National Culture and Groups, Volume 9

LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS Wendi L. Adair S.C. Johnson Graduate School of Management, Cornell University, USA Sungu Armagan...

Author: YA-RU CHEN

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LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS Wendi L. Adair

S.C. Johnson Graduate School of Management, Cornell University, USA

Sungu Armagan

College of Business Administration, Florida International University, Florida, USA

Kristin Behfar

Merage School of Business, University of California, Irvine, USA

Bryan L. Bonner

David Eccles School of Business, The University of Utah, USA

Jeanne Brett

Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, USA

Marilynn B. Brewer

Department of Psychology, Ohio State University, USA

Ya-Ru Chen

Rutgers Business School, Rutgers University, USA

Roy Yong-Joo Chua

Columbia Business School, Columbia University, USA

Lorna Doucet

College of Business, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA

P. Christopher Earley

NUS Business School, National University of Singapore, Singapore

Hillary Anger Elfenbein

University of California, Berkeley, USA

Miriam Erez

Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Israel

Manuel Portugal Ferreira

ESTG, Instituto Politećnico de Leiria, Portugal ix

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LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS

Jeanne Ho-Ying Fu

Nanyang Business School, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

Adam D. Galinsky

Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, USA

Morela Hernandez

The Fuqua School of Business, Duke University, USA

Mary Kern

Zicklin School of Business, Baruch College, USA

William W. Maddux

INSEAD, France

Joe C. Magee

Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, New York University, USA

Tanya Menon

Graduate School of Business, The University of Chicago, USA

Michael W. Morris

Columbia Business School, Columbia University, USA

Lisa M. Moynihan

London Business School, UK

Gregory Northcraft


Gerardo A. Okhuysen

David Eccles School of Business, The University of Utah, USA

Daphna Oyserman

University of Michigan, USA

Randall S. Peterson

London Business School, UK

Aiwa Shirako

University of California, Berkeley, USA

Efrat Shokef

Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Israel

Masako S. Taylor

School of Hotel Administration, Cornell University, USA

Catherine H. Tinsley

The McDonough School of Business, Georgetown University, USA

Ayse K. Uskul

University of Michigan, USA

List of Contributors

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Kimberly A. Wade-Benzoni

Fuqua School of Business, Duke University, USA

Lu Wang


Chen-Bo Zhong

The Joseph L. Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto, Canada

Jing Zhou

Jones Graduate School of Management, Rice University, USA

NATIONAL CULTURE AND GROUPS: AN INTRODUCTION Japanese and American management is 95 percent the same, but differs in all important respects. Takeo Fujisawa, Co-founder of the Honda Motor Corporation.

This volume is based on the premise that in an era of rapid globalization, while there is a great deal of convergence on many aspects of group processes and interactions across national cultures, it is the understanding and appreciation of the divergence among people of different national cultural backgrounds that make all the difference. Indeed, management of globalization and its social, economic, and political implications hit both a nerve and the bottom line. From the ‘‘cross-cultural’’, ‘‘international,’’ or ‘‘global’’ themes of academic conferences to news about trade deficit and surplus discussions among world leaders, the impact of national culture has become one of the most important topics in management research. Researchers’ increasing attention toward the importance of national culture in various social processes is quite clear. For instance, a search of the numbers of publications under the subject heading of cross-culture at PsycINFO shows an unambiguous growing trend of interest in crosscultural issues. In the period 1961–1970, there were only 544 articles falling under the cross-culture heading. The number of cross-culture publications increased to 1,899 in 1971–1980, more than tripling the number in the previous decade. The following two decades showed a steady doubling attention from scholars to the examination of national culture in their research: 3,892 cross-culture publications in 1981–1990 and 7,194 in 1991–2000. This upward trajectory of cross-cultural publications continues to appear in the current decade. Since 2001 to February 2006, there have been more than 6,500 cross-culture articles published! Similar results emerged when the search was conducted among management journals. Thus, it is clear that the community of cross-cultural researchers has been growing! This suggests that an era, such as 1960s and 1970s, when cross-cultural research was seen as non-mainstream is over (Triandis, 1999), thanks to the dedication and xiii

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contribution from many pioneers in this area, and the increasing globalization of the markets in the last few decades. Cross-cultural research has broken numerous grounds and received many criticisms over the years (e.g., Earley & Gibson, 1998; Erez & Earley, 1993; Fiske, 2002; Hofstede, 1980, 2003; Triandis, 1989; Oyserman, Coon, & Kemmelmeier, 2002). Given the growing interest and importance in understanding cross-national differences and similarities, one thing for sure in the coming years is that greater conceptual clarity and empirical rigor will continue to add to our understanding of when, why, and how cultural factors affect people’s cognition, motivation, and behavior. The chapters in the current volume represent one set of such accomplishments. Several notable themes across the chapters include the following: Beyond Mean Differences. Many studies in the earlier years of crosscultural research tended to focus on discovering mean differences in certain variables between cross-national samples. For this reason, findings of culture main effects were abundant. Recently, however, cross-cultural researchers have noted that direct mean comparisons as such can be quite problematic for many reasons (e.g., van de Vijver & Leung, 1997; Chen, Brockner, & Katz, 1998; Chen, Mannix, & Okumura, 2003). Uskal and Oyserman’s paper in the volume provides a detailed account of one such reason – how response biases among national cultural samples might yield false cultural differences in the variables of researchers’ interest. The chapters in this volume explore the influence of cultural factors beyond the main effect level. Instead, they adopt a more dynamic and interactive approach to the examination of cultural factors. Together, they advocate a culture-moderating perspective – that is, culture factors moderate the relationships and dynamics in a given process or phenomenon. For example, in the chapter on how cultural factors might play a significant role in inter-generational resource allocation decisions, Hernandez, Chen, and Wade-Benzoni suggest that while there might be no differences in managers’ intergenerational decisions between the U.S. and China, the bases for their decisions might be different across cultures. Similarly, in examining the role of affect in social influence in group settings, Wang, Doucet, and Northcraft explore how individualism–collectivism and power distance cultural factors might strengthen or weaken links in their affect-social influence model. Introduction of New Exciting Topics. Social loafing (Earley, 1993), attributions (Morris & Peng, 1994), resource allocation (Leung & Bond, 1984), and inter-group relations (Chen et al., 1998), to name a few, dominated much of the attention in the past cross-cultural research. The current volume highlights new exciting topics in the cross-cultural area: power, time,

National Culture and Groups: An Introduction

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creativity, emotions, social networks, and multi-cultural diversity. They constitute a set of important and emerging topics not only in the crosscultural research domain, but also in the broad research areas of social psychology and organizational behavior. Thus, insights provided by the chapters in this volume are of great relevance and appeal to members in both the cross-cultural community and communities of behavioral science in general. Parallel Focus of Comparative vs. Multi-Cultural Approaches. Most early cross-cultural research adopted a comparative approach to the examination of cultural effects, e.g., people in high-individualistic cultures such as the U.S. tend to show stronger self-serving biases than those in low-individualistic cultures such as China (Brockner & Chen, 1996). Scholars using this approach are often interested in whether patterns of relationships among variables within a given culture vary across cultures. Chapters in Part I of the volume adopt this comparative approach. For example, Chua and Morris compared the relative importance of socio-emotional basis vs. instrumental basis of trust in social network formations between China and the U.S. Likewise, Armagan, Ferreira, Okhuysen, and Bonner discuss how cultural differences in the interpretation of time affect negotiation outcomes in Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S. In contrast, chapters in Part II examine dynamics and processes in multicultural settings, where people from two or more national cultures interact with one another. For example, Behfar, Kern, and Brett examine how the effects of cultural diversity add to those of demographic diversity in influencing group processes of multi-cultural teams. Moynihan, Peterson, and Earley, on the other hand, explore how the experience of working in multicultural teams might enhance members’ cultural intelligence, i.e., their capability to adapt to different cultural contexts in the future. Given the tenfold increase in joint ventures, cross-border mergers and acquisitions, and international expansion of firm markets in the current global economy, this multi-cultural interactive approach is likely to become ever more important and relevant to theory and practice in cross-cultural management. Contributors to this volume were asked to address two broad important questions: (1) Do our theories of groups and teams functioning apply universally? (2) How do our theories apply, if at all, in multi-cultural settings? Together, they did just that. The chapters attest to the fact that study of national culture is thriving and essential. It not only informs but also modifies and expands theories and research of group processes and social behavior. The collective effort here should stimulate further inquiry regarding the role of national culture in the increasingly globalized human experience.

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REFERENCES Brockner, J., & Chen, Y. (1996). The moderating roles of self-esteem and self-construal in reaction to a threat to the self: Evidence from the People’s Republic of China and the United States. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 603–615. Chen, Y., Brockner, J., & Katz, T. (1998). Toward an explanation of cultural differences in in-group favoritism: The role of individual vs. collectivistic primacy. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 75, 1490–1502. Chen, Y., Mannix, E. A., & Okumura, T. (2003). The importance of who you meet: Effects of self- versus other-concerns among negotiators in the United States, the People’s Republic of China, and Japan. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 39, 1–15. Earley, P. C. (1993). East meets west meets mideast: Further exploration of collectivistic and individualistic work groups. Academy of Management Journal, 36, 319–348. Earley, P. C., & Gibson, C. B. (1998). Taking stock in our progress on individualism-collectivism: 100 years of solidarity and community. Journal of Management, 24, 265–304. Erez, M., & Earley, P. C. (1993). Culture, self-identity, and work. New York: Oxford University Press. Fiske, A. P. (2002). Using individualism and collectivism to compare cultures – a critique of the validity and measurement of the constructs: Comment on Oyserman et al.. Psychological Bulletin, 128, 78–88. Hofstede, G. (1980). Culture’s consequences: International differences in work-related values. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage. Hofstede, G. (2003). Culture’s consequences: Comparing values, behaviors, institutions, and organizations across nations. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Leung, K., & Bond, M. H. (1984). The impact of cultural collectivism on reward allocation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 47, 793–804. Morris, M., & Peng, K. (1994). Culture and cause: American and Chinese attributions for social and physical events. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67, 949–971. Oyserman, D., Coon, H. M., & Kemmelmeier, M. (2002). Rethinking individualism and collectivism: Evaluation of theoretical assumptions and meta-analyses. Psychological Bulletin, 128, 3–72. Triandis, H. C. (1989). The self and social behavior in differing cultural contexts. Psychological Review, 96, 506–520. Triandis, H. (1999). Personal communication. Van de Vijver, F., & Leung, K. (1997). Methods and data analysis for cross-cultural research. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.

Ya-Ru Chen

TOWARD AN UNDERSTANDING OF PSYCHOLOGICAL DISTANCE REDUCTION BETWEEN GENERATIONS: A CROSSCULTURAL PERSPECTIVE Morela Hernandez, Ya-Ru Chen and Kimberly A. Wade-Benzoni ABSTRACT We explore how cultural factors at both socio-economic and psychological individual levels affect the present generation’s beneficence toward future generations in organizations and society. We examine how socioeconomic mechanisms may influence the present generation’s focus on the future consequences of their decisions. In addition, we examine how selfconstruals in different cultures might result in different mechanisms underlying the reduction of psychological distance between generations in different cultures. Implications of our cross-cultural analysis to intergenerational decision making within the context of group research in general are discussed.

National Culture and Groups Research on Managing Groups and Teams, Volume 9, 3–20 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1534-0856/doi:10.1016/S1534-0856(06)09001-3

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MORELA HERNANDEZ ET AL.

Leaders in business and society often need to make tradeoffs between the short- and long-term interests of their organizations and communities. Decisions with future consequences can be especially complex when the interests of future generations are not aligned with those in the present. Intergenerational dilemmas that call for a sacrifice on the part of the present generation for the good of future generations are ubiquitous and pervasive challenges. Some of the most important intergenerational issues in our society today, such as global level environmental change, transcend national boundaries. In addition, competitive pressures for organizations to perform well and survive over time require managers worldwide to take into account longer-term consequences of business decisions. Given the relevance and importance of such issues in today’s global environment, we propose that a national cultural perspective is essential in order to fully understand intergenerational decision making. In exploring how various cultural factors might influence intergenerational resource allocation decisions, we focus our attention on the notion of psychological distance, which refers to an individual’s degree of personal connectedness with other generations across time periods. When psychological distance is great, the intergenerational consequences of one’s actions lack a sense of immediacy, which can consequently limit intergenerational beneficence (Wade-Benzoni, 1996; Wade-Benzoni, Sondak, & Galinsky, 2005). If decision makers have an adequate level of affinity or identification with future generations, they may vicariously experience the benefits and burdens left to future generations since the future consequences of their decisions on others feel more immediate and personal (Wade-Benzoni, 2003). Factors that increase affinity and identification between present and future generations offer a critical opportunity in the reduction of psychological distance. Importantly, our underlying assumption is that the psychological distance between the present and future generations is inherently larger than that between different groups of people that exist contemporaneously; this is primarily due to the significant time lag and absence of direct contact between present and future generations that characterizes the class of intergenerational contexts we address in this paper. Furthermore, we assume that all cultures that have survived to date possess various mechanisms that directly or indirectly reduce psychological distance between present and future generations, and thus, ensure their very survival (Schein, 1992). With these two assumptions in mind, we begin our paper with a synopsis of the most relevant findings in the existing intergenerational decision research and then show how the examination of cultural factors at the societal

Toward an Understanding of Psychological Distance

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and individual levels help identify processes underlying the reduction of embedded psychological distance between the present and future generations. We will organize our cultural analysis along the intertemporal and interpersonal dimensions in the intergenerational paradigm. When delineating the effects of the temporal cultural dimension, we will identify several central macro-level socioeconomic factors of a society and how they influence the temporal frame individuals in organizations adopt when making intergenerational decisions (e.g., Adler, 2002; Kluckhohn & Strodtbeck, 1961). Further, we will concentrate on micro-level psychological factors by examining the effects of cultural influences of self-construal (e.g., Brewer & Gardner, 1996; Hofstede, 1980; Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Triandis, 1989, 1995). We will posit that macro-level socioeconomic factors may directly or indirectly interact or moderate culturally specific psychological dynamics at a given time. By comparing both the contextual and individual mechanisms in East Asian cultures (Chinese, Japanese, and India) and North American cultures (US and Canada), we aim to enrich the current analysis of intergenerational decisions and thus, offer a more complete understanding of how and why national culture exerts influence in the intergenerational context. Finally, we close by examining the implications of our cross-cultural analysis to intergenerational decision challenges underlying group-oriented processes.

PSYCHOLOGICAL DISTANCE IN INTERGENERATIONAL DECISIONS Intergenerational decisions involve both an intertemporal component, as there is a time delay between decisions made in the present and their potential effects on future generations, and an interpersonal component, as there is a tradeoff between the benefits or costs to oneself and benefits or costs to those in future generations (e.g., Wade-Benzoni, 2002; WadeBenzoni, Hernandez, Medvec, & Messick, 2005). A central question in the study of intergenerational behavior is what motivates intergenerational beneficence in situations where the present generation must choose whether or not to make a sacrifice for the benefit of future generations. A growing body of empirical and theoretical work on intergenerational decision making has demonstrated that intergenerational beneficence may move beyond economic or material considerations to be motivated by social psychological variables (e.g., Wade-Benzoni, 1996, 2002; Wade-Benzoni, forthcoming; Wade-Benzoni et al., 2005a, b). In the sections that follow, we will discuss the role of psychological distance, which refers to an

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individual’s lack of connection with a collective entity or a sense of affinity with another individual, within the intertemporal and interpersonal dimensions of intergenerational decision making. We will then center our discussion of psychological distance on the cultural mechanisms that may facilitate its reduction and thus, promote intergenerational beneficence. Different from the traditional intertemporal choice literature, the intergenerational framework involves a consideration of oneself in the present versus others in the future, rather than a focus solely on tradeoffs between one’s own present and future interests. While there is naturally some overlap and consistency between intergenerational and traditional intertemporal choice, empirical work has shown that the combination of the intertemporal and interpersonal dimensions in intergenerational contexts can result in unique patterns of behavior and psychological dynamics under certain conditions (e.g., Wade-Benzoni & Hernandez, 2005; Wade-Benzoni et al., 2005a, b). Additionally, intergenerational dilemmas differ from classic social dilemmas. In the classic social dilemma the tradeoff is between the individual and the collective (e.g., Brewer & Kramer, 1986; Dawes, 1980). After the individuals involved make their decisions, they remain part of the collective and experience the group level consequences that result from the combination of individual decisions. In contrast, in the intergenerational contexts that have been studied empirically, the decision makers exit the social exchange situation over time and therefore no longer benefit or suffer from consequences of prior decisions. More generally, intergenerational dilemmas can involve tradeoffs between two individuals (one in the present and one in the future), two groups, or an individual and a group. In contrast, social dilemmas by definition focus on individual versus group tradeoffs (e.g., Brewer & Kramer, 1986; Dawes, 1980). The notion of generations is of theoretical importance to the intergenerational paradigm. In our framework, a generation does not occupy a position indefinitely; it takes on a role that may be an office, status, or set of responsibilities for a finite period of time (Wade-Benzoni, 2002), which can be either fixed (e.g., a class of MBA students) or flexible (e.g., directors of departments in organizations). Further, a generation can consist of an individual or a group in organizations and society. A single generation may be time- and role-bound. For example, an individual’s tenure in a particular role (e.g., CEO or dean of a college) may differentiate between generations. Similarly, a group of individuals can be demarcated as a generation if they have a common temporal starting point in a common role, which causes them to hold a certain status contemporaneously (i.e., classes of Ph.D. or


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MBA students). This type of group-level generation is ‘‘cohort’’ based. Alternatively, group level generations may be ‘‘event’’-based, created by the occurrence of a significant event that leads to the creation of different generations in organizations, or causes differentiation among generations to become meaningful, important, or apparent (see Wade-Benzoni, 2002 for a more in depth discussion). Importantly, intergenerational beneficence between present and future generations may be affected by a common factor: psychological distance.

MECHANISMS REDUCING PSYCHOLOGICAL DISTANCE WITHIN VARIOUS CULTURES As we discussed earlier, a central barrier to intergenerational beneficence is the inherently large psychological distance between the decision makers and the people who experience the consequences of the intergenerational decision. One of the most obvious ways in which the repercussions of intergenerational decisions are removed from the decision maker is through the temporal delay that exists between the decision and the effects of that decision on others. Consistent with the findings from the literature on intertemporal choice, prior work in intergenerational contexts indicates that generally the greater the time delay between an intergenerational decision and the consequences of that decision to future generations, the less people act on the behalf of future generations (Wade-Benzoni, 1996; Wade-Benzoni et al., 2005a, b). People discount the value of commodities that will be consumed in the future reflecting an inborn impatience and preference for immediate over postponed consumption. As time delay increases, people have greater difficulty making sense of, or fully understanding the consequences of decisions. Beyond these cognitive limitations, however, motivational effects, such as the immediate pain of deferral, also make it difficult for people to delay benefits for the future. Crucially, the psychological distance that is already present from the time dimension is compounded in the intergenerational context because people are making decisions in the present that affect others in the future rather than themselves. When making tradeoffs between the well-being of oneself and that of others, there is a tension between self-interest and the desire to benefit others. Although people may care about the outcomes of others, tradeoffs between one’s own and others well-being are typically skewed to the point where very little weight is put on the effect of one’s decisions on others (Loewenstein, 1996). The impact of individuals’ decisions on

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themselves is generally far more immediate than their impact on other parties. In terms of intergenerational sacrifices, the costs of changing one’s behavior are more immediate than the future benefits to others not only in the temporal sense, but also because they affect the decision maker directly.

Macro Socio-Economic Mechanisms We argue that different conceptions of time and relationships across cultures may fundamentally influence the manner in which intergenerational consequences are discounted and as a result, the degree to which psychological distance is perceived. Research on short- versus long-term focus (Adler, 2002) and the past-present-future orientation (Hall, 1989; Kluckhohn & Strodtbeck, 1961) has identified East Asian cultures as more long-term and past-oriented, whereas North American cultures have been classified as more short-term and present/near future-oriented (Adler, 2002; Hall, 1989; Kluckhohn & Strodtbeck, 1961). This implies that many East Asians will evaluate plans and decisions in terms of their effects on the existing customs, traditions, and the old wisdom of the society and be more willing to let go of short-term gains if long-term benefits of a plan will suffer. More generally, change within the Eastern context is welcomed only to the extent that it complements past experiences. In contrast, North American cultures tend to evaluate plans and decisions in terms of the projected near-term future benefits to be gained and make decisions based on clear short-term returns on their investment. Change in the Western context is a welcome innovation to the extent that it leads to immediate positive results. Within these frameworks, the time orientation of a culture may fundamentally affect the perceived psychological distance between present and future generations as the weight and value given to time delay differs crossculturally. From the cultural trends outlined above, one would expect that since many East Asians believe that preserving past traditions and practices is a critical part of ensuring the survival and success of a business enterprise or a society, a greater time delay between generations may not increase psychological distance to the extent it would for North Americans. Indeed, some scholars may argue that although North American business executives talk about achieving 5–10-year returns of their current plans, all they tend to work toward is obtaining the current quarterly’s results in the stock market. Therefore, the psychological distance between present and future generations in the North American context could generally be perceived as greater


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than in the East Asian context due to this difference in how time delays may be experienced. We suggest, however, that such predictions are unduly static given the complexities of cultural phenomena. Cultures that have traditionally been past and long-term oriented, such as those in East Asia, might find themselves more present and short-term oriented in the face of changes in their economic environment at a given time. For example, Chinese society, which has traditionally been longer-term focused, has experienced a change in the temporal focus of its senior executives’ business decisions. Specifically, after the establishments of stock markets, senior executives of state-owned enterprises in China began to emphasize short-term performance in their business decisions (Peng, 2000), leading them to behave more similarly to executives in many public-traded firms in North America (He, Chen, & Zhang, 2004). This effect is in line with the predictions of many theorists of culture (Inglehart & Baker, 2000; Kluckhohn & Strodtbeck, 1961; Triandis, 1995) who have linked the relationship between the degree of capitalization of the markets in a given society and people’s time orientation (Hofstede, 1980; Inglehart & Baker, 2000). For this reason, one might expect to observe greater variance in the temporal orientation within East Asian cultures than between East Asian culture and in North American culture, given the competing forces between the old traditional beliefs about time and the new economic challenges. For example, while people in the inland rural areas of China or Japan may maintain traditional long-term values, people in metropolitan cities such as Shanghai and Tokyo might behave no differently from those in the US (Kashima et al., 2005). Clearly, in order to explicate the psychology of intergenerational decisions and the role of psychological distance in particular, a dynamic and evolving cultural perspective is needed. In view of this, we identify two potentially contradictory macro-level influences – religious and ideological beliefs and market/firm establishment – and then examine the micro-level mechanisms that may be shaped by these macro-level forces. Note that national culture and their differing macro-level forces deeply influence the self-construal of the decision maker (Hofstede, 1980; Triandis, 1989). However, as we will discuss in detail below, changes in the socioeconomic forces of a society and/or the particular establishment of a firm might make the traditionally promoted culture time-frame out of synch with the situation that a given firm faces at a given time in that culture. For this reason, the macro-mechanisms are rather distinct from, though historically related to, the psychological factors that we will examine. In addition, a separate examination of the macro-dynamics will also shed light on variation within a given society.

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Religious and Ideological Beliefs A society’s time orientation – short- versus long-term focus and the relative emphasis of the past, the present, or the future – is fundamentally reinforced by a culture’s religious and ideological beliefs. In cultures where Buddhism and Hinduism are dominant religions (such as Japan, China, Singapore, and India), the beliefs in reincarnation (rebirth after death) and circling of cause and effect bind generations of people in a closely inter-related relationship (Campbell, 1972). Death has been described in Buddhism and Hinduism as a temporary end to a temporary phenomenon, and even though the present form may perish, it is followed by another form which is conditioned by the preceding one, but which is neither the same as nor absolutely different from it (Campbell, 1972). As a result, the actions that are taken by the present generation today are no longer decoupled from the consequences that will affect the future generations – individual entities today were reborn from the past generations – and will transform to those in the future. Even though there is no one-to-one connection (e.g., Person A in the present and Person A in the future) in these associations, the interdependence between generations across lifetimes and among individuals within a generation is high, bringing to bear a long-term focus and past orientation. By contrast, Western cultures are dominated by linear progressivism, characterized as having a linear unidirectional time perspective (Erikson, 1982). Central to this idea is the assumption that people evolve forward and upward, a progression through which earlier and simpler stages are left behind as the individual moves onward toward greater complexity in life (Loevinger, 1976). The focus in these types of cultures is on the current and near future where short-term consequences are central. Religions in most Western cultures including those in North America view the present and future generations as distinct entities, believing that the advancement of the current generation is paramount to the continuity of society. Hence, one would expect that the present generation in East Asian cultures where Buddhism and Hinduism are highly prevalent would show less psychological distance between generations and thus, greater beneficence toward future generations in their decisions than Western cultures. Market/Firm Establishment At the organizational level, the relative establishment a firm holds in the market might also have a deep influence on the perception of time and closeness of relationships between generations cross-culturally. When a firm enjoys a relatively high status and attains clear establishment in its market,


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executives in the firm are in a better economic position to concern themselves with needs and continued prosperity of the firm in the future. In contrast, when the firm’s relative market status is still at its entrepreneur stage, executives of the firm might only be able to focus on the needs of the firm in the present or, at the most, the immediate future, particularly when the market is highly competitive and resources are not munificent (Hodge, Anthony, & Gales, 2003). Accordingly, a greater degree of psychological distance may be induced when a firm holds a relatively low status in its market due to the importance of the firm’s own immediate survival needs. This may be the case even in an East Asian society whose broader religious and ideological beliefs promote closer intergenerational ties. Alternatively, psychological distance may be reduced when a firm has a well-established standing and thus, has the luxury of thinking in terms of longer-term goals due to relatively high-economic stability. Likewise, this may be the case even in a society traditionally characterized by linear progressivism. In a similar vein, at a market-level, the stage of market life cycle in a given society may also influence the time frame executives in the firm adopt when making important decisions. When most firms in a society are at a start-up stage as opposed to an elaboration stage (Hodge et al., 2003), executives of the present generation may be more concerned about immediate survival issues than consequences of the ‘‘potential’’ future. Thus, even though East Asian cultures such as China and India are typically categorized as being more long-term, and past-oriented, as suggested above, firms in these cultures aspiring to compete at a global level are likely to shift their goal priority to more urgent needs of the present (Chen, 1995). Under such conditions, a sense of connectedness between the current and future generation is likely trumped by the sense of immediacy between the present generation’s current and near-future needs. After delineating the complexities between how the traditional forces might shape people’s orientations in intergenerational decisions and how changing socio-economic factors might shift their time focus at a given time, we will now examine the micro-psychological factors across cultures. Micro Individual Mechanisms National culture and its differing macro-level forces deeply influence the self-construal of the decision maker. In particular, the varying degrees to which cultures perceive cyclical and linear implications from intergenerational decisions may determine the extent to which individuals define themselves in terms of their relationship to future others. If cultures embed

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the notion of temporal interdependence and identification between generations through religion or market forces, the result can be an increased sense of ‘‘oneness’’ between the current self and future others, and consequently the future consequences to others feel ‘‘closer’’ to present decision makers than would otherwise be the case. Earlier work on intergenerational beneficence has focused on the construct of ‘‘affinity’’ between generations, which is conceptualized as the extent to which the present generation feels empathetic toward future generations, is able to visualize future generations, and believes they understand how their actions will affect future generations. High affinity with the future generation blurs the distinction between interests of the present generation and those of the future generation, which thus, reduces psychological distance and consequently promotes more intergenerational beneficence (Wade-Benzoni, 1996; Wade-Benzoni et al., 2005a, b). Underlying this argument is the idea that the way in which interpersonal ties are evaluated is fundamentally rooted in the way the self is construed. Relevant to the notion of self-construal is the cultural dimensions of individualism–collectivism (Hofstede, 1980; Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Oyserman, Coon, & Kemmelmeier, 2002; Triandis, 1989, 1995). As they are generally conceptualized, individualists, or those with independent self-construal, are characterized by an emphasis on autonomy and independence of the self from others; whereas collectivists, or those with interdependent self-construal, are characterized by social embeddedness and interdependence with others and their groups (Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Oyserman et al., 2002; Triandis, 1995). When faced with the dilemma between self-interests and those of the group, collectivists subordinate their personal interests to those of their group whereas individualists give priority to their own interests (Chen, Brockner, & Chen, 2002; Chen, Brockner, & Katz, 1998). According to this line of research, one might expect to observe greater intergenerational beneficence from collectivists than from individualists as the psychological distance between generations in a socially embedded and interdependent society would be smaller than in an autonomous, independent community. Based on recent conceptualization and research in the individualism and collectivism domain (Brewer & Chen, 2005), and the fact that both individualistic and collectivistic cultures have both been able to survive today, we argue that people in all cultures are able to and can be motivated to sacrifice for others (e.g., future generations in their organizations and communities). As will be presented below, the motivational bases underlying their actions, however, are different. Specifically, we posit that at the


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individual level, the mechanisms that reduce psychological distance, such as a perceived interdependence, may depend on different pathways of interdependence across cultures. Of greatest relevance to the interpersonal dimension of intergenerational decisions are the relational and collective selves. The relational self is the self defined in terms of connectedness and role relationships with significant others (Cross & Madson, 1997; Markus & Kitayama, 1991). The collective self is the self defined in terms of group memberships, and prototypical properties of members of a common ingroup (Turner, Hogg, Oakes, Reicher, & Wetherell, 1987). Each level of the self is a distinct selfrepresentation with its own unique structural properties, motivational goal, and basis of evaluation (see Sedikides & Brewer, 2001). The relational and collective levels of self represent two different forms of interdependence (Brewer & Gardner, 1996). Whereas the relational self involves personalized dyadic relationships with specific close others and the extension of these relationships in the form of interpersonal connections and networks, the collective self involves depersonalized relationships with others through common membership in a social group (Yuki, Maddux, Brewer, & Takemura, 2005). Note that in the theoretical frameworks of social identity (Hogg & Abram, 1988; Hogg & Turner, 1987; Turner et al., 1987), identification with a given collective does not require interpersonal knowledge of others within the collective. In fact, seeing one’s group as an entity independent of personal relationships with other members in the group is a necessary requirement for the formation of the collective identity (Turner, et al., 1987). Drawing on the distinction between relational and collective selves, Yuki (2003) suggests that the predominant characteristics of group cognition and behavior may differ across cultures. While people in Western cultures tend to place emphasis on the categorical distinction between in- and out-groups, people in East Asian cultures may tend to perceive groups as primarily relationship-based. Moreover, while social identity theory (Tajfel & Turner, 1986) proposes intergroup comparison as a key source of in-group identification and cooperation, recent evidence (e.g., Buchan, Croson, & Dawes, 2002; Oyserman et al., 2002) and Yuki’s framework suggest that such a perspective might be more applicable in North American and European cultures than in East Asian cultures. According to Yuki (2003), for people in East Asian cultures, the primary source for identification and cooperation emanates from the maintenance of relational harmony and promotion of cohesion within groups. Moreover, the recent conceptualization and empirical evidence on the meaning and properties of self-construals suggest that the distinction

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between relational and collective selves is of theoretical and practical importance as it provides different pathways for interdependence across cultural contexts and thus, the reduction of psychological distance. This suggests that for East Asians, a focus on the relationship-based connectedness (either direct or indirect) with future generations would be more effective than the categorical distinction in reducing psychological distance. Specifically, when East Asians can personally relate to future generations (e.g., through the belief in reincarnation), the psychological distance between present and future generations is reduced. When the connection is not personalized, East Asians might instead focus on their own immediate outcomes rather than show beneficence toward future generations. Because this level of interdependence requires personalized knowledge and connectedness, one can argue that East Asians can only be motivated to show beneficence toward small groups (e.g., family), not large social entities (e.g., global society), of future generations. After all, it is psychologically less feasible to establish interdependence with large collectives than small social groups if a ‘‘personal’’ connection is necessary (Brewer & Chen, 2005). In contrast, for North Americans, it is the categorical distinction between their group and an out-group (e.g., competition between their firm versus a competing firm) that would prove to be more effective than the relationshipbased distinction in reducing psychological distance in intergenerational decision making. Since this level of identification/affinity does not require personalized connectedness, as we argued above, North Americans may in fact show greater beneficence toward future generations when large social entities are involved (Brewer & Chen, 2005).

