the conclusion.

EGs may themselves be a source of variation, particularly when a concept is used to pursue multiple EGs, or when an EG serves multiple concepts. An EG provides coherence to a variable concept insofar as a stable EG (or multiple EGs) can be connected to a particular concept. As Brigandt explains: “While a scientific community often uses several concepts and theoretical resources to pursue a particular explanatory or investigative goal, in some cases such an epistemic goal (or a set of epistemic goals) can be tied to an individual scientific concept, in that the rationale for the introduction or continued use of a central theoretical concept is to pursue this epistemic goal” (Brigandt 2010 , 23). The EG of ‘levels’ exhibits just such stability.

To be sure, a problem agenda is a more complicated type of problem entity that subsumes the former two problem tasks of characterizing a problem and articulating constraints of the problem and its solution (as an anonymous reviewer pointed out). However, I take a problem agenda to also be (due to its more molar character) a more ‘organic’ kind of problem entity that subsumes or presupposes many more non-problem factors as part of its framework, such as social and research-political factors involved in the conceptual and empirical negotiations that adjudicate between the interests of the different scientific actors being served by the agenda. Thus, the contrast between the first two kinds of tasks and the task(s) involved in generating a problem agenda lend examples to different grains of problem-engaging behavior by researchers. More particularly, they encompass different breadths of scientific activity in which usage of ‘levels’ finds fertile ground.

In this way, the so-called “top-down” approach was itself retooled from earlier meanings related to first looking to mathematically-derived “theoretical” descriptions of motion-mediated behaviors in flies (particularly the optomotor reflex) using abstract cybernetic models, then connecting these descriptions to physiological details that implement these algorithmic descriptions. As these passages here indicate, “top-down” now came to mean looking ‘deeper’ into the physiological details of the fly’s visual system components themselves in a level-mediated sense. To be sure, looking into how mathematical descriptions are realized in the fly brain is still an ongoing project, but this project has largely been displaced by “wet” biological studies into how components of the visual system actually process motion.

One important source I have already intimated toward for these issues (Brooks 2017 , 153) is William C. Wimsatt’s pioneering work on levels, which offers a potent and suggestive springboard into thinking about the nature of levels (see also Eronen and Brooks 2018 ). However, Wimsatt’s work is not without its attendant challenges. For example: What are “local maxima of regularity and predictability” (Wimsatt’s tentative definition for levels)? How do perspectives (or “causal thickets”) contrast with levels, in the Wimsattian sense or otherwise (see especially Kästner 2018 )? Solutions to these questions comprise an early to-do list for any work into the nature of levels of organization.

In another paper (Brooks, forthcoming), I offer an account of the “fragmentary” character of the levels concept, which traces the variation of the levels concept to four putative “content fragments”, or unique core attributes that each specify part of the meaning of ‘levels’ in a given instance.

I am open to the possibility, though am not convinced, that the levels concept could turn out to be, as the skeptics claim, a hopelessly muddled concept that produces systematically misleading or false descriptive content. Though not probable (if I am right), there is certainly no ‘silver bullet’ aspect to the levels concept in the matters of its application. Particularly, I credit the work of Angela Potochnik and Markus Eronen on levels for compelling me to acknowledge that substantial influence of, or attributed to, ‘levels’ has been noxious or misleading. This, however, is to be expected of heuristic notions, which typically eschew principled accounts of scientific usefulness.

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Acknowledgements

This paper benefitted substantially from my discussions with Alan Love, Wes Anderson, Ingo Brigandt, Markus Eronen, and James DiFrisco. I thank them all for their invaluable feedback and suggestions. I also benefited from the comments and queries of two anonymous reviewers; I thank them for their excellent suggestions and advice.

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Brooks, D.S. A New Look at ‘Levels of Organization’ in Biology. Erkenn 86 , 1483–1508 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-019-00166-7

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1.2 Levels of Biological Organization

Organization from atoms to cells.

Living things are highly organized and structured, following a hierarchy that we can examine on a scale from small to large. The  atom is the smallest and most fundamental unit of matter. It consists of an atomic nucleus surrounded by electrons. Atoms form molecules . A molecule  is a chemical structure consisting of at least two atoms held together by one or more chemical bonds. Many molecules that are biologically important are  macromolecules , large molecules that are typically formed by combining smaller units called monomers . An example of a macromolecule is deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), which contains the instructions for the structure and functioning of all living organisms.

Some cells contain organelles , which are small structures that exist within cells. Examples of organelles include mitochondria and chloroplasts, which carry out essential functions: mitochondria produce energy to power the cell, while chloroplasts enable green plants to utilize the energy in sunlight to make sugars.

All living things are made of cells. The cell itself is the smallest fundamental unit of structure and function in living organisms. Some organisms consist of a single cell and others are multicellular. Scientists classify cells as prokaryotic or eukaryotic.  Prokaryotes  are single-celled or colonial organisms that do not have membrane-bound nuclei. In contrast, the cells of  eukaryotes  do have membrane-bound organelles and a membrane-bound nucleus.

Organization from Cells to Organisms

In larger organisms, cells combine to make  tissues , which are groups of similar cells carrying out similar or related functions.  Organs  are collections of tissues grouped together performing a common function. Organs are present not only in animals but also in plants. An  organ system  is a higher level of organization that consists of functionally related organs. Mammals have many organ systems. For instance, the circulatory system transports blood through the body and to and from the lungs. It includes organs such as the heart and blood vessels.  Organisms  are individual living entities. For example, each tree in a forest is an organism. Single-celled prokaryotes and single-celled eukaryotes are also organisms, which biologists typically call microorganisms.

Organization from Organisms to the Biosphere

Biologists collectively call all the individuals of a species living within a specific area a  population . For example, a forest may include many pine trees, which represent the population of pine trees in this forest. Different populations may live in the same specific area. For example, the forest with the pine trees includes populations of flowering plants, insects, and microbial populations. A  community  is the sum of populations inhabiting a particular area. For instance, all of the trees, flowers, insects, and other populations in a forest form the forest’s community. The forest itself is an ecosystem . An  ecosystem consists of all the living things in a particular area together with the abiotic, nonliving parts of that environment such as nitrogen in the soil or rain water. At the highest level of organization, the biosphere  is the collection of all ecosystems, and it represents the zones of life on Earth. It includes land, water, and even the atmosphere to a certain extent.

fundamental unit of matter

chemical structure consisting of two or more atoms held together by chemical bonds

large molecule, typically formed by the joining of smaller molecules

a subunit that can be bound to other monomers to make a polymer

smallest fundamental unit of structure and function in living things

small structures that exist within cells and carry out cellular functions

organisms which are comprised of cells that lack a nucleus

organisms that are comprised of cells that have a nucleus

group of similar cells carrying out related functions

collection of related tissues grouped together performing a common function

level of organization that consists of functionally related interacting organs

individual living being

all of the individuals of a species living within a specific area

all of the populations inhabiting a particular area

all the living things in a particular area together with the abiotic, nonliving parts of that environment

collection of all the ecosystems on Earth

College Biology I Copyright © by Melissa Hardy is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

1.2 Structural Organization of the Human Body

Learning objectives.

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

• Describe the structure of the body, from simplest to most complex
• Describe the interrelationships between the organ systems

Before you begin to study the different structures and functions of the human body, it is helpful to consider its basic architecture; that is, how its smallest parts are assembled into larger structures. It is convenient to consider the structures of the body in terms of fundamental levels of organization that increase in complexity, such as (from smallest to largest): chemicals, cells, tissues, organs, organ systems, and an organism.

The organization of the body often is discussed in terms of the distinct levels of increasing complexity, from the smallest chemical building blocks to a unique human organism.

The Levels of Organization

To study the chemical level of organization, scientists consider the simplest building blocks of matter: subatomic particles, atoms and molecules. All matter in the universe is composed of one or more unique pure substances called elements. Examples of these elements are hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, calcium, and iron. The smallest unit of any of these pure substances (elements) is an atom. Atoms are made up of subatomic particles such as the proton, electron and neutron. Two or more atoms combine to form a molecule, such as the water molecules, proteins, and sugars found in living things. Molecules are the chemical building blocks of all body structures.

A cell is the smallest independently functioning unit of a living organism. Single celled organisms, like bacteria, are extremely small, independently-living organisms with a cellular structure. Humans are multicellular organisms with independent cells working in concert together. Each bacterium is a single cell. All living structures of human anatomy contain cells, and almost all functions of human physiology are performed in cells or are initiated by cells.

A human cell typically consists of flexible membranes that enclose cytoplasm, a water-based cellular fluid, with a variety of tiny functioning units called organelles . In humans, as in all organisms, cells perform all functions of life.

A tissue is a group of many similar cells (though sometimes composed of a few related types) that work together to perform a specific function. An organ is an anatomically distinct structure of the body composed of two or more tissue types. Each organ performs one or more specific physiological functions. An organ system is a group of organs that work together to perform major functions or meet physiological needs of the body.

This book covers eleven distinct organ systems in the human body ( Figure 1.2.2 ). Assigning organs to organ systems can be imprecise since organs that “belong” to one system can also have functions integral to another system. In fact, most organs contribute to more than one system.

The organism level is the highest level of organization. An organism is a living being that has a cellular structure and that can independently perform all physiologic functions necessary for life. In multi-cellular organisms, including humans, all cells, tissues, organs, and organ systems of the body work together to maintain the life and health of the organism.

Chapter Review

Life processes of the human body are maintained at several levels of structural organization. These include the chemical, cellular, tissue, organ, organ system, and the organism level. Higher levels of organization are built from lower levels. Therefore, molecules combine to form cells, cells combine to form tissues, tissues combine to form organs, organs combine to form organ systems, and organ systems combine to form organisms.

Review Questions

Critical thinking questions.

Cancers are defined by uncontrolled growth at the cellular level. Describe why cancer is a problem for the organism as a whole using your understanding of the levels of organization.

Cellular problems create issues at more complex levels of organization. For example, a tumor can interrupt the function of the organ it is in, despite the fact that it is a molecular mutation with direct cellular implications.

The female ovaries and the male testes are a part of which body system? Can these organs be members of more than one organ system? Why or why not?

The female ovaries and the male testes are parts of the reproductive system. They also secrete hormones, as does the endocrine system, therefore, ovaries and testes function within both the endocrine and reproductive systems.

This work, Anatomy & Physiology, is adapted from Anatomy & Physiology by OpenStax , licensed under CC BY . This edition, with revised content and artwork, is licensed under CC BY-SA except where otherwise noted.

Images, from Anatomy & Physiology by OpenStax , are licensed under CC BY except where otherwise noted.

Access the original for free at https://openstax.org/books/anatomy-and-physiology/pages/1-introduction .

Anatomy & Physiology Copyright © 2019 by Lindsay M. Biga, Staci Bronson, Sierra Dawson, Amy Harwell, Robin Hopkins, Joel Kaufmann, Mike LeMaster, Philip Matern, Katie Morrison-Graham, Kristen Oja, Devon Quick, Jon Runyeon, OSU OERU, and OpenStax is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

10.1 Organizational Structures and Design

• What are mechanistic versus organic organizational structures?