IMPLICATIONS Many cross-cultural researchers have long claimed that the collectivist makes a sharper distinction between in-groups and out-groups than the individualist (Erez & Earley, 1987; Triandis, 1989, 1995). Considering the category-based vs. relational-based group attraction discussed above, we propose that such a prior claim be modified: All cultures differentiate in-groups versus out-groups to a similar extent; what differs across cultures is the meaning of in- versus out-groups and the strength of psychological attachment to the in-group. Whereas the meaning of in-groups in East Asia refers to direct versus indirect relationships or relational networks, the meaning of in-groups in North American cultures refers to the categorical membership distinction between one’s group and other groups. Naturally,


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when circumstances call for a sacrifice of the individual to benefit the wellbeing of an in-group, it is the strong attachment developed through repeated close relational interactions (among the collectivists), not the depersonalized membership association (among the individualists), that serves as a sufficient motivational force to propel the individual to do so (Chen et al., 1998). Moreover, strength of psychological attachment to an in-group may be determined by the composition of the intergenerational target, the future generation. In view of the findings in cross-cultural research, the distinction of which future generation, a specific or general collective (e.g., whether the future generation encompasses specific, personalized or general, depersonalized future others) is critical. In line with social identity theory and the theoretical framework on self-construal, we posit that if the intergenerational decision for East Asians targets specific future others, an in-group that has stronger relational ties to the present generation, psychological distance will be reduced. Since Eastern decision makers have been shown to greatly favorable members of their identity groups in allocation decisions, it is likely that the intergenerational allocation of resources to specific future others will be in line with the findings of Wade-Benzoni et al. (2002): Eastern decision makers will construe intergenerational decisions as interdependent situations and thus, be willing to take on burdens that are greater than their share to promote the well-being of future generations. We would expect this situation to be present at the organizational level of Eastern society where strong bonds between individuals in the company foster especially durable interpersonal ties. In contrast, if the future generation includes general others, traditionally interdependent cultures would be expected to act in a self-serving manner when making intergenerational resource allocations. The result of out-group disfavor could cause present generations to allocate more burdens to general future others in order to secure the well-being of specific future others. We would expect this situation to occur when Eastern decision makers are asked to consider the consequences of their decisions at a global level. Chinese society’s record of environmentalism is a good illustration of this phenomenon. Another possibility for why people in collective cultures would be willing to be more intergenerationally beneficent can be drawn from the ‘‘cushion hypothesis’’ by Hsee and Weber (1999). The cushion hypothesis argues that in collectivistic cultures like China, family or other close others will step in to help if one encounters a large and possibly catastrophic loss after selecting a risky option. This theory posits an implied transfer of responsibility between generations, which may drive interdependence within collectivistic

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cultures. Accordingly, if such is the case, the affinity between present and future generations may be a result of intergenerational obligation induced by social norms and beliefs of such, rather than individuals’ psychological orientations or macro-ideological/market factors. The potential for a reduction in psychological distance would be the same in all cases; however, the mechanisms underlying greater intergenerational affinity would differ.

CONCLUSION Business executives and leaders around the world sometimes face dilemmas that involve choosing between the short- and long-term interests of their organizations and communities. One central mission of intergenerational research is to uncover mechanisms that contribute to our understanding of when and why the present generation would take into account the interests of future generations and be willing to make a sacrifice for their benefit when conflict of interests exist with future generations. Empirical and theoretical work on intergenerational decision-making to date has mainly been conducted in the U.S. Our current paper expands the existing paradigms in this research by taking a national cultural perspective. In so doing, we developed the notion of psychological distance, which captures an inherent psychological barrier in intergenerational decision making. One key dimension that contributes to such a barrier is temporal delay that occurs between the time the decision is made and the time the consequences of that decision are experienced by others. The greater the time lag between an intergenerational decision and the consequences of that decision to future generations, the greater the psychological distance between the present and the future generations, and the less likely the present generation would act in the best interests of future generations. The psychological distance that is already present in the intertemporal dimension is compounded by the fact that people are making decisions in the present that have an impact on others in the future rather than themselves. In this paper, we have examined the role of both the intertemporal and interpersonal dimensions of intergenerational decisions in the reduction of psychological distance across cultures. While past research in intergenerational decision making has made important contributions to our understanding of intergenerational dynamics by focusing on social psychological factors of the individuals (e.g., Wade-Benzoni, 1996, 2002; Wade-Benzoni et al., 2005), our analysis here highlights the importance of how socio-economic


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contextual factors can significantly affect the psychological dynamics that play into the present generation’s intergenerational decision making. It is clear from our discussion that the present generation of executives and leaders do not make intergenerational decisions in a social or marketfree vacuum. However, culturally advocated religious or ideological beliefs might not always be consistent with the competing economic forces, making national culture as a proxy for people’s temporal orientation problematic (Chen et al., 2002; Chen, Mannix, & Okumura, 2003). Accordingly, we have argued that the degree to which intertemporal and interpersonal interdependence is created by socially embedded notions of religion or market forces may be a decisive influence in shaping and reinforcing people’s selfconstruals. Different self-construals may determine the degree of psychological distance between present and future generations and its influence on intergenerational decisions. Moreover, the underlying mechanisms for macro- and micro- level processes are complex and evolving; we have only begun to explore their interrelationships in the current paper. For this reason, future theoretical and empirical work in intergenerational decision making should seek to directly capture the effects of these macro- and micro-level factors on the decision maker. In sum, our analysis suggests that cross-cultural researchers should be especially sensitive to possible competing forces and ideologies within any given culture as coarse dichotomies in most of our cross-cultural frameworks (e.g., Hofstede, 1980) might not be adequate to fully understand cross-cultural intricacies. Furthermore, cultural differences may emerge in different forms. Instead of focusing on possible cultural differences on the degree of beneficence the present generation would exhibit toward future generations, our thesis throughout this chapter has been based on the assumption that all cultures that survive today have developed mechanisms that ensure sufficient levels of interdependence across generations. As we argued, cultural differences in the intergenerational context are likely to be observed along the processes underlying the reduction of psychological distance between the present and the future generations. Future research should seek to uncover other possible forms of cross-cultural differences and similarities.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We thank the participants of the 2005 Research in Managing Groups and Teams Conference for their thoughtful and insightful feedback. We

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especially thank Maggie Neale and two anonymous reviewers for their enormously helpful comments.

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Wade-Benzoni, K. A., Hernandez, M., Medvec, V. H., & Messick, D. (2005a). Psychological influences in judgments of fairness to future generations: The role of egocentrism and uncertainty. Working Paper, Duke University. Wade-Benzoni, K. A., Okumura, T., Brett, J., Moore, D. A., Tenbrusel, A. E., & Bazerman, M. H. (2002). Cognitions and behavior in asymmetric social dilemmas: A comparison of two cultures. Journal of Applied Psychology, 87(1), 87–95. Wade-Benzoni, K. A., Sondak, H., & Galinsky, A. (2005b). Leaving a legacy: The intergenerational allocation of benefits and burdens. Working Paper, Duke University. Yuki, M. (2003). Intergroup comparison versus intragroup relationships: A cross-cultural examination of social identity theory in North American and East Asian cultural contexts. Social Psychology Quarterly, 66, 166–183. Yuki, M., Maddux, W. W., Brewer, M. B., & Takemura, K. (2005). Cultural differences in relationship- and group-based trust. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 31(1), 48–62.

CULTURE AND CONTROL: HOW INDEPENDENT AND INTERDEPENDENT SELVES EXPERIENCE AGENCY AND CONSTRAINT Tanya Menon and Jeanne Ho-Ying Fu ABSTRACT Personal agency is often considered the hallmark of the independent self. By contrast, interdependent selves are viewed as fitting into groups, adjusting to situations, and minimally asserting themselves. This characterization of the interdependent self as a ‘‘non-agent’’ assumes that personal and group agency are inimical to one another. We propose that group agency does not simply constrain personal agency, it also substitutes for personal agency, coexists with personal agency, and enhances personal agency. Further, we examine how independent selves experience constraint, a similarly underrepresented theme. These arguments introduce more nuanced conceptions of how independent and interdependent selves exercise agency.


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TANYA MENON AND JEANNE HO-YING FU

When we consider the question, ‘‘what is the nature of the American,’’ we readily imagine a rugged individualist (Hsu, 1983; De Tocqueville, 1835/ 2000). We have various prototypes of what the independent self might look like – perhaps, a John Wayne figure who faces an untamable environment yet, through determination, effort, and risk-taking, manages to carve the terrain into something of his own design. Even if we locate individualists in modern American suburbia rather than in this lawless terrain, we still evoke an image of people who exert their will on the world around them, exercise an endless array of choices in every department of their life, and who determinedly construct for themselves a uniquely personal environment of their own liking. Individualists choose their own spouses and jobs, and freely walk away from both if they fail to further their pursuit of happiness. Even in the most inconsequential domains of life, individualists exercise personal preferences, choosing among thousands of products in grocery stores and malls, eating at restaurants with lengthy menus, and buying cars with endless combinations of options (Iyengar & Lepper, 2000; Vohs & Baumeister, 2004). When we consider the question, ‘‘what is the nature of the Chinese, the Japanese, or the Indian,’’ however, we conjure a markedly different image of the interdependent self. Perhaps, we imagine an army of Japanese businessmen indistinguishably clothed in careful conformity with their co-workers, Chinese families forcing their children to study relentless hours, or Indian parents arranging marriages for their children. Each of these images is a view of how interdependent selves, chained by their inviolable bond to their companies, families, and the other groups around them, experience constraints as they navigate their environments. According to Markus and Kitayama (1991), the independent self that American culture cultivates ‘‘stress[es] attending to the self, the appreciation of one’s difference from others, and the importance of asserting the self’’ (p. 224). On the other hand, the interdependent self that Asian cultures such as Japan, India, and China cultivate emphasizes ‘‘attending to and fitting in with others and the importance of harmonious interdependence with them’’ (p. 224). However, the contrasts that the images above depict go beyond Markus and Kitayama’s original distinctions. In particular, these intuitive conceptions make the inferential leap that independent and interdependent self-construals are associated with particular levels of agency and constraint. Simply put, we imagine that people in cultures that cultivate independent self-construals are active agents who cause and control events in their environments whereas people in cultures that cultivate interdependent selfconstruals are passive and externally constrained.

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Given that cross-cultural research often relies on these implicit links between interdependence and constraint on one hand, and independence and agency on the other, this paper proposes a conceptual model that disentangles these dimensions. We start by introducing a model that conceptualizes selfconstrual, agency, and constraint in a more fine-tuned way. Specifically, we describe theoretical and empirical research in the cross-cultural literature that associates independent self-construal with agency and interdependent selfconstrual with constraint. We then propose more novel associations by illustrating the forms of agency that the interdependent self displays and the various forms of constraint that the independent self experiences. Finally, we discuss the model’s implications for cross-cultural theory, methodology, and management practice.

THE MODEL To provide a more balanced view of cross-cultural behavior, we suggest that independent and interdependent selves both (a) act as agents and (b) experience constraints from their surroundings. Table 1 shows the four cells that result from crossing self-construal (independent versus interdependent orientations) and mode of action (agency versus constraint). The first cell considers the independent self’s patterns of agency. Specifically, independent selves are likely to assert their agency in opposition to the groups around them. By contrast, the diagonal cell considers the constraints that interdependent selves face, i.e., from social obligations to the ingroup. These two cells are well researched in the cross-cultural behavior literature because traditional conceptions of agency and social control often assume that a parsimonious relationship exists between independence and agency, and interdependence and constraint. Next, and more counter-intuitively, we describe the key contribution of this paper, which lies in developing the two less frequently researched cells: (1) interdependent self acting as an agent and (2) independent self experiencing constraint. We suggest that interdependent selves exert their personal agency by finding ways to recruit and use the groups around them, and if not, to skillfully circumvent group influence. Similarly, independent selves experience constraints, particularly as they limit the degree to which their agency interferes with others. We describe the theoretical background associated with these two conceptualizations and link them to a variety of findings in the cross-cultural literature, including risk taking, leadership, competition vs. cooperation, responsibility attribution, and justice.

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Table 1.

Disentangling Agency-Constraints and IndependentInterdependent Orientations. Self as Agent

Self as Constrained

Independent motives

Stand out from social groups

Limit the extent to which the self interferes with the autonomy of others

Independent strategies

Direct self-assertion, selfenhancement, and confrontation

Avoid requests of favors and personal information from others Submit to universal laws and procedures

Interdependent motives

Assert self by preserving relationships and using them

Fulfill obligations to the group, maintain group harmony

Interdependent strategies

Group agent as a substitute for individual agent

Self minimizing strategies (Amae, modesty, other enhancement, conflict avoidance, self-restraint, emotional repression) Adjust/accept

Seek ingroup support Indirect assertion (e.g., withdrawal in negotiation) Direct personal agency through effort

INDEPENDENT SELVES AND AGENCY To be an agent, a person must be a self-governing, autonomous actor (Christman, 2003; Dworkin, 1988; Kant, 1786/1949). People with agency are capable of freely making their own decisions, imposing actions on the world, and thereby causing and shaping outcomes within it, as compared to being the object of external forces that push, sway, and oppress them. An actor’s control in the environment is a crucial notion in Western philosophy, with implications for free will-determinism debate[s]; theories of personal identity; theories of practical reasoning and deliberation; conceptions of y selfhood; accounts of character and self-respect; and theories of oppression, embodiment, and subjectivity (Mackenzie & Stoljar, 2000, p. 4).

Agency is not just a central concept in the canons of Western philosophy (Emerson, 1841/1982; Kant, 1786/1949; Locke, 1689/1990; Mill, 1859/1975), it is also a value that the independent self celebrates. The writings of Western

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political philosophers on liberty and individual rights indicate that the self should remain free from external forces that could potentially oppress it; a principle that forms the basis of the ideal political state (Locke, 1689/1990; Mill, 1859/1975). In Western moral philosophy, personal agency is the basis for moral judgment (Korsgaard, 1996); a person cannot be held liable for actions that external forces determined. Likewise, agency is also a prerequisite for status in Western societies. Independent selves admire those who manage to exert their will through pure desire and hard work, in the face of all external pressures. The general who wins a war against overwhelming odds, the poor child who pulls himself up by his bootstraps and becomes a successful CEO, the Olympic athlete who defies illness, poverty, and even limited genetic endowment to achieve greatness – they are all considered heroes. By contrast, children, the seriously disabled, and certain elderly people, all of whom lack a capability for self-governance and hence agency, lack full status in society (Christman, 2003).

INTERDEPENDENT SELVES AND CONSTRAINT Cross-cultural observers of interdependent cultures have noticed that it is more difficult to discern personal agency in East Asian interdependent settings given that powerful groups and relationships circumscribe the individual. There are many reasons why interdependent relationships should, in theory, constrain a person’s agency. On the one hand, although groups, relationships, and strong social bonds offer potential rewards, they also require the individual to fulfill time-consuming obligations, roles, and duties (Burt, 1992; Chiu, Dweck, Tong, & Fu, 1997). They exact financial costs as well, when group members expect (and sometimes demand) that individuals share their personal financial gains to bring up fellow group members. If the individual tries to shirk these expectations, or otherwise deviates from the group’s values, culture, and shared identity (O’Reilly & Chatman, 1996), the group enforces control by using a variety of social techniques. The group punishes violations of its norms by wielding social threats including dislike of dissenting group members (Chua & Fu, 2003), gossip, embarrassment, loss of face, and ultimately breaking ties and isolating the offending individual. The group’s ultimate threat has traditionally been exclusion and excommunication (Lebra, 1976). Whereas the independent self might regard the shedding of social influence as an opportunity to exercise agency, the interdependent self perceives it as ‘‘social death.’’ As a result of these social pressures ranging from the simple embarrassing loss of face to ultimately,

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the loss of the group itself, the interdependent self treads carefully within the group and avoids disrupting its harmony. In sum, these arguments suggest that interdependent selves are fundamentally more responsive to other persons and relationships (Markus & Kitayama, 1991), more focused on duties and obligations (Chiu et al., 1997), and therefore more restrained in the degree to which they assert their personal wishes and desires, as compared to independent selves who are beholden to no one. This implies that those with interdependent orientations may simply strive for autonomous agency less than those with independent orientations: Independent-selves y strive to achieve independence and autonomy by establishing their distinctiveness from others and by remaining uninfluenced by group and environmental pressures y Interdependent-selves, then, strive not for autonomy or independence but instead pursue the goal of fitting in and conforming to the demands and expectations of their social ingroups (Hernandez & Iyengar, 2001, p. 270).

MODES OF ACTION: AGENTIC INDEPENDENT SELVES VS. CONSTRAINED INTERDEPENDENT SELVES The cross-cultural literature has traditionally emphasized the comparison between the independent self’s agency and the interdependent self’s constraints. We focus on three specific lines of research which support this contrast: (a) Agency perceptions: Perceiving one’s own power and competence in the environment (Benson, 1994) and perceiving other people’s agency. (b) Decision making: Making decisions based on one’s own preferences vs. the preferences of the ingroup. (c) Ingroup relationships: Communicating, managing conflict, and dealing with natural tensions between self and other ingroup members. Agency Perceptions A prerequisite for possessing personal agency is recognizing one’s own ability and competence within the environment (Benson, 1994). People who hold beliefs in their own personal agency even engage in self-enhancement, and exaggerate their power and capabilities (Greenwald, 1980). Indeed, whereas Americans report glowing assessments of their own performance, Japanese modestly under-represent their abilities (Heine, Lehman, Markus,

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& Kitayama, 1999), and thus minimize the self’s competence and capability in the environment. Likewise, people in societies where personal agency is a norm and a value should also assume that other people possess higher levels of agency. Once again, independent selves often make fundamental attribution errors, i.e., unwarranted attributions to people’s traits that ignore the relevant situational factors that might affect their behavior (e.g., he is often late to work because he is lazy and disorganized) (Ross, 1977). By contrast, interdependent selves are more likely to take situational factors into account when they understand other people’s actions (e.g., he is often late to work because he has four children he has to care for every morning) (Morris & Peng, 1994; Shweder & Bourne, 1982). Rather than assuming that cause resides with individuals who personally control and direct outcomes in the environment, interdependent selves perceive action holistically, and assume that cause resides with the surrounding context (Nisbett, Peng, Choi, & Noranzayan, 2001). While people and their causal agency loom large for the independent self, the interdependent self views people as situationally constrained and their actions as environmentally determined (Cousins, 1989).

Decision Making A second prerequisite of personal agency, as Western philosophers define that term, is having one’s own preferences and values, rather than ingroup preferences or situational pressures, determine choice (Anderson, 1996). In contrast to independent selves who exhibit unique choices that separate the self from the ingroup, interdependent selves tend to conform to their peers (Kim & Markus, 1999). By readily allowing other people’s choices to define them, as compared to setting their own standards (Anderson, 1996), people in East Asian cultures appear to violate basic principles of autonomous agency. Indeed, East Asians seem to value personal choice and control less than Americans. Whereas Americans feel motivated when they choose for themselves, East Asians feel motivated when the ingroup chooses for the self instead (Iyengar & Lepper, 1999). More generally, interdependent selves tend to avoid rather than approach (Lee, Aaker, & Gardner, 2000). They are concerned about duties and responsibilities to the group (Chiu et al., 1997), and as a result, are less likely to take personal risks which could have negative implications for the group and their standing within it (Lee et al., 2000). Thus, rather than making decisions by rationally forming personal preferences and acting on them to further their

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own interests, people with interdependent self-construals instead consider the ingroup’s preferences and their social obligations to the group. Ingroup Relationships A final prerequisite for agency is that a person behaves in a self-directed manner, rather than as a result of others’ goals and interests (Dworkin, 1988; Kant, 1786/1949). Once again, as compared to independent selves, interdependent selves often do not directly assert their personal agency in interpersonal relationships to preserve in-group harmony. For instance, interdependent selves often communicate indirectly (Yum, 1988). The Japanese famously avoid the word ‘‘no,’’ which they consider harsh and potentially insulting, and the Chinese focus on maintaining ‘‘face’’ in their interactions with others (Hwang, 1987; Ting-Toomey et al., 1991). Whereas Americans frequently talk as they are thinking, Koreans are more guarded in their expression and think before talking (Kim, 2002). Likewise, in conflict situations, rather than directly pursuing their own goals, people with interdependent self-construals prefer procedures that preserve the relationship (Leung, 1987). What seems, for an independent self, like a simple conflict with one other person is much more than that for the interdependent self. The interdependent self is embedded in tightly interconnected networks that connect each person to the other and that create a ripple effect whereby a fight with a single person could involve all other group members and painfully disrupt social harmony. As a result, interdependent selves often prefer to adjust to the resulting situation (Morling, Kitayama, & Miyamoto, 2002), rather than assert themselves directly. Even the expression of emotion has social implications for the interdependent self. Whereas the independent self expresses consistent reactions in public and in private, the interdependent self often conceals private emotions when in a group context so as to reduce the outward expression of negative emotion. Japanese thus display very different emotions when watching a movie in public and in private, differences that Americans do not display (Ekman & Friesen, 1969). From a Western vantage point, these examples suggest that East Asians inhibit the expression of their ‘‘authentic’’ selves for the sake of convention, social obligation, and interpersonal harmony (Anderson, 1996). People often experience conflict between two desires (Frankfurt, 1971), for instance, their authentic personal goals and the desire to meet the expectations of their groups. When the self cannot overcome surrounding external pressures and fails to act on personal desires and values, this violates a basic requirement of agency.

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To summarize, as compared to the independent self, the interdependent self perceives less personal agency, makes choices based on others’ preferences rather than their own, and finally, inhibits personal desires, words, and behaviors for the sake of group harmony. All of these findings suggest that the interdependent self violates basic tenets of autonomous decision making and behavior, and exercises less agency than does the independent self. In the next section, however, we present another view of interdependence – one that characterizes the interdependent self’s personal agency in a dramatically different way.

INTERDEPENDENT SELVES AND AGENCY The evening news program 60 minutes recently interviewed Aishwarya Rai, former Miss Universe and Bollywood actress. As they talked, Aishwarya revealed to her American interviewer that she still lived at home with her parents. Clearly taken aback and possibly imagining how his own parents would hamper his lifestyle, the interviewer observed that he found it surprising that a clearly well-adjusted, financially independent, successful, 30-yearold career woman would choose to live at home with her parents. The question that independent selves were left with was, why would Aishwarya – who apparently has so many options at her disposal – choose to live in the restrictive confines of her parents’ home? This question reveals the interesting twist that underlies the more novel arguments we discuss next. We first present philosophical perspectives that critique overly individualistic conceptions of agency. Next, we argue that, rather than viewing the ingroup as necessarily oppressing the individual, interdependent selves are more likely to view individual and group agency as compatible with one another, and thus they maintain and even exert personal agency in the face of powerful ingroups. Finally, we explore the specific strategies that interdependent selves use to achieve personal agency while embedded within powerful groups.

Relational Critiques of Individual Agency While some theorists have celebrated the concept of autonomous agency, various theorists have attacked the notion with charges that it is overly individualistic, overly Western, overly masculine, and hence, unable to capture the fundamentally relational and interdependent nature of the person (Mackenzie & Stoljar, 2000). First, the very idea that people can ever be

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‘‘free from external constraint’’ assumes away social relations and imagines individuals as disembodied and atomized. Even the most independent selves do not decide and act in a vacuum, but as a result of values that have been inculcated through extended processes of socialization with others (Friedman, 2000). As a result, this conception of agency is possibly unattainable as social influence is unavoidable. Second, even when traditional conceptions recognize the groups and relationships that surround the individual, they implicitly assume that these social forces reduce the individual’s ability to act as an agent. As reflected in the philosophical writings of Marx, Freud, Locke, Nietzsche, Foucault, and Ayn Rand, Western culture inculcates an implicit theory which depicts the individual struggling to extricate itself from the oppressive groups around it. This notion of autonomous agency has been described as ‘‘a thoroughly noxious concept that encourages us to believe that connecting and engaging with others limits us and undermines our sense of self (Hoagland, 1988, cited in Barclay, 2000, p. 52).’’ According to relational perspectives, people’s agency is a product of socialization and it exists in the context of relationships. Indeed, people are agents, not because of their freedom from others but because of their ‘‘relationships y which provide the support and guidance necessary for the development and experience of autonomy’’ (Nedelsky, 1989, cited in Stoljar, 2000, p. 95). Relational perspectives are thus characterized by the conviction that people are ‘‘socially embedded and that agents’ identities are formed within the context of social relationships’’ (Mackenzie & Stoljar, 2000, p. 4). Following this argument, we suggest that agency is not only celebrated in independent-oriented cultures but in interdependent cultures as well. We first describe how cross-cultural psychologists conceptualize agency in interdependent societies and then describe our own perspective.

Configuring the Relationship between Individual and Group Agency Instead of arguing that the prospects for agency in interdependent societies are necessarily limited, some cross-cultural researchers have noted that independent and interdependent selves both behave agentically, although very different cultural models of agency guide action (Kitayama & Uchida, 2004; Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Markus & Kitayama, 2002). Independent selves assert agency by expressing ‘‘internal needs, rights, and capacities and to withstand undue social pressure,’’ whereas interdependent selves experience agency as an ‘‘effort to be receptive to others, to adjust to their needs and

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demands, and to restrain one’s own inner needs or desires (1991, p. 240).’’ Kitayama and Uchida (2004) suggest that interdependent selves exhibit their own forms of agency, and describe the contrast between two students, Tom, the American, and Tomoko, the Japanese, both of them study hard. On one hand, Tom’s agency lies in identifying his internal attributes and using them to construct personal goals, desires, and preferences. Tomoko, on the other hand, constructs her ‘‘field of action’’ in reference to her parents’ goals and desires. She has adjusted to her parents’ expectations and, furthermore, there is probably a significant overlap between her goals and her parents’ goals for her. As this example demonstrates, independent selves experience agency in the form of primary control (acting on the environment to influence it) whereas interdependent selves exercise secondary control (adjusting to parents, relationships, groups, and other circumstances) (Morling, Kitayama, & Miyamoto, 2002). Kitayama and Uchida (2004) argue that the concept of agency is culturally bound and posit a theory of ‘‘interdependent agency.’’ This concept rests on two observations. First, the authors note that the interdependent self often internalizes ingroup goals, i.e., there is a considerable overlap between self and other, and that boundary is often indistinguishable. Interdependent selves often do not see the self and other has having conflicting goals because they engage in ‘‘self-expansion,’’ whereby they encapsulate the other and its concerns within the self (Gardner, Gabriel, & Hochschild, 2002). Rather than experiencing negative emotions that arise when an ingroup member bests the self on a personally relevant task (Tesser, 1988), interdependent selves are more likely to feel happy for their friends even when these friends outperform the self because they include the other in the self (Gardner et al., 2002). Second, Kitayama and Uchida observe that in situations where the individual’s and the group’s will do not perfectly align, the individual often adjusts and restrains his or her own desires in favor of the group’s will. In both cases, whether due to a natural coincidence of interests or the self’s restraint and adjustment, the self and the ingroup effectively become indistinguishable. Kitayama and Uchida also note that these internalizations and adjustments have very different implications cross-culturally. According to Western philosophers, ‘‘autonomous agents must regard themselves as authorized to act on their own interests and ordering of preferences (Stoljar, 2000, p. 97),’’ they should not ‘‘bow down to social convention, tradition, or even morality’’ or ‘‘take other people’s reasons for how they should act as their reasons for action;’’ they should ‘‘regard themselves as self-originating sources of claims

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(Anderson, 1996, cited in Stoljar, 2000, p. 97).’’ Thus, from the vantage point of Western philosophy, internalizing the group’s way of thought is a depressing sign of personal weakness; it is ‘‘caving in,’’ conformity, false consciousness (Engels, 1893/1972), and ‘‘social control,’’ i.e., a state in which cultural meanings constrain the person’s ability to think and act outside dominant paradigms (O’Reilly & Chatman, 1996; Foucault, 1977). However, from the perspective of the East Asian interdependent self, behaviors such as Tomoko’s do not constitute weakness, passivity, and conformity but the natural process by which the matured interdependent person actualizes the self within the group (Kitayama & Uchida, 2004). However, these contrasts suggest that interdependent agency is so different from Western philosophical conceptions of agency that it bears closer resemblance to constraint, i.e., the very opposite of Western agency. Even though the results are the same – i.e., the individual submits to the group will – the key difference, as specified by these authors, is that interdependent agency might be viewed as restraint, i.e., the individual has internally managed or come to terms with the external forces that constrain the self. The question that arises from these arguments, however, is, ‘‘what counts as agency?’’ East Asians may not consider themselves to be passively constrained when they adjust to their environment, but does it really count as agency when external forces hold one’s personal will in check, whether the self has adjusted to these external forces or not? We try to salvage the possibility for personal agency, as Western philosophers define that term, in East Asian, interdependent cultures. Instead of focusing on the process by which interdependent selves are attuned to others and promote group harmony, we examine how they are attuned to others yet promote self-interest. We argue in this paper that the exercise of personal agency, even under this ‘‘Western’’ definition of the term, is still compatible with an interdependent orientation. Specifically, we question the assumption that the boundary between self and ingroup is blurred, such that there is either no conflict between individual and group goals, or if there is a conflict, the interdependent individual resolves it by adjusting to the group. While this relationship is indeed a frequent pattern of action in interdependent contexts (Kitayama & Uchida, 2004), we build on this perspective by arguing that the self and group are constantly involved in a variety of relationships with each other. In some situations, the group will and the individual will are truly opposed, consistent with assumptions from Western philosophy, and in other situations the two wills are compatible, as in Tomoko’s situation. We examine situations where individual and group goals align and individuals use the group to substitute for

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individual agency (Tomoko’s situation). We also look at situations where individual and group interests do not immediately align, but East Asian interdependent selves recruit the group as a support to facilitate their own personal agency. Finally, we examine situations in which the will of the interdependent self and the will of the ingroup are in tension. In addition to willingly adjusting to the group in these conditions (Kitayama & Uchida, 2004), we suggest that interdependent selves also use a variety of strategies that subtly evade the relational pressures upon them so that the self can assert its goals, desires, and will in the face of social pressures to the contrary. To demonstrate the above arguments, we develop a culturally informed conception of the strategies by which interdependent achieve agency even when they are embedded within powerful groups.