First, an organizational structure is a system for accomplishing and connecting the activities that occur within a work organization. People rely on structures to know what work they should do, how their work supports or relies on other employees, and how these work activities fulfill the purpose of the organization itself.

Second, organizational design is the process of setting up organizational structures to address the needs of an organization and account for the complexity involved in accomplishing business objectives.

Next, organizational change refers to the constant shifts that occur within an organizational system—for example, as people enter or leave the organization, market conditions shift, supply sources change, or adaptations are introduced in the processes for accomplishing work. Through managed change , leaders in an organization can intentionally shape how these shifts occur over time.

Finally, organizational development (OD) is the label for a field that specializes in change management. OD specialists draw on social science to guide change processes that simultaneously help a business achieve its objectives while generating well-being for employees and sustainable benefits for society. An understanding of OD practices is essential for leaders who want to maximize the potential of their organizations over a long period of time.

Together, an understanding of these concepts can help managers know how to create and direct organizations that are positioned to successfully accomplish strategic goals and objectives. 1

To understand the role of organizational structure, consider the experience of Justin, a young manager who worked for a logistics and transportation company. Their success at leading change in the United States gave their leaders the confidence that Justin could handle a challenging assignment: organize a new supply chain and distribution system for a company in Northern Europe. Almost overnight, Justin was responsible for hiring competent people, forming them into a coherent organization, training them, and establishing the needed infrastructure for sustained success in this new market.

If you were given this assignment, what would you do? How would you organize your employees? How would you help them understand the challenge of setting up a new organization and system? These are the kinds of questions that require an understanding of organizational structure, organizational design, organizational change, and organizational development.

One of the first issues Justin will need to address deals with how they will organize the system. “The decisions about the structure of an organization are all related to the concept of organizational design. There are two fundamental forms of structure to remember when designing an organization.

To address these questions, we need to be familiar with two fundamental ways of building an organization.

The formal organization is an officially defined set of relationships, responsibilities, and connections that exist across an organization. The traditional organizational chart, as illustrated in Exhibit 10.2 , is perhaps the most common way of depicting the formal organization. The typical organization has a hierarchical form with clearly defined roles and responsibilities.

When Justin sets up the formal organization, they will need to design the administrative responsibilities and communication structures that should function within an organizational system. The formal systems describe how flow of information and resources should occur within an organization. To establish the formal organization, they will identify the essential functions that need to be part of the system, and they will hire people to fill these functions. They will then need to help employees learn their functions and how these functions should relate to one another.

The informal organization is sometimes referred to as the invisible network of interpersonal relationships that shape how people actually connect with one another to carry out their activities. The informal organization is emergent, meaning that it is formed through the common conversations and relationships that often naturally occur as people interact with one another in their day-to-day relationships. It is usually complex, impossible to control, and has the potential to significantly influence an organization’s success.

As depicted in Exhibit 10.3 , the informal organization can also be mapped, but it is usually very different than the formal organization. The chart you see in this example is called a network map, because it depicts the relationships that exist between different members of a system. Some members are more central than others, and the strength of relationships may vary between any two pairs or groups of individuals. These relationships are constantly in flux, as people interact with new individuals, current relationships evolve, and the organization itself changes over time. 2

The informal organization in Justin’s design will form as people begin interacting with one another to accomplish their work. As this occurs, people will begin connecting with one another as they make sense of their new roles and relationships. Usually, the informal organization closely mirrors the formal organization, but often it is different. People quickly learn who the key influencers are within the system, and they will begin to rely on these individuals to accomplish the work of the organization. The informal organization can either help or hinder an organization’s overall success.

In sum, the formal organization explains how an organization should function, while the informal organization is how the organizational actually functions. Formal organization will come as Justin hires and assigns people to different roles. They can influence the shape of the informal organization by giving people opportunities to build relationships as they work together. Both types of structures shape the patterns of influence, administration, and leadership that may occur through an organizational system.

As we continue our discussion of structure and design, we will next examine different ways of understanding formal structure.

Types of Formal Organizational Structures

Now, Justin will need to choose and implement an administrative system for delegating duties, establishing oversight, and reporting on performance. They will do this by designing a formal structure that defines the responsibilities and accountability that correspond to specific duties throughout an organizational system. In this section, we’ll discuss the factors that any manager should consider when designing an organizational structure.

Bureaucracy

One of the most common frameworks for thinking about these issues is called the bureaucratic model . It was developed by Max Weber, a 19th-century sociologist. Weber’s central assumption was that organizations will find efficiencies when they divide the duties of labor, allow people to specialize, and create structure for coordinating their differentiated efforts, usually within a hierarchy of responsibility. He proposed five elements of bureaucracy that serve as a foundation for determining an appropriate structure: specialization, command-and-control, span of control, centralization, and formalization. 3

Specialization

The degree to which people are organized into subunits according to their expertise is referred to as specialization —for example, human resources, finance, marketing, or manufacturing. It may also include specialization within those functions. For instance, people who work in a manufacturing facility may be well-versed in every part of a manufacturing process, or they may be organized into specialty units that focus on different parts of the manufacturing process, such as procurement, material preparation, assembly, quality control, and the like.

Command-and-Control

The next element to consider is the reporting and oversight structure of the organization. Command-and-control refers to the way in which people report to one another or connect to coordinate their efforts in accomplishing the work of the organization.

Span of Control

Another question addresses the scope of the work that any one person in the organization will be accountable for, referred to as span of control . For instance, top-level leaders are usually responsible for all of the work of their subordinates, mid-level leaders are responsible for a narrower set of responsibilities, and ground-level employees usually perform very specific tasks. Each manager in a hierarchy works within the span of control of another manager at a level of the organization.

Centralization

The next element to consider is how to manage the flows of resources and information in an organization, or its centralization . A highly centralized organization concentrates resources in only one or very few locations, or only a few individuals are authorized to make decisions about the use of resources. In contrast, a diffuse organization distributes resources more broadly throughout an organizational system along with the authority to make decisions about how to use those resources.

Formalization

The last element of bureaucracy, formalization , refers to the degree of definition in the roles that exist throughout an organization. A highly formalized system (e.g., the military) has a very defined organization, a tightly structured system, in which all of the jobs, responsibilities, and accountability structures are very clearly understood. In contrast, a loosely structured system (e.g., a small, volunteer nonprofit) relies heavily on the emergent relationships of informal organization.

Mechanistic and Organic Structures

Using the principles of bureaucracy outlined above, managers like Justin have experimented with many different structures as way to shape the formal organization and potentially to capture some of the advantages of the informal organization. Generally, the application of these principles leads to some combination of the two kinds of structures that can be seen as anchors on a continuum (see Table 10.1 ).

On one end of the continuum is mechanistic bureaucratic structure . This is a strongly hierarchical form of organizing that is designed to generate a high degree of standardization and control. Mechanistic organizations are often characterized by a highly vertical organizational structure , or a “tall” structure, due to the presence of many levels of management. A mechanistic structure tends to dictate roles and procedure through strong routines and standard operating practices.

In contrast, an organic bureaucratic structure relies on the ability of people to self-organize and make decisions without much direction such that they can adapt quickly to changing circumstances. In an organic organization, it is common to see a horizontal organizational structure , in which many individuals across the whole system are empowered to make organizational decision. An organization with a horizontal structure is also known as a flat organization because it often features only a few levels of organizational hierarchy.

The principles of bureaucracy outlined earlier can be applied in different ways, depending on the context of the organization and the managers’ objectives, to create structures that have features of either mechanistic or organic structures.

For example, the degree of specialization required in an organization depends both on the complexity of the activities the organization needs to account for and on the scale of the organization. A more organic organization may encourage employees to be both specialists and generalists so that they are more aware of opportunities for innovation within a system. A mechanistic organization may emphasize a strong degree of specialization so that essential procedures or practices are carried out with consistency and predictable precision. Thus, an organization’s overall objectives drive how specialization should be viewed. For example, an organization that produces innovation needs to be more organic, while an organization that seeks reliability needs to be more mechanistic.

Similarly, the need for a strong environment of command-and-control varies by the circumstances of each organization. An organization that has a strong command-and-control system usually requires a vertical, tall organizational administrative structure. Organizations that exist in loosely defined or ambiguous environments need to distribute decision-making authority to employees, and thus will often feature a flat organizational structure.

The span of control assigned to any specific manager is commonly used to encourage either mechanistic or organic bureaucracy. Any manager’s ability to attend to responsibilities has limits; indeed, the amount of work anyone can accomplish is finite. A manager in an organic structure usually has a broad span of control, forcing her to rely more on subordinates to make decisions. A manager in a mechanistic structure usually has a narrow span of control so that they can provide more oversight. Thus, increasing span of control for a manager tends to flatten the hierarchy while narrowing span of control tends to reinforce the hierarchy.

Centralization addresses assumptions about how an organization can best achieve efficiencies in its operations. In a mechanistic structure, it is assumed that efficiencies will occur in the system if the resources and decisions flow through in a centralized way. In an organic system, it is assumed that greater efficiencies will be seen by distributing those resources and having the resources sorted by the users of the resources. Either perspective may work, depending on the circumstances.

Finally, managers also have discretion in how tightly they choose to define the formal roles and responsibilities of individuals within an organization. Managers who want to encourage organic bureaucracy will resist the idea of writing out and tightly defining roles and responsibilities. They will encourage and empower employees to self-organize and define for themselves the roles they wish to fill. In contrast, managers who wish to encourage more mechanistic bureaucracy will use tools such as standard operating procedures (SOPs) or written policies to set expectations and exercise clear controls around those expectations for employees.

When a bureaucratic structure works well, an organization achieves an appropriate balance across all of these considerations. Employees specialize in and become highly advanced in their ability to perform specific functions while also attending to broader organizational needs. They receive sufficient guidance from managers to stay aligned with overall organizational goals. The span of control given to any one manager encourages them to provide appropriate oversight while also relying on employees to do their part. The resources and decision-making necessary to accomplish the goals of the organization are efficiently managed. There is an appropriate balance between compliance with formal policy and innovative action.

Business Structures

Aside from the considerations outlined above, organizations will often set structures according to the functional needs of the organization. A functional need refers to a feature of the organization or its environment that is necessary for organizational success. A business structure is designed to address these organizational needs. There are two common examples of functional structures illustrated here.

Product structures exist where the business organizes its employees according to product lines or lines of business. For example, employees in a car company might be organized according to the model of the vehicle that they help to support or produce. Employees in a consulting firm might be organized around a particular kind of practice that they work in or support. Where a functional structure exists, employees become highly attuned to their own line of business or their own product.

Geographic structures exist where organizations are set up to deliver a range of products within a geographic area or region. Here, the business is set up based on a territory or region. Managers of a particular unit oversee all of the operations of the business for that geographical area.

In either functional structure, the manager will oversee all the activities that correspond to that function: marketing, manufacturing, delivery, client support systems, and so forth. In some ways, a functional structure is like a smaller version of the larger organization—a smaller version of the bureaucracy that exists within the larger organization.

One common weakness of a bureaucratic structure is that people can become so focused on their own part of the organization that they fail to understand or connect with broader organizational activities. In the extreme, bureaucracy separates and alienates workers from one another. These problems can occur when different parts of an organization fail to communicate effectively with one another.

Some organizations set up a matrix structure to minimize the potential for these problems. A matrix structure describes an organization that has multiple reporting lines of authority. For example, an employee who specializes in a particular product might have both the functional reporting line and a geographic reporting line. This employee has accountability in both directions. The functional responsibility has to do with her specialty as it correlates with the strategy of the company as a whole. However, her geographic accountability is to the manager who is responsible for the region or part of the organization in which she is currently working. The challenge is that an employee may be accountable to two or more managers, and this can create conflict if those managers are not aligned. The potential benefit, however, is that employees may be more inclined to pay attention to the needs of multiple parts of the business simultaneously.

Concept Check

• What is an organizational structure?
• What are different types of organizational structures?
• What is organizational design?
• What concepts should guide decisions about how to design structures?

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Article contents

Organizational behavior.

• Neal M. Ashkanasy Neal M. Ashkanasy University of Queensland
•  and  Alana D. Dorris Alana D. Dorris University of Queensland
• https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190236557.013.23
• Published online: 29 March 2017

Organizational behavior (OB) is a discipline that includes principles from psychology, sociology, and anthropology. Its focus is on understanding how people behave in organizational work environments. Broadly speaking, OB covers three main levels of analysis: micro (individuals), meso (groups), and macro (the organization). Topics at the micro level include managing the diverse workforce; effects of individual differences in attitudes; job satisfaction and engagement, including their implications for performance and management; personality, including the effects of different cultures; perception and its effects on decision-making; employee values; emotions, including emotional intelligence, emotional labor, and the effects of positive and negative affect on decision-making and creativity (including common biases and errors in decision-making); and motivation, including the effects of rewards and goal-setting and implications for management. Topics at the meso level of analysis include group decision-making; managing work teams for optimum performance (including maximizing team performance and communication); managing team conflict (including the effects of task and relationship conflict on team effectiveness); team climate and group emotional tone; power, organizational politics, and ethical decision-making; and leadership, including leadership development and leadership effectiveness. At the organizational level, topics include organizational design and its effect on organizational performance; affective events theory and the physical environment; organizational culture and climate; and organizational change.

• organizational psychology
• organizational sociology
• organizational anthropology

Introduction

Organizational behavior (OB) is the study of how people behave in organizational work environments. More specifically, Robbins, Judge, Millett, and Boyle ( 2014 , p. 8) describe it as “[a] field of study that investigates the impact that individual groups and structure have on behavior within organizations, for the purposes of applying such knowledge towards improving an organization’s effectiveness.” The OB field looks at the specific context of the work environment in terms of human attitudes, cognition, and behavior, and it embodies contributions from psychology, social psychology, sociology, and anthropology. The field is also rapidly evolving because of the demands of today’s fast-paced world, where technology has given rise to work-from-home employees, globalization, and an ageing workforce. Thus, while managers and OB researchers seek to help employees find a work-life balance, improve ethical behavior (Ardichivili, Mitchell, & Jondle, 2009 ), customer service, and people skills (see, e.g., Brady & Cronin, 2001 ), they must simultaneously deal with issues such as workforce diversity, work-life balance, and cultural differences.

The most widely accepted model of OB consists of three interrelated levels: (1) micro (the individual level), (2) meso (the group level), and (3) macro (the organizational level). The behavioral sciences that make up the OB field contribute an element to each of these levels. In particular, OB deals with the interactions that take place among the three levels and, in turn, addresses how to improve performance of the organization as a whole.

In order to study OB and apply it to the workplace, it is first necessary to understand its end goal. In particular, if the goal is organizational effectiveness, then these questions arise: What can be done to make an organization more effective? And what determines organizational effectiveness? To answer these questions, dependent variables that include attitudes and behaviors such as productivity, job satisfaction, job performance, turnover intentions, withdrawal, motivation, and workplace deviance are introduced. Moreover, each level—micro, meso, and macro—has implications for guiding managers in their efforts to create a healthier work climate to enable increased organizational performance that includes higher sales, profits, and return on investment (ROE).

The Micro (Individual) Level of Analysis

The micro or individual level of analysis has its roots in social and organizational psychology. In this article, six central topics are identified and discussed: (1) diversity; (2) attitudes and job satisfaction; (3) personality and values; (4) emotions and moods; (5) perception and individual decision-making; and (6) motivation.

An obvious but oft-forgotten element at the individual level of OB is the diverse workforce. It is easy to recognize how different each employee is in terms of personal characteristics like age, skin color, nationality, ethnicity, and gender. Other, less biological characteristics include tenure, religion, sexual orientation, and gender identity. In the Australian context, while the Commonwealth Disability Discrimination Act of 1992 helped to increase participation of people with disabilities working in organizations, discrimination and exclusion still continue to inhibit equality (Feather & Boeckmann, 2007 ). In Western societies like Australia and the United States, however, antidiscrimination legislation is now addressing issues associated with an ageing workforce.

In terms of gender, there continues to be significant discrimination against female employees. Males have traditionally had much higher participation in the workforce, with only a significant increase in the female workforce beginning in the mid-1980s. Additionally, according to Ostroff and Atwater’s ( 2003 ) study of engineering managers, female managers earn a significantly lower salary than their male counterparts, especially when they are supervising mostly other females.

Job Satisfaction and Job Engagement

Job satisfaction is an attitudinal variable that comes about when an employee evaluates all the components of her or his job, which include affective, cognitive, and behavioral aspects (Weiss, 2002 ). Increased job satisfaction is associated with increased job performance, organizational citizenship behaviors (OCBs), and reduced turnover intentions (Wilkin, 2012 ). Moreover, traditional workers nowadays are frequently replaced by contingent workers in order to reduce costs and work in a nonsystematic manner. According to Wilkin’s ( 2012 ) findings, however, contingent workers as a group are less satisfied with their jobs than permanent employees are.

Job engagement concerns the degree of involvement that an employee experiences on the job (Kahn, 1990 ). It describes the degree to which an employee identifies with their job and considers their performance in that job important; it also determines that employee’s level of participation within their workplace. Britt, Dickinson, Greene-Shortridge, and McKibbin ( 2007 ) describe the two extremes of job satisfaction and employee engagement: a feeling of responsibility and commitment to superior job performance versus a feeling of disengagement leading to the employee wanting to withdraw or disconnect from work. The first scenario is also related to organizational commitment, the level of identification an employee has with an organization and its goals. Employees with high organizational commitment, job satisfaction, and employee engagement tend to perceive that their organization values their contribution and contributes to their wellbeing.

Personality represents a person’s enduring traits. The key here is the concept of enduring . The most widely adopted model of personality is the so-called Big Five (Costa & McCrae, 1992 ): extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability, and openness. Employees high in conscientiousness tend to have higher levels of job knowledge, probably because they invest more into learning about their role. Those higher in emotional stability tend to have higher levels of job satisfaction and lower levels of stress, most likely because of their positive and opportunistic outlooks. Agreeableness, similarly, is associated with being better liked and may lead to higher employee performance and decreased levels of deviant behavior.

Although the personality traits in the Big Five have been shown to relate to organizational behavior, organizational performance, career success (Judge, Higgins, Thoresen, & Barrick, 2006 ), and other personality traits are also relevant to the field. Examples include positive self-evaluation, self-monitoring (the degree to which an individual is aware of comparisons with others), Machiavellianism (the degree to which a person is practical, maintains emotional distance, and believes the end will justify the means), narcissism (having a grandiose sense of self-importance and entitlement), risk-taking, proactive personality, and type A personality. In particular, those who like themselves and are grounded in their belief that they are capable human beings are more likely to perform better because they have fewer self-doubts that may impede goal achievements. Individuals high in Machiavellianism may need a certain environment in order to succeed, such as a job that requires negotiation skills and offers significant rewards, although their inclination to engage in political behavior can sometimes limit their potential. Employees who are high on narcissism may wreak organizational havoc by manipulating subordinates and harming the overall business because of their over-inflated perceptions of self. Higher levels of self-monitoring often lead to better performance but they may cause lower commitment to the organization. Risk-taking can be positive or negative; it may be great for someone who thrives on rapid decision-making, but it may prove stressful for someone who likes to weigh pros and cons carefully before making decisions. Type A individuals may achieve high performance but may risk doing so in a way that causes stress and conflict. Proactive personality, on the other hand, is usually associated with positive organizational performance.

Employee Values

Personal value systems are behind each employee’s attitudes and personality. Each employee enters an organization with an already established set of beliefs about what should be and what should not be. Today, researchers realize that personality and values are linked to organizations and organizational behavior. Years ago, only personality’s relation to organizations was of concern, but now managers are more interested in an employee’s flexibility to adapt to organizational change and to remain high in organizational commitment. Holland’s ( 1973 ) theory of personality-job fit describes six personality types (realistic, investigative, social, conventional, enterprising, and artistic) and theorizes that job satisfaction and turnover are determined by how well a person matches her or his personality to a job. In addition to person-job (P-J) fit, researchers have also argued for person-organization (P-O) fit, whereby employees desire to be a part of and are selected by an organization that matches their values. The Big Five would suggest, for example, that extraverted employees would desire to be in team environments; agreeable people would align well with supportive organizational cultures rather than more aggressive ones; and people high on openness would fit better in organizations that emphasize creativity and innovation (Anderson, Spataro, & Flynn, 2008 ).

Individual Differences, Affect, and Emotion

Personality predisposes people to have certain moods (feelings that tend to be less intense but longer lasting than emotions) and emotions (intense feelings directed at someone or something). In particular, personalities with extraversion and emotional stability partially determine an individual predisposition to experience emotion more or less intensely.

Affect is also related as describing the positive and negative feelings that people experience (Ashkanasy, 2003 ). Moreover, emotions, mood, and affect interrelate; a bad mood, for instance, can lead individuals to experience a negative emotion. Emotions are action-oriented while moods tend to be more cognitive. This is because emotions are caused by a specific event that might only last a few seconds, while moods are general and can last for hours or even days. One of the sources of emotions is personality. Dispositional or trait affects correlate, on the one hand, with personality and are what make an individual more likely to respond to a situation in a predictable way (Watson & Tellegen, 1985 ). Moreover, like personality, affective traits have proven to be stable over time and across settings (Diener, Larsen, Levine, & Emmons, 1985 ; Watson, 1988 ; Watson & Tellegen, 1985 ; Watson & Walker, 1996 ). State affect, on the other hand, is similar to mood and represents how an individual feels in the moment.

The Role of Affect in Organizational Behavior

For many years, affect and emotions were ignored in the field of OB despite being fundamental factors underlying employee behavior (Ashforth & Humphrey, 1995 ). OB researchers traditionally focused on solely decreasing the effects of strong negative emotions that were seen to impede individual, group, and organizational level productivity. More recent theories of OB focus, however, on affect, which is seen to have positive, as well as negative, effects on behavior, described by Barsade, Brief, and Spataro ( 2003 , p. 3) as the “affective revolution.” In particular, scholars now understand that emotions can be measured objectively and be observed through nonverbal displays such as facial expression and gestures, verbal displays, fMRI, and hormone levels (Ashkanasy, 2003 ; Rashotte, 2002 ).