MODES OF ACTION: INTERDEPENDENT STRATEGIES TO ACHIEVE AGENCY The key reason why interdependent agency has been obscured in the literature is the Western assumption that strong groups necessarily interfere with the individual’s agency. However, research suggests that people in different cultures conceive of the relationship between individual and group agency in very different ways. Ying-Yi Hong has recently developed a scale of beliefs in individual and group agency that supports this observation (Brewer, Hong, & Li, 2004; Menon, unpublished data). Hong’s scale contains sample items such as: ‘‘To what extent do you agree that: In this society, social groups and organizations influence what happens in an individual’s life;’’ ‘‘Individual’s will is the most powerful force in society;’’ ‘‘In society, the will of social groups is more powerful than that of individuals;’’ and ‘‘An individual’s own will can most determine his or her future development’’. For Chinese participants, there was a positive correlation between the belief ingroup agency and individual agency, while this correlation did not exist for North American participants. Strong groups did not necessarily undermine or inhibit personal agency for interdependent selves, indeed, they seemed to be associated with enhanced personal agency. We propose that this is because there are complicated models of agency whereby strong personal and collective agency can coexist. In contrast to Western conceptions of agency that implicitly pit individual will against social relationships and collectives, there are at least three other

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ways to interpret the relationship between individual and group agency that prevail in East Asia: Group as substituting for personal agency. Westerners and Asians have different implicit theories about which kinds of actors act as agents; East Asians have a reduced sense of personal agency but a higher belief in group agency, relative to Americans (Menon, Morris, Chiu, & Hong, 1999; Morris, Menon, & Ames, 2001). Rather than venturing out as individuals, the group, e.g., families, teams, and other collectives, becomes the vehicle by which interdependent selves experience agency. Group as facilitating personal agency. It is possible that groups can also support individuals, and augment their motivations and abilities to act as agents in the environment (Hsee & Weber, 1999). Group as irrelevant to personal agency. Group agency and individual agency can coexist and are largely unaffected by one another. In particular, individuals skillfully develop strategies to deal with strong groups and their pressures, especially when individual and group will diverge. In the sections below, we examine these three novel relationships between individual and group agency and describe how they become mechanisms through which interdependent selves, particularly in East Asian settings, exert agency in their environments.

Group as a Substitute for Personal Agency In one line of research, we reconcile interdependence and agency by arguing that whereas Americans are more likely to hold implicit theories that endorse a belief in individual agency, East Asians are more likely to hold implicit theories that endorse collective agency, i.e., the causal power of groups in the environment (Menon et al., 1999; Morris et al., 2001). In addition to being more likely to support beliefs related to group agency, East Asians were also more likely to endorse group-level traits as causes of action, as compared to Americans. Thus, whereas Americans were more likely to describe an individual employee’s unfairness as the cause of their wrongdoing, East Asians were more likely to use the trait term when they were making attributions about the group. This reconciliation of interdependence and agency relies on a conception of the group agent as a substitute for the individual agent. The implication of this argument is that people in interdependent cultures view groups such as families and teams as the appropriate vehicle for agency, as compared to the

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individual. Thus, particularly in situations in which individual and group interests coincide, individuals will use groups as a mechanism to fulfill their personal goals. As a result, rather than a single entrepreneur starting a business, a group of cousins or a family does; rather than a single individual making a personal decision, the collective does (e.g., Japan’s ringi system of decision making); and, rather than distributing work to a single employee, it is allocated to a team of workers – who would also collectively receive the rewards and punishments that are due following its completion (Chiu & Hong, 1992). In these group situations, interdependent individuals do not reduce their effort in groups and exhibit patterns of social loafing found among independent selves (Earley, 1989). Indeed, given the alignment of individual and group goals in this situation, the interdependent individual uses the group as a vehicle to accomplish their personal will. Studies of leadership also indicate that group agency may be a substitute for individual agency. In a research by Fu & Chiu (in preparation), Chinese participants perceived leaders as less likable and as having worse leadership skills when they alone were the agent of change, as compared to the group as a whole. These findings show that leaders who pursue group agency instead of individual agency are more effective in leading groups in interdependent cultures. Group as Facilitating Individual Agency While the previous argument assumes (1) a coincidence between individual and group goals and (2) that interdependent selves perceive and value personal agency less than independent selves, our next arguments separate individual and group goals. In particular, in situations where the individual’s and group’s goals do not immediately align, interdependent individuals often recruit groups to support their personal interests. For instance, Hsee and Weber (1999) describe the ‘‘cushion hypothesis.’’ They suggest that the group does not just act as a source of obligation and constraint upon the individual but also as a support, which facilitates their ability to take financial risk. Because groups provide individuals with resources that are a cushion against losses, interdependent individuals can take more financial risks than Americans, who have access to less support from their networks. Even though members of interdependent groups may complain bitterly about supporting the individual financially and try to avoid incurring losses to themselves, the individual can often recruit support from them nonetheless. The perception that the ingroup is a ‘‘cushion’’ can also enable the interdependent self to assert itself in situations beyond the domain of risk. For

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instance, the hypothesis helps explain why East Asians are particularly likely to take aggressive stances against outgroups. Leung (1987) finds that Chinese are less likely than Americans to sue a friend but more likely to sue a stranger than are Americans. East Asians may behave more assertively in conflict situations with outgroups because they rely on a powerful ingroup’s support. The indigenous Chinese concept of guanxi is another cushioning mechanism through which interdependent selves gain social resources for future use (Chua & Morris, this volume; Farh, Tsui, Xin, & Cheng, 1998; Xin & Pearce, 1996). Chinese executives, especially those from private companies, commonly rely on social networks to gain a competitive edge. They build these ties even when they do not offer immediate advantage for the company because these ties could serve as future sources of competitive business information, allies, and social exchange. These observations suggest that the interdependent network is a chain of reciprocity that involves, not only constraint, but also support. While the preponderance of research emphasizes the degree to which groups and relationships drain individual resources and saddle the individual with obligations, they also facilitate individual agency.

Group as Irrelevant to Personal Agency Finally, consider situations where the individual and group interest fail to align. In these situations, in addition to adjusting or conforming to their groups, interdependent individuals find ways to ‘‘work around’’ the agency of their groups to assert their individual will. We consider first, the indirect strategies by which this occurs, and then illustrate the more direct ways in which interdependent individuals assert their will upon their environments. Indirect Strategies in Interpersonal Relationships In settings with powerful and potentially constraining groups and relationships, interdependent selves learn influence techniques that enable their agency to coexist with these pressures. As evidence of the importance of these skills of personal influence, in research on executive MBAs in the US, Europe, and Asia, we find that Asians have higher Mach scores than do Americans and Europeans (Menon, unpublished data). While Westerners are direct in the ways that they exert influence, the Asian students are more likely to endorse strategies that are more indirect – and that seem, to Westerners, to be somewhat manipulative. As a result, the low scores that Asians

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receive on managing conflict directly could be misleading. While Asians are unwilling to directly pursue conflicts because they seek to preserve relationships, they also use indirect ways to skillfully exert the self that are not captured by dimensions such as conflict avoidance or accommodation (Lebra, 1984). For instance, Tse, Francis, and Wall (1994) find Chinese executives used negotiation strategies such as discontinuing and withdrawing from negotiation to indirectly gain control. Another example is that Chinese prefer to use a third-party who has connection to the disputants to resolve conflict. This way, they do not face the other party while they maintain their control in the resolution process (Fu, Morris, Lee, & Chiu, 2002). Additionally, anecdotal evidence suggests that Japanese say yes while meaning no, and Chinese solicit advice from ingroup members yet frequently proceed to do what they please, if this advice fails to coincide with their interests. Thus, East Asians exercise a good deal of personal agency, albeit through a more subtle, indirect style. Direct Strategies that Reflect Personal Agency Finally, interdependent selves often exert their personal agency directly. In particular, consider the role of personal effort and the prevalence of competitive dynamics within ingroups. Effort. One way to interpret evidence that East Asians do not engage in selfenhancement is that they are modest, self-minimizing, and underrate their competence in the environment. Similarly, the evidence that East Asians do not make fundamental attribution errors to individuals and instead focus on their situational constraints, could indicate that East Asians underrate the individual’s causal agency in the environment, relative to North Americans. However, given that East Asians make internal malleable attributions (i.e., if I work hard, I can do it) (Dweck, Chiu, & Hong, 1995), another interpretation of this research is that it reflects a belief in even greater personal agency than is found in North American samples. Specifically, the internal malleable attribution has been demonstrated to lead to greater agency in changing outcomes than does a trait attribution, which often leads to learned helplessness (i.e., I am just not good at this task; I do not have the ability) just as external attributions do (I had bad luck, the task was difficult) (Seligman, 1975). These internal malleable explanations, which reflect implicit theories about the self and its agency in the environment, have been found to underlie sales performance (Seligman & Schulman, 1986), children’s abilities to learn, and math performance. In the case of math performance, the pervasive East Asians (and Asian American) implicit theory

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that math ability is not innate but malleable underlie their higher performance in those subjects relative to North Americans (Holloway, 1988). Furthermore, East Asians persist after their failures to a greater extent than do North Americans (Heine et al., 2001). The crucial implication is that effort attributions reflect a belief in the efficacy of the individual to change reality – rather than to simply accept or adjust to it given the constraints of either one’s traits and abilities, or the situation. Competition vs. Cooperation. We have already discussed one implication of interdependent self-construal: the self and its interests tend to be suppressed for the sake of relationships and collective goals. However, Markus and Kitayama (1991) warn against conceptions that romanticize the interdependent self as an unselfish self who is ‘‘ever attuned to the concerns of others’’ (p. 299), and who is unwilling to promote and assert the self at the expense of other ingroup members. They note that East Asians cultivate harmonious social values such as sunao, a term which ‘‘implies that working with others does not suggest giving up the self but, rather, that cooperation is the appropriate way of expressing, enhancing, and affirming the self’’ (Kumagai, 1981; White & LeVine, 1986, cited in Markus & Kitayama, 1991, p. 229). Whereas interdependent people sometimes succeed in restraining the self or expanding the self to include the other (Gardner et al., 2002), other evidence indicates that interdependent selves are also quite susceptible to experiencing envy and competitiveness within the ingroup. Chinese in fact make more social comparisons than do Americans, and particularly more upward comparisons to successful others (White & Lehman, 2005). Further, Hong Kong employees displayed envy when their colleagues received promotions (Schaubroeck & Lam, 2004). More anecdotally, the intense competition, which characterizes Singaporean society, has been captured by the Hokkien term ‘‘Kiasu’’ which refers to the fear of losing out, and ‘‘keeping up with the Joneses.’’ Kiasu often involves indirect (and occasionally manipulative) strategies to gain advantage over one other people (Hwang, Ang, & Francesco, 2002). Examples of kiasu behaviors are people shoving through crowds at sales to get the bargains, students keeping as many reference books as they could and parents prepping their children for school as early as possible so as to outdo their neighbors and peers. The concept has been ‘‘celebrated’’ as a central part of Singaporean culture, with a Mr. Kiasu cartoon figure and even a McDonalds’ marketing promotion, the ‘‘Kiasu’’ deal. These arguments, which have been underrepresented in the cross-cultural literature, suggest that the more someone stakes their sense of self upon a

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group, the more important it is for that group to confer esteem and status upon the self. Further, groups confer esteem, not only on those who cooperate well, but to those who finish first in school and who attain financial rewards and achievements that signal social status. Values such as ‘‘harmony’’ and ‘‘modesty,’’ which have been emphasized in prior cross-cultural research, could simply be a means to suppress the envy and natural competition that becomes more pronounced among people when they are embedded in close-knit groups. Indeed, a functionalist perspective suggests that societies characterized by interdependent selves are replete with mechanisms (e.g., seniority-based promotions) to undermine the competitive behaviors that naturally arise in such groups. Each of these examples illustrates the kinds of strategies that East Asians use to exert agency in their environments. The core idea here is that not only does the degree of social influence differ for independent and interdependent self, but how people interpret groups and their influence differs as well (Kitayama & Uchida, 2004). As a result, interdependent selves use very different strategic responses to groups as they exert personal agency in their environments. Rather than seeing the group as simply shackling the self, the interdependent self also sees the group as compatible with personal agency and as a facilitator of personal agency. Further, the interdependent self learns to skillfully navigate through the sometimes forceful ways in which groups encumber them (i.e., indirect, perhaps Machiavellian strategies to influence their counterparts). They readily use effort and the group itself to further their own personal desires and goals. In the process, interdependent selves are powerful agents who act on their environments – rather than to simply accepting or adjusting to them.

MODES OF ACTION: INDEPENDENT SELVES AND THE EXPERIENCE OF CONSTRAINT We have described the forms of agency exercised by people with interdependent selves; the flip side of the question is the nature of the constraints that the independent self experiences. Whereas interdependent selves feel less obligated to social groups than interdependent selves, they feel more constrained by (1) the internalized social expectations that define the consistent, autonomous self; and (2) principles and procedures that enforce and govern individual rights in an ordered society. We now describe these areas where the independent self experiences more constraint than the interdependent self,

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arguments that have often been underemphasized in the literature which views the independent self as a free and unconstrained actor.

Social Expectations about ‘‘Independent’’ Identity Just as groups and relationships saddle the interdependent self with obligations and expectations around what it means to be a proper ‘‘interdependent self,’’ independent selves are similarly limited by the social expectations around what it means to be a ‘‘good independent self (Heine, 2005).’’ Because the independent self is expected to be unwavering and consistent in its preferences, once an independent self has made a particular choice, they experience pressures – both internal and external – to behave consistently with that choice (Cialdini, 2001; Festinger, 1957). They feel overly committed and are unable to flexibly change course because they stake their identities on the belief that they possess a stable, consistent, and coherent essence. Personal choices and commitments are particularly oppressive when contexts change. Independent selves are often dependent on their identities – which they have heavily invested in based on their conceptions of what provides them with social recognition (Barclay, 2000). When men who have used work as source of self worth are laid off or when women who have stayed at home send their children to college, they often feel disoriented because their identities were overly dependent on changeable external factors (Barclay, 2000). By contrast, we hypothesize that East Asians feel similar stress in such circumstances, although this stress arises from different sources (i.e., an inability to meet family financial obligations or a loss of face in society as compared to dependence on a particular coherent and consistent definition of one’s personal identity). Additionally, because independent selves (a) seek to maintain their own self-reliant and independent image and (b) seek to respect other people’s autonomy, they restrain themselves from placing demands on others, and requesting favors and help. More generally, to maintain social harmony, they limit the degree to which the self and its opinions are imposed on others; a classic rule of etiquette in the West is to ‘‘never discuss religion or politics’’ (Friedman, 2000). Indeed, the interdependent self is actually quite willing to assert their wishes and demands upon an ingroup member (Yan, 1996) while the independent self feels constrained, given their fear of interfering with another person’s life and autonomy and appearing helpless and dependent.

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The independent self can find these expectations particularly stressful in bad times. In contrast to Japanese actors who can share the responsibility for their wrongdoings with the company, people personally blame American actors for wrongdoing (Sanders et al., 1996). Not only is the independent self held more responsible, they also feel inhibited in recruiting advantages from the larger collective. They avoid requesting favors from others that provide material support, and curb their desire for the personal information and close contact that provide social support. In sum, these arguments build upon classic research in social science, which has frequently observed the costs associated with an independent orientation. Durkheim (1857/1958) noted that independent selves experience anomie, feeling less tied to others and to society, and less able to claim necessary social resources. Durkheim argued that ‘‘anomie’’ was the reason why, across so many parts of Europe, Protestants (more independent in their orientation) tended to commit suicide at higher rates than did Catholics (more interdependent in their orientation). To compensate for their inability to recruit financial and social resources from their ingroups, independent selves are more likely to rely on impersonal mechanisms for these needs (e.g., they may have greater dependence on trained professionals for psychological support or financial institutions to provide money).

Constraints from Principles and Procedure One of the first (and most frustrating) things that an American observes on a trip to India – or Greece, Italy, and many other societies characterized by interdependent selves – is people’s willingness to cut ahead in line. At first, queue jumpers casually stand next to you, and then they gradually insert themselves ahead of you, hardly intimidated by a basic sense of procedure. This willingness to circumvent law and order stems from the fact that universal principles are less likely to inhibit interdependent selves. The evidence for this observation comes from research on Indian and Americans notions of justice (Miller, Bersoff, & Harwood, 1990). Miller and colleagues gave Indians and Americans a variety of scenarios in which they had to choose how they would respond to various ethical dilemmas which pitted their relational duties to another person against obligations from universal laws and procedures. Whereas Indians placed their relationships above the law, Americans were much more likely to obey laws and rules. This finding is rooted in the Hobbsian idea that government and law are crucial constraints on anarchic individualism. As a result, whereas independent selves see laws

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and procedures as binding, interdependent selves are more likely to see them as secondary to relationships, and as flexibly evolving with situations. Thus, whereas social harmony in interdependent societies arises from the self-submitting to obligations from ingroup relationships, in independent societies it arises from the self submitting to fundamental principles and procedures.

DISCUSSION An underlying assumption implicit in much cross-cultural research is that interdependent selves possess less agency than their independent counterparts. An abundance of research documents the fact that interdependent selves value personal choice less, perceive agency less often in their environments, minimize the self, avoid asserting their demands, communicate less directly, and submerge their individual will to the groups that they are part of – all because of their impulse to promote harmonious social relationships. If all of these evidence is interpreted from the perspective of Western philosophical definitions of what it means to be an agent, it certainly seems that the interdependent self acts with less agency than does the independent self. Cross-cultural comparisons of agency should rest on more complex models of individual and group agency. In contrast to Western definitions of agency and autonomy that implicitly pit individual will against social relationships and collectives, we suggest several other ways to specify the relationship between individual and group agency. Individuals do not achieve agency simply by overcoming the agency of the groups around them, but by using group agency as a substitute for individual agency, using group agency as a supplement to their own agency, and by developing strategies to work around the agency of other powerful actors in the environment. By examining these other relationships between individual and group agency, each of which enables personal agency to flourish even in the midst of strong groups, we identify a variety of domains in which interdependent selves can display even more personal agency than their independent counterparts. We describe the implications of these arguments for cross-cultural theory, methodology, and managerial practice below. Theoretical Implications Our arguments suggest the need for two directions in cross-cultural theory development. First, we have identified various theoretical mechanisms by

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which interdependent selves achieve agency. These mechanisms are theoretical tools, which enable us to generate counterintuitive hypotheses across a variety of domains that defy stereotypic expectations. For instance, Hsee and Weber’s (1999) cushion mechanism, which demonstrates that East Asians are more risk taking than North Americans in some situations, can underlie interdependent agency in a variety of other domains (e.g., conflict behavior). Second, to tap counter-intuitive phenomena, researchers need to generate new theoretical constructs. Rather than imposing etic categories from Western psychology (such as conflict avoidance and directness, or modesty and self-enhancement) perhaps indigenous, emic categories are more relevant. For instance, although it has been difficult to document competitive and envious behaviors among East Asians, Singaporeans often anecdotally describe kiasu behaviors. Further, while East Asians exhibit what appears to be simple modesty, they simultaneously display what Hsee and colleagues label ‘‘secret happiness,’’ a private delight at knowing that the self outperforms the other’s expectations (Zhang, Hsee, & Dai, 2004). These more subtle constructs capture unique strategies that Asians use, and provide crucial distinctions that enable support for counterintuitive hypotheses.

Methodological Implications To capture these counterintuitive tendencies, innovative methodologies from mainstream psychology such as priming and implicit measures such as the Implicit Association Test (Greenwald, McGhee, & Schwartz, 1998) may also be necessary. Priming Whereas priming techniques have captured the contrast between the independent and interdependent selves (Mandel, 2003; Brewer & Gardner, 1996; Trafimow, Triandis, & Goto, 1991), agency and constraint primes offer a test of the hypotheses outlined in this paper. We predict that independent and interdependent agency elicit different responses. Our preliminary evidence suggests that an interdependent self primed with agency is considerably more aggressive in conflict situations and in risk taking than even the independent self, although the constrained interdependent self is more avoidant of conflict and risk (Menon, Hsee, & Fu, data collection in progress). The hypothesis is that interdependence may involve a dual nature, with both more constraint (in the form of obligations) and more agency (because of financial and social cushion) than an independent orientation.

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Implicit measures In the same way that people in the West consider racist responses to be socially undesirable, people in East Asia recoil from self-enhancement, ingroup competition, jealousy, and envy. Because they do not directly admit that they feel competitive toward ingroup members and because they feel embarrassed when they enhance the self, implicit measures are a crucial means to tap these phenomena (Hsee, 2005; Kitayama & Uchida, 2003). Kitayama and Uchida (2003) found evidence that although Japanese explicitly evaluate themselves negatively, they hold positive implicit self-evaluations. Similarly, whereas East Asians are reluctant to admit negative feelings toward a successful ingroup member on a pencil and paper survey, such associations may be captured in an IAT (Greenwald & Banaji, 1995) or another subtle, implicit measure.

Managerial Implications Our key argument is that both independent and interdependent selves act with agency and experience constraint; however, culture shapes the kinds of factors that promote agency and the particular strategies that people use to achieve agency. Thus, rather than relying on stereotypic expectations – which often implicitly presume that Westerners possess more agency than do Asians (Hsee & Weber, 1999), the arguments in this paper enable managers to better anticipate the ways in which people in other cultures act upon their environments. The key implications for cross-cultural managers derive from the recognition that people in different cultures (a) possess different sources of power; (b) exert influence using different strategies; and (c) exhibit differences between their publicly held values and their behavior. First, consider the stereotypic expectation that independent selves possess more agency than interdependent selves, who are more constrained by social expectations (Hsee & Weber, 1999). By contrast, our arguments suggest that independent and interdependent selves derive their personal agency from different sources, and that managers must understand how people experience particular social factors as constraining or enabling to better anticipate crosscultural behavior. Without this understanding, they risk underestimating the other sides level of agency and sources of power. Assuming that the other side will acquiesce and not pursue their interests because they lack agency can be a costly miscalculation when managing people in organizations. Relatedly, cultural misunderstandings often occur because independent and interdependent selves use very different strategies to achieve agency.

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For instance, Westerners often assume that they have reached an agreement in their negotiations with the Japanese because the Japanese negotiator did not say no, and fail to realize that this diplomatic response was not tantamount to saying ‘‘yes.’’ More generally, independent selves may fail to detect the more indirect strategies that interdependent selves use to achieve agency. By contrast, independent selves may offend interdependent selves with their direct strategies. In all of these examples, people misunderstand the strategies of influence that members of other cultures use, and thus, fail to understand the other side’s interests and thus fail to achieve their own goals. Finally, we note that the often-documented cultural differences in independent agency and interdependent constraint could simply represent values and aspirations. Thus, there may be a considerable divergence between these ideals and reality. It may be the case that interdependent selves publicly minimize competitive and self-enhancing behaviors, although they also enjoy subtle opportunities to better their neighbors and experience envy when their neighbors better them. Similarly, Americans may declare their independence and individualism with vigor but conform to friends and family (Cialdini, 2001). These patterns are invisible when analyzing explicit or public pronouncements but may be more subtle, implicit patterns that complicate the typical generalizations about managing in another culture.

CONCLUSION It is hardly original to level the charge that Western observers of other cultures underestimate the level of agency that their subjects possess. Indeed there is a long anthropological history that rests on either making these assumptions or criticizing them. In her book Culture and Agency, Margaret Archer (1988) cites one anthropologist who characterizes non-Western thought as follows: Primitive people, because of their low individuation, are held to lack a sense of alternatives y in traditional cultures there is no developed awareness of alternatives to the established body of theoretical tenets whereas in scientifically oriented cultures, such an awareness is highly developed (Horton, 1974, p. 153).

This type of assumption that people from other cultures are ‘‘non-agents’’ creates two levels of misperception: on the one hand, a romanticization whereby they are seen as unselfish, modest, and nice (Markus & Kitayama, 1991), and on the other hand, a perpetuation of the stereotype of passivity,

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whereby researchers fail to fully appreciate other people’s active efforts in shaping the world and pursuing their own interests. At the same time, such assumptions ignore the constraints that limit the action and behavior of the independent self. In our opinion, this blind spot in the literature is not the result of some deliberate prejudice, but is instead created by cultural differences in what it means to be an agent, and cultural differences in the kinds of strategies by which people act on their environment. What is original, however, is research that makes counterintuitive predictions by reversing these assumptions. Only by examining agency in its complex cultural manifestations, can we imagine how people understand it differently and the contrasting strategies by which they achieve it. The irony may be that the very factors that inhibit personal agency in one culture – interdependence with strong groups and powerful social relationships – are the factors that promote and create it in others.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT We would like to thank Ying-Yi Hong, Carol Dweck, Chris Hsee, the editors, and the reviewers for their thoughtful comments. Tanya Menon was supported by the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business. Jeanne Ho-Ying Fu was a visiting scholar at Stanford University and she is now an Assistant Professor at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

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POWER, CULTURE, AND ACTION: CONSIDERATIONS IN THE EXPRESSION AND ENACTMENT OF POWER IN EAST ASIAN AND WESTERN SOCIETIES Chen-Bo Zhong, Joe C. Magee, William W. Maddux and Adam D. Galinsky ABSTRACT We present a model of how culture affects both the conceptualizations and behavioral consequences of power, focusing in particular on how culture moderates the previously demonstrated positive relationship between power and assertive action. Western cultures tend to be characterized by independence, whereas individuals in East Asian cultures tend to think of themselves as interdependent. As a result, power is conceptualized around influence and entitlement in the West, and Westerners behave assertively to satisfy oneself. In contrast, East Asians conceptualize power around responsibility and tend to consider how their behavior affects others. As a result the experience of power activates a tendency toward restraint. Therefore, power is associated with an increase in assertive action in independent cultures, whereas it leads to restraint of action in interdependent National Culture and Groups Research on Managing Groups and Teams, Volume 9, 53–73 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1534-0856/doi:10.1016/S1534-0856(06)09003-7

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cultures. We discuss a number of moderators of this effect including the type of actions and the groups who are affected by those actions. [Conquer with inaction] (L. C. Tsu (600 BC) Tao te ching).

Power is a fundamental feature of society and individual psychology. Hobbes, for example, suggested that to obtain pleasure it is necessary first and foremost to have power (cf., Allport, 1954). Concern for how power affects the power possessor is motivated by the modern cliche´ that power corrupts (Kipnis, 1972) and by the paradox that although the actions of the powerful have greater social consequences than the actions of those without power, power often leads to the taking of bold action regardless of those consequences (Galinsky, Gruenfeld, & Magee, 2003; Keltner, Gruenfeld, & Anderson, 2003). In these traditionally Western theories, power often is part and parcel of the ability to do what one wants to do and to take action to satisfy one’s desires and goals. Eastern philosophy, however, suggests a different view of power and its consequences. Lau Tsu, for example, commented on the importance of inaction when it comes to power and control. In the phrase ‘‘to conquer with inaction,’’ the Taoist philosopher recognized that the universe works harmoniously according to its own laws, and as humans exert their will against the world, they turn the natural state of harmony into a world of dissonance. Lao Tsu seemed to suggest that the supreme exercise of will was to withhold, to refrain from interfering with this natural equilibrium. This form of Eastern philosophy prescribes a very different approach to the use of power compared to Western society. According to these teachings, power-holders should try to suppress their instincts to act to preserve social and natural equilibrium. Experiencing power should highlight East Asians’ responsibility to those who submit to their power. Given that this philosophical tradition is deeply embedded in East Asian culture – in its religions, its institutions, its systems of politics, economics, and education – it may well affect individual and group psychology that is directly related to power. In this chapter, we argue that Lao Tsu’s philosophical ideas, from a period estimated as far back in history as the 6th century B.C., are alive and well in East Asian consciousness today and that their cultural influence creates a very different relationship between power and action for East Asians’ thought and behavior. This paper is part of a rapidly growing area of psychological research concerned with how culture affects not only the norms for how people think they should behave at a conscious level, but also people’s automatic,

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unconscious responses to social cues they encounter in everyday life. In particular, we advance the thesis that the association between power and assertive action demonstrated heretofore (Galinsky et al., 2003) is culturally prescribed and circumscribed. We develop a two-part theory about the relationship between culture, power, and action. First, we discuss how historical and contemporary aspects of culture affect individuals’ self-concepts, underlying psychological states, and goals, or what they strive to do in their everyday life. Second, we propose that, rather than promoting action in all situations, power actually facilitates a focus on completion of one’s goals (see also Chen, Lee-Chai, & Bargh, 2001). That is, power increases goal directed behavior, but the Western and Eastern cultures differ in their salient and enduring goals, leading to different conceptualizations and consequences of power. In Western cultures, the predominant goals tend to be oriented toward individualistic concerns; hence the experience of power leads to assertive action to fulfill those goals. In contrast, in Eastern cultures, where the goals are oriented toward managing relationships and maintaining harmony, power may promote restraint. In testing this theory, we take a comparative approach by investigating differences between Western (e.g., American, Western European) and East Asian (e.g., Chinese, Japanese) cultures in the automatic associations that people hold between power and goal-relevant concepts including entitlement vs. responsibility and assertiveness vs. restraint as well as actual behaviors in social dilemma situations.

THE IMPORTANCE OF CULTURE Historically, psychologists have been universalists. In other words, the prevalent view among those who study the mind has long been that people think, feel, perceive, and behave in much the same way all over the world (e.g., Nisbett, 2003). Although few if any would deny that individuals from different cultures vary tremendously in terms of the languages they speak, the clothes they wear, their average height, weight, and skin color, and their customs for eating, drinking, and bathing, psychologists have tended to neglect the extent to which psychological processes might be affected by cultural variables. However, the zeitgeist in psychology has been shifting rapidly over the course of the last two decades. At present, most psychologists would concede that culture has a significant impact on the way individuals perceive and behave in the world. Research has been particularly adept at documenting psychological differences between people from East Asian and Western cultures (for reviews, see Fiske, Kitayama, Markus, & Nisbett,

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1998; Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Nisbett, Peng, Choi, & Norenzayan, 2001). Even within the United States, regional cultures alter the ways individuals see and approach the world; for example, individuals born in the South, compared to those born in the Northeast, respond differently to insults at the psychological, physiological, and behavioral levels (Cohen, Nisbett, Bowdle, & Schwarz, 1996). The consistent emergence of cross-cultural differences in perception, cognition, motivation, and emotion have led researchers to the conclusion that many psychological processes previously thought to be universal are often culturally specific (e.g., Nisbett, 2003). Western Cultures Western intellectual and psychological tradition has been strongly influenced by the thinking of the ancient Greeks and the Humanists of the postRenaissance era. For many of these thinkers, the dominant theme concerned the rights of the individual and the beliefs that people should have a strong sense of individual agency and should develop their interests and lives however they wish, using their individual sense of self as a guide for proper behavior. Thus, people in the West tend to be socialized to think of themselves as separate, unconnected entities and are encouraged to forge their own way independent of the expectations of others. Indeed, cross-cultural theorists have noted that this tradition continues in the West even today, where people tend to be individualistic, construe themselves as independent of others, attend to attributes that make them separate and unique from others, and focus on how to control and change their environment for their own benefit more than individuals in Eastern cultures (Hofstede, 1980; Lee, Aaker, & Gardner, 2000; Markus & Kitayama, 1991). As a result, independent cultures in the West embrace goals that target self-enhancement and promotion (Markus & Kitayama, 1991). In fact, Western psychologists have long believed that self-enhancement is a universal phenomenon, one intimately connected to human evolution, with high levels of self-esteem being necessary for psychological well-being (Taylor & Brown, 1988; Twenge, Catanese, & Baumeister, 2002). To enhance and maintain positive self-regard, individuals in Western cultures tend to focus on individual reward, gains, and successes. East Asian Cultures In contrast to the West, the cultural traditions of most East Asian societies are heavily influenced by Confucian and Buddhist thinking, both of which


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place a dramatically different emphasis on the ideal method of human development. In contrast to the self-focused traditions of the West, the Confucian influence on East Asian cultures leads individuals to consider others explicitly, stressing the notion that productive societies should have a relationship- and group-centered focus (Nisbett et al., 2001). Thus, East Asians learn to think about the world not necessarily in terms of themselves but in terms of the relationships among people, understanding events within a relatively broad social context. The individual raised in an East Asian culture is steeped in the role of interconnectedness and knows the importance of interpersonal relationships, fulfilling obligations and responsibilities to others, and maintaining intra-group harmony (Heine, Lehman, Markus, & Kitayama, 1999; Markus & Kitayama, 1991). In essence, having a strong sense of interconnectedness with others is paramount for people from East Asian cultures. With an overriding emphasis on interconnectedness, some scholars have postulated that in Confucian societies, the concept of ‘‘self’’ actually does not exist in the absence of other people (Smith, 2001). As a result, self-esteem is less important to East Asians than it is for people from Western cultures, if in fact it is important at all (Heine & Lehman, 1995, 1997; Kitayama, Markus, Matsumoto, & Norasakkunkit, 1997; Markus & Kitayama, 1991; for a review, see Heine et al., 1999). Not only do the Japanese have relatively lower levels of self-esteem compared to Americans, they actually show tendencies in the opposite direction, displaying self-criticism, a stark contrast to the robust self-enhancing tendencies typically noted in the West. Selfcriticism serves the goal of interconnectedness, allowing individuals to fit in with other group members and avoid being seen as distinct from the collective (Heine et al., 1999; Kitayama et al., 1997). Although debate continues about the necessity of high self-esteem for the Japanese (e.g., Sedikides, Gaertner, & Toguchi, 2003), clearly the cross-cultural perspective has shown that high self-esteem is not the universally rich resource and psychological panacea it was once thought to be. The key is that compared to individuals in the West, East Asians are more concerned about interpersonal relationships and relatively less concerned about achieving positive, individual distinctiveness. Being independent and individually recognized might hold great value in the West, but these motives are perceived to be disruptive to group harmony and collective integrity in East Asian cultures. Given the fundamental differences in which Westerners and East Asians think about the social world and construe themselves, psychologists have noted a myriad of different ramifications for cognition, affect, and behavior consistent with these different intellectual traditions. East Asians demonstrate

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a greater tendency to prefer conformity to situational norms than Westerners (Kim & Markus, 1999), to allow others to make decisions for them (Iyengar & Lepper, 1999), to mimic the physical mannerisms of others (van Baaren, Maddux, Chartrand, de Bouter, & van Knippenberg, 2003), and to make more social comparisons (White & Lehman, 2005). These differences are highlighted in the different ways that egocentrism and self-enhancement play out in these disparate cultures. East Asians tend to show fewer self-related biases and are particularly more averse to self-enhancement than are Westerners (Heine & Lehman, 1995, 1997; Markus & Kitayama, 1991). However, consistent with a relationship-based focus, there is evidence that East Asians do have biases in favor of the quality of their own relationships (Endo, Heine, & Lehman, 2000). Thus, empirical psychological research has tended to confirm that the different intellectual influences that predominate in the West and East continue to have an enduring impact on the psychological makeup of their respective contemporary societal cultures. In the West, the individual is of primary importance; in the East, relationships with others are the psychological focal point.