Fritz, Sonnentag, Spector, and McInroe ( 2010 ) focus on the importance of stress recovery in affective experiences. In fact, an individual employee’s affective state is critical to OB, and today more attention is being focused on discrete affective states. Emotions like fear and sadness may be related to counterproductive work behaviors (Judge et al., 2006 ). Stress recovery is another factor that is essential for more positive moods leading to positive organizational outcomes. In a study, Fritz et al. ( 2010 ) looked at levels of psychological detachment of employees on weekends away from the workplace and how it was associated with higher wellbeing and affect.

Emotional Intelligence and Emotional Labor

Ashkanasy and Daus ( 2002 ) suggest that emotional intelligence is distinct but positively related to other types of intelligence like IQ. It is defined by Mayer and Salovey ( 1997 ) as the ability to perceive, assimilate, understand, and manage emotion in the self and others. As such, it is an individual difference and develops over a lifetime, but it can be improved with training. Boyatzis and McKee ( 2005 ) describe emotional intelligence further as a form of adaptive resilience, insofar as employees high in emotional intelligence tend to engage in positive coping mechanisms and take a generally positive outlook toward challenging work situations.

Emotional labor occurs when an employee expresses her or his emotions in a way that is consistent with an organization’s display rules, and usually means that the employee engages in either surface or deep acting (Hochschild, 1983 ). This is because the emotions an employee is expressing as part of their role at work may be different from the emotions they are actually feeling (Ozcelik, 2013 ). Emotional labor has implications for an employee’s mental and physical health and wellbeing. Moreover, because of the discrepancy between felt emotions (how an employee actually feels) and displayed emotions or surface acting (what the organization requires the employee to emotionally display), surface acting has been linked to negative organizational outcomes such as heightened emotional exhaustion and reduced commitment (Erickson & Wharton, 1997 ; Brotheridge & Grandey, 2002 ; Grandey, 2003 ; Groth, Hennig-Thurau, & Walsh, 2009 ).

Affect and Organizational Decision-Making

Ashkanasy and Ashton-James ( 2008 ) make the case that the moods and emotions managers experience in response to positive or negative workplace situations affect outcomes and behavior not only at the individual level, but also in terms of strategic decision-making processes at the organizational level. These authors focus on affective events theory (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996 ), which holds that organizational events trigger affective responses in organizational members, which in turn affect organizational attitudes, cognition, and behavior.

Perceptions and Behavior

Like personality, emotions, moods, and attitudes, perceptions also influence employees’ behaviors in the workplace. Perception is the way in which people organize and interpret sensory cues in order to give meaning to their surroundings. It can be influenced by time, work setting, social setting, other contextual factors such as time of day, time of year, temperature, a target’s clothing or appearance, as well as personal trait dispositions, attitudes, and value systems. In fact, a person’s behavior is based on her or his perception of reality—not necessarily the same as actual reality. Perception greatly influences individual decision-making because individuals base their behaviors on their perceptions of reality. In this regard, attribution theory (Martinko, 1995 ) outlines how individuals judge others and is our attempt to conclude whether a person’s behavior is internally or externally caused.

Decision-Making and the Role of Perception

Decision-making occurs as a reaction to a problem when the individual perceives there to be discrepancy between the current state of affairs and the state s/he desires. As such, decisions are the choices individuals make from a set of alternative courses of action. Each individual interprets information in her or his own way and decides which information is relevant to weigh pros and cons of each decision and its alternatives to come to her or his perception of the best outcome. In other words, each of our unique perceptual processes influences the final outcome (Janis & Mann, 1977 ).

Common Biases in Decision-Making

Although there is no perfect model for approaching decision-making, there are nonetheless many biases that individuals can make themselves aware of in order to maximize their outcomes. First, overconfidence bias is an inclination to overestimate the correctness of a decision. Those most likely to commit this error tend to be people with weak intellectual and interpersonal abilities. Anchoring bias occurs when individuals focus on the first information they receive, failing to adjust for information received subsequently. Marketers tend to use anchors in order to make impressions on clients quickly and project their brand names. Confirmation bias occurs when individuals only use facts that support their decisions while discounting all contrary views. Lastly, availability bias occurs when individuals base their judgments on information readily available. For example, a manager might rate an employee on a performance appraisal based on behavior in the past few days, rather than the past six months or year.

Errors in Decision-Making

Other errors in decision-making include hindsight bias and escalation of commitment . Hindsight bias is a tendency to believe, incorrectly, after an outcome of an event has already happened, that the decision-maker would have accurately predicted that same outcome. Furthermore, this bias, despite its prevalence, is especially insidious because it inhibits the ability to learn from the past and take responsibility for mistakes. Escalation of commitment is an inclination to continue with a chosen course of action instead of listening to negative feedback regarding that choice. When individuals feel responsible for their actions and those consequences, they escalate commitment probably because they have invested so much into making that particular decision. One solution to escalating commitment is to seek a source of clear, less distorted feedback (Staw, 1981 ).

The last but certainly not least important individual level topic is motivation. Like each of the topics discussed so far, a worker’s motivation is also influenced by individual differences and situational context. Motivation can be defined as the processes that explain a person’s intensity, direction, and persistence toward reaching a goal. Work motivation has often been viewed as the set of energetic forces that determine the form, direction, intensity, and duration of behavior (Latham & Pinder, 2005 ). Motivation can be further described as the persistence toward a goal. In fact many non-academics would probably describe it as the extent to which a person wants and tries to do well at a particular task (Mitchell, 1982 ).

Early theories of motivation began with Maslow’s ( 1943 ) hierarchy of needs theory, which holds that each person has five needs in hierarchical order: physiological, safety, social, esteem, and self-actualization. These constitute the “lower-order” needs, while social and esteem needs are “higher-order” needs. Self-esteem for instance underlies motivation from the time of childhood. Another early theory is McGregor’s ( 1960 ) X-Y theory of motivation: Theory X is the concept whereby individuals must be pushed to work; and theory Y is positive, embodying the assumption that employees naturally like work and responsibility and can exercise self-direction.

Herzberg subsequently proposed the “two-factor theory” that attitude toward work can determine whether an employee succeeds or fails. Herzberg ( 1966 ) relates intrinsic factors, like advancement in a job, recognition, praise, and responsibility to increased job satisfaction, while extrinsic factors like the organizational climate, relationship with supervisor, and salary relate to job dissatisfaction. In other words, the hygiene factors are associated with the work context while the motivators are associated with the intrinsic factors associated with job motivation.

Contemporary Theories of Motivation

Although traditional theories of motivation still appear in OB textbooks, there is unfortunately little empirical data to support their validity. More contemporary theories of motivation, with more acceptable research validity, include self-determination theory , which holds that people prefer to have control over their actions. If a task an individual enjoyed now feels like a chore, then this will undermine motivation. Higher self-determined motivation (or intrinsically determined motivation) is correlated with increased wellbeing, job satisfaction, commitment, and decreased burnout and turnover intent. In this regard, Fernet, Gagne, and Austin ( 2010 ) found that work motivation relates to reactions to interpersonal relationships at work and organizational burnout. Thus, by supporting work self-determination, managers can help facilitate adaptive employee organizational behaviors while decreasing turnover intention (Richer, Blanchard, & Vallerand, 2002 ).

Core self-evaluation (CSE) theory is a relatively new concept that relates to self-confidence in general, such that people with higher CSE tend to be more committed to goals (Bono & Colbert, 2005 ). These core self-evaluations also extend to interpersonal relationships, as well as employee creativity. Employees with higher CSE are more likely to trust coworkers, which may also contribute to increased motivation for goal attainment (Johnson, Kristof-Brown, van Vianen, de Pater, & Klein, 2003 ). In general, employees with positive CSE tend to be more intrinsically motivated, thus additionally playing a role in increasing employee creativity (Judge, Bono, Erez, & Locke, 2005 ). Finally, according to research by Amabile ( 1996 ), intrinsic motivation or self-determined goal attainment is critical in facilitating employee creativity.

Goal-Setting and Conservation of Resources

While self-determination theory and CSE focus on the reward system behind motivation and employee work behaviors, Locke and Latham’s ( 1990 ) goal-setting theory specifically addresses the impact that goal specificity, challenge, and feedback has on motivation and performance. These authors posit that our performance is increased when specific and difficult goals are set, rather than ambiguous and general goals. Goal-setting seems to be an important motivational tool, but it is important that the employee has had a chance to take part in the goal-setting process so they are more likely to attain their goals and perform highly.

Related to goal-setting is Hobfoll’s ( 1989 ) conservation of resources (COR) theory, which holds that people have a basic motivation to obtain, maintain, and protect what they value (i.e., their resources). Additionally there is a global application of goal-setting theory for each of the motivation theories. Not enough research has been conducted regarding the value of goal-setting in global contexts, however, and because of this, goal-setting is not recommended without consideration of cultural and work-related differences (Konopaske & Ivancevich, 2004 ).

Self-Efficacy and Motivation

Other motivational theories include self-efficacy theory, and reinforcement, equity, and expectancy theories. Self-efficacy or social cognitive or learning theory is an individual’s belief that s/he can perform a task (Bandura, 1977 ). This theory complements goal-setting theory in that self-efficacy is higher when a manager assigns a difficult task because employees attribute the manager’s behavior to him or her thinking that the employee is capable; the employee in turn feels more confident and capable.

Reinforcement theory (Skinner, 1938 ) counters goal-setting theory insofar as it is a behaviorist approach rather than cognitive and is based in the notion that reinforcement conditions behavior, or in other words focuses on external causes rather than the value an individual attributes to goals. Furthermore, this theory instead emphasizes the behavior itself rather than what precedes the behavior. Additionally, managers may use operant conditioning, a part of behaviorism, to reinforce people to act in a desired way.

Social-learning theory (Bandura, 1977 ) extends operant conditioning and also acknowledges the influence of observational learning and perception, and the fact that people can learn and retain information by paying attention, observing, and modeling the desired behavior.

Equity theory (Adams, 1963 ) looks at how employees compare themselves to others and how that affects their motivation and in turn their organizational behaviors. Employees who perceive inequity for instance, will either change how much effort they are putting in (their inputs), change or distort their perceptions (either of self or others in relation to work), change their outcomes, turnover, or choose a different referent (acknowledge performance in relation to another employee but find someone else they can be better than).

Last but not least, Vroom’s ( 1964 ) expectancy theory holds that individuals are motivated by the extent to which they can see that their effort is likely to result in valued outcomes. This theory has received strong support in empirical research (see Van Erde & Thierry, 1996 , for meta-analytic results). Like each of the preceding theories, expectancy theory has important implications that managers should consider. For instance, managers should communicate with employees to determine their preferences to know what rewards to offer subordinates to elicit motivation. Managers can also make sure to identify and communicate clearly the level of performance they desire from an employee, as well as to establish attainable goals with the employee and to be very clear and precise about how and when performance will be rewarded (Konopaske & Ivancevich, 2004 ).

The Meso (Group) Level of Analysis

The second level of OB research also emerges from social and organizational psychology and relates to groups or teams. Topics covered so far include individual differences: diversity, personality and emotions, values and attitudes, motivation, and decision-making. Thus, in this section, attention turns to how individuals come together to form groups and teams, and begins laying the foundation for understanding the dynamics of group and team behavior. Topics at this level also include communication, leadership, power and politics, and conflict.

A group consists of two or more individuals who come together to achieve a similar goal. Groups can be formal or informal. A formal group on the one hand is assigned by the organization’s management and is a component of the organization’s structure. An informal group on the other hand is not determined by the organization and often forms in response to a need for social contact. Teams are formal groups that come together to meet a specific group goal.

Although groups are thought to go through five stages of development (Tuckman, 1965 : forming, storming, norming, performing, and adjourning) and to transition to effectiveness at the halfway mark (Gersick, 1988 ), group effectiveness is in fact far more complex. For example, two types of conformity to group norms are possible: compliance (just going along with the group’s norms but not accepting them) and personal acceptance (when group members’ individual beliefs match group norms). Behavior in groups then falls into required behavior usually defined by the formal group and emergent behavior that grows out of interactions among group members (Champoux, 2011 ).

Group Decision-Making

Although many of the decisions made in organizations occur in groups and teams, such decisions are not necessarily optimal. Groups may have more complex knowledge and increased perspectives than individuals but may suffer from conformity pressures or domination by one or two members. Group decision-making has the potential to be affected by groupthink or group shift. In groupthink , group pressures to conform to the group norms deter the group from thinking of alternative courses of action (Janis & Mann, 1977 ). In the past, researchers attempted to explain the effects of group discussion on decision-making through the following approaches: group decision rules, interpersonal comparisons, and informational influence. Myers and Lamm ( 1976 ), however, present a conceptual schema comprised of interpersonal comparisons and informational influence approaches that focus on attitude development in a more social context. They found that their research is consistent with the group polarization hypothesis: The initial majority predicts the consensus outcome 90% of the time. The term group polarization was founded in Serge Moscovici and his colleagues’ literature (e.g., Moscovici & Zavalloni, 1969 ). Polarization refers to an increase in the extremity of the average response of the subject population.

In other words, the Myer and Lamm ( 1976 ) schema is based on the idea that four elements feed into one another: social motivation, cognitive foundation, attitude change, and action commitment. Social motivation (comparing self with others in order to be perceived favorably) feeds into cognitive foundation , which in turn feeds into attitude change and action commitment . Managers of organizations can help reduce the negative phenomena and increase the likelihood of functional groups by encouraging brainstorming or openly looking at alternatives in the process of decision-making such as the nominal group technique (which involves restricting interpersonal communication in order to encourage free thinking and proceeding to a decision in a formal and systematic fashion such as voting).

Elements of Team Performance

OB researchers typically focus on team performance and especially the factors that make teams most effective. Researchers (e.g., see De Dreu & Van Vianen, 2001 ) have organized the critical components of effective teams into three main categories: context, composition, and process. Context refers to the team’s physical and psychological environment, and in particular the factors that enable a climate of trust. Composition refers to the means whereby the abilities of each individual member can best be most effectively marshaled. Process is maximized when members have a common goal or are able to reflect and adjust the team plan (for reflexivity, see West, 1996 ).

Communication

In order to build high-performing work teams, communication is critical, especially if team conflict is to be minimized. Communication serves four main functions: control, motivation, emotional expression, and information (Scott & Mitchell, 1976 ). The communication process involves the transfer of meaning from a sender to a receiver through formal channels established by an organization and informal channels, created spontaneously and emerging out of individual choice. Communication can flow downward from managers to subordinates, upward from subordinates to managers, or between members of the same group. Meaning can be transferred from one person to another orally, through writing, or nonverbally through facial expressions and body movement. In fact, body movement and body language may complicate verbal communication and add ambiguity to the situation as does physical distance between team members.

High-performance teams tend to have some of the following characteristics: interpersonal trust, psychological and physical safety, openness to challenges and ideas, an ability to listen to other points of view, and an ability to share knowledge readily to reduce task ambiguity (Castka, Bamber, Sharp, & Belohoubek, 2001 ). Although the development of communication competence is essential for a work team to become high-performing, that communication competence is also influenced by gender, personality, ability, and emotional intelligence of the members. Ironically, it is the self-reliant team members who are often able to develop this communication competence. Although capable of working autonomously, self-reliant team members know when to ask for support from others and act interdependently.

Emotions also play a part in communicating a message or attitude to other team members. Emotional contagion, for instance, is a fascinating effect of emotions on nonverbal communication, and it is the subconscious process of sharing another person’s emotions by mimicking that team member’s nonverbal behavior (Hatfield, Cacioppo, & Rapson, 1993 ). Importantly, positive communication, expressions, and support of team members distinguished high-performing teams from low-performing ones (Bakker & Schaufeli, 2008 ).

Team Conflict

Because of member interdependence, teams are inclined to more conflict than individual workers. In particular, diversity in individual differences leads to conflict (Thomas, 1992 ; Wall & Callister, 1995 ; see also Cohen & Bailey, 1997 ). Jehn ( 1997 ) identifies three types of conflict: task, relationship, and process. Process conflict concerns how task accomplishment should proceed and who is responsible for what; task conflict focuses on the actual content and goals of the work (Robbins et al., 2014 ); and relationship conflict is based on differences in interpersonal relationships. While conflict, and especially task conflict, does have some positive benefits such as greater innovation (Tjosvold, 1997 ), it can also lead to lowered team performance and decreased job satisfaction, or even turnover. De Dreu and Van Vianen ( 2001 ) found that team conflict can result in one of three responses: (1) collaborating with others to find an acceptable solution; (2) contending and pushing one member’s perspective on others; or (3) avoiding and ignoring the problem.

Team Effectiveness and Relationship Conflict

Team effectiveness can suffer in particular from relationship conflict, which may threaten team members’ personal identities and self-esteem (Pelled, 1995 ). In this regard, Murnighan and Conlon ( 1991 ) studied members of British string quartets and found that the most successful teams avoided relationship conflict while collaborating to resolve task conflicts. This may be because relationship conflict distracts team members from the task, reducing team performance and functioning. As noted earlier, positive affect is associated with collaboration, cooperation, and problem resolution, while negative affect tends to be associated with competitive behaviors, especially during conflict (Rhoades, Arnold, & Jay, 2001 ).

Team Climate and Emotionality

Emotional climate is now recognized as important to team processes (Ashkanasy & Härtel, 2014 ), and team climate in general has important implications for how individuals behave individually and collectively to effect organizational outcomes. This idea is consistent with Druskat and Wolff’s ( 2001 ) notion that team emotional-intelligence climate can help a team manage both types of conflict (task and relationship). In Jehn’s ( 1997 ) study, she found that emotion was most often negative during team conflict, and this had a negative effect on performance and satisfaction regardless of the type of conflict team members were experiencing. High emotionality, as Jehn calls it, causes team members to lose sight of the work task and focus instead on the negative affect. Jehn noted, however, that absence of group conflict might also may block innovative ideas and stifle creativity (Jehn, 1997 ).

Power and Politics

Power and organizational politics can trigger employee conflict, thus affecting employee wellbeing, job satisfaction, and performance, in turn affecting team and organizational productivity (Vigoda, 2000 ). Because power is a function of dependency, it can often lead to unethical behavior and thus become a source of conflict. Types of power include formal and personal power. Formal power embodies coercive, reward, and legitimate power. Coercive power depends on fear. Reward power is the opposite and occurs when an individual complies because s/he receives positive benefits from acting in accordance with the person in power. In formal groups and organizations, the most easily accessed form of power is legitimate because this form comes to be from one’s position in the organizational hierarchy (Raven, 1993 ). Power tactics represent the means by which those in a position of power translate their power base (formal or personal) into specific actions.

The nine influence tactics that managers use according to Yukl and Tracey ( 1992 ) are (1) rational persuasion, (2) inspirational appeal, (3) consultation, (4) ingratiation, (5) exchange, (6) personal appeal, (7) coalition, (8) legitimating, and (9) pressure. Of these tactics, inspirational appeal, consultation, and rational persuasion were among the strategies most effective in influencing task commitment. In this study, there was also a correlation found between a manager’s rational persuasion and a subordinate rating her effectively. Perhaps this is because persuasion requires some level of expertise, although more research is needed to verify which methods are most successful. Moreover, resource dependence theory dominates much theorizing about power and organizational politics. In fact, it is one of the central themes of Pfeffer and Salancik’s ( 1973 ) treatise on the external control of organizations. First, the theory emphasizes the importance of the organizational environment in understanding the context of how decisions of power are made (see also Pfeffer & Leblebici, 1973 ). Resource dependence theory is based on the premise that some organizations have more power than others, occasioned by specifics regarding their interdependence. Pfeffer and Salancik further propose that external interdependence and internal organizational processes are related and that this relationship is mediated by power.

Organizational Politics

Political skill is the ability to use power tactics to influence others to enhance an individual’s personal objectives. In addition, a politically skilled person is able to influence another person without being detected (one reason why he or she is effective). Persons exerting political skill leave a sense of trust and sincerity with the people they interact with. An individual possessing a high level of political skill must understand the organizational culture they are exerting influence within in order to make an impression on his or her target. While some researchers suggest political behavior is a critical way to understand behavior that occurs in organizations, others simply see it as a necessary evil of work life (Champoux, 2011 ). Political behavior focuses on using power to reach a result and can be viewed as unofficial and unsanctioned behavior (Mintzberg, 1985 ). Unlike other organizational processes, political behavior involves both power and influence (Mayes & Allen, 1977 ). Moreover, because political behavior involves the use of power to influence others, it can often result in conflict.

Organizational Politics, Power, and Ethics

In concluding this section on power and politics, it is also appropriate to address the dark side, where organizational members who are persuasive and powerful enough might become prone to abuse standards of equity and justice and thereby engage in unethical behavior. An employee who takes advantage of her position of power may use deception, lying, or intimidation to advance her own interests (Champoux, 2011 ). When exploring interpersonal injustice, it is important to consider the intent of the perpetrator, as well as the effect of the perpetrator’s treatment from the victim’s point of view. Umphress, Simmons, Folger, Ren, and Bobocel ( 2013 ) found in this regard that not only does injustice perceived by the self or coworkers influence attitudes and behavior within organizations, but injustice also influences observer reactions both inside and outside of the organization.