DEFINITION AND CONSEQUENCES OF POWER People are dependent on each other for social and material resources (Emerson, 1962; Mintzberg, 1983). Further, individuals have different amounts of control over others’ access to desired resources because of unequal resource distribution (Fiske, 1993; Fiske & De´pret, 1996). These two concepts, ‘‘dependence’’ and ‘‘control’’, are at the heart of most definitions of power (e.g., Bacharach & Lawler, 1981; Emerson, 1962; Fiske, 1993; Mintzberg, 1983), with many researchers defining power as the capacity to withhold or provide resources and thereby to determine outcomes for oneself and for others (see Fiske, 1993; Keltner et al., 2003; Thibaut & Kelley, 1959). All other things being equal, an individual who has more of a valued resource in a specific situation is less dependent upon and has more control over others who have less of that resource. Because power offers increased control and decreased dependence, we believe that, regardless of culture, power channels behavior toward accomplishing one’s goals in a wide variety of situations. Indeed, there is considerable evidence showing that power increases the link between internal psychological states and observable behavior (Galinsky et al., 2003), suggesting that power allows individuals to satisfy their enduring goals. As a result, individuals who


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experience power are more likely to engage in behaviors that are consistent with currently held goals than those who are powerless and respond to situational opportunities in the pursuit of their goals (Guinote & Trope, 2005). The meaning and consequences of power therefore should depend on culturally specific goals – what individuals strive for in their everyday lives and the goals they hold in specific situations (see also Galinsky et al., 2003; Keltner et al., 2003). In the present research, we are interested in how culture determines the degree or amount of assertive action as a function of the experience of power. We believe the Western research lens has highlighted an action-oriented notion of power, and has failed to capture and frame important cross-cultural differences in the relation between power and assertive action (Belk et al., 1988; Ellis, Kimmel, Dı´ az-Guerrero, Canãs, & Bajo, 1994). Thus, we feel it is particularly important to strip assumptions about assertiveness and action from our conceptualization of power to avoid conflating our independent and dependent variables. According to our theory, power liberates goal-directed behavior, but the East and West differ in their salient and enduring goals, leading to different conceptualizations and consequences of power. In the West, the goals are individually based; as a result power is conceptualized as influence, and therefore power leads to assertive action. In the East, the goals are communally oriented; as a result power is conceptualized as responsibility, and therefore power leads to restraint.

POWER IN THE WEST Conceptualizations of Power: Influence Research in the West has focused theoretically and empirically on power as the ability to influence others. Dahl (1957), for instance, defined power as the ability of one individual to get another to do something he or she does not want to do. Another popular way to think about power was explicated first by Weber (1947) in his statement that power is the probability that one can produce the effects that one intends on the world. In these definitions, power is synonymous with influence. Salancik and Pfeffer (1974) similarly discussed power as the use of influence to obtain benefits. Likewise, power is often operationalized with special focus on individual assertive behavior by having one person exercise influence over another person’s outcomes (e.g., Anderson & Berdahl, 2002; Copeland, 1994; Galinsky et al., 2003; Goodwin, Gubin, Fiske, & Yzerbyt, 2000; Overbeck & Park, 2001; Sachdev & Bourhis, 1985).

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Across a range of Western theorists, then, power is conceptualized in terms of influence. Consequences of Power: Assertive Action This Western conceptualization of power as influence has focused on what it allows the powerful person to do and to accomplish; that is, power is viewed through a lens of individual assertiveness. Consistent with this notion of power, Keltner et al. (2003) made an explicit connection between power and assertive behavior when formulating their power-approach theory, which posits that power is associated with a general state of approach whereas powerlessness is connected to inhibition. Scholars have demonstrated that approach and inhibition are fundamental dimensions of how individuals interact with and respond to the environment (Depue, 1995; Gray, 1982, 1987, 1991, 1994; Sutton & Davidson, 1997). Activation of the behavioral approach system (BAS) is associated with a focus on rewards and the taking of action to seize those rewards, whereas activation of the behavioral inhibition system (BIS) is associated with concern about and vigilant inspection of the environment for threats (Carver & White, 1984; Higgins, 1997). The power-approach theory posits that with increasing power comes increasing activation of the BAS and depression of the BIS (Keltner et al., 2003). Power is correlated with both increased resources (e.g., financial resources, food, attraction, praise) and heightened awareness that one can act at will without interference and with exemption from serious social consequences (Gruenfeld, Keltner, & Anderson, 2003). Acting within reward-rich environments and being unconstrained by others’ evaluations or the consequences of one’s actions, people with power are disposed to elevated levels of approach-related affect, cognition, and behavior in the pursuit of their goals. A number of studies conducted in North America support this contention. Individuals with power focus more on rewards as compared to threats in the environment (Anderson & Berdahl, 2002; Zander & Forward, 1968) than do low-power individuals. Those with power experience and express more positive affect (Anderson & Berdahl, 2002; Keltner, Young, Heerey, Oemig, & Monarch, 1998) and less negative affect (Keltner et al., 2003), and they act in more extraverted ways (Anderson, John, Keltner, & Kring, 2001). At the group and societal level, however, power appears to be a doubleedged sword, producing both positive and negative consequences interpersonally. It has been widely observed that power can produce a host of malfeasant and antisocial consequences, such as aggression (Howard, Blumstein, & Schwartz, 1986; Keltner et al., 2003), sexual harassment


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(Bargh, Raymond, Pryor, & Strack, 1995; Winter & Barenbaum, 1985), and corruption (Chen et al., 2001). However, power can also serve as a beacon of pro-social behavior, increasing generosity in those who are communally disposed (Chen et al., 2001) and motivating contribution to public goods (Galinsky et al., 2003). Although seemingly contradictory, the dual nature of power can be understood by noting a single pattern present across all these findings: the association between power and the taking of assertive action in the service of one’s goals (Galinsky et al., 2003). It would appear that the activation of the BAS, the initiation of approach-related behavior, and the taking of assertive action are all wrapped up in the relationship between power and behavior directed toward satisfying individually based goals. As a result of the predominant goals in Western cultures (independent actors concerned with selfinterested desires), the power-assertive action relationship may in fact be limited to cultures that are characterized by an independent self-construal and individually assertive goals, such as Western cultures.

POWER IN THE EAST Given that Eastern cultures focus on relationships and interconnectedness, both the meaning of power and the consequence of power should be markedly different in Eastern cultures. Because so much of the research on power has been conducted by Western researchers, our discussion of the conceptualization and consequences of power draws more heavily from our theory than it does on empirical support. Conceptualizations of Power: Responsibility Whereas much of the conceptualization of power in the West has been focused on influence, the conceptualization of power in the East is geared toward self-discipline and responsibility toward those without power. Lau Tsu, for example, considers the ability to exercise self-discipline as the greatest form of power. Similar logics can be found in teachings of Confucianism, which considers four hierarchical relationships as the basis of society: the relationship between king and subject, father and son, husband and wife, and elder and younger brother. In each of these relationships, the latter party with less power is expected to conform to the ruling of the more powerful party. Thus, the social structure defined by Confucianism does not require those with power to exercise influence – obedience and submission from low power

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individuals are expected and embedded in hierarchical relationships rather than secured by high-power individuals’ exercise of influence or control. Instead, a balanced society requires the powerful to discipline and restrain their own desires and attend to the needs of those who are dependent on their power and provide care for their welfare. Owing to the influences of these dominant doctrines, we expect power in the East to be associated with a sense of responsibility rather than the ability to influence. Recent empirical research lends some support to the idea that East Asians have a broader sense of responsibility for others than do Westerners, particularly regarding actors who hold power over others, such as CEOs (Maddux & Yuki, 2006). For example, in a vignette involving a CEO firing employees and implementing pay cuts, the Japanese participants took more responsibility for the effects on the employees and their families, while American participants took more responsibility for cutting their own salary. The Japanese also took more responsibility for a very indirect, distal event: a societal crime rate increase a year later, which could have been a result of a large number of people being out of work. Thus, power leads individuals to attend more carefully to culturally specific goals. Consequences of Power: Restraint We believe that two forces produce a power-induced tendency toward restraint among East Asians. First, communal concern for others should sensitize those in power to the potential negative consequences for others of taking assertive action. The goals in these Eastern cultures are animated by a sense of responsibility for others, which should serve as a brake pedal of restraint. Second, as previously mentioned, Taoist philosophers recognized that the universe works harmoniously according to its own laws, and as humans exert their will against the world, they disrupt this natural equilibrium. The chronic concern for preserving social relations (Hofstede, 1980; Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Triandis & Gelfand, 1998) and the reluctance to interfere with natural equilibrium should produce a strong tendency of restraint among East Asians. Compared with individuals from Western cultures, East Asians may refrain from acting assertively because such actions could disrupt their own relationships or the greater social order. As we discuss below this is not to say that East Asians will never take action. Just as power intensifies the default goals – individual influence and communal responsibility – power also solidifies the behavioral defaults. In general, we believe that there is an inaction default among East Asians – all else equal, the default orientation of an East Asian is not to take action


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unless the situation requires otherwise. This contrasts with the Western concept of individual agency, or the tendency to take action unless the situation prohibits it. Since power liberates underlying states and increases goal-directed behavior, the behavior of the powerful in East Asian cultures should be geared less toward assertive action and more toward restraint.

A MODEL OF CULTURE AND POWER The central hypothesis of the chapter is that power facilitates enduring psychological states and goal satisfaction; thus, because chronic social goals tend to differ in the East and West, the relationship between power and action tendencies may also be sensitive to the cultural context. Fig. 1 highlights the different focus on social constraints and consequences by Westerners and East Asians. Independent of power, East Asians show a broader focus that considers social constraints on and consequences of their behaviors compared to Westerners. As mentioned above, power makes individuals truer representations of their culture’s underlying dispositions and desires. As a result, we expect that power leads to an accentuation of cultural differences between individuals. If Westerners think of themselves in individualistic and agentic terms, then the power-assertive action link makes intuitive sense: action is not necessarily dependent on appraisals of how it might affect others. One has the power to act assertively, and one does so. Thus, power experienced by Westerners tends to focus their attention on action in the service of their individual goals and reduce their considerations for social constraints and Westerners East Asians

Assertive Action

Social context

Fig. 1.

Consequences for others

Level of Focus on Social Constraints and Consequences Independent of Power.

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High-Power East Asians

High-Power Westerners

High-Power East Asians

Assertive Action

Social context

Fig. 2.

Consequences for others

Power Narrows Focus Away From Social Constraints and Consequences among Westerners and Broadens this Focus among East Asians.

Culturally Determined Self-Concept Independent vs. Interdependent

+ Conceptualization of Power Influence vs. responsibility

Behavioral Consequences of Power Assertive vs. Restrained

+ Goals Individual vs. Communal

Fig. 3.

Process Model Illustrating that Power Intensifies the Relationship between Culturally Determined Self-Concept/Goals and Behavior.

consequences of the action. However, in cultures where the default tendency is toward restraint and to consider how actions might affect others, being possessed of power intensifies these default tendencies and actually leads to restraint of assertive action. In East Asian cultures, power broadens one’s consideration of situational factors and heightens how one’s behaviors might negatively impact others (see Fig. 2). According to our model (Fig. 3), power strengthens the culturally normative prescriptions for thought and behavioral tendencies. Power increases the salience of the predominant goals and solidifies the default tendencies toward action or inaction. Western cultures, characterized by independent selfconcepts and individualistic concerns, conceptualize power as influence.


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Consequently, the experience of power primarily leads to assertive action. East Asian cultures, characterized by interdependent self-concepts and communal concerns, conceptualize power as responsibility. Rather than producing assertive action, we predict that power experienced by individuals in interdependent cultures will lead to the restraint of assertive action, especially when the action has the potential to adversely affect the lives of others. Response Latencies to Entitlement and Responsibility Words We have begun to explore the meanings of and associations with power that differ across Western and Eastern cultures. One way of exploring whether the goals of a culture determine the conceptualization of power is to explore whether individuals from different cultures demonstrate the same strength of association between the concepts of power on the one hand and those of entitlement and responsibility on the other. The individualistic and agentic nature of Western cultures and the dominating goals of satisfying one’s own needs suggest that activating power in Westerners should increase the accessibility of concepts related to entitlement and reward for these individuals. On the other hand, the primary goals of maintaining and fostering relationships in East Asian cultures means that activating power would increase the accessibility of concepts related to responsibility and dependability for individuals exposed to those cultures. Zhong, Magee, Maddux, and Galinsky (2005) tested the proposition that culture determines meanings of power using a reaction time design. In their study, participants were informed that they were about to engage in a study investigating the ability to detect objects under distracting conditions. Specifically, they were presented with a number of letter strings, and they had to decide whether each string of letters constituted a word or non-word. They were instructed to go through this task as fast and as accurately as possible. At the same time, they were told that light flashes would be presented to distract them. It was pointed out that they should attempt to remain uninfluenced by the light flashes, and to do so, they should concentrate on the focus point that was presented in the center of the screen. The letter strings would occur at exactly the same position. The light flashes actually constituted the power manipulation. The word ‘‘power’’ or ‘‘paper’’ was flashed for 86 ms at one of four positions on the screen. It was immediately masked with a letter string (i.e., ‘‘XX’’) that was presented for 14 ms. Thus, the concept of power was activated outside of conscious awareness when the word ‘‘power’’ was presented (see Bargh & Chartrand, 2000).

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Immediately after the presentation of the masking stimulus (i.e., ‘‘XX’’), a target stimulus was presented and participants had to decide whether it was a word or a non-word. The target stimulus included 4 words that are related to the concept of responsibility (responsibility, duty, obligation, and dependable) and 4 words that are related to the concept of entitlement (deserve, merit, earn, and entitlement), as well as some neutral words and non-words that served as controls. We found that when European-Americans were subliminally primed with power, accessibility of the entitlement words was facilitated, whereas accessibility of the responsibility words was inhibited. These results indicate an association between the concept of power and concepts associated with entitlement in European-Americans. In contrast, when Asians and Asian-Americans were primed with power, their response latencies to entitlement-related words increased whereas their response latencies to responsibility-related words decreased. Response Latencies to Action and Restraint Words We also explored the consequences of power between Western and Eastern cultures by looking at whether power indeed activates an assertive action mental schema for individuals from independent cultures and a restraint schema for people from interdependent cultures. We used a reaction time design as in the first study. We invited participants to perform two different computer tasks. The first task was a manipulation of power, in which participants were asked to perform a word generation task. Participants in the high-power condition were asked to generate 4 words that related to the concept of power; the low-power participants were asked to generate 4 words that related to the concept of subordination. Participants generated words such as ‘authority’ and ‘control’ in the power condition and ‘weak’ and ‘submissive’ in the subordinate condition. In the second task, which immediately followed the first one participants were asked to react as quickly and accurately as possible to whether a string of letters presented on the center of the computer screen was a word or non-word in English. Included in these strings of letters were a number of words that related to assertive action and restraint. There were 5 assertive action words, including change, challenge, oppose, move, and start, and 5 restraint words: hold, restrain, withhold, stay, and cease. For European-Americans, those who received the power prime had shorter response latencies to assertive action-related words and longer response latencies to restraint-related words than those primed with subordination. This


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suggests that activating the concept of power for individuals in independent cultures tends to increase the cognitive accessibility of assertive action-related constructs and to decrease the accessibility of restraint-related constructs. This is consistent with the studies conducted in the West that demonstrated a power-action association (Galinsky et al., 2003; Keltner et al., 2003). For Asians and Asian-Americans, however, this pattern was reversed. Asians and Asian-Americans who received the power prime had shorter response latencies to restraint-related words and longer response latencies to assertive action-related words than those in the control condition. Thus, the experience of power by individuals in interdependent cultures increases the mental accessibility of restraint-related constructs and decreases the accessibility of assertive action-related constructs. A Commons Dilemma: Comparing Asians and Asian-Americans and European-Americans In addition to the reaction time studies, we have demonstrated that power leads to actual restraint behaviors by East Asians. Galinsky et al. (2003) showed that power leads to action regardless of the social consequences of that action. In their study, the powerful compared to low-power and control individuals took more from a common resource, a situation where individuals must decide how much they want to take from a common resource pool. This assertive action by the powerful ultimately exhausted the resource into extinction. Galinsky et al. (2003) considered this evidence supporting the proposition that power leads to assertive action, even when this action can hurt collective interests. However, this study was conducted in a major U.S. city with a predominant Western religion and in which the vast majority of participants were European-American students. If we were to conduct the commons dilemma study using Asian and Asian-American participants, we would expect that high-power Asians and Asian-Americans would not show the same levels of taking from a common resource that Galinsky et al. (2003) demonstrated with high-power European-Americans. If power is associated with restraint for those with an East Asian cultural background, then Asians and AsianAmericans primed with power should take less than Asians and AsianAmericans who are primed with low power. This is in fact what we found in a pilot study (Zhong et al., 2005) with a sample of undergraduate Asians and Asian-Americans at a large Midwestern university. At the beginning of the study, half of the participants were instructed to write about a time when they held a position of power

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(high-power prime). The other half of participants were instructed to write about a time when someone held power over them (low-power prime). As an ostensibly unrelated study, participants were then told that they were to make a choice about how many points (up to a maximum of 10) they wanted to take from an initial, common pool of 100 points. Participants were instructed that the person with the most points from each experimental session would be entered into a lottery to win $50; this was done to induce participants to maximize the incentive to take some points. However, in order to prevent all participants from taking all 10 points, we introduced one major caveat; participants were told that if the entire pool of 100 points was collectively used up, then no one would be eligible to enter the lottery. Since individuals participated in sessions of 12–15 at a time, using up the resource was a distinct possibility if everyone took their maximum. Thus, there was a specific incentive to consider how one’s actions might affect others in determining how many points to take. Overall, the results supported our power-restraint hypothesis: Asians and Asian-Americans primed with high power took less from the commons than those who were primed with low power. The tendency toward action, which in this case served selfish ends, was not observed for Asians and Asian-Americans. This suggests that the default relationship between power and assertive action is not invariant across cultures.

MODERATING FACTORS This work is only the foundation for a rich understanding of the potential behavioral responses that individuals in high- and low-power positions can have in different national cultures. Our data suggest that the default setting – the implicit response – for power-holders from East Asian cultures is one of less assertive action than for power-holders from the West and, at times, one of complete restraint. Yet, we acknowledge that it is unlikely that this relationship persists across all situations in these cultures and to understand the relationship between power and action more completely one must consider the contextual meaning of any particular action as well as who is affected by the action. Our interpretation of why East Asians with power exercise more restraint than their Western counterparts is that their self-concept, embedded in relationships, leaves them with a heightened sense of responsibility for others in their community. When taking action harms community members, as it did in the commons dilemma study we reported, high-power East Asians appear to recognize the consequences their action will have on others and


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refrain from depleting the commons. Consider an alternative scenario: a public goods dilemma, in which the taking of action (making contributions to the shared resource) improves collective well-being. If, on the one hand, the community affected by contributions to the public good was one in which an East Asian power-holder felt deeply embedded, she might be bold in action, relative to a powerful Westerner, to insure the livelihood of the collective. This would also be consistent with the notion that East Asians are more prevention-focused than Westerners (Lee et al., 2000). When action prevents harm to people for whom they feel responsible, high-power East Asians should be especially action-oriented. On the other hand, if the community in possession of the public good was composed of individuals with whom an East Asian power-holder felt no connection, then her chance of taking actions would likely be no greater or possibly even lower than those of a high-power individual from a Western culture. Consideration of these scenarios suggests that the sense of connectedness and related variables, such as the social categories of others whom one’s behavior could affect (Yuki, Maddux, Brewer, & Takemura, 2005), are important moderating factors in the relationship between power, culture, and action. When power is conceptualized as responsibility, whether assertive action is taken or restraint rules the day will be determined by how action by the powerful will impact the powerless. In contrast to our theory and data on East Asians’ behavior, Westerners’ action appears to be driven by a conceptualization of power as connected to entitlement. When a Western power-holder feels particularly entitled, the tendency to be assertive and take forceful action compared to Eastern power-holders should be magnified. One interesting implication of this reasoning is that the longer someone has power in the West, the more entitled she may feel, and the bolder she may become.

CONCLUSION With the benefit of the cross-cultural perspective, researchers are now more aware of the complexities of how the mind works and how adaptable psychological processes are to different cultural surroundings. As a result, it has become increasingly important for research to explicitly consider the extent to which any given phenomenon may be bound by culture. In this chapter we set out to provide evidence for the moderating effect of culture on the link between power and action. Our central hypothesis is that Western and East Asian cultures differ fundamentally in the goals they

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prescribe, in the way power is conceptualized, and in the type of behavior in which the powerful engage. We reviewed evidence that power tends to facilitate behavior that serves the salient goals of the individual; that is, power increases goal-directed responses. For western cultural backgrounds with their independent self-construals, the salient goals are individualistic, whereas for individuals from East Asian cultural backgrounds with interdependent self-construals, the predominant goals are collectivistic. In addition, power is conceptually linked to influence in the West but to responsibility in the East. Therefore power should increase assertive action among Westerners but produce restraint among East Asians. This is indeed what we found across several preliminary studies: the enactment and expression of power is inextricably linked to and moderated by culture.

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A MODEL OF PATERNALISTIC ORGANIZATIONAL CONTROL AND GROUP CREATIVITY Jing Zhou ABSTRACT In this chapter, I develop a model concerning effects of paternalistic organizational control on group creativity. I develop the model on the basis of a diverse set of literatures, including research on individual and group creativity, paternalistic leadership, self-systems theory, and its implications for impact of choice on intrinsic motivation. According to this model, (a) paternalistic organizational control enhances work group creativity for groups in the East; (b) the impact of paternalistic organizational control on group creativity is mediated by groups’ intrinsic motivation; and (c) national culture (i.e., East versus West) moderates the relationship between organizational control and group intrinsic motivation (and subsequently, group creativity) in such a way that organizational control would enhance intrinsic motivation (and creativity) for groups in the East, but it would inhibit intrinsic motivation (and creativity) for groups in the West. Commentators argue that with the advancement of new technology, the changing nature of work, and with the intense competition in the international National Culture and Groups Research on Managing Groups and Teams, Volume 9, 75–94 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1534-0856/doi:10.1016/S1534-0856(06)09004-9

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business environment, we are at the beginning of a ‘‘creative economy’’ (BusinessWeek, 2005). In the ‘‘creative economy’’, one of the key drivers for companies’ survival and growth is creativity exhibited by their employees. Consequently, management research has made substantial progress in understanding the factors that facilitate or inhibit employee creativity (see Amabile, 1996; Shalley, Zhou, & Oldham, 2004, for reviews). Although more and more employees work in groups, relatively less research has been conducted on work group creativity (Shalley et al., 2004). Moreover, even less research has been done on group creativity in non-Western countries. Because most research has been done in the West concerning what factors influence employee creativity at the individual level of analysis, it might be problematic to directly borrow findings documented in this literature to inform us on how to manage group creativity in Eastern countries (Shin & Zhou, 2003). For example, a robust finding in the individual employee creativity literature is that autonomy has a positive impact on creativity, presumably through enhancing employees’ intrinsic motivation, which is theorized to foster creativity (Amabile, 1996). However, recent research in social psychology revealed that the positive effect of autonomy or choice on intrinsic motivation is not equal across cultures. Specially, Iyengar and Lepper (1999) found that Asian American (i.e., Chinese, Japanese, and Vietnamese) school children performed better and were more intrinsically motivated when they believed that their mother – an authoritative figure – chose the experimental task and materials for them than the children who made these choices themselves. These results concerning differential effects of autonomy on intrinsic motivation leads to an interesting question: Will paternalistic organizational control, enhance or restrict creativity, especially group creativity? In the pages that follow, I will develop a conceptual model concerning how paternalistic organizational control affects group creativity in organizations. Paternalistic organizational control is defined as the extent to which top management has control and influence over work groups’ personnel (e.g., designation of group leaders and promotion of group members) and task arrangements (e.g., selection of projects, use of budget or funding, and acquisition of material and equipment). Although few previous studies have examined the impact of paternalistic organizational control on creativity, prior research suggests that top management or leadership behaviors have substantial influence on employee creativity (Shin & Zhou, 2003). The conceptual model will be formulated on the basis of a review of literatures on creativity, paternalistic leadership, and the self-systems theory developed by Markus and Kitayama (1991). The premise of the model developed

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in this chapter is that paternalistic organizational control positively affects work groups’ collective intrinsic motivation in the East rather than in the West. Intrinsic motivation, in turn, positively affects group creativity. This model seeks to contribute to the employee creativity literature in at least three ways. First, it introduces the construct of paternalistic organizational control. Second, it theorizes the motivational mechanism through which organizational control exert positive impact on group creativity. And finally, from a research method standpoint, the development of the theoretical model, especially the key construct of paternalistic organizational control, follows an ‘‘indigenous approach’’ to research involving international management (Yang, Hwang, & Kim, in press). More specially, whereas much of previous theorizing and research in this area has often taken a ‘‘generalizability approach’’ in which theories developed in the West especially in the U.S. are tested in countries with a non-Western culture to see whether they still hold in a different cultural context. Alternatively, research has also taken a ‘‘comparative approach’’ in which, for example, data are collected from countries from the West and the East, and comparisons are made to see whether there are systematic differences in employees’ attitudes and behavior between the West and the East. In contrast, the ‘‘indigenous approach’’, taken in the present theory development, focuses on identifying constructs specifically relevant and prominent in, for example, a cultural context in the East, and theorizing the relationships among these constructs (e.g., Farh, Earley, & Lin, 1997). In doing so, this approach allows researchers to discover unique constructs and theoretical relationships that would otherwise not be attended to because they would not be characteristic of organizations operating in the West.

RESEARCH ON INDIVIDUAL AND GROUP CREATIVITY IN THE WORKPLACE To set the stage for developing the model of paternalistic organizational control and group creativity, in this section, I will provide a selective and relevant review of theorizing and research in the areas of individual and group creativity in the workplace. I will start with a definition of group creativity. Group Creativity Defined Consistent with the creativity literature (Amabile, 1988; Woodman, Sawyer, & Griffin, 1993), in this paper I define group creativity as the production of

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novel and potentially useful ideas, products, services, processes, or knowledge by a small group or employees working together. Here I use the term ‘‘group creativity’’ instead of ‘‘team creativity’’ intentionally. Some researchers (e.g., Salas, Dickinson, Converse, & Tannenbauem, 1992) emphasize the need to differentiate groups from teams. They suggest that the term ‘‘team’’ should be used when there is a high level of task interdependence among a collective of employees working together, whereas the term ‘‘group’’ should be used when task interdependence is relatively low. In this chapter I use the term ‘‘group creativity’’ to represent creativity exhibited by both group and team with varying degrees of interdependence. That is, a group of employees can produce creative ideas in many different ways; they could work highly interdependently or have low levels of interdependence. For example, a task force could be assembled together to brainstorm ideas for solving a particular problem. In this case the employees work closely and interdependently together toward a common goal, and once the goal is accomplished the group ceases to exist. As another example, a research and development group could be put together in a certain area of science or technological research and development (e.g., image processing). This group of employees could stay together as an intact ‘‘unit’’ over a relatively long period of time (e.g., several years or even decades), working on different projects either highly interdependently or somewhat independently, depending on the complexity, duration, and scope of the projects. When they work highly interdependently, each individual group member may have equal involvement or contribution to different routes of creative idea generation. Routes refer to avenues through which creativity in organizations comes into being (Zhou & George, 2003). More specifically, Zhou and George (2003) suggest that there are five routes essential for creative idea production: identifying a problem or an opportunity, gathering information, generating ideas, evaluating and modifying ideas, and implementing ideas. After reviewing research on the creative process, these researchers concluded that while all five routes are essential for creativity, they do not necessarily unfold linearly or in a particular predetermined sequence. Relevant to our definition of group creativity is the fact that group members could have equal involvement and contribution to all five routes of creative idea generation. Alternatively, their involvement and contribution are equal but they do not interact with each other intensively while making the contributions. Yet another possible alternative is that different group members make different contributions to different routes of creative idea generation. Finally, it is possible that different group members work on different sub-projects. Although they


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offer input to other members’ projects when needed, they largely complete their sub-projects in an independent fashion. The above discussion concerning different ways in which groups produce creative ideas provide implications for measuring group creativity. To capture the true level of creativity exhibited by an intact work group, it is necessary to take all modes of creative idea production discussed above into consideration. One way to do this is to specify a time period that by objective criteria (e.g., the entire duration of a taskforce) or, in the absence of any objective criteria, by researchers’ subjective judgment is reasonable given the goal of the research. After specifying the time period, and when objective measures of creativity are available, the researchers can collect the objective creative outputs generated by groups during that time period or subjective ratings of group creativity by knowledgeable parties. (For a more detailed discussion on objective and subjective measures of creativity, see Zhou & Shalley, 2003.) For example, Pelz and Andrews (1966) collected data on number of patents obtained by work groups in a three-year period prior to data collection. Research on Group Creativity Shalley et al. (2004) reviewed the employee group creativity literature. The review led them to make two important conclusions. One, they found that only limited theorizing and research have been conducted in the area of employee group creativity. Although a large body of literature exists on group brainstorming, this literature may be informative to research on creativity in employee groups, by definition employee creativity is conceptually different from some of the brainstorming research conducted in the behavioral laboratory. More specifically, the definition of employee creativity emphasizes both the novelty and usefulness aspect of creative idea production, whereas research on brainstorming typically records fluency and quantity of ideas generated as creativity. Therefore, compared with workplace creativity which must take usefulness into consideration, research on brainstorming tends to emphasize or measure only the novelty dimension of creativity. In addition, the composition and processes of on-going employee groups in work organizations may be quite different from those experienced by college student ad hoc groups assembled for a short period of time in the behavioral laboratory. Two, they found that the input–process–output framework is useful in guiding theorizing and research in this area. More specifically, the inputprocess-output framework posits that a group’s creative output is a direct

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result of the group’s processes, which are influenced by input made by either the group members or external agents to the group. On the basis of this review, they called for more theoretical and empirical work to be carried out to describe and predict what factors are positively related to group creativity. The goal of this paper is to formulate a model concerning effects of paternalistic organizational control on group creativity. The development of this model is greatly informed by research on individual creativity in the workplace. I now turn to a briefly overview of that body of research. Research on Individual Employee Creativity: The Central Role of Intrinsic Motivation In contrast to the relatively slow pace of progress made in research on work groups’ creativity, research on creativity exhibited by individual employees has grown rather rapidly (Shalley et al., 2004). Much of this research has been guided by an intrinsic motivation perspective. Intrinsic motivation refers to the motivation state that individuals experience when they are interested in and excited by the work task themselves, instead of seeing completing the work tasks as a means toward getting something outside the tasks (Deci & Ryan, 1985). According to this perspective, when individuals are motivated by the tasks themselves, the individuals tend to be willing to devote high levels of cognitive energy to the tasks, to be playful with ideas, and to be persistent when faced with obstacles and setbacks (Amabile, 1996; Oldham & Cummings, 1996; Shalley, 1991; Zhou, 1998). All these motivational forces are theorized to lead to high levels of creativity. Thus, intrinsic motivation is a key ingredient for individual creativity (Amabile, 1988). In addition, this perspective posits that contextual and organizational factors can substantially boost or reduce employees’ intrinsic motivation (Amabile, 1988). Key contextual and organizational factors examined in previous research included leadership (Shin & Zhou, 2003; Tierney, Farmer, & Graen, 1999) and supervisory behaviors (George & Zhou, 2001; Oldham & Cummings, 1996; Zhou, 2003). Among field studies, only the Shin and Zhou (2003) study directly tested the theorized psychological mechanism – intrinsic motivation. The study demonstrated that intrinsic motivation partially mediated the relationship between transformational leadership and creativity. Although many studies did not directly test whether intrinsic motivation was a mediator, results obtained in those studies were largely consistent with theoretical predictions derived from the intrinsic motivation perspective (Shalley et al., 2004).


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To summarize, research on individual employees’ creativity suggests that intrinsic motivation is key to actual creativity, and that contextual factors such as leadership can facilitate or inhibit creativity via intrinsic motivation. Although the vast majority of research applying the intrinsic motivation theory to creativity has been conducted in the West, the Shin and Zhou (2003) study, which obtained a positive association between intrinsic motivation and creativity (correlation coefficient ¼ 0.19, po0.05), was conducted in an Eastern country – Korea. Thus, there is reason to believe that in both the East and the West, intrinsic motivation leads to creativity. However, the manner in which intrinsic motivation can be boosted may differ between the East and the West. I argue that in the East, intrinsic motivation would be boosted by paternalistic organizational control, whereas in the West it would be reduced by this variable. Next, I will first review theorizing and research on paternalistic leadership, a concepts that was originated in the East, followed by a review of self-systems theory and its implications for the relationship between paternalistic organizational control and intrinsic motivation.

PATERNALISTIC LEADERSHIP Empirical and theoretical work on paternalistic leadership has gained momentum in recent years, perhaps because its importance in the East has been recognized by more and more researchers. Farh and Cheng (2000) and Aycan (in press) are two representative pieces in this area of research. Paternalistic Leadership: Using the Chinese Context as an Illustration Farh and Cheng (2000) presented an integrated review of paternalistic leadership in overseas Chinese family businesses, and analyzed the cultural roots of this type of leadership. Because China is a prototypical country in the East, the Farh and Cheng paper is quite informative. Relevant to the present paper are two points made by Farh and Cheng (2000). The first point is concerned with the general research methodology. They note that much of leadership research in Chinese organizations involved translating measurement instruments of leadership behaviors from English to Chinese. These instruments were grounded in the leadership literature built in the West, especially in the U.S. After being translated into Chinese, they would then be used in studies that were designed to test the generalizability of Western theories in the East (e.g., China). Farh and Cheng argued that there are substantial differences between the cultural

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contexts in the East and the West. Thus, testing Western theories can only provide evidence concerning boundary conditions of extant leadership theories developed in the West. They suggest that a complementary and perhaps more fruitful avenue of research is to develop indigenous concepts and theories specifically for the Chinese context. The second point is concerned with the concept of paternalistic leadership. Farh and Cheng (2000) define paternalistic leadership as ‘‘y a fatherlike leadership style in which clear and strong authority is combined with concern and considerateness and elements of moral leadership y .’’ (p. 85). They point out that this type of leadership is widely used in overseas Chinese family businesses. In fact, their preliminary survey of employees in China indicated that employees expected and responded positively to this type of leadership. Paternalism: An East and West Comparison Consistent with Farh and Cheng, Aycan (in press) suggests that paternalism includes both control and care. Translating this duality into the workplace, Aycan argues that paternalistic leaders or superiors provide their employees with care, protection, and guidance. In return, the employees are expected to fulfill their obligation in this relationship by being loyal and deferent to the leaders or superiors. Whereas Farh and Cheng’s research on paternalistic leadership focused only on the Chinese context in an attempt to uncover the richness and complexity of this concept, Aycan (in press) takes a broader theoretical perspective. More specifically, she argues that although paternalism is an indigenous concept originated in the East and continues to play a significant role there, it is relevant to both the East and the West. By ‘‘East’’, she refers to countries in Asia, Latin America, and the Middle-East whose national cultural values are characterized as highly traditional, hierarchical, and collectivistic. In contrast, in her terminology ‘‘West’’ refers to countries in North American, Western and Northern Europe whose national cultural values are characterized as highly industrialized, egalitarian, and individualistic. By situating this concept in both the Eastern and the Western countries, Aycan may have foregone the opportunity to uncover the richness and complexity of this concept in a particular national context. However, her approach would allow her to ground this concept in the larger literature on cross-cultural similarities and differences in relationships at work, thereby facilitating comparative research comparing effects of paternalistic leadership on work outcomes in the East and the West.


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In particular, Aycan grounded the paternalism concept in Hofstede’s (1980) framework. She maintains that paternalism is likely to be positive and desirable in countries that have cultural values characterized by high levels of collectivism and large power distance (i.e., countries in the East). In contrast, it is likely to carry a negative tone and results in negative work outcomes in countries that have cultural values characterized by low levels of collectivism and small power distance (i.e., countries in the West). According to Hofstede (1980), collectivism ‘‘is characterized by a tight social framework in which people distinguish between ingroups and outgroups, they expect their ingroup to look after them, and in exchange for that they feel they owe absolute loyalty to it’’ (p. 45). On the other hand, individualism refers to ‘‘a loosely knit social framework in which people are supposed to take care of themselves and of their immediate families only’’ (p. 45). In addition to individualism-collectivism, another key dimension in Hofstede’s (1980) framework is power distance. It refers to ‘‘the extent to which a society accepts the fact that power in institutions and organizations is distributed unequally’’ (p. 45). In sum, Aycan (in press) situates the concept of paternalism at the intersection of collectivism and power distance. Because countries in the East can be roughly categorized as having high collectivism and large power distance, and those in the West may be loosely categorized as having high individualism and small power distance, following her analysis an East– West comparison of effects of paternalism becomes possible. Because the central concern of the present chapter is on group creativity, and because the creativity literature suggests that group intrinsic motivation is a key ingredient for group creativity, it would be necessary to examine effects of paternalism-related concepts on intrinsic motivation. For this purpose, I now turn to a review and discussion on a major distinction between the East and the West: self-construals delineated in the self-systems theory, especially the implications of this theory for relationships between paternalistic organizational control and intrinsic motivation.

SELF-SYSTEMS THEORY: ITS IMPLICATION FOR CHOICE AND EFFECTS OF PATERNALISTIC ORGANIZATIONAL CONTROL Self-construals are building blocks governing social relationships among individuals, and they have significant motivational, cognitive, and emotional consequences. On the basis of previous theory and research in psychology

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and anthropology, Markus and Kitayama (1991) contend that individuals in different cultures have substantially different self-construals. These differences are especially profound when one compares East Asian cultures represented by the Japanese, and Chinese cultures with Western cultures represented by the American culture. More specifically, whereas people representing the predominate culture in the U.S. as well as many European countries tend to hold self-construals that highlight individuals’ independence and uniqueness from others, East Asians’ self-construals emphasize one’s interdependence with others, particularly one’s interconnectedness and belongingness with one’s social in-groups. Thus, according to Markus and Kitayama, there are two distinctly different types of self-construals – independent self-construals commonly seen in the U.S. and interdependent selfconstruals held by East Asians. And different types of self-construals result in different nature and processes of motivation, cognition, and emotion. Particularly relevant to the present paper is the notion that East Asians’ self-construals are interdependent in nature. The self does not exist in isolation. Instead, one is an integral part of a social entity and thus the self can only be appropriately and meaningfully defined as part of certain social relationships. After an individual is defined as part of a social relationship, he or she will is motivated to fit in the relationship properly by fulfilling his or her obligations defined in this relationship. Using self-systems theory, Iyengar and Lepper (1999) investigated effects of choice on intrinsic motivation. They reasoned that for independent selves, having personal choice would lead to higher intrinsic motivation than not having such a choice. In contrast, for interdependent selves, having choices made for them by trusted authority figures or peers would make them most intrinsically motivated. Results of their studies largely supported these theoretical predictions. As mentioned earlier in this chapter, the results of this set of studies suggest that for interdependent selves, paternalistic organizational control would enhance their intrinsic motivation, whereas for independent selves it would diminish their intrinsic motivation. Similar to the authority figures who made choice for the participants in Iyengar and Lepper’s (1999) studies, paternalistic organizational control represents authority figures (i.e., leaders or top management in an organization), making choices for their employees. For employees with interdependent self-construals (e.g., employees commonly seen in the East), experiencing paternalistic organizational control would enhance their intrinsic motivation toward the chosen task. In contrast, for employees with independent self-construals (e.g., employees commonly seen in the West), such experiences would tend to diminish their intrinsic motivation.


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As suggested above, the self-systems theory and the Iyengar and Lepper studies focus on the individual level of analysis. In addition, the above analysis concerning the relationship between paternalistic organizational control and employee intrinsic motivation focus on the top management– employee dyad. Nevertheless, the same logic can be applied to the group level of analysis. Consider, for example, a group of employees in the East. Because the group members each has interdependent self-construals, aggregating this tendency to the group level, it is conceivable that the group as an entity is also interdependent in nature when one considers this group’s relationship with top management. As a collective entity, the group as a whole would have a high level of collective intrinsic motivation when top management exerts paternalistic organizational control. On the other hand, when a group of employees in the West experiences paternalistic organizational control, the group’s collective intrinsic motivation will be reduced. Thus, taken together, the impact of paternalistic organizational control on the group’s intrinsic motivation parallels the influence of paternalistic organizational control on individual employees’ intrinsic motivation. Drawing from aforementioned theory and research in diverse sources including literatures on employee creativity, self-systems theory, and paternalistic leadership, I next formulate a model of group creativity.

TOWARD A MODEL OF PATERNALISTIC ORGANIZATIONAL CONTROL AND GROUP CREATIVITY On the basis of the theoretical viewpoints reviewed above, in this section I develop a model concerning effects of paternalistic organizational control on group creativity. Fig. 1 is a graphic representation of this model. Effects of Paternalistic Organizational Control on Group Creativity Recall that at the beginning of this chapter, paternalistic organizational control was defined as the extent to which an organization exerts influence on its work groups’ personnel (e.g., the designation of the group leader and the promotion of the group members) and task arrangements (e.g., the selection of project topics, utilization of allocated funding, and acquisition of equipment) (Carroll, 1967; Fischer, Blackmon, & Woodward, 1990; Kowalewska, 1979; Tannenbaum, 1968). This construct is rooted in paternalism and paternalistic leadership (e.g., Aycan, in press; Farh & Cheng, 2000)

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Paternalistic Organizational Control

Group Intrinsic Motivation

Group Creativity

National Culture (East vs. West)

Fig. 1.

A Model of Effects of Paternalistic Organizational Control on Group Creativity.

reviewed earlier in this chapter. Paternalism and related concepts have been discussed in various literatures ranging from political science, philosophy, sociology, to business and management (for an extensive description see Aycan, in press). However, there is not yet a consensus in management research on exactly what dimensions the construct of paternalistic organizational control entails. For the purposes of this chapter, I follow common elements in theorizing and research by Aycan (in press) and Farh and Cheng (2000) in arguing that paternalistic organizational control includes both control and care. Therefore, the paternalistic organizational construct as defined in this chapter is closely related to the benevolent paternalism dimension identified by Aycan and the benevolence dimension identified by Farh and Cheng. Because groups operate in the context of the organization (Gladstein, 1984), organizational factors should affect group processes, which, in turn, affect group creativity (Woodman et al., 1993). Organizational control is likely to be such a factor (Fischer et al., 1990; Rosner, 1968; Tannenbaum, 1968). Unfortunately, little research has directly examined this possibility. The literature developed in the West would suggest that when the organization has a great deal of control over how to conduct the group task (e.g., selecting topics and using funds) and the promotion of group members, it takes the sense of ownership and choice away from the group. Consequently, the group members may be reluctant to develop and use work strategies and may lose interest in external information exchange. Thus, a seemingly straightforward prediction is organizational control negatively affects group creativity. However, the above arguments are largely based on empirical data from Western countries such as the U.S. (e.g., Amabile, Conti, Coon, Lazenby, &


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Herron, 1996; Pelz & Andrews, 1966), and directly generalizing them to work groups in the East may prove to be premature. As suggested earlier, for work groups and their top management in the East, their relationship is characterized by power differentials and mutual obligations: subordinate work groups should respect, trust, and obey authorities (e.g., top management), and authorities should provide direction and structure for the groups. Therefore, in the East, work groups may actually expect a great deal of control from the top management of the organization. When management does exhibit controls, the groups may interpret this ‘‘control from above’’ as coaching and mentoring, because top management is paying attention to their groups and providing directions, thereby fulfilling the management’s obligation of taking care of their subordinates. Consequently, the groups’ collective intrinsic motivation is boosted. As suggested by the creativity literature (e.g., Amabile, 1988), intrinsic motivation leads to creativity. Thus, I propose: Proposition 1. Groups in the East will exhibit higher levels of creativity when their organizations exert more control than when organizations exert less control. Mediating Role of Group Intrinsic Motivation To develop a complete understanding of the relationship between paternalistic organizational control and group creativity, it would be necessary to identify the intervening psychological or group processes that explain the aforementioned positive impact of paternalistic organizational control on group creativity. Essentially, the above discussion suggests that the positive impact of paternalistic organizational control on groups’ creativity is due to the fact that paternalistic organizational control enhances groups’ intrinsic motivation. Consistent with the motivation and creativity literatures (e.g., Amabile, 1988; Ambrose & Kulik, 1999), groups’ intrinsic motivation is defined as group members’ collective direction, effort, and persistence toward creative endeavors. This group-level construct is analogous to intrinsic motivation as an individual-level construct. However, a group cannot directly experience intrinsic motivation per se; as a psychological mechanism, intrinsic motivation is experienced by individual group members. Thus, group intrinsic motivation may be measured by taking average of individual group members’ self-report intrinsic motivation. It may also be measured by asking key group members to report the general level of intrinsic motivation present in

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the group. If these key informants’ reports demonstrate reasonable agreement, their reports can then be summed or averaged to create a measure of group intrinsic motivation. These two types of equally acceptable measures represent the additive model and the direct consensus model, respectively, defined in the multilevel research. More specifically, Chan (1998, p. 236) points out that an addictive model is one in which ‘‘higher level unit is a summation of the lower level units regardless of the variance among these units’’. And a direct consensus model is one in which the ‘‘meaning of higher level construct is in the consensus among lower level units’’. When a group has a high level of intrinsic motivation, the group members’ attention is directed toward coming up with new and appropriate ideas, they put forth great effort, and they stay engaged and being persistent when faced with obstacles. The large body of literature on individual employee creativity, the central tenet of which was briefly summarized earlier in this paper, has established that intrinsic motivation is a key ingredient for creativity to occur (Shalley et al., 2004). Amabile (1988) has affirmed that parallel effects of intrinsic motivation on creativity holds at the group level as well. In addition, employees often make sense of their work by taking cues from their social environment (Wrzesniewski, Dutton, & Debebe, 2003). Their motivation toward work tasks are also shaped by their social and organizational environment. For work groups in the East, paternalistic organizational control may serve as cues to indicate that their groups’ work is important and valuable, and that their organizations administrators and leaders have high expectation for them and trust that they are capable of successfully producing creative work. These practices from the organization send signal to the groups that the management and leaders are fulfilling their part of the mutual obligation, and should be seen as cues inviting the groups to fulfill their part of the mutual obligation. Work groups in the East are motivated to do so. Thus, overall, paternalistic organizational control should enhance groups’ intrinsic motivation in countries in the East. And it is intrinsic motivation, in turn, that propels groups to exhibit high levels of creativity. Consequently, I propose: Proposition 2. In the East, group intrinsic motivation will mediate the relationship between paternalistic organizational control and group creativity. Moderating Role of National Culture Throughout the foregoing discussions, I implied that paternalistic organizational control would have different impact on group intrinsic motivation


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and subsequently group creativity for groups in the East and the West. Whereas Propositions 1 and 2 would apply to work groups in the East, the aforementioned discussions suggest that groups in the West will experience the opposite effects. Consequently, I propose: Proposition 3a. National culture will moderate the relationship between paternalistic organizational control and group intrinsic motivation in such a way that high levels of paternalistic organizational control will boost group intrinsic motivation for groups working in the East, and diminish group intrinsic motivation for groups working in the West. Proposition 3b. National culture will moderate the relationship between paternalistic organizational control and group creativity in such a way that high levels of paternalistic organizational control will results in greater group creativity for groups working in the East, and results in less creativity for groups in the West. Proposition 3c. Group intrinsic motivation will mediate the moderated relationships among paternalistic organizational control, national culture, and group creativity.

DISCUSSION Drawing from a diverse set of literatures, in this paper, I have developed a model that posits that paternalistic organizational control fosters group creativity in East instead of the West. In addition, the model postulates that the positive influence of organizational control on group creativity is via elevating groups’ intrinsic motivation. This model contributes to the creativity literature by being the first one depicting differential effects of a concept rooted in the East on group creativity for work groups in the East and the West. In addition to calling for future research to test and refine this model, I suggest that this model could also stimulate researchers to explore additional avenues of theorizing and research along this line of inquiry. One possibility for future theorizing and research is concerned with whether paternalistic organizational control will work in the same fashion on groups with collective interdependent self-construals working in companies operating in the West as in the East. Previous research has shown that influence of cultural values on attitudes and behavior could be influenced by the situation one is in. For example, Haberstroh, Oyserman, Schwarz, Kuhnen, and Ji (2002) found that after being primed with interdependent

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self-construals, individuals with chronic independent self-construals (i.e., Germans) could exhibit similar patterns of behaviors on a judgment task as individuals with chronic interdependent self-construals. Applying this logic to groups with chronic interdependent self-construals, it is conceivable that they can be primed with independent self-construals. If this turns out to be the case, then one might follow the logical deduction that groups with chronic interdependent self-construals working in the West may be primed so that they hold independent self-construals in the workplace in the West. Consequently, paternalistic organizational control will not have any positive effects on them when they work in the West. Following the same logic, therefore, it is conceivable that groups with high levels of collective interdependent self-construals will respond favorably to paternalistic organizational control by exhibiting great creativity only in the East. If those groups were moved to the U.S., for instance, paternalistic organizational control would not exert similar impact on those groups’ creativity. In addition, groups engage in social comparison through which they reach conclusions with regard to whether they are treated justly and fairly. To the extent that leadership in an organization exerts paternalistic organizational control only to certain groups but not other groups, for example, using paternalistic organizational control only on a group of scientists from the East, but not on groups comprised of scientists from the West; the group from the East may feel that they are being treated unfairly and hence will not respond favorably by being more creative. Future research is needed to examine these interesting possibilities. Comparison with Relevant Theories Several major creativity theories have discussed issues related to group creativity. For example, in her seminal work, Amabile (1988, 1996) identifies key components that contribute to an individual’s creativity. In addition, she specifies how these components play a role in a series of stages (i.e., problem identification, preparation, response generation, response validation and communication, and outcome) through which a creative idea or response is produced. Relevant to group creativity is the fact that she suggests that the same set of stages may be applicable to creativity at the group level. Little systematic research has been conducted to test whether groups go through these stages to produce creative outcomes. Extending Amabile’s earlier work, Amabile and associates (1996) developed a questionnaire to measure individuals’ perceptions of work environments


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relevant to their creativity. They took a ‘‘total-work-environment level of analysis’’ (p. 1157) approach and measured individuals’ perceptions of their coworkers, supervisors, upper management, and the organization as a whole in affecting their creativity. For validation purposes, they then linked these perceptions to pre-identified group projects rated as high or low on creativity. As emphasized above, the central concern of the present chapter is creativity at the group level of analysis. In another creativity theory, Woodman et al. (1993) posit that individual characteristics, group characteristics, and organizational characteristics affect creativity. Based on a review of a diverse body of literatures, including theory and research on the effectiveness of research groups, on group problem solving, brainstorming and performance, and on task design, Woodman et al. argue that group characteristics include norms, cohesiveness, size, diversity, roles, task, and problem-solving approaches. Different from Woodman et al.’s model, however, the present model underscores paternalistic organizational control as a key and positive factor in the East. In addition, whereas the Woodman et al. model includes characteristics at individual, group, and organizational levels, the present study focuses on the group level. In sum, the present model is different from prior creativity models in that it is a group level model. It is based on contemporary research in cultural psychology, this model highlights the positive role of paternalistic organizational control in promoting group intrinsic motivation and creativity in the East. As such, it is particularly useful for an understanding of how and why groups produce creative output in the East versus in the West. Implications for Future Research I now discuss a few issues related to how best to test the proposed model. Field research. To test this model, especially to let the theorized effects of paternalistic organizational control and group processes to manifest fully, it if preferable to conduct field studies with intact work groups in organizations. Measurement. It is also desirable to collect data from multiple sources. In particular, it is preferable to measure paternalistic organizational control by directly asking administrators or top executives of organizations the extent to which they exert control over their work groups. On the other hand, researchers are advised to measure groups’ intrinsic motivation by one of two ways. One, they could measure group intrinsic motivation by aggregating group members’ self-reported intrinsic motivation. Alternatively,

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they could obtain a measure of group intrinsic motivation by asking key informants to describe the general level of intrinsic motivation present at the group, and then taking average of their responses. Finally, groups’ creative output can be measured by ratings from knowledgeable experts including supervisors and group members, and by collecting archival data if possible (see Zhou & Shalley, 2003, for a discussion on ratings versus objective or archival measures of creativity). A seemingly ideal approach to test the model is to use a longitudinal research design in which data are collected at three stages over time. At the first stage, measure paternalistic organizational control. At the second stage, measure intrinsic motivation. At the third stage, measure group creativity. This approach has a temporal sequence that matches the sequence depicted in the model, and hence may be the preferred approach by some researchers. Note, however, that this approach is not without problems and limitations. One potential problem is associated with the difficulty of determining the appropriate time intervals between each of these three stages. If a chosen interval is short, not enough time may have elapsed to allow the variable measured at one stage to exert its theorized effect on the variable(s) measured at the next stage or to give enough time to allow the effect manifest. On the other hand, if a chosen interval is long, it might be too long in the sense that the effect of a variable measured at a previous stage has substantially waned by the time its theorized outcome variable is measured at the current stage. In addition, choosing too long an interval increases the possibility that some unmeasured variables interfere, interrupt, or exert other unknown influences on the theorized relationship between the two measured variables, which would make the observed relationship deviate from the theorized relationship in unknown ways. Moreover, it is difficult to determine whether the three time intervals separating the three data collection stages should be equal to one another or whether some intervals should be longer than the others. Last, but not the least, creative endeavors or projects conducted in organizational sometimes do not have a clear starting and ending time, and sometimes they unfold over an extended period of time (Zhou & Shalley, 2003). This possibility, together with all the problems and limitations identified in the preceding paragraph, poses tremendous challenges to longitudinal research design. Thus, there is not necessarily one approach to study group creativity that is far superior than all the other approaches and research designs. To truly understanding group creativity, it is best to value all types of studies involving different methods and design (e.g., longitudinal, cross-sectional, or laboratory design), and let the research evidence accumulate over time.


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REFERENCES Amabile, T. M. (1988). A model of creativity and innovation in organizations. In: B. M. Staw, & L. L. Cummings (Eds), Research in organizational behavior (Vol. 10, pp. 123–167). Greenwich, CT: JAI Press. Amabile, T. M. (1996). Creativity in context. Boulder, CO: Westview. Amabile, T. M., Conti, R., Coon, H., Lazenby, J., & Herron, M. (1996). Assessing the work environment for creativity. Academy of Management Journal, 39, 1154–1184. Ambrose, M. L., & Kulik, C. T. (1999). Old friends, new faces: Motivation research in the 1990s. Journal of Management, 25, 231–292. Aycan, Z. (in press). Paternalism: Towards conceptual refinement and operationalization. In: K. S. Yang, K. K. Hwang, & U. Kim (Eds), Scientific advances in indigenous psychologies: Empirical, philosophical, and cultural contributions. London: Cambridge University Press. BusinessWeek. (2005). Special report: Get creative! How to build innovative companies. Business Week, August. Carroll, J. (1967). A note on departmental autonomy and innovation in medical schools. The Journal of Business, 40, 531–534. Chan, D. (1998). Functional relations among constructs in the same content domain at different levels of analysis: A typology of composition models. Journal of Applied Psychology, 83, 234–246. Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (1985). Intrinsic motivation and self-determination in human behavior. New York: Plenum. Farh, J. L., & Cheng, B. S. (2000). A cultural analysis of paternalistic leadership in Chinese organizations. In: J. T. Li, A. S. Tsui & E. Weldon (Eds), Management and organizations in the Chinese context. UK: Macmillan. Farh, J. L., Earley, P. C., & Lin, S. C. (1997). Impetus for action: A cultural analysis of justice and organizational citizenship behavior in Chinese society. Administrative Science Quarterly, 42, 421–444. Fischer, W. A., Blackmon, K. L., & Woodward, W. (1990). Technical decision making in Chinese enterprises. International Studies of Management and Organizations, 20, 35–45. George, J. M., & Zhou, J. (2001). When openness to experience and conscientiousness are related to creative behavior: An interactional approach. Journal of Applied Psychology, 86, 513–524. Gladstein, D. L. (1984). Groups in context: A model of task group effectiveness. Administrative Science Quarterly, 29, 499–517. Haberstroh, S., Oyserman, D., Schwarz, N., Kuhnen, U., & Ji, L. (2002). Is the interdependent self more sensitive to question context than the independent self? Self construal and the observation of conversational norms. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 38, 323–329. Hofstede, G. (1980). Motivation, leadership, and organization: Do American theories apply abroad. Organizational Dynamics, 9, 42–63. Iyengar, S. S., & Lepper, M. R. (1999). Rethinking the value of choice: A cultural perspective on intrinsic motivation. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 76, 349–366. Kowalewska, S. (1979). Patterns of influence and the performance of research units. In: F. M. Andrews (Ed.), Scientific productivity (pp. 169–189). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.

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Markus, H. R., & Kitayama, S. (1991). Culture and the self: Implications for cognition, emotion, and motivation. Psychological Review, 98, 224–253. Oldham, G. R., & Cummings, A. (1996). Employee creativity: Personal and contextual factors at work. Academy of Management Journal, 39, 607–634. Pelz, D., & Andrews, F. (1966). Scientists in organizations. New York: Wiley. Rosner, M. M. (1968). Administrative controls and innovation. Behavioral Science, 13, 36–43. Salas, E., Dickinson, T. L., Converse, S. A., & Tannenbauem, S. I. (1992). Toward an understanding of team performance and training. In: R. W. Swezey & E. Salas (Eds), Teams: Their training and performance (pp. 3–29). Norwood, NJ: Ablex. Shalley, C. E. (1991). Effects of productivity goals, creativity goals, and personal discretion on individual creativity. Journal of Applied Psychology, 76, 179–185. Shalley, C. E., Zhou, J., & Oldham, G. R. (2004). The effects of personal and contextual characteristics on creativity: Where should we go from here? Journal of Management, 30, 933–958. Shin, S., & Zhou, J. (2003). Transformational leadership, conservation, and creativity: Evidence from Korea. Academy of Management Journal, 46, 703–714. Tannenbaum, A. S. (1968). Control in organizations. New York: McGraw-Hill. Tierney, P., Farmer, S. M., & Graen, G. B. (1999). An examination of leadership and employee creativity: The relevance of traits and relationships. Personnel Psychology, 52, 591–620. Woodman, R. W., Sawyer, J. E., & Griffin, R. W. (1993). Toward a theory of organizational creativity. Academy of Management Review, 18, 293–321. Wrzesniewski, A., Dutton, J. E., & Debebe, G. (2003). Interpersonal sensemaking and the meaning of work. Research in organizational behavior, 25, 93–135. Yang, K. S., Hwang, K. K., & Kim, U. (Eds). (in press). Scientific advances in indigenous psychologies: Empirical, philosophical, and cultural contributions. London: Cambridge University Press. Zhou, J. (1998). Feedback valence, feedback style, task autonomy, and achievement orientation: Interactive effects on creative performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 83, 261– 276. Zhou, J. (2003). When the presence of creative coworkers is related to creativity: Role of supervisor close monitoring, developmental feedback, and creative personality. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88, 413–422. Zhou, J., & George, J. M. (2003). Awakening employee creativity: The role of leader emotional intelligence. Leadership Quarterly, 14, 545–568. Zhou, J., & Shalley, C. E. (2003). Research on employee creativity: A critical review and directions for future research. In: J. Martocchio (Ed.), Research in personnel and human resource management (pp. 165–217). Oxford, England: Elsevier.

DYNAMICS OF TRUST IN GUANXI NETWORKS Roy Yong-Joo Chua and Michael W. Morris ABSTRACT Interpersonal trust is an important element of Chinese guanxi network. In this chapter, we examine Chinese guanxi network from a trust perspective. We adopt the distinction that trust could be built on either a socio-emotional basis (affect-based trust) or an instrumental basis (cognition-based trust) and use this lens to examine cultural differences in Chinese and Western social networks. Specifically, we will discuss (a) how the two dimensions of trust are related in the Chinese versus American context, and (b) how affect-based trust is associated with different forms of social exchange in Chinese versus American social networks. Because dyadic relationships are embedded within larger social networks, trust between two network actors is also likely to be influenced by the social context that surrounds them. Hence, we also examine how dyadic trust is shaped by higher-level network properties such as density.