Leadership plays an integrative part in understanding group behavior, because the leader is engaged in directing individuals toward attitudes and behaviors, hopefully also in the direction of those group members’ goals. Although there is no set of universal leadership traits, extraversion from the Big Five personality framework has been shown in meta-analytic studies to be positively correlated with transformational, while neuroticism appears to be negatively correlated (Bono & Judge, 2004 ). There are also various perspectives to leadership, including the competency perspective, which addresses the personality traits of leaders; the behavioral perspective, which addresses leader behaviors, specifically task versus people-oriented leadership; and the contingency perspective, which is based on the idea that leadership involves an interaction of personal traits and situational factors. Fiedler’s ( 1967 ) contingency, for example, suggests that leader effectiveness depends on the person’s natural fit to the situation and the leader’s score on a “least preferred coworker” scale.

More recently identified styles of leadership include transformational leadership (Bass, Avolio, & Atwater, 1996 ), charismatic leadership (Conger & Kanungo, 1988 ), and authentic leadership (Luthans & Avolio, 2003 ). In a nutshell, transformational leaders inspire followers to act based on the good of the organization; charismatic leaders project a vision and convey a new set of values; and authentic leaders convey trust and genuine sentiment.

Leader-member exchange theory (LMX; see Graen & Uhl-Bien, 1995 ) assumes that leadership emerges from exchange relationships between a leader and her or his followers. More recently, Tse, Troth, and Ashkanasy ( 2015 ) expanded on LMX to include social processes (e.g., emotional intelligence, emotional labor, and discrete emotions), arguing that affect plays a large part in the leader-member relationship.

Leadership Development

An emerging new topic in leadership concerns leadership development, which embodies the readiness of leadership aspirants to change (Hannah & Avolio, 2010 ). In this regard, the learning literature suggests that intrinsic motivation is necessary in order to engage in development (see Hidi & Harackiewicz, 2000 ), but also that the individual needs to be goal-oriented and have developmental efficacy or self-confidence that s/he can successfully perform in leadership contexts.

Ashkanasy, Dasborough, and Ascough ( 2009 ) argue further that developing the affective side of leaders is important. In this case, because emotions are so pervasive within organizations, it is important that leaders learn how to manage them in order to improve team performance and interactions with employees that affect attitudes and behavior at almost every organizational level.

Abusive Leadership

Leaders, or those in positions of power, are particularly more likely to run into ethical issues, and only more recently have organizational behavior researchers considered the ethical implications of leadership. As Gallagher, Mazur, and Ashkanasy ( 2015 ) describe, since 2009 , organizations have been under increasing pressure to cut costs or “do more with less,” and this sometimes can lead to abusive supervision, whereby employee job demands exceed employee resources, and supervisors engage in bullying, undermining, victimization, or personal attacks on subordinates (Tepper, 2000 ).

Supervisors who are very high or low in emotional intelligence may be more likely to experience stress associated with a very demanding high-performance organizational culture. These supervisors may be more likely to try to meet the high demands and pressures through manipulative behaviors (Kilduff, Chiaburu, & Menges, 2010 ). This has serious implications for employee wellbeing and the organization as a whole. Abusive supervision detracts from the ability for those under attack to perform effectively, and targets often come to doubt their own ability to perform (Tepper, 2000 ).

The Macro (Organizational) Level of Analysis

The final level of OB derives from research traditions across three disciplines: organizational psychology, organizational sociology, and organizational anthropology. Moreover, just as teams and groups are more than the sum of their individual team members, organizations are also more than the sum of the teams or groups residing within them. As such, structure, climate, and culture play key roles in shaping and being shaped by employee attitudes and behaviors, and they ultimately determine organizational performance and productivity.

Organizational Structure

Organizational structure is a sociological phenomenon that determines the way tasks are formally divided and coordinated within an organization. In this regard, jobs are often grouped by the similarity of functions performed, the product or service produced, or the geographical location. Often, the number of forms of departmentalization will depend on the size of the organization, with larger organizations having more forms of departmentalization than others. Organizations are also organized by the chain of command or the hierarchy of authority that determines the span of control, or how many employees a manager can efficiently and effectively lead. With efforts to reduce costs since the global financial crisis of 2009 , organizations have tended to adopt a wider, flatter span of control, where more employees report to one supervisor.

Organizational structure also concerns the level of centralization or decentralization, the degree to which decision-making is focused at a single point within an organization. Formalization is also the degree to which jobs are organized in an organization. These levels are determined by the organization and also vary greatly across the world. For example, Finnish organizations tend to be more decentralized than their Australian counterparts and, as a consequence, are more innovative (Leiponen & Helfat, 2011 ).

Mintzberg ( 1979 ) was the first to set out a taxonomy of organizational structure. Within his model, the most common organizational design is the simple structure characterized by a low level of departmentalization, a wide span of control, and centralized authority. Other organizational types emerge in larger organizations, which tend to be bureaucratic and more routinized. Rules are formalized, tasks are grouped into departments, authority is centralized, and the chain of command involves narrow spans of control and decision-making. An alternative is the matrix structure, often found in hospitals, universities, and government agencies. This form of organization combines functional and product departmentalization where employees answer to two bosses: functional department managers and product managers.

New design options include the virtual organization and the boundaryless organization , an organization that has no chain of command and limitless spans of control. Structures differ based on whether the organization seeks to use an innovation strategy, imitation strategy, or cost-minimization strategy (Galunic & Eisenhardt, 1994 ). Organizational structure can have a significant effect on employee attitudes and behavior. Evidence generally shows that work specialization leads to higher employee productivity but also lower job satisfaction (Porter & Lawler, 1965 ). Gagné and Deci emphasize that autonomous work motivation (i.e., intrinsic motivation and integrated extrinsic motivation) is promoted in work climates that are interesting, challenging, and allow choice. Parker, Wall, and Jackson ( 1997 ) specifically relate job enlargement to autonomous motivation. Job enlargement was first discussed by management theorists like Lawler and Hall ( 1970 ), who believed that jobs should be enlarged to improve the intrinsic motivation of workers. Today, most of the job-design literature is built around the issue of work specialization (job enlargement and enrichment). In Parker, Wall, and Jackson’s study, they observed that horizontally enlarging jobs through team-based assembly cells led to greater understanding and acceptance of the company’s vision and more engagement in new work roles. (In sum, by structuring work to allow more autonomy among employees and identification among individual work groups, employees stand to gain more internal autonomous motivation leading to improved work outcomes (van Knippenberg & van Schie, 2000 ).

The Physical Environment of Work

Ashkanasy, Ayoko, and Jehn ( 2014 ) extend the topic of organizational structure to discuss, from a psychological perspective, how the physical work environment shapes employee attitudes, behaviors, and organizational outcomes. Elsbach ( 2003 ) pointed out that the space within which employees conduct their work is critical to employees’ levels of performance and productivity. In their study, Ashkanasy and his colleagues looked at the underlying processes influencing how the physical environment determines employee attitudes and behaviors, in turn affecting productivity levels. They base their model on affective events theory (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996 ), which holds that particular “affective” events in the work environment are likely to be the immediate cause of employee behavior and performance in organizations (see also Ashkanasy & Humphrey, 2011 ). Specifically, Ashkanasy and colleagues ( 2014 ) looked at how this theory holds in extremely crowded open-plan office designs and how employees in these offices are more likely to experience negative affect, conflict, and territoriality, negatively impacting attitudes, behaviors, and work performance.

• Organizational Climate and Culture

Although organizational structure and the physical environment are important determinants of employee attitudes and behaviors, organizational culture and climate lie at the heart of organizational interactions (Ashkanasy & Jackson, 2001 ). Organizational culture derives from an anthropological research tradition, while organizational climate is based on organizational psychology.

A central presumption of culture is that, as Smircich ( 1983 ) noted, organizational behavior is not a function of what goes on inside individual employees’ heads, but between employees, as evidenced in daily organizational communication and language. As such, organizational culture allows one organization to distinguish itself from another, while conveying a sense of identity for its members.

Organizational Climate and its Relation to Organizational Culture

Organizational culture creates organizational climate or employees’ shared perceptions about their organization and work environment. Organizational climate has been found to facilitate and/or inhibit displays of certain behaviors in one study (Smith-Crowe, Burke, & Landis, 2003 ), and overall, organizational climate is often viewed as a surface-level indicator of the functioning of the employee/organizational environment relationship (Ryan, Horvath, Ployhart, Schmitt, & Slade, 2000 ). For instance, a more restrictive climate may inhibit individual decision-making in contrast to a more supportive climate in which the organization may intervene at the individual level and in which the ability/job performance relationship is supported (James, Demaree, Mulaik, & Ladd, 1992 ). In a study focused on safety climate, Smith-Crowe and colleagues found that organizational climate is essential in determining whether training will transfer to employee performance, and this is most likely because organizational climate moderates the knowledge/performance relationship. Gibbs and Cooper ( 2010 ) also found that a supportive organizational climate is positively related to employee performance. They specifically looked at PsyCap, the higher-order construct of psychological capital first proposed by Luthans and Youssef ( 2004 ).

Organizational Change

The final topic covered in this article is organizational change. Organizational culture and climate can both be negatively impacted by organizational change and, in turn, negatively affect employee wellbeing, attitudes, and performance, reflecting onto organizational performance. Often, there is great resistance to change, and the success rate of organizational change initiatives averages at less than 30% (Al-Haddad & Kotnour, 2015 ). In order to overcome this resistance, it is important that managers plan ahead for changes and emphasize education and communication about them. As organizations becoming increasingly globalized, change has become the norm, and this will continue into the future.

Additionally, as organizations become increasingly globalized, organizational changes often involve mergers that have important organizational implications. In this regard, Kavanagh and Ashkanasy ( 2006 ) found that, for a merger to be successful, there needs to be alignment between the individual values and organizational cultures of merging partners. Managers during a merger situation need to be especially cognizant of how this organizational change affects the company’s original organizational culture.

Organizational development (OD), a collection of planned change interventions, may be the way to improve organizational performance and increase employee wellbeing. OD focuses on employees respecting one another, trust and support, equal power, confrontation of problems, and participation of everyone affected by the organizational change (Lines, 2004 ). Moreover, when an organization already has an established climate and culture that support change and innovation, an organization may have less trouble adapting to the change.

Organizational change research encompasses almost all aspects of organizational behavior. Individuals and employees are motivated to achieve success and be perceived as successful. In this regard, each of the individual differences—personality, affect, past experiences, values, and perceptions—plays into whether individuals can transcend obstacles and deal with the barriers encountered along the journey toward achievement. Teams are similarly motivated to be successful in a collective sense and to prove that they contribute to the organization as a whole. In addition to individual differences, team members deal with bringing all those individual differences together, which can wreak havoc on team communication and cause further obstacles in terms of power differences and conflicts in regard to decision-making processes. Last, at the organizational level of organizational behavior, it is important to account for all of these micro- and meso-level differences, and to address the complexity of economic pressures, increasing globalization, and global and transnational organizations to the mix. This is at the top level of sophistication because, as emphasized before, just as groups equal much more than the sum of individual members, organizations are much more than the sum of their teams. The organizational structure, the formal organization, the organizational culture, and climate and organizational rules all impact whether an organization can perform effectively. Organizational behavior, through its complex study of human behavior at its very conception, offers much-needed practical implications for managers in understanding people at work.

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Organising levels of organisation for biology education: a systematic review of literature.