Anyone who is interested in doing business in a Chinese environment will quickly encounter the term guanxi. In the literal sense, guanxi means ‘‘connections’’ or ‘‘relations’’. It is also used to refer to personal bonds that are established between people who may engage in business together (e.g., Lin,


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2001; Tsui & Farh, 1997; Xin & Pearce, 1996; King, 1991). Although social capital is discussed in the West, observers of business practices in Chinese cultures note that having the right personal connection appears to be a stronger predictor of success in the Chinese business environment than in Western countries such as the United States. Researchers have accounted for the use of guanxi in Chinese culture as reliance on personal bonds to protect against defection (e.g., Xin & Pearce, 1996; Nee, 1992; Redding, 1990; Zucker, 1986). In other words, guanxi engenders trust and thereby serves as a form of insurance in an otherwise risky business environment. However, there is, to date, little research that explicitly examines the psychology of trust in guanxi networks. Whenever trust is discussed in the guanxi literature, it is assumed rather than measured. There is also a dearth of empirical research on how trust dynamics in Chinese guanxi networks differ from that in Western social networks. Moreover, extant social network research involving interpersonal trust tends to conceptualize trust as a unidimensional construct (e.g., Uzzi, 1996, Ferrin, Dirks, & Shah, 2004) and makes little attempt to differentiate the dimensions of trust that may have different bases. In sum, the psychology of trust in guanxi networks remains unexplored. A key distinction in the psychological literature is between trust formed on a social, emotional basis -affect-based trust- or a rational, instrumental basis -cognition-based trust (McAllister, 1995; Lewis & Weigert, 1985). In this chapter, we integrate this notion of trust with research in social network and culture in an attempt to better understand how trust in managerial networks differs between the Chinese and American cultures. Specifically, we argue that the distinction between affective and cognitive bases of trust is an important one toward advancing our understanding of Chinese guanxi networks and explaining why personal connections are so critical in the Chinese business world. In the ensuing sections, we will first review work that supports the distinction between cognition-and affect-based trust. Then, we discuss (a) the relationship between affect- and cognition-based trust in Chinese versus American cultures, (b) how affect-based trust is associated with different forms of social exchange in Chinese versus American social networks, and (c) how network density can influence each dimension of trust. Empirical evidence supporting our arguments comes from our research program that investigates cross-cultural differences in managerial networks. By studying how trust operates in both Chinese guanxi networks and American social networks, we hope to better understand how embedded relationships differ across these cultures.

Dynamics of Trust in Guanxi Networks

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DISTINGUISHING COGNITIVE AND AFFECTIVE BASES OF TRUST Although there have been different definitions of interpersonal trust in organizational research, most scholars agree that it involves willingness to make oneself vulnerable to another despite uncertainty regarding motives, intentions, and prospective actions (Kramer, 1999). For instance, Mayer, Davis, and Schoorman (1995) define trust as ‘‘a willingness of a party to be vulnerable to the actions of another party based on the expectation that the other will perform a particular action important to the trustor, irrespective of the ability to monitor or control that party.’’ Likewise, McAllister (1995) defines trust as the ‘‘extent to which a person is confident in, and willing to act on the basis of, the words, actions, and decisions of another.’’ However, most scholars also acknowledged that trust is not a unitary construct (Lewicki & Bunker, 1996; Lewis & Weigert, 1985; McAllister, 1995). A common distinction is between trust from the heart (affect-based) versus trust from the head (cognition-based). McAllister (1995) proposes that affect-based trust is founded on the socio-emotional bonds between individuals. With affect-based trust, individuals express care and concern for the welfare of their partners, believe in the intrinsic virtue of such relationships, and believe that these sentiments are reciprocated (Rempel, Holmes, & Zanna, 1985). Hence, affect-based trust involves concerns about others’ motives (Lewis & Wiegert, 1985). Cognition-based trust, on the other hand, centers on beliefs in the other party’s competence and reliability. Cognition-based trust is faith in the other party that rests on rational and instrumental information processing. The distinction between cognition and affect-based trust is not restricted to the Western conceptualization of the trust construct. Chinese scholars have also highlighted this distinction, one marked in the Chinese term for trust, the compound word ‘‘xing-ren’’. The first part, ‘‘xing’’, refers to trustworthiness in the sense of a person’s sincerity and concerns for one’s welfare (Chen & Chen, 2004). The second part, ‘‘ren’’, refers to a person’s trustworthiness in the sense of dependability, usability, and employability, which suggests that competence and reliability are also important components of the Chinese concept of trust. This sincerity-ability distinction of trust in the Chinese context corresponds well with the Western conceptualization of cognitive and affective trust (Chen & Chen, 2004). The distinction between cognition- and affect-based trust has received considerable empirical support. In a study involving managers in the U.S. (McAllister, 1995), confirmatory factor analyses results showed that the 2-factor structure is superior to a 1-factor structure. Managers’ ratings of

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relationships on the two dimensions of trust1 differentially relate to other variables included in the study in ways that follow from the theorized distinction. Empirical evidence for the distinction between cognition- and affect-based trust in a Chinese context comes from a series of laboratory studies involving Chinese college students from Singapore (Ng & Chua, 2003, 2005). Results from these studies consistently suggest that cognitionand affect-based trust are conceptually distinct in that each dimension of trust is linked to different patterns of individual’s contribution to teamwork. So far, we have reviewed literature that argued for the conceptual distinction between cognition- and affect-based trust. However, it is important to note that the two dimensions of trust are not independent or completely orthogonal. For example, McAllister (1995) reported that cognition- and affect-based trust are correlated at r ¼ 0.63. Ng and Chua (2003) also reported similar results (r ¼ 0.49). However, more interestingly, because the Ng and Chua’s (2003) study involves laboratory manipulation of each dimension of trust, it was found that the overflow of one dimension of trust to the other is asymmetrical. Specifically, affect-based trust overflows to cognition-based trust more than the other way round. This is consistent with the finding that interpersonal affect can positively influence objective ratings. For instance, Tsui and Barry (1986) found that managerial performance ratings were positively related to the degree of positive affect between rater and ratee through the mechanism of halo effects (Latham & Wexley, 1981). Put differently, the presence of affect between two persons can inflate the rater’s favorable judgment of the ratee, even though this judgment is to be made on some objective criteria. Though cognition-based trust may also be the basis for affect-based trust, this effect is likely to be weaker as Zajonc (1980,1984) found that affective reactions are more primary and irrevocable than cognitive ones. As we shall see later, the finding on the asymmetrical overflow between the two dimensions of trust has implication for understanding the differences in the dynamics of trust between Chinese and American cultures.

COGNITION- AND AFFECT-BASED TRUST IN SOCIAL NETWORKS Given the above distinction between cognition- and affect-based trust, one would therefore expect that in a social network context, the two dimensions of trust should be related to different forms of social exchanges. A recent study of American executives by Chua, Ingram, and Morris (2005) shows that this is indeed the case. These researchers measured the levels of trust felt


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by executives across their network relationships of various kinds and found that cognition-based trust was more associated with instrumental exchanges of economic resources and task-related advice. In other words, to the extent that an executive has previously approached an individual to get task-related advice and economic assistance, he or she is likely to perceive this individual as reliable and capable (cognition-based trust). Conversely, affect-based trust is more associated with personal exchanges such as friendship. Hence, to the extent that an individual is a source of friendship and social enjoyment for an executive, the executive is likely to perceive that this individual has his or her welfare and interest at heart (affect-based trust). This study represents a first wave of empirical evidence that the distinction between cognition- and affect-based trust can be fruitful in a social network context. The finding that different dimensions of trust are associated with different forms of network exchange provides a more nuanced understanding of how trust operates in embedded relationships. In the subsequent sections, we will draw heavily on this idea to discuss cultural differences in trust dynamics in Chinese versus American social networks.

CULTURAL DIFFERENCES IN TRUST DYNAMICS Although the distinction between affect and cognition-based trust applies to both Chinese and American cultures, we argue that the affective aspect of trust is likely to be highly emphasized by the Chinese people even as they seek instrumental ends. Thus, affect-based trust is more likely to co-exist with the cognition-based trust during trust development in the Chinese context than in the American context. This argument can be constructed from two theoretical perspectives. From a psychological perspective, it has been argued that Chinese people tend to have interdependent construal of the self while Americans tend to have independent construal of the self (Markus & Kitayama, 1991). Thus, relative to Americans, Chinese people tend to emphasize and value their relationships with others more. This implies that when building trust, besides making a rational choice assessment of the other party’s trustworthiness, Chinese are relatively more likely to take the quality of relationship with the other party into consideration. Conversely, because Americans tend to see themselves as autonomous and self-contained individuals each of whom comprises a unique combination of internal attributes (Markus & Kitayama, 1991, p. 224), the focus during the trust building process is likely

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to be on the task-oriented attributes of the other party such as competence, ability, track records, and reliability. From a more historical perspective, Bond and Hwang (1986) argued that Chinese societies are by and large constructed on the basis of the philosophy of Confucianism. The Confucian society is a relation-based one characterized by familial collectivism. Under this premise, the family is considered to be the basic organizing framework for social structure and function. Specifically, the Chinese people believe that the family is the core unit of both economic as well as social life and is often used as a model for structuring social collectives. Not only does the family provide one with affect and social support, it can also be counted on for economic resources and help. To the extent that the Chinese people are acculturated in the familial-oriented norm in which instrumental concerns are tightly coupled with affective relationships, they tend to be highly sensitive to socio-emotional concerns when interacting with social others. For instance, Sanchez-Burks et al. (2003) found that Chinese people are comparatively more attentive to indirect social cues in a work context than Americans. In addition, an individual growing up in a Confucian society is taught from young that the amount and type of obligations that exist in a given relationship depend on the nature of the relationship and are often not the same between different relationships. Thus, Chinese tend to approach social relationships in a highly relation-specific manner (Chen, Meindl, & Chen, 2003). Similarly, we argue that interpersonal trust is likely to be particularistic too. The amount of trust a Chinese has in another person depends to a great extent not only on the personal qualities that person has, but also on the kind of relationship that exists between them. In contrast, the Anglo-American economic, legal, and philosophical traditions (Lukes, 1973) in the United States gave rise to a different phenomenon. There is relative ease in the formation of instrumental work relations without the prior basis of any friendship or family connection (Tocqueville, 1848/1945). As long as the other party is competent and has good track records, he or she is deemed trustworthy enough to enter a work relationship with. At the same time, individuals in the American context are relatively willing to break away from existing ties if those ties no longer serve any instrumental value. Thus, in a work context, trust is built on relatively more instrumental basis of what resources the other person can offer and how reliably these can be made available. So how does each dimension of trust relate to the other within Chinese versus American culture? We propose that the two dimensions of trust are more likely to co-occur in the Chinese context than in the American context.


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Put differently, the two dimensions of trust are more intertwined for Chinese than for Americans. Specifically, if Chinese were to place more importance on the affective aspect of trust when assessing the trustworthiness of the other party, individuals in a Chinese person’s guanxi network are likely to be those whom he or she has considerable affect-based trust in. Drawing on the finding that affect-based trust is likely to overflow to cognition-based trust, one would also expect considerable levels of cognition-based trust to be induced. Thus, to the extent that an individual trusts a particular person in his or her social network, both cognitive and affective aspects of trust are likely to co-exist. This characterization of interpersonal trust in the Chinese culture is consistent with the notion that Chinese people tend to strive for achievement through personal relationships (Hsu, 1953) and are thus relatively uninhibited in mixing instrumental and socio-emotional concerns. On the other hand, while the American culture does not preclude mixing socio-emotional concerns with work concerns (e.g., friendship can be forged between business associates), there is considerable tension in the co-existence of these two types of social interaction. Specifically, the Protestant Ethic (Weber, 1904/1930) that prevails in the American workplace advocates that it is unprofessional to inject affective concerns or friendship into work or business engagements. In an extreme manifestation of this ideology, behavior at the workplace is supposed to be efficiency and effectiveness oriented yet impersonal. Thus, in a work context, Americans are likely to place more emphasis on cognition-based trust, rather than affect-based trust. In other words, it is one’s instrumental assessment that determines whether a given person is trustworthy enough to be included in one’s network. Furthermore, drawing on the finding that cognition-based trust is less likely to overflow to affect-based trust, one would not necessarily expect a concomitant level of affect-based trust even though cognition-based trust is built. In short, we argue that, in a workplace context, while Chinese people tend to build trust from an affective foundation and have little inhibition in mixing personal and work concerns, Americans tend to build trust from a cognitive foundation and are more inhibited in mixing socio-emotional concerns with instrumentality. Hence, although affect- and cognition-based trust have been found to co-occur in relationships among the American managers (McAllister, 1995), we expect the two dimensions of trust to be more intertwined in the Chinese context than in the American context. Using network data collected from executives2 attending Executive-MBA courses in China (Beijing, Shanghai, & Guizhou) and the United States, Chua, Morris, and Ingram (2005) found evidence for this argument. In a research program that investigates cross-cultural differences in managerial

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networks, these researchers found that controlling for a host of network measures such as types of tie, network size, density, tie strength and individual differences such as race and gender, affect-based trust strongly predicts cognition-based trust and vice versa3. This is not surprising since the two dimensions of trust, are found to be correlated. What is striking in the results is that the association between the two dimensions of trust is significantly stronger for the Chinese sample than for the American sample, supporting the argument that the two dimensions of trust are more intertwined for Chinese.

AFFECT-BASED TRUST AND NETWORK TIES In our earlier discussion, we argued that although affect-based trust is relevant to both American and Chinese cultures, Chinese people are more likely than Americans to use interpersonal affect and relationship to assess whether another person is trustworthy or not. Consequently, we expect that the level of affect-based trust a Chinese person has in the individual in his or her social network to be fairly high. Conversely, Americans tend to use a more instrumental approach in trust development, i.e., they decide whether or not someone is trustworthy based on non- socio-emotional criteria such as the person’s competence and track records, etc. Hence, interpersonal affect need not always enter an American’s trust assessment process. Given this cultural difference in trust development, it is plausible that affect-based trust could be useful in explaining cultural differences in social exchange patterns in networks. Here, we focus on two common forms of social network exchanges – (a) friendship and social support and (b) economic resource. Friendship and Social Support Since affect-based trust involves interpersonal affect and the feeling of care and concern for the welfare of the other party, this dimension of trust should be stronger in network ties that contain friendship relations than those that do not. However, we expect friendship ties to have a stronger effect on affect-based trust in the American culture than in the Chinese culture. This proposed asymmetry could again be traced to the effect of Confucian influence on Chinese social relations. As discussed earlier, Confucian societies are characterized by kinship affiliation and familial collectivism (Bond & Hwang, 1986) with clear delineation of the types of


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relationship in terms of their associated rights and obligations. Out of the five cardinal relationships (father–son, husband–wife, elder brother–younger brother, sovereign–subject, and friend–friend) outlined by Confucius, friendship among peers is just one of them. Although goodwill and loyalty are emphasized in friendships, Chinese often feel great debts of kindness and gratitude toward individuals such as family members, parents, and teachers (Chen, Miendl, & Chen, 2003). In fact, in Chinese societies, when the friendship between two peers became extremely strong, it is common to overlay the relationship with fictive kinship ties such as sworn brotherhood (Peng, 2004, p. 1049). A friend henceforth becomes part of the family. More importantly, the feelings of affect for friends or peers are differentiated from that toward other individuals such as family members, teachers, superior, etc. For instance, because of higher power distance in the Chinese culture, it is inappropriate to regard teachers and superiors as friends. Rather, any affective feelings for these individuals tend to take on additional elements of awe, deference, and respect. In sum, friendship is but one of the many sources from which affect-based trust could develop from in the Chinese culture. In contrast, American societies do not place as strong an emphasis on hierarchical structures and differentiating among types of relationships as characterized by the relatively lower power distance (Hofstede, 1984) and egalitarian philosophy. It is totally legitimate and acceptable to regard one’s teachers, bosses, and even parents as friends. This implies that friendship ties involving social support and enjoyment could be developed with almost everyone in one’s social network. For instance, it is very common in the United States that subordinates and superiors address each other by first name and participate in social activities after work as friends do. Hence, we expect that network ties that carry friendship-related social exchanges such as social enjoyment and support are likely to be the main channels through which interpersonal affect is developed in American social networks. Therefore, we argue that friendship ties are more strongly linked to the development of affect-based trust in the American culture than in the Chinese culture. Economic Resource Another interesting feature of the familial orientation in Chinese culture is that the family is not only a source of unconditional social protection, but also a source of financial and economic support. Research on Chinese businesses has consistently argued that the family is a key provider of economic resources for entrepreneurs. According to Whyte (1995, 1996), Chinese familism and kinship

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loyalty are the social roots of economic developments. Because of the high degree of obligation a Chinese person has toward his or her family, there is a strong norm of commitment to advance the interests and goals of any family member. Such kinship solidarity (Peng, 2004) suggests that family members should be highly willing to provide economic and financial resources to those in need, sometimes even at the expense of self-interests. This obligation to offer economic or financial help to someone whom one has an affective relationship with could also be potentially extended outside the family. Among close friends who have developed fictive kinship ties, there is often strong obligation to help one another financially through means such as loans, job recommendation, free labor, and providing information regarding investment opportunities. For example, Whyte (1996) described how hometown residents, old classmates, and friends were recruited to fill positions in family businesses when there was labor shortage, often for free. Hence, when a Chinese person turns to another individual for economic resources, it is likely that he or she believes that this individual has his or her welfare at heart and can be counted on. In American culture, however, an individual’s dependence on family resources diminishes drastically when he or she comes of age. When a young person is of college age, he or she typically leaves home and become financially less reliant on the family. Although parents continued to have financial obligations toward their children, such obligations are relatively weaker than in the Chinese culture and are not bounded by moral principles such as those depicted by Confucius. Among siblings and friends, the obligation to help one another economically is even less given the American emphasis on voluntary associations and individual jurisdiction. Therefore, even though an American may perceive an individual to be genuinely concerned about him or her and can be relied upon, this person is not likely to be an immediate candidate to turn to for economic help. The relatively low level of multiplexity in American social ties also suggests that affective relationships and instrumental relationships are more clearly demarcated. Hence, we do not expect any positive relationship between affect-based trust and economic resource tie among American managers. In short, we argue that there is a positive relationship between the acquisition of economic resources and affect-based trust for Chinese managers but not for American managers. Empirical support for the above two arguments can be drawn from our research program. Specifically, results from the Chua, Morris, and Ingram (2005) study indicate a significant country by friendship tie interaction such that friendship tie is more predictive of affect-based trust for Americans than for Chinese. We also found a main effect of friendship tie on affectbased trust such that friendship is positively related to affect-based trust.


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Taken together, this set of results suggest that while friendship and social support is predictive of affect-based trust in both Chinese and American cultures, friendship seem to have a greater effect on the development of affect-based trust for Americans than for Chinese. Our results also demonstrated a significant country by economic resource tie interaction such that Chinese are more likely than Americans to have affect-based trust in those whom they obtain economic resources from.

THE EFFECTS OF NETWORK DENSITY ON TRUST Does the social system that one is embedded in influence the development of trust? There is reason to believe that this is so. Although interpersonal trust exists between a trustor and a trustee, each dyad is embedded within a larger social network whereby each individual simultaneously engages in multiple dyadic relationships. Consequently, the trust between any two actors is likely to be influenced by the social context that surrounds them (Ferrin et al., 2004). One critical social network property that may have considerable impact on the formation of interpersonal trust is network density. The density of an individual’s network refers to the extent to which the people in his or her network are also interconnected (Burt, 1992). Hence, the more that individuals in one’s network also know one another, the denser is one’s social network. Various scholars have argued that dense networks are beneficial to employee and firm performance in part because they facilitate the exchange of information and foster trust (e.g., Uzzi, 1996; Ingram & Roberts, 2000; Ahuja, 2000). We extend this line of theorizing by proposing that the positive effect of a dense network on trust may be more salient for affect-based trust than for cognition-based trust. This is because cognition-based trust is built on a relatively more instrumental basis. The fact that a person is highly connected to other individuals in a focal manager’s social network does not necessarily render him or her to be perceived as more competent or reliable in getting things done. A person’s degree of competence and task-related reliability should be associated with specific individual characteristics (e.g., skills, past interaction patterns etc) rather than how embedded he or she is in the focal manager’s network. As such, cognition-based trust between two network actors is likely to be more dependent on dyadic level interaction (e.g., how long they have known each other and how often they interact) rather than whether they are connected to common social others per se. In contrast, affect-based trust is more socio-emotional in nature. Because a dense network helps foster interpersonal relationships and affect, it may

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also enhance this dimension of trust. There are a couple of mechanisms how this may play out. One mechanism is that of social homophile. According to Burt (1992), the main drawback of a dense network (i.e., one with few structural holes) is that actors in a dense network tend to be very similar to one another, resulting in much redundancy. Yet, this redundancy and similarity can have a positive effect since individuals tend to trust, like, and associate with others who are similar to themselves in terms of a large number of personal characteristics such as social background, attitudes, values, and beliefs (McPherson, Smith-Lovin, & Cook, 2001). Imagine a closely-knit group in which everyone knows everyone. Members of the group are likely to be similar to one another and hence share more common references, which in turn lead to stronger socio-emotional bonds. Another mechanism is that of norm establishment. Various research suggests that a dense social network provides clarity of norms and social support (Mitchell & Trickett, 1980; Polister, 1980). To the extent that norms are shared understandings of what is appropriate in a collectivity, the more interconnected individuals are in this collectivity, the stronger the norm is through increased mutual influence and reinforcement. A strong norm not only reduces uncertainty as to how social others will behave but also fosters a sense of belonging or identity to a group. The heightened level of socioemotional bond and group identity in a dense network is likely to enhance affect-based trust. In short, we posit that network density has a direct positive main effect on affect-based trust but not cognition-based trust. Results from the Chua, Morris, and Ingram (2005) study show that this is indeed the case for American managers. Specifically, these researchers found that the higher the network density, the higher the affect-based trust. There is however no density effect on cognition-based trust. Unpublished data from our research program indicated that for Chinese managers, network density also has positive effect on affect-based trust. So far, we have built a case that affect- and cognition-based trust, are more intertwined in the Chinese culture and how affect-based trust is enhanced by network density. Next, we link these two arguments by considering the effects of culture on network density. There is a long-standing line of theorizing which argues that Chinese are more likely to have denser social networks than Americans (e.g., Peng, 2004; Menon & Morris, 2001). The underlying logic is that because the Chinese culture is characterized by high levels of collectivism, interdependence, and tight in-groups, individuals in a given social network are more likely to know and interact with others in the same network. In addition, because social ties are relatively more particularistic in the Chinese culture, Chinese people do not forge relationship easily with strangers.


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Therefore, social ties tend to be restricted to a set of in-group members such as family members, relatives, friends, and classmates, etc., who over time also get to know one another. This gives rise to social networks with relatively few ‘‘structural holes’’ (Burt, 1992) or in Granovetter’s (1973) term, ‘‘weak ties’’. Given these theoretical underpinnings, one ought to observe relatively higher network density in Chinese social networks. Empirical evidence supporting this proposal is found from our program of research (unpublished data). Specifically, in two independent waves of data collection, we found that Chinese managers reported significantly denser social networks than Americans managers. This finding is significant because past research studying Chinese and American social networks has not been successful in showing this density effect (e.g., Morris, Podolny, & Ariel, 2000) though there has been much theoretical support for it. The findings that (a) cognition- and affect-based trust are more correlated in Chinese culture than American culture, (b) Chinese managers have denser social network than American managers, and (c) network density predicts affect-based trust but not cognition-based trust, when taken together begins to tell a coherent story. Specifically, it seems that Chinese managers rely on a dense network to foster affect-based trust, which in turns serves as a foundation for cognition-based trust. In the next section, we discuss the implications of these findings.

DISCUSSION: IMPLICATIONS FOR GUANXI RESEARCH Many organizational scholars have written about guanxi as if it were an indigenously Chinese concept (e.g., Hung, 2004; Vanhonacker, 2004) while others tend to associate it with the idea of networking in the Western context (e.g., Wellman, Chen, & Dong, 2001). In this chapter, we draw on the notion that cognition- and affect-based trust operate differently in social networks and propose that this distinction can help us better understand the similarities and differences between Chinese guanxi networks and American social networks. Through a series of network studies from our research program, we found evidence for this proposal. Specifically, we found that the dynamics of cognition- and affect-based trust differ across cultures. First of all, the two dimensions of trust are more intertwined for Chinese than for Americans. Second, friendship ties are more correlated to affect-based trust for Americans than for Chinese while Chinese are more likely than Americans to obtain

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economic resources from those they have affect-based trust in. Turning to more structural constructs, we found that network density appears to have a main effect on affect-based trust in both Chinese and American cultures. However, Chinese networks are likely to be denser than American networks. Our finding on the impact of culture on trust dynamics helps advance our understanding of Chinese guanxi networks. While the Chen and Chen (2004) model of guanxi network argues for the need to consider both affectand cognition-based trust, our research presents the first sign of empirical support that the dynamics between two types of trust indeed vary across cultures. Various scholars (e.g., Xin & Pearce, 1996; Nee, 1992; Redding, 1990; Zucker, 1986) have written about how guanxi networks in Chinese business environments are often used as a compensation for the lack of a stable legal and regulatory environment which facilitates impersonal business transaction. However, even as China improves her legal infrastructure, there does not appear to be a decline in the importance of personal connections (Tsui, Farh, & Xin, 2004). Many Chinese businessmen today still consider personal relationships with individuals such as family members, old classmates etc to be critical in business dealings. Our finding that affect- and cognition-based trust are more tightly coupled in Chinese social networks than in American social networks speaks to this observation. Since our Chinese sample were collected from highly developed Chinese cities (e.g., Shanghai and Beijing) where business and legal regulations are more comprehensive than in other less-developed cities, we believe that this suggests that the Chinese people’s emphasis on socio-emotional ties during business transactions stems from more socio-cultural roots rather than the result of having to deal with a poorly regulated business environment. Interestingly, our result is consistent with Sanchez-Burks et al.’s (2003) finding that East Asians are more likely to mix socio-emotional concerns with instrumental concerns than Americans. The convergence of our findings with Sanchez-Burks et al.’s (2003) work provides a compelling perspective that one important difference between collectivistic and individualistic cultures could lie in the degree to which instrumental ties also contain socio-emotional bases. This offers an expanded view of the popular collectivism–individualism dimension in explaining cultural differences. Instead of seeing the collectivism and individualism dichotomy as opposing value orientations, our research suggests that cross-cultural scholars may want to focus on the extent to which people consider socio-emotional factors at the same time as they strive for individual achievements or goals. This is a more sophisticated view because it recognizes that people from both individualistic and collectivistic cultures value both individual achievements as well as social harmony. What differs is


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the extent to which people are willing or feel comfortable to mix both considerations in a single interpersonal interaction. Another result worth highlighting is that Chinese social networks were found to be denser than American social networks. Although many scholars have proposed that Chinese social networks are likely to be denser than American social networks (e.g., Peng, 2004; Menon & Morris, 2001), there has been, so far, no empirical evidence. Hence, our research provides some initial support for this line of theorizing. Finally, given that density is found to predict affect-based trust, it seems that Chinese managers appear to rely on a dense network to foster affectbased trust, which in turns serves as a foundation for cognition-based trust. If true, this manner of trust formation is in stark contrast to McAllister’s (1995) view that there has to be cognition-based trust first before the more socio-emotional type of trust can be built. Hence, our research suggests a new line of inquiry on cultural differences in the trust development process. Throughout this chapter, our focus has been on highlighting differences between Chinese and American networks. However, it is important to qualify that network dynamics in these two cultures do share similarities as well. For instance, data from the Chua, Morris, and Ingram (2005) study indicates that career guidance ties in managerial networks predict both dimensions of trust for Chinese as well as Americans. Task advice ties predict cognition-based trust but not affect-based trust, regardless of culture. Hence, our approach of studying two distinct dimensions of trust in a network context serves to not only elucidate cultural differences in network dynamics but also reveal areas of similarity. Practical Implications Western businesspeople who have worked in China often experience difficulty in establishing trust and breaking into the local social networks. Our research suggests that this is probably due to the relatively denser network structure and the higher correlation between affect- and cognition-based trust in China. If one wants cognition-based trust from a Chinese counterpart (e.g., be seen as both reliable and competent), one cannot ignore the affect-based trust with which it is closely intertwined. Yet because affect-based trust is positively associated with network density, the recommendation is to get to know as many people in the Chinese counterpart’s network as possible. In other words, it is not sufficient to just interact with the person whom one wants to do business with. One also needs to be acquainted with the other person in this people’s social network. Unfortunately, this cannot be established overnight!

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Hence, Western businesspeople heading to the Chinese market should be aware that the trust-building process tends to take more time than in the U.S. The finding that economic resource ties are associated with affect-based trust for Chinese managers but not American managers also has implications for businesspeople seeking funding or sales in the Chinese business environment. Financial ties in Chinese cultures tend not to be purely transactional in nature. Such ties are either built on existing personal connections or if these economic resource ties were to be established first, they are likely to be overlaid with affective elements over time. This phenomenon highlights the norm of familial collectivism in Chinese societies whereby socio-emotional aspects of a relationship are usually not cleanly separated from instrumental concerns of the relationship. Understanding this aspect of Chinese business conduct can greatly reduce culture shocks and frustration when foreign businesspeople engage the Chinese market. For instance, practices (e.g., personal considerations being factored into business financial decisions), which may be construed as corrupt from the perspectives of Westerners, may not be so in the eyes of the Chinese people. Ability to understand and deal with such cultural differences is critical for business success in China. Future Research Directions Future research could take a more nuanced approach toward studying the effect of culture on trust. For instance, since Chinese are relatively more particularistic in their social engagements, it is possible that there are many factors, which contribute to the formation of trust. For instance, the role that social others play may have a significant impact. In a recent study on Chinese managers, Tsui et al. (2004) found that having teachers and communist party members in one’s network has positive effects on one’s managerial reputation. Taking a slightly different tack, it is also plausible that managers from different cultures trust different people in their network. For instance, in the Chinese culture, due to strong emphasis on role obligation (Yang, 1993) and unconditional reciprocity among family members, familial ties are the greatest source of trust. One can always count on family members for both emotional and instrumental support in times of need. In contrast, in American societies, which celebrate individual agency, individuals may derive more trust from friends since these are people whom one can actively choose to associate with and not preordained at birth. In the current research, we are unable to capture the specific role(s) that each individual plays in our participants’ social networks. Future research could investigate the effect of network contacts’ role on trust formation.


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CONCLUSION In this chapter, we have shown that the distinction between affect- and cognition-based trust is useful in understanding how trust develops in working relationships and how this varies across Chinese and American cultures. We have also received evidence for the role of dense networks in building trust and related this to the Chinese pattern of social interactions. Overall, as suggested by the Chinese term ‘‘xing-ren’’, which combines the two dimensions of trust, affect- and cognition-based trust are more tightly intertwined in the Chinese culture than the American culture. These cultural differences in trust dynamics help elucidate the phenomenon that the Chinese people prefer to do business with friends and relatives.

NOTES 1. Sample items of affect-based trust include ‘‘We have a sharing relationship. We can both freely share our ideas, feelings, and hopes’’. Sample items of cognitionbased trust include ‘‘given this person’s track record, I see no reason to doubt his/her competence and preparation for the job’’. 2. A total of 143 Chinese managers and 88 American managers participated in this study. The mean age of these participants is 40 and 75% are males. For the American sample, the most common industries of employment for the participants were finance and banking, information technology, and consulting. For the Chinese sample, the most common industries of employment for the participants were pharmaceutical/medical, manufacturing, and consulting. 3. In regression analysis of cross sectional network data, the causal relationship between the two types of trust cannot be disentangled. Thus the two types of trust predict each other, though we know from experimental data that the overflows tend to be asymmetric.