1. Introduction

“Systems thinking has become synonymous to developing coherent understanding of complex biological processes and phenomena from the molecular level to the level of ecosystems”. [ 1 ] (p. 1)

2. Research Questions

• How do the authors describe the levels of organisation?
• Which levels of organisation do the authors name?
• How do the authors describe the relationship between different levels of organisation?
• How do the authors describe the challenges of these levels for biological education?
• How do the authors describe the benefit of these levels for biological education?

3. Material

• Language: English or German (due to linguistic proficiency)
• Type: articles in peer-reviewed journals
• Date restrictions: none
• Relevance: addresses levels of organisation

5. Findings

5.1. research question 1: how do the authors describe the levels, 5.2. research question 2: which levels of organisation do the authors name, 5.2.1. biology (n = 14), 5.2.2. education (n = 22), 5.2.3. summary, 5.2.4. range of levels, 5.2.5. science education articles use different levels based on the underlying phenomenon., 5.3. research question 3: how do the authors describe the relationships between levels, 5.3.1. dependence of levels.

• The part-whole relationship,
• The flow-of-information relationship,
• The matter–energy relationship,
• The coevolutionary relationship, and
• The phylogenetic relationship.

5.3.2. The Part–Whole Relationship

5.3.3. the flow-of-information relationship.

“This kind of hierarchy, in which information flows between levels in both directions, as well as between units within a given level, we may call a hierarchy of control”. [ 37 ] (p. 508)

“And again, it is the flow of information both horizontally and vertically that makes the organism an integrated, working whole”. [ 37 ] (p. 508)

5.3.4. The Matter–Energy Relationship

5.3.5. the coevolutionary relationship.

“The combinations of positive, negative, and neutral effects on expected reproductive success are embodied in the familiar concepts of competition, mutualism, commensalism, etc. (Burkholder 1952). These are specific kinds of coevolutionary interactions”. [ 39 ] (p. 701)

5.3.6. The Phylogenetic Relationship

5.4. research question 4: how do the authors describe the challenges of levels for biological education, 5.5. research question 5: how do the authors describe the benefit of levels for biological education, 6. discussion, 6.1. summary.

• RQ 1: General descriptions of the levels of organisation were scarce. Authors focussed on the order of levels and emergent properties.
• RQ 2: Based on the analysis of N = 36 articles, it can be stated that there is currently no consensus on which levels of organisation form a consistent system. Authors name different sets of up to 21 different levels ranging from subatomic particles to the universe. Of the 36 articles reviewed, the most commonly used levels are organisms (79%), cells (74%), molecules (65%), organs (50%), and populations (47%). Additionally, we were able to show that articles on Science Education use specific levels of organisation based on the phenomenon they focus on ( Figure 6 ).
• The physiological relationship (part–whole relationship and the flow-of-information relationship);
• The matter–energy relationship;
• The coevolutionary relationship; and
• RQ 4: In the articles we analysed, authors rarely discuss challenges of levels of organisation. One challenge we were able to identify was pointed out by Assaraf, Dodick and Tripto [ 27 ]: students focus on system components rather than their interactions. Knippels and Waarlo [ 51 ] added that students might confuse concepts of systems–theory and empirical part–whole entities.
• RQ 5: Levels can structure scientific problems and guide investigations. According to the analysed articles, this is the main benefit of the levels. Levels guide investigations mainly by focussing on what is essential in relation to the research question. Mechanisms are to be examined in lower levels, functions in higher levels.
• For RQ 1, we reflect on the nature of levels of organisation.
• For RQ 2, we discuss differences in names for specific levels, the usage of different levels based on the phenomenon and differences in the order of levels.
• For RQ 3, we address whether levels are interdependent or only lower levels depend on higher levels. Additionally, we focus on qualitative differences of relationships between levels.
• For RQ 4 and 5, we elucidate the challenges and benefits of levels of organisation.

6.2. The Nature of Levels of Organisation

“Yet, in spite of the ubiquity of the notion, levels of organization have received little explicit attention in biology or its philosophy. Usually they appear in the background as an implicit conceptual framework that is associated with vague intuitions. Attempts at providing general and broadly applicable definitions of levels of organization have not met wide acceptance” [ 35 ]

6.3. Ordering Levels

6.4. levels of organisation can be related through different relationships, 6.5. levels of organisation can be formed, based on relationships, 6.6. relationships between levels of organisation are qualitatively different, 6.7. meeting the challenges and benefits, 7. system for educational purposes, 8. implications, 9. limitations, author contributions, acknowledgments, conflicts of interest.

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Schneeweiß, N.; Gropengießer, H. Organising Levels of Organisation for Biology Education: A Systematic Review of Literature. Educ. Sci. 2019 , 9 , 207. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci9030207

Schneeweiß N, Gropengießer H. Organising Levels of Organisation for Biology Education: A Systematic Review of Literature. Education Sciences . 2019; 9(3):207. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci9030207

Schneeweiß, Niklas, and Harald Gropengießer. 2019. "Organising Levels of Organisation for Biology Education: A Systematic Review of Literature" Education Sciences 9, no. 3: 207. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci9030207

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• Biology Article
• Five Levels Of Ecology

Five Levels of Ecology

Table of Contents

What are the 5 Levels of Ecology?

Ecology is the scientific study of the distribution and abundance of life along with the interactions between different organisms and their natural environment. It is the branch of biology, and the name Ecology was derived from the Greek word, which refers to the house or the environment.

Explore more:  Ecology 

There are five Levels of Organization, and all levels are listed according to their size in increasing order – from small to large.

It is the lowest level of organization, which includes both unicellular and multicellular organisms . All the living species in this level exhibit all the characteristics required for the existence of life.

Read more about: Characteristics Of Organisms

A population is a group of individuals of a single species living together within a particular geographic area. They interbreed and compete with each other for resources.

Also Read:  Population And Its Types

It refers to the several populations that interact and inhabit a common environment and are interdependent.

It is a set of all living species and abiotic components existing and interacting in a given area. There is an interaction with both living and nonliving components of the environment.

Also Read:  Ecosystem

 It is the highest level of organization. It is the global ecological system which consists of all the living organisms and other factors which support life. The biosphere mainly refers to the part of the earth’s crust.

Also Read :  Biotic And Abiotic

This was a brief introduction to the Ecological Levels of Organization in an ecosystem. Learn more in detail about levels of Ecology, Ecosystem, Our environment and other related topics at BYJU’S Biology

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• Knowledge Base
• How to structure an essay: Templates and tips

How to Structure an Essay | Tips & Templates

Published on September 18, 2020 by Jack Caulfield . Revised on July 23, 2023.

The basic structure of an essay always consists of an introduction , a body , and a conclusion . But for many students, the most difficult part of structuring an essay is deciding how to organize information within the body.

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Table of contents

The basics of essay structure, chronological structure, compare-and-contrast structure, problems-methods-solutions structure, signposting to clarify your structure, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions about essay structure.

There are two main things to keep in mind when working on your essay structure: making sure to include the right information in each part, and deciding how you’ll organize the information within the body.

Parts of an essay

The three parts that make up all essays are described in the table below.

Order of information

You’ll also have to consider how to present information within the body. There are a few general principles that can guide you here.

The first is that your argument should move from the simplest claim to the most complex . The body of a good argumentative essay often begins with simple and widely accepted claims, and then moves towards more complex and contentious ones.

For example, you might begin by describing a generally accepted philosophical concept, and then apply it to a new topic. The grounding in the general concept will allow the reader to understand your unique application of it.

The second principle is that background information should appear towards the beginning of your essay . General background is presented in the introduction. If you have additional background to present, this information will usually come at the start of the body.

The third principle is that everything in your essay should be relevant to the thesis . Ask yourself whether each piece of information advances your argument or provides necessary background. And make sure that the text clearly expresses each piece of information’s relevance.

The sections below present several organizational templates for essays: the chronological approach, the compare-and-contrast approach, and the problems-methods-solutions approach.

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The chronological approach (sometimes called the cause-and-effect approach) is probably the simplest way to structure an essay. It just means discussing events in the order in which they occurred, discussing how they are related (i.e. the cause and effect involved) as you go.

A chronological approach can be useful when your essay is about a series of events. Don’t rule out other approaches, though—even when the chronological approach is the obvious one, you might be able to bring out more with a different structure.

Explore the tabs below to see a general template and a specific example outline from an essay on the invention of the printing press.

• Thesis statement
• Discussion of event/period
• Consequences
• Importance of topic
• Strong closing statement
• Claim that the printing press marks the end of the Middle Ages
• Background on the low levels of literacy before the printing press
• Thesis statement: The invention of the printing press increased circulation of information in Europe, paving the way for the Reformation
• High levels of illiteracy in medieval Europe
• Literacy and thus knowledge and education were mainly the domain of religious and political elites
• Consequence: this discouraged political and religious change
• Invention of the printing press in 1440 by Johannes Gutenberg
• Implications of the new technology for book production
• Consequence: Rapid spread of the technology and the printing of the Gutenberg Bible
• Trend for translating the Bible into vernacular languages during the years following the printing press’s invention
• Luther’s own translation of the Bible during the Reformation
• Consequence: The large-scale effects the Reformation would have on religion and politics
• Summarize the history described
• Stress the significance of the printing press to the events of this period

Essays with two or more main subjects are often structured around comparing and contrasting . For example, a literary analysis essay might compare two different texts, and an argumentative essay might compare the strengths of different arguments.

There are two main ways of structuring a compare-and-contrast essay: the alternating method, and the block method.

Alternating

In the alternating method, each paragraph compares your subjects in terms of a specific point of comparison. These points of comparison are therefore what defines each paragraph.

The tabs below show a general template for this structure, and a specific example for an essay comparing and contrasting distance learning with traditional classroom learning.

• Synthesis of arguments
• Topical relevance of distance learning in lockdown
• Increasing prevalence of distance learning over the last decade
• Thesis statement: While distance learning has certain advantages, it introduces multiple new accessibility issues that must be addressed for it to be as effective as classroom learning
• Classroom learning: Ease of identifying difficulties and privately discussing them
• Distance learning: Difficulty of noticing and unobtrusively helping
• Classroom learning: Difficulties accessing the classroom (disability, distance travelled from home)
• Distance learning: Difficulties with online work (lack of tech literacy, unreliable connection, distractions)
• Classroom learning: Tends to encourage personal engagement among students and with teacher, more relaxed social environment
• Distance learning: Greater ability to reach out to teacher privately
• Sum up, emphasize that distance learning introduces more difficulties than it solves
• Stress the importance of addressing issues with distance learning as it becomes increasingly common
• Distance learning may prove to be the future, but it still has a long way to go

In the block method, each subject is covered all in one go, potentially across multiple paragraphs. For example, you might write two paragraphs about your first subject and then two about your second subject, making comparisons back to the first.

The tabs again show a general template, followed by another essay on distance learning, this time with the body structured in blocks.