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TEMPORALITY IN NEGOTIATIONS: A CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE Sungu Armagan, Manuel Portugal Ferreira, Bryan L. Bonner and Gerardo A. Okhuysen ABSTRACT This paper discusses national differences in the interpretation of time in mixed motive decision contexts, such as negotiation. Specifically, we consider how members of different national cultures (Portugal, Turkey, and the United States) experience temporality in these situations. We argue that cultural temporality such as polychronicity, future orientation, and uncertainty avoidance form part of a broader national environment. The national environment is also expressed in national stability factors such as legal systems, family ties, and homogeneity of populations. We propose that temporality and stability aspects of national environment determine negotiation paradigms, which subsequently influence temporality in negotiations. We conclude by suggesting that inclusion of complex and interdependent national environment factors in the study of negotiation has the potential to substantially advance our understanding of mixed motive decision situations. As national borders become increasingly open to international trade, foreign investments, and cross-national partnerships, successfully negotiating in different cultures becomes critical to organizational success. In the last two decades, academics have given increased attention to how cultural differences National Culture and Groups Research on Managing Groups and Teams, Volume 9, 115–145 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1534-0856/doi:10.1016/S1534-0856(06)09006-2

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influence negotiation processes and outcomes (e.g., Adair, Okumura, & Brett, 2001; Adler, Brahm, & Graham, 1992; Harnett & Cummings, 1980; Tung, 1982). One apparent conceptual gap in this research deals with the construct of time. Although a number of studies have examined negotiation behavior cross-culturally, only limited progress has been made in understanding how cultural views of time can influence negotiation behavior. To our knowledge, Foster’s (1992) research is the only work that comparatively explores temporality in intra-cultural negotiations. Foster examined the behaviors of different cultures such as Mexicans, French, Asians, and people in the U.S., and provided a narrative of how these cultures behave in a negotiation context in relation to time, such as their attention to deadlines or the extent to which they juggle several negotiation issues at the same time. Individuals’ interpretations of time are likely to become salient in a number of situations, such as when negotiations involve deadlines by which an agreement has to be reached, when negotiations are one-time vs. multiple-time events, or when negotiations involve explicit temporal dependencies. One circumstance in which negotiations involve explicit temporal dependencies is when the outcomes of negotiated agreements are implemented at a future date. For instance, a negotiator may strike a deal on the price of a product today but not receive the product for some time. Existing research on delays has shown that when the temporal distance between a negotiation and its outcome increases, parties tend to reach more efficient agreements (Okhuysen, Galinksy, & Uptigrove, 2003). Okhuysen et al. (2003) speculated that this is due to decreased contentiousness in the negotiation when the outcomes are delayed, due to discounting. Although these types of temporal constraints are a common experience for negotiators around the world, existing research on temporality in negotiations has yet to uncover the factors that underlie the negotiation experience in different cultural settings. Since individuals’ understandings of time are culturally constructed (Hall, 1959; Hall & Hall, 1990), differences in negotiation processes and outcomes across cultures are likely to be observed when negotiations involve temporal constraints such as delayed outcomes or deadlines. In this paper, we suggest that national-level environmental factors, including aspects of national stability and cultural temporality, lead to the development of national-level negotiation paradigms. These three elements, in turn, affect individual-level factors, such as the perceptions of time, negotiation processes, and negotiation outcomes. National-level environmental factors are described by Guisinger’s (2001) GEOVALENT dimensions of econography (economy and geography), culture, legal systems, income profile, political risk, tax systems, exchange rates, and government restrictions. We define national

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National Environment Culture

Fig. 1.

Cultural Temporality

Negotiation Paradigm

National Stability

Nation Level Variables

Perceptions of Time

Negotiation Process

Negotiation Outcomes

Individual Level Variables

Model of Cultural Components of Negotiation Related to Temporality.

stability as the environmental conditions that pertain to the steadiness and the strength of political, legal, economic, and social institutions in a given nation. We describe cultural temporality as the way in which cultures perceive time and the consequent attitudes, preferences, and behaviors individuals in these cultures display in relation to time. Finally, we define negotiation paradigms as the shared cognitive representations of individuals in a given nation, which individuals use to make sense of the negotiation activity. Fig. 1 portrays our conceptual model of how the factors we discussed above relate to one another. We illustrate our discussion using three countries as exemplars: Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S. Prior research has shown that these countries differ in a number of important dimensions including those on the national (e.g., temporality) (Hall, 1959, 1989) and individual (e.g., uncertainty avoidance) (Hofstede, 1980) levels of analysis. According to the results of the GLOBE project1 (see Ashkanasy, Trevor-Roberts, & Earnshaw, 2002; Jesuino, 2002), Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S. belong to separate clusters of nations (Latin Europe cluster, Arabic cluster, and the Anglo clusters, respectively), allowing us to use them as representations of these three clusters.2 Our interest in negotiation stems from its role as a mixed-motive, collective decision-making process (Neale & Bazerman, 1991). Negotiation involves collaboration in the desire to create value as well as competition in the desire to claim value (Lax & Sebenius, 1992). Negotiation also includes interdependence between parties, as behaviors by one party can easily affect other participating parties (Thompson, 1998). Additionally, the process of negotiation involves two or more parties (i.e., individuals, groups, or organizations; Lewicki,

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Saunders, Barry, & Minton, 2004), highlighting situations where the social nature of decision making is important such that the outcome of the collaborative decision-making effort depends on the interactions that occur between the parties. As such, we consider negotiation a special case of collective decision processes, such as group decision making. This paper contributes to the existing literature in three primary ways. First, we explore the differences in temporal views that affect negotiations in different national cultures, which have received scant attention in the literature (see Foster, 1992). Second, we emphasize the role of nation-level environmental factors, which encompass not only the national culture (e.g., cultural views on time) but also the political, legal, economic, and social institutions in a given nation to explain temporal perspectives. Third, we propose that it is through negotiation paradigms that environmental factors influence temporal preferences, attitudes, and behaviors in negotiations. The legal, economic, and social realities of nations help create cognitive representations of how to think about and approach negotiations, which then influences parties’ temporal preferences and behaviors. In this paper, we first examine the environmental factors of national stability and cultural temporality that pertain to the negotiation experiences in different national cultures, specifically in Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S. We then present nation-level negotiation paradigms with an emphasis on differences in negotiation processes and outcomes across these national cultures. We follow with a discussion of the linkages among environmental factors and how they impact temporality in negotiations by influencing the negotiation paradigms individuals hold. We conclude with a discussion including implications for negotiations and avenues for future research.

CULTURE AND NEGOTIATION Although an ideal literature review for this paper would encompass research that explored the influence of culture on temporality in intra-cultural negotiations, such a literature is scarce (see Foster, 1992). Therefore, our literature review in this section will rely heavily on existing work that examines the influence of culture on negotiation behaviors and outcomes. Through this literature review, we aim to highlight some of the ways in which national cultures can affect negotiation styles, behaviors, and outcomes. Following this literature, we suggest in later sections that cultures also differ in how they view time in negotiation contexts, and we explore the factors that affect these temporal views.


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Research on the effect of culture on negotiations has commonly contrasted the styles of negotiators from different national cultures. Much of this work has compared U.S. negotiators to Chinese negotiators. For example, Adler et al. (1992) found that Chinese negotiators tended to ask questions and to interrupt more frequently than their U.S. counterparts. In terms of expressing conflict, Tse, Francis, and Walls (1994) showed that Chinese negotiators were more likely to avoid expressions of conflict than were U.S. negotiators. In their survey, Morris et al. (1998) found that, when managing conflict, Chinese managers relied more heavily on an avoiding style (e.g., avoiding expressions of conflict) due to their emphasis on conformity and tradition, whereas U.S. managers relied more heavily on a competing style (e.g., being assertive in making demands) due to their emphasis on individual achievement. Finally, Tinsley and Pillutla (1998) found that U.S. negotiators were more likely to display both self-interest norms aimed at maximizing one’s own gain and joint problem-solving norms aimed at maximizing joint gain, whereas Chinese negotiators were more likely to subscribe to an equality norm aimed at distributing the outcomes equally. Other research has focused on contrasting the negotiation styles of U.S. negotiators with those of Brazilian and Japanese negotiators. For example, Graham (1985) found that U.S. negotiators tended to make larger initial concessions than the Japanese, but that Brazilian negotiators tended to be more ‘‘greedy’’ in their first offers than either of the other two. Gelfand et al. (2001) showed that, compared to people from the U.S., the Japanese perceived conflicts as more compromise-focused. Adair et al. (2001) found that U.S. negotiators exchanged information directly, whereas the Japanese negotiators exchanged information indirectly. Inter- and intracultural negotiation research has also studied negotiation tactics in conjunction with individual or joint gains of negotiators. Graham (1983) found that deceptive information from an opponent decreased negotiation outcomes for U.S. negotiators, whereas deceptive bargaining strategies enhanced individual profits for Brazilian negotiators, concluding that dishonest opponents could take advantage of U.S. negotiators. Adair et al. (2004) showed that cultures that utilized direct information-sharing strategies or a combination of indirect and direct strategies maximized their joint gains. Finally, Tinsley and Pillutla (1998) found that U.S. negotiators reported higher levels of satisfaction when they maximized joint gain and Chinese negotiators were happier when they attained outcome parity. Overall, these differences highlight the differential outcomes that negotiators attain depending on the particular negotiation style they ascribe to within their culture.

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Although this research is helpful in establishing cultural differences across nations, there is very little work considering the effect of culture on temporality in negotiations. Foster (1992) examined the negotiation behaviors of people from the U.S., Mexicans, French, and Asians in relation to time. He discussed how, for example, people in the U.S. are comfortable discussing things in an orderly fashion, whereas Mexicans discuss more than one point at the same time. Mexicans tend to interrupt one another and sometimes even act emotionally when they need to emphasize a point. He also discussed how to the French, the quality of a project is more important than meeting its deadline, whereas people in the U.S. tend to emphasize deadlines to a greater degree. In this paper, we add to Foster’s work by suggesting other temporal preferences and behaviors that different cultures display as they make decisions in negotiation contexts.

NATIONAL STABILITY AND TEMPORALITY IN NEGOTIATIONS Table 1 provides a brief summary of how Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S. compare on a variety of important aspects of national environment including religion, government, and economy. Other important differences also distinguish these countries and its citizens, such as the differences in societal values of human development, power distance, and performance orientation (see the GLOBE project; Ashkanasy et al., 2002; Jesuino, 2002). Furthermore, these three countries and their citizens also vary in terms of individualism–collectivism, with Portugal at the collectivist end of this scale, the U.S. at the individualistic end, and Turkey ranking as a moderately collectivistic society (Cavusgil, Civi, Tutek, & Dalgic, 2003). We argue that the differences between these countries in terms of the broader national environment meaningfully distinguish these nations from one another in significant ways relevant to negotiation. In this section, we advance three dimensions of national stability that are likely to play an important role in temporal views in negotiations across different national cultures. We define national stability as the environmental conditions pertaining to the strength and consistency of political, economic, and institutional norms and realities in a given nation. For the purposes of understanding temporality in negotiations within cultures, we select aspects of the environment that directly pertain to temporality in negotiations: institutional systems, relationships, and national homogeneity.


Table 1.

Demographic Information about Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S. Portugal

Location Size (sq. km) Population (million) Languages

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Turkey

Europe 92,391 10.6 Portuguese (official), Mirandese (official – but locally used) Parliamentary democracy

Europe and Asia 780,580 68.9 Turkish (official), Kurdish, Arabic, Armenian, Greek Republican parliamentary democracy

Legal system

Civil law system

Religions

Roman Catholic 94%

Derived from various European legal systems Muslim 99.8% (mostly Sunni), other 0.2% (mostly Christians and Jews)

Currency GDP per capita Inflation rate (consumer prices) Unemployment rate

Euro (EUR) $17,900 2.1%

Turkish lira (TRL) $6,700 18.4%

6.5%

11.3% (plus underemployment of 6.1%)

Government type

U.S. North America 9,631,418 295.7 English, Spanish (spoken by a sizable minority) Constitution-based federal republic; strong democratic tradition Common law system

Protestant 52%, Roman Catholic 24%, Mormon 2%, Jewish 1%, Muslim 1%, other 10%, none 10% US dollar (USD) $40,100 2.5% 5.5%

Sources: The CIA World Factbook, U.S. Department of State, Area Handbook of the US Library of Congress. 2005 estimate. 2004 estimate. 1995 estimate. 2002 estimate. 2003 estimate.

Institutional Systems and Temporality in Negotiations One important element in national cultures is the institutional environment. Institutional actors are social groups that exert some overarching influence on

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how national culture is expressed. Examples of institutional actors can include churches, national governments, regulatory bodies, and the armed forces. These institutions are important because they can provide stability, which is critical as individuals assess the predictability of the future. For example, some have suggested that the Israeli army, with its forced conscription, provides a common experience for all Israeli citizens. Institutions within countries, however, are not always stable. In Turkey, for example, one can observe frequent state intervention in business life through unpredictable policy changes, which creates uncertainty for private companies that remain highly dependent on the state for financial incentives (Kabasakal & Bodur, 1998). The instability of institutional actors can create an absence of behavioral guidance (Khanna & Palepu, 1997). If institutional actors cannot guarantee stability in the national environment, then individuals face an unpredictable future. Institutional actors can affect negotiations, for instance, through their impact on how negotiators view the future. Legal systems are one example of a set of institutional actors that can affect how individuals see the future. Legal systems can be quite different and include systems based on common law, civil law, religious law, and many hybrid forms (LaPorta, Lakonishok, Shleifer, & Vishny, 1997; LaPorta, Lopez-De-Silanes, & Shleifer, 1999). One element that distinguishes these systems is the extent to which they protect investors through processes that provide for the enforcement of contracts. Higher levels of protection reduce the uncertainty involved in investment and increase the predictability of the future by providing an institutionalized process to fall back on in situations where, for example, agreements are not fulfilled. It is the ability to rely on institutional actors that allows individuals and organizations to negotiate for future outcomes even though the future, in its very essence, is unpredictable. As an example of how different legal systems can impact temporality in negotiations, consider the case of a buyer and a seller that involves the delivery of merchandise at a later date. In this situation, two considerations may be relevant. The first one is whether or not the buyer can count on the seller to deliver at the appointed time, and the second one is whether or not the seller can count on payment after delivery. Even in such a simple situation, a strong and effective legal protection of contracts and property can be an important enabler of agreements, because it is a critical factor in the enforcement of agreements. Thus, in a country with a strong judicial system, a retailer will want to be able to enforce the contract and to take action if a supplier does not deliver the merchandise at the appointed time. Similarly, the buyer can count on the legal system to guarantee payment.


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In Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S., the legal systems operate in different ways, potentially leading to differences in the way individuals view the future and thus the way in which the legal system enables agreements for delayed outcomes. For example, a central tenet of the U.S. legal system (a common law system) is that justice must be quick, that ‘‘justice delayed is justice denied.’’ In this respect, the U.S. legal system is quite different from the legal systems in Portugal (a civil law system) and Turkey (a law system derived from various European legal systems), where civil disputes can take a long time to settle. One potential consequence of the differences in legal systems is that individuals in Turkey and Portugal may be less likely to rely on the judicial system as a guarantor of agreements that involve delays compared to individuals in the U.S. In turn, negotiators in Turkey and Portugal may prefer and provide incentives for negotiated agreements that involve an immediate realization of outcomes (such as preferring cash payments rather than credit or other forms of delayed payments), even providing price reductions for those parties willing to pay up front. In some cases, making cash payments may be the only option available to the buyer. In contrast, negotiators in the U.S. may be much more willing to provide delayed payment options to buyers due to a greater ability to rely on the judicial system in the event of a default.

Relationships and Temporality in Negotiations Family ties and close relationships are another element of national stability that can exert a strong influence on how transactions occur in a society. In particular, the existence of strong ties in families, including the extended family, friendships, and other close-knit groups, can serve to reduce uncertainty for individuals. For example, some scholars have speculated that close relationships can substitute for other governance mechanisms, such as contractual safeguards, by providing an alternative mechanism based on trust (Gulati, 1995; Gundlach & Murphy, 1993; Heide, 1994; Inkpen & Currall, 1998; Parkhe, 1993; Ring & Van de Ven, 1992). In negotiation contexts, close relationships can reduce the uncertainty associated with the implementation of agreements. Close relationships can reduce the risk and the uncertainty regarding the implementation of negotiated agreements by providing trust among the parties involved in the negotiation. However, close relationships may have another interesting temporal effect. Some have observed that one way to establish or build close relationships is by extending trust. In these situations,

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it is more likely that an actor will find it acceptable to fulfill his or her part of an agreement without immediate reciprocity, using the delay of payment, or an unfulfilled promise, as an opportunity to build the relationship. That is, the acceptability of a delay in payment in these conditions, on its own, can become a trust-building exercise. This delay, by engendering trust, can also increase the confidence in partner cooperation (Das & Teng, 1998). Although the expectation for the other party to implement their part of the agreement at a future date is there, the actual implementation time may be quite uncertain. In such a system of relationships, each transaction is embedded in a deeper network of interactions, both past and future. One example of how family ties or other close relationships can influence the negotiation of delayed outcomes is the case of a buyer and a seller involving the payment for a used car. One can assume that the seller’s main concern is receiving payment for the car. In a situation where family or other relationship networks are strong, they may not rely on a contract, but on a verbal agreement instead. To the extent that a strong direct or indirect relationship exists between the parties, the seller is more likely to trust the buyer. In addition, the seller may be willing to accommodate the buyer by delaying the payment to preserve or enhance the existing relationships, perhaps by showing kindness and generosity. Situations such as this highlight the important point that negotiation outcomes often involve factors exogenous to the negotiation per se, including the preservation of social ties, which may be differentially valued based on national culture. In Turkey, Portugal, and the U.S., family and friendship ties take different forms and may lead to differences in individuals’ reliance on networks of family and friends. For instance, the U.S. is known for its strong individualistic orientation (Hofstede, 1980). In this respect, the U.S. orientation to family and other close relationships is quite different from that in Portugal, where there is a strong sense of loyalty to an extended network of family and friends, and where some have noted a weaker ‘‘civic sense’’ toward the larger community (Osland, Franco, & Osland, 1999). As Cheke (1953, p. 45) noted, ‘‘the Portuguese is kind and charitable to five categories of persons: to his family, to his friends, to the friends of his family, to the friends of his friends, and lastly, to the beggar in his path.’’ In Turkey, the network of interdependent relationships includes family, regional origin, and school affiliation, and carries great importance. This network gains even more importance in Turkey due to the influence of Islam, which places great value in a collectivist culture (Kabasakal & Bodur, 2002). Consequently, we propose that in Turkey, delaying payments and extending generosity in this way to enhance existing relationships among


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parties is likely to be more common than in Portugal where these types of generous behaviors will be mostly observed among friends and family. Improving existing relationships serves the purpose of enlarging one’s network of relationships, creating opportunities for new business and personal relationships. In contrast, in the U.S., intentional delays will be less frequently observed as compared to Portugal or Turkey because maintaining relationships may be less of a concern due to an individualistic orientation.

National Homogeneity and Temporality in Negotiations The extent of homogeneity within a national population is another aspect of national stability, and may have important implications for how transactions are conducted in a society. Populations that are relatively homogeneous in terms of background, language, religion, historical traditions, education, ethnicity, and so forth are more likely to have widely shared schemas to understand the world. Shared schemas may assist individuals in crafting agreements because individuals may share an understanding for what each party’s expectations are concerning the negotiation. For example, in some cultures, negotiating over certain commodities is expected and prices are deliberately kept at a higher level with the expectation that the potential buyer will negotiate the price. Sharing similar expectations, both the buyer and the seller go into the negotiation prepared for the negotiation to take place, attenuating conflict that can arise due to differential expectations. Shared schemas as derived from homogeneity in the population may help individuals craft agreements for delayed outcomes because individuals share many of the concerns about the future, and thus these concerns may be implicitly accounted for in the agreements that are reached. For example, suppose that a country suffers a financial crisis and currency devaluation. An event of this type can be a severe shock to an economic system. Consider, for instance, how the Great Depression in the U.S. affected an entire generation’s view of savings, waste, and personal sacrifice. The events that could precipitate such a crisis, its resolution, and the recovery from it are likely to be events that are shared by many individuals within that society. This shared history can create a mutual understanding of expectations and preferences concerning future outcomes and lead to cooperative behavior for delayed issues. Portugal is a more homogeneous society with regard to values, preferences, and behaviors than either Turkey or the U.S. Portugal’s homogeneity comes from its small population residing in a small land area compared to Turkey or the U.S. In Turkey, one can observe a multiplicity of ideologies

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that emerge from ethnic and regional differences. This heterogeneity of cultures within Turkey creates a diversity that blends traditional and modern values, secular and Islamic ideologies, and Eastern and Western perspectives (Kabasakal & Bodur, 1998). Due to its sheer population size, geographic magnitude, and tradition as a haven for immigrants, the U.S. displays even greater diversity than Turkey extreme mix of cultures, religions, and peoples. We propose that individuals in a country like Portugal, where greater homogeneity exists, may be able to rely on common understandings to develop agreements that involve delayed outcomes more than individuals in Turkey or the U.S. These agreements are more likely, in addition, to include implicit and explicit elements that account for the shared experience of the Portuguese. In particular, this reliance on common understandings may be more effective than relying on the legal system, like negotiators in the U.S. might be expected to do. Furthermore, we suggest that when negotiating for delays themselves, a common understanding of expectations and preferences in Portugal is likely to allow for an accommodation of each party’s concerns on how great a delay is desirable, whereas this accommodation is less likely to be observed in places such as Turkey or the U.S., where shared understandings exist to a lesser degree. In this section, we introduced the concept of national stability and three ways in which national cultures differ in national stability. In addition, we discussed the consequent temporal preferences and behaviors individuals in different national cultures display in negotiations. We suggested that institutional, relationship, and population characteristics of a society affect temporal preferences and behaviors in negotiation. In the next section, we introduce the notion of cultural temporality and how it affects negotiations.

CULTURAL TEMPORALITY AND TEMPORALITY IN NEGOTIATIONS We now focus on another aspect of the broader national environment, the temporal culture, and its impact on negotiations conducted in different national cultures. We define cultural temporality as the ways in which people in different cultures perceive time and their consequent attitudes, preferences, and behaviors in relation to time. Given our focus on understanding temporality in negotiations across different cultural settings, considering the temporal dimension of national culture is central to our discussion. We suggest that temporal dimensions of the national culture influence negotiators’


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perceptions of time. Prior research has identified a number of time-related factors that are culture-specific, such as polychronicity, future orientation, and uncertainty avoidance. These factors are manifested in individuals’ perceptions of time. In the following section, we explore these temporal factors and their impact on negotiations.

Polychronicity and Temporality in Negotiations Hall (1959) introduced the concept of polychronicity to describe how different cultures use and view time. He suggested that people in polychronic cultures tend to have a preference for doing many things at once or, in other words, for multi-tasking. This ‘‘multi-tasking’’ behavior enables individuals to easily combine personal and professional lives. Also, in polychronic cultures human relationships are emphasized over schedules. In contrast, individuals in monochronic cultures tend to prefer doing one thing at a time, and generally place greater emphasis on schedules and the need to keep them. Hall (1989) further associated polychronicity with the intangibility of time, noting that in polychronic cultures individuals are less likely to speak of time as being spent, wasted, or lost. Latin cultures and Eastern cultures tend to be polychronic. Individuals in these cultures often prefer doing several things at a time and are not as concerned about deadlines as Western cultures are. Western cultures tend to be more monochronic such that people in these countries tend to prefer focusing on one thing at a time and greatly emphasize punctuality (Hall, 1959, 1989). Individuals in polychronic cultures are likely to display negotiating behaviors consistent with the temporal characteristics of their culture, which emphasize multi-tasking, during negotiating. They are likely to negotiate over multiple issues at a time rather than over one issue at a time. Consequently, individuals in polychronic cultures may be more likely to find the integrative potential in an agreement by making trade-offs among issues compared to monochronic cultures, where individuals are likely to focus on one issue at a time. In addition, given that polychronic cultures do not speak of time as spent or lost, individuals in these cultures are likely to go through lengthier negotiations compared to those in monochronic cultures, where there is a greater awareness of the passage of time and where individuals are likely to end negotiations after a specified period of time even if a decision is not yet reached. Longer duration negotiations may also facilitate the creation or strengthening of personal relationships. Furthermore, we suggest that individuals from polychronic cultures are likely to multi-task and focus

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on both negotiation-specific concerns and outside concerns, such as personal issues, during negotiations. Outside concerns can create distraction and prevent individuals from focusing fully on the task at hand. Overall, although polychronicity may be associated with greater logrolling, it may also be associated with lengthier negotiations and greater interference of personal matters with the negotiation task compared to monochronicity. Conversely, monochronic cultures are likely to focus on the task, which is the negotiation itself, not allowing personal or other outside matters to interfere with the negotiation. This can allow for a more focused and attentive way of approaching the negotiation process. Latin cultures (e.g., the Portuguese culture) and Eastern cultures (e.g., the Turkish culture) are polychronic cultures, whereas Western cultures such as the U.S. culture tend to be monochronic (Hall, 1989). Accordingly, we argue that Portuguese and the Turkish negotiators are more likely to tackle multiple issues at once in a multi-issue negotiation compared to U.S. negotiators, who are more likely to tackle one issue at a time. In addition, given their polychronic nature and consequent lack of attention to the passage of time, one can expect the Eastern and Latin cultures to go through a rather lengthy negotiation process, perhaps involving activities such as business lunches and dinners, as part of building a trusting relationship in the negotiation (see Cavusgil et al., 2003, for Turkey). In these situations, negotiations may reach impasse or the agreement may remain vague, but the process may also be expected to pick up again at a later time. In contrast, U.S. negotiators may be more likely to adhere to deadlines and attempt to finalize negotiations after a predetermined period.

Future Orientation and Temporality in Negotiations Future orientation refers to the extent to which individuals in societies engage in behaviors focused on the future such as planning, investing in the future, or delaying gratification (House, Javidan, & Dorfman, 2001; House, Javidan, Hanges, & Dorfman, 2002). An orientation to the future both influences environmental factors such as national stability, legal environment, or religion, and is also influenced by these factors. Factors such as institutional systems, historical heritage, economic development, governance or religion can reinforce the way the present, past, and the future are viewed by people of different cultures. For example, in cultures that adhere to the Muslim faith, one can observe a short-term orientation and lack of planning and forecasting, since believing in fate as a basic principle of faith


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in God involves accepting all conduct that occurred in the past or that will occur in the future (Ilmihal I, 1999), which is prearranged and perhaps preordained by God (Kabasakal & Dastmalchian, 2001). Economic hardship can also turn people’s attention to the present and prevent individuals from making plans regarding the future if it is perceived as uncertain and bleak. The extent to which a negotiator is culturally oriented toward the future can affect both the negotiation process and outcome. For example, a strong future orientation can increase negotiators’ focus on issues with delayed outcomes and increase the competition over these issues. Lack of cooperation over delayed issues can increase the chances of reaching impasse or prevent negotiators from identifying the integrative potential in an agreement. Further, compared to those in present-oriented cultures, negotiators embedded in future-oriented cultures may be more likely to take into account future opportunities with their counterparts, allowing cross-temporal trade-offs to take place between the present and the future. Research initiated by the GLOBE project suggests that people in the U.S. are higher in future orientation than Turks, who are slightly higher than the Portuguese (Ashkanasy et al., 2002; Jesuino, 2002; Kabasakal & Bodur, 2002). A strong future orientation in the U.S. can be attributed to the tendency of thinking of the future as greater, bigger, better, and more prosperous than the present (Kluckhohn & Strodtbeck, 1961), which is perhaps largely reinforced by the strength of the economy and the U.S. status as the world’s only superpower (Ashkanasy et al., 2002). On the other hand, economic hardships along with Islamic roots and a consequent belief in ‘‘fate’’ (Kabasakal & Dastmalchian, 2001) reinforces a present-orientation in Turkey. The Portuguese tend to be oriented to the past due to a somewhat recent history of economic hardships that contrasts with a far more glorious colonial past. We propose that negotiators in the U.S. are more likely to assume a competitive stance when negotiating over delayed issues compared to negotiators in Turkey or Portugal because negotiators in the U.S. tend to be more future-oriented (Ashkanasy et al., 2002; Jesuino, 2002; Kabasakal & Bodur, 2002) and, therefore, may discount the value of delayed outcomes to a lesser degree, placing relatively more emphasis on issues with delayed outcomes. Further, negotiators in the U.S. may be more likely to trade-off present negotiations for future ones compared to Turkey or Portugal. In other words, negotiators in the U.S. are likely to concede to the other party in a present, less important negotiation while expecting a return from the other party in a more important future negotiation. Naturally, such a

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relationship would be moderated by the strength of the relationships between the parties.

Uncertainty Avoidance and Temporality in Negotiations Uncertainty avoidance refers to the extent to which individuals strive to avoid ambiguity by relying on social norms, rituals, and bureaucratic practices (House et al., 2001). Societies that are oriented to the future can also try to avoid the ambiguity the future entails. Thus, future-oriented societies tend to be heavily involved in planning, forecasting, and investing in the future (House et al., 2001, 2002), which serve to minimize the negative impact of an ambiguous future on the present. Similar to an orientation to the future, the level of uncertainty avoidance in a society is likely to be heavily affected by stability factors. Institutional systems, historical heritage, economic development, or religion can shape the way time is viewed by people of different cultures and how they view and deal with uncertainty. For example, people in a country battered by a history of economic crises are likely to get used to uncertainty as it is a part of daily life. Conversely, a stable economy creates the perception of a more certain future and any uncertainty is likely to be mitigated through extensive planning and forecasting. The degree of uncertainty avoidance in a society can affect temporal preferences in a negotiation context. Compared to negotiators from a culture that is accepting of uncertainty, negotiators from an uncertainty avoidant culture may be more competitive when negotiating over delayed issues, because delayed issues carry more uncertainty in their implementation. Moreover, negotiators from cultures that avoid uncertainty may assign more risk to future outcomes than present ones, whereas those that embrace uncertainty are likely to assign less risk due to a lower level of desire to control the effect of the future on their present decisions. Research has shown that the Turks are generally more tolerant of uncertainty than the Portuguese, who are more tolerant of uncertainty than individuals from the U.S. (Ashkanasy et al., 2002; Jesuino, 2002; Kabasakal & Bodur, 2002). Turks are less avoidant of uncertainty compared to individuals from the U.S., perhaps due to Turkey’s roots in Islam and individuals’ need to maintain a strong relationship with the family and other closely knit groups (Kabasakal & Bodur, 2002). These networks of close relationships may provide the security the Turks need to cope with ambiguity. On the other hand, what is distinctive and peculiar about Portugal is the ‘‘paternalistic role attributed to the state’’ which is expected to ‘‘regulate,


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educate and protect its subjects’’ (Jesuino, 2002, p. 84). Within Portuguese society, the state assumes the protector role and provides a ‘‘safety net’’ from uncertainty. In contrast, the individualistic nature of the U.S. seems to leave little room for the immediate family or other members of the community to protect individuals from uncertainty. Instead, individuals in the U.S. tend to rely on processes and institutions focused on planning. These differences across national cultures in how uncertainty is viewed can impact negotiations. In particular, Turks may be more cooperative when negotiating over delayed issues than immediate ones, as they are more likely to embrace ambiguous situations, compared to the Portuguese, who in turn will be more cooperative than individuals in the U.S. In addition, due to differences in uncertainty avoidance in Turkey, Portugal, and the U.S, negotiators from these cultures can create agreements that involve conditional agreements tied to risk preferences, where Turks take more risks than the Portuguese who take more risks than individuals from the U.S. In this section, we have described three elements of cultural temporality: polychronicity, future orientation, and uncertainty avoidance. These temporal factors have been previously examined to understand how societies view time (e.g., Hall, 1989; House et al., 2001). We have extended previous work to explore the potential impact of cultural temporality on temporal preferences and behaviors in negotiations. We have suggested that cultural temporality may have an influence on individuals’ perceptions of time, and, therefore, may have consequences for individuals’ temporal preferences and behaviors during negotiation.