• Point 1 (compare)
• Point 2 (compare)
• Point 3 (compare)
• Point 4 (compare)
• Advantages: Flexibility, accessibility
• Disadvantages: Discomfort, challenges for those with poor internet or tech literacy
• Advantages: Potential for teacher to discuss issues with a student in a separate private call
• Disadvantages: Difficulty of identifying struggling students and aiding them unobtrusively, lack of personal interaction among students
• Advantages: More accessible to those with low tech literacy, equality of all sharing one learning environment
• Disadvantages: Students must live close enough to attend, commutes may vary, classrooms not always accessible for disabled students
• Advantages: Ease of picking up on signs a student is struggling, more personal interaction among students
• Disadvantages: May be harder for students to approach teacher privately in person to raise issues

An essay that concerns a specific problem (practical or theoretical) may be structured according to the problems-methods-solutions approach.

This is just what it sounds like: You define the problem, characterize a method or theory that may solve it, and finally analyze the problem, using this method or theory to arrive at a solution. If the problem is theoretical, the solution might be the analysis you present in the essay itself; otherwise, you might just present a proposed solution.

The tabs below show a template for this structure and an example outline for an essay about the problem of fake news.

• Introduce the problem
• Provide background
• Describe your approach to solving it
• Define the problem precisely
• Describe why it’s important
• Indicate previous approaches to the problem
• Present your new approach, and why it’s better
• Apply the new method or theory to the problem
• Indicate the solution you arrive at by doing so
• Assess (potential or actual) effectiveness of solution
• Describe the implications
• Problem: The growth of “fake news” online
• Prevalence of polarized/conspiracy-focused news sources online
• Thesis statement: Rather than attempting to stamp out online fake news through social media moderation, an effective approach to combating it must work with educational institutions to improve media literacy
• Definition: Deliberate disinformation designed to spread virally online
• Popularization of the term, growth of the phenomenon
• Previous approaches: Labeling and moderation on social media platforms
• Critique: This approach feeds conspiracies; the real solution is to improve media literacy so users can better identify fake news
• Greater emphasis should be placed on media literacy education in schools
• This allows people to assess news sources independently, rather than just being told which ones to trust
• This is a long-term solution but could be highly effective
• It would require significant organization and investment, but would equip people to judge news sources more effectively
• Rather than trying to contain the spread of fake news, we must teach the next generation not to fall for it

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Signposting means guiding the reader through your essay with language that describes or hints at the structure of what follows.  It can help you clarify your structure for yourself as well as helping your reader follow your ideas.

The essay overview

In longer essays whose body is split into multiple named sections, the introduction often ends with an overview of the rest of the essay. This gives a brief description of the main idea or argument of each section.

The overview allows the reader to immediately understand what will be covered in the essay and in what order. Though it describes what  comes later in the text, it is generally written in the present tense . The following example is from a literary analysis essay on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein .

Transitions

Transition words and phrases are used throughout all good essays to link together different ideas. They help guide the reader through your text, and an essay that uses them effectively will be much easier to follow.

Various different relationships can be expressed by transition words, as shown in this example.

Because Hitler failed to respond to the British ultimatum, France and the UK declared war on Germany. Although it was an outcome the Allies had hoped to avoid, they were prepared to back up their ultimatum in order to combat the existential threat posed by the Third Reich.

Transition sentences may be included to transition between different paragraphs or sections of an essay. A good transition sentence moves the reader on to the next topic while indicating how it relates to the previous one.

… Distance learning, then, seems to improve accessibility in some ways while representing a step backwards in others.

However , considering the issue of personal interaction among students presents a different picture.

If you want to know more about AI tools , college essays , or fallacies make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples or go directly to our tools!

• Ad hominem fallacy
• Post hoc fallacy
• Appeal to authority fallacy
• False cause fallacy
• Sunk cost fallacy

College essays

• Choosing Essay Topic
• Write a College Essay
• Write a Diversity Essay
• College Essay Format & Structure
• Comparing and Contrasting in an Essay

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The structure of an essay is divided into an introduction that presents your topic and thesis statement , a body containing your in-depth analysis and arguments, and a conclusion wrapping up your ideas.

The structure of the body is flexible, but you should always spend some time thinking about how you can organize your essay to best serve your ideas.

An essay isn’t just a loose collection of facts and ideas. Instead, it should be centered on an overarching argument (summarized in your thesis statement ) that every part of the essay relates to.

The way you structure your essay is crucial to presenting your argument coherently. A well-structured essay helps your reader follow the logic of your ideas and understand your overall point.

Comparisons in essays are generally structured in one of two ways:

• The alternating method, where you compare your subjects side by side according to one specific aspect at a time.
• The block method, where you cover each subject separately in its entirety.

It’s also possible to combine both methods, for example by writing a full paragraph on each of your topics and then a final paragraph contrasting the two according to a specific metric.

You should try to follow your outline as you write your essay . However, if your ideas change or it becomes clear that your structure could be better, it’s okay to depart from your essay outline . Just make sure you know why you’re doing so.

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7 Organizational Structure Types (With Examples)

Updated: May 29, 2024, 5:39pm

Table of Contents

What is an organizational structure, 4 common types of organizational structures, 3 alternative organizational structures, how to choose the best organizational structure, frequently asked questions (faqs).

Every company needs an organizational structure—whether they realize it or not. The organizational structure is how the company delegates roles, responsibilities, job functions, accountability and decision-making authority. The organizational structure often shows the “chain of command” and how information moves within the company. Having an organizational structure that aligns with your company’s goals and objectives is crucial. This article describes the various types of organizational structures, the benefits of creating one for your business and specific elements that should be included.

Employees want to understand their job responsibilities, whom they report to, what decisions they can and should make and how they interact with other people and teams within the company. An organizational structure creates this framework. Organizational structures can be centralized or decentralized, hierarchical or circular, flat or vertical.

Centralized vs. Decentralized

Many companies use the traditional model of a centralized organizational structure. With centralized leadership, there is a transparent chain of command and each role has well-defined responsibilities.

Conversely, with a decentralized organizational structure, teams have more autonomy to make decisions and there may be cross-collaboration between groups. Decentralized leadership can help companies remain agile and adapt to changing needs.

Hierarchical vs. Circular

A hierarchical organization structure is the pyramid-shaped organization chart many people are used to seeing. There is one role at the top of the pyramid and the chain of command moves down, with each level decreasing in responsibilities and authority.

On the other hand, a circular organization chart looks like concentric circles with company leadership in the center circle. Instead of information flowing down to the next “level,” information flows out to the next ring of management.

Vertical vs. Flat

A vertical organizational chart has a clear chain of command with a small group of leaders at the top—or in the center, in the case of a circular structure—and each subsequent tier has less authority and responsibility. As discussed below, functional, product-based, market-based and geographical organizational structures are vertical structures.

With a flat organization structure, a person may report to more than one person and there may be cross-department responsibilities and decision-making authority. The matrix organizational structure described below is an example of a flat structure.

Benefits of Creating an Organizational Structure

There are many benefits to creating an organizational structure that aligns with the company’s operations, goals and objectives. Clearly disseminating this information to employees:

• Provides accountability
• Clarifies expectations
• Documents criteria for promotion
• Designates decision-making authority
• Creates efficiency
• Fosters collaboration

Essential Elements of Clear Organizational Structure

Regardless of the special type of organizational structure you choose, it should have the following components:

• Chain of command
• Roles and responsibilities
• Scope of control
• Decision-making authority
• Departments or teams within the organization

Functional/Role-Based Structure

A functional—or role-based—structure is one of the most common organizational structures. This structure has centralized leadership and the vertical, hierarchical structure has clearly defined roles, job functions, chains of command and decision-making authority. A functional structure facilitates specialization, scalability and accountability. It also establishes clear expectations and has a well-defined chain of command. However, this structure runs the risk of being too confining and it can impede employee growth. It also has the potential for a lack of cross-department communication and collaboration.

Product- or Market-Based Structure

Along with the functional structure, the product- or market-based structure is hierarchical, vertical and centralized. However, instead of being structured around typical roles and job functions, it is structured around the company’s products or markets. This kind of structure can benefit companies that have several product lines or markets, but it can be challenging to scale. It can also foster inefficiency if product or market teams have similar functions, and without good communication across teams, companies run the risk of incompatibility among various product/market teams.

Geographical Structure

The geographical structure is a good option for companies with a broad geographic footprint in an industry where it is essential to be close to their customers and suppliers. The geographical structure enables the company to create bespoke organizational structures that align with the location’s culture, language and professional systems. From a broad perspective, it appears very similar to the product-based structure above.

Process-Based Structure

Similar to the functional structure, the process-based structure is structured in a way that follows a product’s or service’s life cycle. For instance, the structure can be broken down into R&D, product creation, order fulfillment, billing and customer services. This structure can foster efficiency, teamwork and specialization, but it can also create barriers between the teams if communication isn’t prioritized.

Matrix Structure

With a matrix organizational structure, there are multiple reporting obligations. For instance, a marketing specialist may have reporting obligations within the marketing and product teams. A matrix structure offers flexibility, enables shared resources and fosters collaboration within the company. However, the organizational structure can be complex, so it can cause confusion about accountability and communication, especially among new employees.

Circular Structure

Similar to the functional and product-based structure, a circular structure is also centralized and hierarchical, but instead of responsibility and decision-making authority flowing down vertically, responsibility and decision-making authority flow out from the center. A circular structure can promote communication and collaboration but can also be confusing, especially for new employees, because there is no clear chain of command.

Organic Structure

Unlike vertical structures, this structure facilitates communication between and among all staff. It is the most complex, but it can also be the most productive. Although it can be challenging to know who has ultimate decision-making authority, it can also foster a positive company culture because employees don’t feel like they have “superiors.” This structure can also be more cost-efficient because it reduces the need for middle managers.

There is no one “right” organizational structure. When deciding which structure will work best for your company, consider the following:

• Current roles and teams within the company. How are job functions currently organized? Does it foster communication and productivity? Does it impede or encourage employee growth?
• Your strategic plan. What are your company’s goals for the short-term and long-term?
• Feedback from employees, leadership and other stakeholders. What do those within your company say about how the company is structured? What feedback do you have from other stakeholders, such as customers and suppliers?
• Alignment. What structure will best support your strategic plans and address any feedback received?

What is the most common organizational structure?

A functional organizational structure is one of the most common organizational structures. If you are still determining what kind of structure to use, this organizational structure can be an excellent place to start.

What is the difference between an organizational structure and an organizational chart?

An organizational chart is a graphic that depicts the organizational structure. The chart may include job titles or it can be personalized to include names and photos.

What are the four types of organizational structures?

A functional—or role-based—structure is one of the most common organizational structures. The second type—the product- or market-based structure—is also hierarchical, vertical and centralized. Similar to these is the third structure—the process-based structure—which is structured in a way that follows a product’s or service’s life cycle. Lastly, the geographical structure is suitable for businesses with a broad geographic footprint.

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Christine is a non-practicing attorney, freelance writer, and author. She has written legal and marketing content and communications for a wide range of law firms for more than 15 years. She has also written extensively on parenting and current events for the website Scary Mommy. She earned her J.D. and B.A. from University of Wisconsin–Madison, and she lives in the Chicago area with her family.

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