NEGOTIATION PARADIGMS, PROCESSES, AND OUTCOMES In this section, we explore negotiation paradigms observed in different cultures as a mechanism to explain how cultural temporality affects temporal preferences and behaviors in negotiations. We describe three aspects of the negotiation experience in day-to-day life in Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S. to explore how the national environment can affect temporality in negotiation. These descriptions highlight ways in which different countries reflect different contextual environments within which negotiation takes place. We argue that different countries, by merit of their different cultural influences, develop paradigms of negotiation that are defined by shared conceptions of how, when, and under what circumstances negotiations should take place. Here, we define negotiation paradigms as shared cognitive representations

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that individuals in a given culture hold and that are used to make sense of the negotiation activity. These negotiation paradigms influence the specific processes and outcomes associated with temporality in any given negotiation.

Negotiating as a Common vs. Uncommon Activity and Temporality in Negotiations In some cultural settings, individuals negotiate frequently because this may be the only way to achieve one’s goals. In other settings, negotiating may not be as common. In Portugal, for instance, negotiating tends to be perceived as awkward and somewhat unnatural, and it is not an everyday task. The Portuguese are not used to negotiating, perhaps as a legacy of a half-century-old dictatorship (Rafael, 1994), which involved a controlling autocratic regime and a high degree of state intervention in all aspects of economic life (Nunes & Montanheiro, 1997). Negotiating opportunities are limited in Portugal, circumscribed to a limited number of places or interactions (e.g., feiras – mobile agglomerations of vendors that sell everything from food products to clothes, furniture, or small domestic appliances). In stark contrast, bargaining is an integral aspect of a Turk’s day-to-day activity. As Cavusgil et al. (2003) remarked, bargaining is a national hobby in Turkey and people frequently negotiate. These negotiations range from bargaining for consumables such as clothing or photocopies to larger-scale items such as a house or car. Finally, individuals from the U.S. are most likely to bargain when acquiring big-ticket items or during major life events, such as changing employers (i.e., job negotiations). Individuals acquire experience in negotiating over time. In a culture where negotiating is a common occurrence, individuals acquire experience more readily. Experience can lead to being more willing and proactive in communicating needs and desires to the other party. In addition, one would expect experienced negotiators to have a greater awareness as to when they, or the other party, will walk away from a negotiation. Because negotiating is less fearsome for experienced negotiators, they may be more assertive in their temporal preferences when negotiating with a party with less initiative and experience. For example, they may be less likely to delay gratification by demanding a quick implementation. Moreover, experienced parties are less likely to give up on their demands and are likely to continue haggling until a satisfactory agreement is reached. Overall, we argue that individuals from the U.S. and Portugal are likely to be less proactive in communicating needs


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and desires to the other party while taking less time to reach an agreement than the Turks.

Negotiating as a Process vs. an Outcome and Temporality in Negotiations Another difference in how negotiation takes place across countries is related to whether there is a primary focus on the process or the outcome. For the Portuguese, personal negotiations, as infrequent as they may be, have to be considered in the context of relationships. The Portuguese tend to value long-term relationships, as reflected in their collectivistic nature (Hofstede, 1980). Bargaining, especially over distributive issues, where one’s gain is the other’s loss, can be particularly tricky and needs to be carried out with great caution so as not to sever relationships. Although Portuguese executives at large companies tend to assume an aggressive and practical stance in business dealings, most small-and medium-sized businesses are less financially aggressive and place high importance on trust and personal loyalty (Rafael, 1994). Overall, for the Portuguese, the handling of the negotiation seems to be as important, if not more important, than the outcome of the negotiation. In Turkey, the bargaining process is considered an enjoyable experience (Cavusgil et al., 2003). Although the end-result of a negotiation is important, the process of negotiating is perceived as a natural and well-appreciated aspect of daily life. In the context of business dealings, Turks use business lunches and dinners as opportunities to develop a relationship, and reciprocating is crucial (Cavusgil et al., 2003). In contrast to both Portugal and Turkey, individuals in the U.S. tend to focus on ‘‘the bottom line.’’ Americans strive to get the best deal and, hence, emphasize the outcome over the process. Given that the U.S. is characterized as an individualistic, achievement-oriented, and performance-driven culture where individuals display high degrees of independence (Ashkanasy, et al., 2002), it is not surprising that a strong performance orientation during bargaining can often be observed. Attempts to get the best end-result in negotiations may also be linked to the assertiveness (i.e., the extent to which societies are assertive, confrontational, and aggressive in social relationships, see House et al., 2002) of the U.S. culture, which is considered to be high on this dimension (Ashkanasy et al., 2002). Cultures that view negotiating as a process rather than an outcome are likely to invest more effort in building relationships and preparing for potential future negotiations compared to cultures that place primary importance on the outcome. Given the importance of building the relationship,

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negotiation deadlines may be taken less seriously. Viewing negotiating as an outcome, on the other hand, makes the handling of negotiation more efficient, such that negotiators are likely to invest less time reaching an agreement because building the relationship is not an integral part of the negotiation process. We argue that due to an outcome orientation in the U.S., one can observe a more efficient way of handling the negotiation process by reaching an agreement more swiftly, compared to Portugal or Turkey. In Portugal or Turkey, individuals are more likely to focus on efficiently managing the relationship than individuals in the U.S. whereas individuals in the U.S. are more likely to focus on the negotiation outcome per se than those in Portugal or Turkey.

Negotiating as a Rational vs. an Emotional Process and Temporality in Negotiations Whereas in some cultures individuals may refrain from expressing emotion, in others open conflict and loud argumentation are an integral (and even enjoyable) aspect of negotiating (Cavusgil et al., 2003). Negotiating in Portugal seems largely based on rational exchanges of arguments. Using rational arguments, the Portuguese bargain at a professional level rather than a personal level, which is not surprising since Portuguese tend to be somewhat formal (Rafael, 1994). At the same time, given the collectivist nature of the Portuguese (Hofstede, 1980), this professional style of negotiating is also amenable to the protection of personal relationships, which may be reflected in emotional aspects of negotiation. Turks, on the other hand, tend to debate and be argumentative as they embrace conflict. In Turkish, the very word ‘‘negotiation’’ translates as pazarlik, which implies a heated, animated, haggling process (Cavusgil et al., 2003). This complements the high levels of aggressiveness in the Turkish society (Kabasakal & Bodur, 2002), which is likely to make Turks low on conflict avoiding behaviors during negotiations. In the U.S., expressions of emotion can sometimes be thought of as inappropriate and negotiations can be carried out in a more rational and less emotional manner. The individualistic nature of the culture in the U.S. (Hofstede, 1980) emphasizes a self that is not attached to others, perhaps allowing a more rational way of dealing with one’s negotiation partner. Important differences mark the influence of negotiating as a rational vs. an emotional process on temporal preferences in negotiation. A rational way of negotiating allows viewing time in blocks, as something that cannot be wasted or spent. Therefore, a rational negotiator may only invest time on


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negotiating as it is deemed necessary. In addition, because a rational negotiator is likely to evaluate a block of time in the future similar to a block of time in the present, he or she may be more likely to envision the impact of future outcomes on current decisions. We suggest that when negotiating over delayed outcomes, rational negotiators such as those in the U.S. are likely to discount the future less compared to emotional negotiators such as those in Turkey and to evaluate delayed issues as similar to immediate ones. In addition, U.S. negotiators will take less time negotiating than negotiators in Turkey since irrelevant, non-factual matters are not as likely to be brought to the table. In Turkey, delayed issues are likely to lose their importance in the face of immediate ones. Being emotional negotiators, Turks will involuntarily focus on their emotions salient during negotiation and have a heightened focus on what is at stake at the present moment in time, possessing an inconsistent view of time. On the other hand, negotiators in Portugal, who may use emotional and rational approaches in negotiations, are likely to lie somewhere in between U.S. and Turkish negotiators in how much time they take to negotiate and how they perceive delayed issues. To summarize, although negotiating may be observed in many different national cultures, the negotiation paradigm with which negotiation is carried out can vary substantially. The idiosyncrasies illustrated for Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S. (see Table 2) highlight some of the negotiation processes that underlie the characteristics of these countries’ negotiation paradigms. Establishing variations across nations on paradigms utilized during negotiations is valuable because these variations are likely to influence temporal preferences Table 2.

Negotiating as a common vs. uncommon activity Negotiating as a process vs. an outcome Negotiating as a rational vs. an emotional, argumentative process

Negotiating in Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S. Portugal

Turkey

U.S.

Infrequent small-and big-item negotiations

Frequent small- and big-item negotiations

Process and outcome (negotiation as a venue to maintain relationships) Rational and emotional exchange

Process (negotiation as an enjoyable activity)

Infrequent smallitem negotiations; frequent big-item negotiations Outcome (negotiation as an end-result)

Emotional exchange (negotiating through debating and argumentation)

Rational exchange

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and behaviors in negotiation such as emphasis on immediate vs. temporally distant outcomes or the amount of time spent on finalizing an agreement.

NATIONAL STABILITY, CULTURAL TEMPORALITY, AND NEGOTIATION PARADIGM In this section, we describe how different elements of national environment (i.e., cultural temporality, negotiation paradigm, and national stability) relate to one another as well as to negotiation processes and outcomes, following Fig. 1. We suggest that individuals’ temporal attitudes and behaviors during negotiations are likely to be heavily influenced by the nation-level negotiation paradigms that stem from both nation-level cultural temporality and stability. To the extent that individuals’ views, attitudes, preferences, and actions are partly a product of their national environment, negotiation processes and outcomes will reflect the characteristics of cultural temporality and stability. Cultural temporality and stability can restrict the available attitudes and behaviors in specific negotiation situations by presenting a frame for how one will approach and think about a negotiation situation. An individual from a culture low on time tangibility (Hall, 1959 i.e., a characteristic of cultural temporality) or a culture of close relationships (i.e., a characteristic of national stability) is likely to place a strong emphasis on the process of negotiating because building and preserving the relationship is an important aspect of these cultures. Therefore, one will observe a process orientation (i.e., a characteristic of negotiation paradigm) from negotiators. Negotiation paradigms will then have an overarching influence on how individuals act during negotiations and the agreements they reach. For example, we would expect that negotiators from a culture low on time tangibility or high on close relationships who tend to be process oriented in negotiation situations will be less focused on meeting the deadlines for reaching an agreement than on creating a trusting relationship. In contrast, negotiators from a culture high on time tangibility (i.e., viewing time in blocks, as something that one can partition into smaller units) or low on close-relationships who tend to place more emphasis on the outcome of the negotiation than the process will focus heavily on planning and preparing for negotiations and meeting the negotiation deadline. It is important to note that at any given time multiple national stability factors, as part of the broader national environment, will influence temporal preferences and behaviors in negotiation. For the purposes of this chapter, we only discuss those stability factors, including institutional systems, close


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relationships, and population homogeneity, whose effects on temporal behaviors are relatively straightforward. However, other factors such as religion, economic development, the role of the state, or historical heritage also exist. These factors can affect negotiations in a combined fashion. For example, a few of the characteristics of the national environment in the U.S. are a future orientation, a Protestant ethic (including elements of punctuality, diligence, deferment of gratification, and primacy of the work domain, Rose, 1985), and a stable, powerful economy. A stable economy may reinforce an optimistic view of the future and enable future-oriented behaviors such as planning or forecasting. A future orientation coupled with a strong Protestant ethic create an even stronger economy and stable institutions, adding to the cycle where both temporal culture (e.g. future orientation) and national stability (e.g., institutional system) influence one another. A heavy orientation to the future and a strong Protestant ethic, in turn, can lead individuals to view negotiating as a rational process where individuals do planning before and during negotiating as well as work toward set deadlines and place great value on issues whose outcomes will be realized in the future. A healthy, steady economy may also eliminate the attractiveness of negotiating as a common activity and limits negotiating to big-ticket items. In addition, future orientation and strong Protestant ethic can focus negotiators’ attention on the outcome of negotiating. Portugal can be characterized by a history of revolutions over the last decades, such as the fall of the dictatorial regime in 1974. The volatile history, resulting in an unstable economy, may reinforce a pessimistic view of the future. In addition, individuals tend to converse about and generally focus on the past and the present more than the future. Because the future is not viewed the same way as the present, and because poor economic conditions persist along with a collectivist culture, the Portuguese are likely to focus on the process of negotiating rather than the outcome to maintain relationships. In turn, deadlines are not heavily emphasized and heavy emphasis is likely to be placed on issues whose outcomes will be realized today in negotiation situations. Turkey’s poor economy in addition to its adherence to the Muslim faith may reinforce a view where the future cannot be controlled, which explains the heavy emphasis on the present. Therefore, the negotiation paradigm in Turkey considers negotiating a common activity, an emotional process, and is process- instead of outcome-oriented. Planning or forecasting is rarely observed because the economy is volatile and future conditions cannot be easily anticipated. Short-term solutions to even complex problems are common. Due to these characteristics of the negotiation

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paradigm in Turkey, one can observe lack of attention to deadlines as well as focus on issues with immediate outcomes.

DISCUSSION National environment has a pervasive impact on perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors of individuals embedded in that environment. In this chapter, we extend previous work on negotiations by exploring temporality in different national cultures and discussing differences in negotiation processes and outcomes across cultures when negotiations have temporal constraints such as deadlines or delayed implementation of outcomes. Understanding how perceptions of time differ across cultures is an important step in understanding a variety of managerial dimensions as perceptions of time influence strategic choices (Reger & Huff, 1993), decision-making styles (Beldona, Inkpen, & Pratak, 1998) and negotiation per se (Foster, 1992). Understanding the influence of time on negotiations is important because temporal concerns are ubiquitous in negotiations. Organizations and individuals often negotiate with a deadline or negotiate for outcomes that are delayed. In fact, not only negotiated outcomes but also other outcomes are often delayed. An investment project may only yield a financial return after many years. The return for years of education manifests itself over the life of an individual. Procurement relationships that entail deliveries scheduled over a predefined period may extend to several months. In addition, negotiation research and practice can benefit from an understanding of conditions under which negotiations are likely to lead to agreements that are more efficient. Delayed outcomes or deadlines may bring this efficiency to the extent that the future is discounted in the eyes of the negotiators, where the rate of discounting can vary from one culture to another, or that deadlines are taken into consideration when building agreements. One of the primary contributions of this paper is to introduce the concept of negotiation paradigm as a mechanism through which national environment affects temporal preferences and behaviors in negotiations. We suggest that complex environmental factors give rise to the development of cognitive paradigms that societies use as a roadmap to approach negotiation situations. For example, we suggested that while some cultures are more process-oriented, others are more outcome-oriented in a negotiation context as a result of differences in future orientation or work values across these cultures. Another important contribution of this paper is in suggesting a way to overcome an implicit view in much research that time means the same for all


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individuals in all countries, suggesting that we move away from ‘‘parochial’’ views of human phenomena (Boyacigiller & Adler, 1991). We argue that we should look at time as a multidimensional construct including, for example, future orientation, uncertainty avoidance, and time tangibility. We also suggest that, to understand the impact of time on negotiation, we must integrate macro environmental factors, such as institutional and economic influences, and cultural temporality that form negotiation paradigms, which influence temporality in negotiation. Our analysis emphasizes the perspective that as the conceptualizations of time differ across cultures so should the negotiations with temporal elements. It is important to note that the effect of national environment on negotiating is complex and, therefore, hard to predict. At any given point in time, several environmental factors such as political, legal, economic, and social factors come together to create certain types of negotiation paradigms in the minds of individuals in a given society. These paradigms, in turn, affect temporal orientations in negotiation, such as how societies negotiate for immediate and delayed implementation of outcomes or behave in the face of a deadline. Turkey, Portugal, and the U.S. are characterized by different combinations of interdependent political, legal, economic, social, and institutional factors, which influence negotiations. These environmental factors also change over time, creating further changes in negotiation paradigms, and, therefore, in temporal preferences and behaviors in negotiations. We suggest specific directions where theoretical and empirical work might be worthwhile. First, future research may benefit from undertaking a more in-depth analysis of the impact of past and present developments in the economic, legal, political, and social arenas. For instance, the influence of British colonization and the September 11th events on the U.S., the effect of Islam and the formal recognition of Turkey as a candidate to join the European Union on Turkey, or how the Portuguese culture has evolved to accommodate the impact of the European Union, are worth noting as forces shaping temporal views. That is, as the environment changes, so do the cultural and individual interpretations of such aspects as time. Future research could also develop a thorough examination of different temporal constructs across cultures. This requires overcoming our natural parochialism (Boyacigiller & Adler, 1991), which often emerges when researchers use the very same measure across countries without appropriate adaptations. In addition, given the complexity inherent in delayed outcomes, future quasi-experimental research on cross-cultural negotiations can benefit from simple manipulations of time, for example, manipulating a single temporal orientation (e.g., future orientation) rather than manipulating delays.

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Another avenue for future research is to identify the similarities and differences among countries in how individuals allocate burdens in negotiation situations. Perhaps the allocation of resources with negative valences (Sondak, Neale, & Pinkley, 1995) is a function of negotiators’ prior experiences. For instance, individuals more accustomed to dealing with burdens may be more efficient when negotiating for burdens than individuals that deal more often with benefits. Thus, it would be reasonable to suggest that negotiators in Turkey would reach more efficient negotiated agreements than those in Portugal, who will reach more efficient agreements than those in the U.S. This should be particularly true when allocating delayed burdens. These relative efficiencies would result naturally from differences in the economic wealth of the country and its citizens. Nonetheless, future research may test specifically whether individuals primed with burdens are more or less efficient than those primed with benefits. Studying negotiation as a special case of collective decision processes such as group decision making highlights the importance of the social or relationship aspect of negotiation, which is affected by the broader environment, including the culture in which the negotiation takes place. For example, in a nation characterized by close interpersonal ties, negotiation interactions will focus on the process of negotiating, which will involve building and maintaining the relationship between parties. These relationship building efforts are likely to yield a cooperative style of negotiating, making it easier for parties to reach the integrative potential of an agreement. Overall, environmental characteristics whose influences are ingrained within individuals in a given nation are likely to affect the interactions between parties, which can determine negotiation outcomes.

Implications Although our examination is theoretical, it is easy to foresee a number of implications for research and practice related to intra-cultural negotiations. Understanding negotiation paradigms within cultures can help set expectations for how negotiations will take place within those cultures. For example, if negotiating is a common experience in a given culture, then, in many situations, individuals will be expected to negotiate to be able to achieve a satisfactory agreement. Going into the negotiation with a shared mindset that negotiating is to be expected will help parties feel comfortable with the idea and act of negotiating, making it easier for them to be able to reach a mutual agreement.


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In addition, understanding the impact of culture on negotiation can help parties adjust their negotiation strategies accordingly. For instance, if, in a given culture, individuals tend to underestimate the importance of the value of future outcomes (i.e., discount the value of future outcomes), they are likely to trade off future outcomes for present ones even though the value of the present outcomes may be less than that of future outcomes. However, a negotiator who is aware of the tendency to underestimate future outcomes can use this information to his or her advantage by trading off present outcomes that are not as valuable for future outcomes that are more valuable. Overall, understanding how individuals go about negotiating within a given culture can set mutual expectations for parties involved in the negotiation and create opportunities to adjust one’s strategy to increase individual gain. A number of implications for cross-cultural negotiations also exist. First, a past or a present orientation may be associated with greater discounting effects, which is not necessarily bad in a negotiation setting. When negotiated outcomes are delayed into the future, greater discounting may lead to less difficult negotiations and therefore better agreements (Okhuysen et al., 2003). Managers in different cultures need to recognize how differences in temporal perceptions may lead to conflicts over the realization of a negotiated agreement. Negotiators may display more or less heated arguments and emotions when the outcomes are delayed or immediately realized. Thus, it is important for managers to pay attention to how negotiators’ temporal perceptions are likely to differ across cultures, and how these orientations may affect the negotiation processes and outcomes. For example, one could expect negotiating to be a little more competitive when negotiating over delayed issues with a negotiator from a future-oriented culture than with a negotiator from a present or past-oriented culture. A negotiator from a future-oriented culture is likely to put great emphasis on the issues even when their implementation is to occur in a distant future. It is important to note that when individuals from different cultures negotiate, the process and the outcome of the negotiation will follow the joint decision-making process, which will include elements of conflict and underlying interests. On one hand, differences in negotiation paradigms such as process orientation as observed in Turkey vs outcome orientation as observed in the U.S. are likely to create conflict during negotiating. Similar to differences in attitudes toward quality and punctuality that Foster (1992) noted between Americans and the French, a Turkish negotiator will value the process of negotiating and extend this process to build a relationship, while a U.S. negotiator will focus on the outcome and the deadline to reach this outcome. Conflict is likely to arise as the Turkish negotiator insists on a

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business lunch or dinner and the U.S. negotiator is anxious to close the deal. On the other hand, differences in time orientations such as present-orientation of a Turkish negotiator and a future-orientation of a negotiator from the U.S. can help parties realize the integrative potential in an agreement through trading-off among issues with immediate and delayed outcomes that have different levels of importance to each party. In sum, differences in negotiation paradigms and temporal orientations can create conflict while providing opportunities for logrolling or trade-offs. Notwithstanding, it is important to remember Adler and Graham’s (1989) finding that individuals adjust their behavior when negotiating cross-culturally. In particular, Adler and Graham (1989) found that managers revealed different negotiating behaviors when negotiating intra-culturally than when they engaged in cross-cultural negotiation. This is a positive indication that managers are aware of the cultural differences and adapt accordingly. However, the first step toward appropriate adaptation is the knowledge of what to adapt to such as the local interpretations of time and the environmental factors surrounding those interpretations.

NOTES 1. GLOBE (Global Leadership and Organizational Behavior Effectiveness) is a research program that focuses on culture and leadership in 61 countries (House et al., 2002). 2. The Latin Europe cluster comprises Spain, Portugal, Italy, French Switzerland, France, and Israel (Jesuino, 2002). The Arabic cluster includes Egypt, Morocco, Turkey, Kuwait, and Qatar (Kabasakal & Bodur, 2002). The Anglo cluster consists of Australia, Canada, England, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa (White sample), and the United States of America (Ashkanasy et al., 2002).

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CULTURE, AFFECT, AND SOCIAL INFLUENCE IN DECISION-MAKING GROUPS Lu Wang, Lorna Doucet and Gregory Northcraft ABSTRACT Although social influence plays an important role in organizational groups, past findings regarding culture’s impact on social influence have been scarce and inconsistent. Past research has found that people from collectivist cultures are more susceptible to social influence, while other studies have found the opposite or no effect. One major weakness of prior research on social influence is the predominantly cognitive orientation that has underemphasized the role of affect in culture’s impact on social influence. We address this weakness by outlining an affective model of social influence, thereby expanding our understanding of social influence in multicultural decision-making groups.

INTRODUCTION Groups have the potential to outperform individuals because groups can tap the unique perspectives, opinions, and information of their members, thereby creating a larger pool of intellectual resources to use when making National Culture and Groups Research on Managing Groups and Teams, Volume 9, 147–172 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1534-0856/doi:10.1016/S1534-0856(06)09007-4

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decisions (Wagerman, 1995; Guzzo & Dickson, 1996). Unfortunately, the potential effectiveness of groups is undermined when social influence processes lead group members to withhold their unique perspectives, opinions, and information from the group (Stasser & Titus, 1985; Gigone & Hastie, 1993). Group members often choose to self-sensor or conform in response to social pressures within the group. Such choices can be detrimental to group performance when group members choose to withhold information that is critical for effective decision making. This disruptive effect of social influence in groups seems a particularly critical issue in multicultural groups. Multicultural groups are those composed of members socialized in countries with different cultures. Individuals socialized in countries with different cultures typically will hold different values, information, opinions, and perspectives (Hofstede, 1980; Triandis, 1994, 1995). These differences represent a critical resource for effective decision making in groups. However, cultural differences may also determine the extent to which social influence processes prevent that critical resource from being put to good use in groups. That is the focus of this chapter: How do cultural differences facilitate or dampen social influence processes in groups? A review of the literature regarding culture and social influence in groups reveals some surprises. Research has been conducted in two main areas: social influence regarding subjective evaluations (e.g. whether a policy is appropriate or inappropriate) and social influence regarding objective judgments (e.g. the length of a line or the direction of a movement). Research concerning the effects of culture and social influence on subjective evaluations is remarkably thin. In two of the few studies that have been conducted, Meade and Barnard (1973) found that Chinese college students were more likely than American students to shift their opinions on controversial issues when faced with group pressure. However, few, if any other studies, have examined the relationship between culture and social influence on subjective evaluations. Somewhat more research has examined the relationship between culture and social influence on objective judgments. Bond and Smith (1996) conducted a meta-analysis of studies examining the relation between individualism–collectivism and conformity using an Asch-type line judgment task (1952b). Although Bond and Smith (1996) reported overall support for a positive relation between collectivism and conformity, they also noted multiple exceptions. For example, while some studies found that individuals from collectivist cultures are more susceptible to social influence than people from individualist cultures (Huang & Harris, 1973; Meade & Barnard, 1973; Sistrunk, Clement, & Guenther, 1971; Bond & Smith, 1996), other studies

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have found the opposite (Frager, 1970; Williams & Sogon, 1984) or no effect at all (Whittaker & Meade, 1967; Rodrigues, 1982). Overall, then, past research on the role of culture in social influence in groups paints a very incomplete picture. An important limitation of past research is that it focuses almost exclusively on verbal communication when examining the relationship between culture and social influence in groups. Few studies have explored the role of nonverbal communication – such as expressed affect – in understanding the role of culture in social influence. Because nonverbal communication is more open to interpretation than verbal communication (Royatos, 1988; Seel, 2005; Kowner & Wiseman, 2003), social influence via nonverbal processes may be more susceptible to cultural effects. The central argument we explore in this chapter is that expressed affect, as a specific type of nonverbal communication, plays an important role in social influence. In a sense, we are building on Asch’s (1952a) contention that affect and cognition are both important determinants of social interactions and influence in groups. Asch (1952a) wrote: The human form is one of the most expressive objects in the surroundings; few of its movements lack expressive qualities. But most vivid and expressive is the appearance of a person in the throes of emotion. In the changes of the face, posture and gait we see the visible forms of determination, fear, cheerfulness, or sadness y . The grasp of these changes quickens our understandings of others and increases the speed and subtlety of social interaction. (p. 183)

Recent studies have provided some indirect evidence confirming affect’s role in social influence. For example, both Doucet (2004) and Pugh (2001) found that employees’ expressions of affect influenced customers’ evaluation of overall service quality. Expressions of negative affect were found to be negatively associated with evaluations of service quality (Doucet, 2004), whereas expressions of positive affect were found to be positively associated with evaluations of service quality (Pugh, 2001). Research has also found transformational leadership to be associated with superior work unit effectiveness – ostensibly due to such leaders’ abilities to influence followers through the expression of affect (see Lowe & Galen Kroeck, 1996 for a review). One reason for this may be that a key element of expressed affect is its evaluative dimension – which can be directly linked to evaluations (Russell, 1979). For example, expressions of positive affect have been found to be attributed to positive evaluations of an issue or an object (Mehrabian & Ferris, 1967). In sum, we propose that the role of culture in social influence can be more fully appreciated by extending previous models to include the role of expressed affect in social influence.

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A BASIC MODEL OF CULTURE AND SOCIAL INFLUENCE Social Influence in Groups Social influence generally refers to processes whereby an individual’s beliefs, opinions, attitudes, values, and behaviors are affected by other(s) through social interaction (Manstead & Hewstone, 1995; Cialdini & Trost, 1998). A basic model of social influence is illustrated in Fig. 1a. Social influence occurs when one group member expresses an evaluation regarding a focal issue, which is perceived by a second group member, which in turn influences the second group member’s evaluation of the focal issue. Group members are often influenced by other group members’ evaluations of important issues and subsequently edit or even refrain from offering their own unique perspectives, opinions, and information once they become aware of other group members’ evaluations (Gigone & Hastie, 1993; Stasser & Titus, 1985). This social influence process has the potential to undermine the

Group members’ verbally expressed evaluations of focal issue

Observing group members’ perceptions of other group members’ evaluations of focal issue

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Fig. 1a.

A Basic Model of Social Influence in Groups.


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effectiveness of group decision making and performance when it leads to the suppression of decision-critical perspectives, opinions, or information. Researchers have suggested at least four reasons why individuals yield to social influence (Deutsch & Gerard, 1955). First, an individual’s susceptibility to social influence may be explained using the accuracy motive – that is, individuals have a desire to be correct or accurate in their judgments and actions (Aronson, 1972; Cialdini & Goldstein, 2004; Deutsch & Gerard, 1955). Individuals often rely on others to determine what constitutes correct judgments or behaviors. When group members express evaluations of key issues during a discussion, others may regard these evaluations as information about reality and therefore alter their personal opinions in order to improve the accuracy of their evaluations (Kaplan & Miller, 1983, 1987). Empirical studies have shown that a desire for accuracy can lead individuals to change their opinions and actions (Burnstein & Vinokur, 1975; Clark, Crockett, & Archer, 1971). For example, Burnstein and Vinokur (1975) examined choice shift in individuals who found out that their initial choices differed from others’. Individuals were more likely to be influenced by the choices made by others when they were given enough time to generate persuasive arguments supporting the choices made by others than when they did not have access to such persuasive arguments. These findings suggest that a desire for accuracy may account for an individual’s susceptibility to social influence. Second, individuals’ susceptibility to social influence may also stem from the desire to create and maintain relationships with others (Cialdini & Goldstein, 2004; Deutsch & Gerard, 1955). This affiliation motive reflects an individual’s desire to gain the social approval of others as well as to build and maintain rewarding relations (Cialdini & Goldstein, 2004). The affiliation motive leads individuals to be influenced by evaluations expressed by other group members. Individuals who conform to evaluations expressed by other group members expect to be rewarded with social approval and positive relationships. Heider’s (1958) balance theory also suggests that positive relationships can only be psychologically comfortable and stable when both parties share opinions and judgments about key issues – implying that social influence and affiliation are interdependent. A number of classic experiments have demonstrated the effect of the affiliation motive on social influence (Asch, 1951, 1955). Third, individuals’ susceptibility to social influence may also be attributed to self-interest regarding material gains. This type of influence is likely to be wielded by group members who control rewards and/or punishments (French & Raven, 1959; Haas, 1981; Kelman, 1961; Schein, 1977). Based on the hedonic principle, individuals are motivated to behave in ways that maximize rewards and minimize punishments (Higgins, 1997).

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Fourth, individuals’ susceptibility to social influence may also stem from respect for legitimate authority (see Cialdini, 1995 for a review; French & Raven, 1959). Deference to legitimate authority is typically based on cultural norms (Linton, 1945). For example, in many societies, children are socialized to respect and defer to their parents’ judgments and employees are socialized to hold their bosses in high esteem and submit to their opinions (Triandis, 1995). In both cases, authority figures have a significant influence on individuals’ evaluative beliefs. In sum, the four reasons we outline above have been used in previous research to explain social influence. As we expand on previous models of social influence, we draw on these reasons to elaborate on the role of affect in culture and social influence in groups. Culture and Social Influence The majority of previous research extending models of social influence to include culture has focused on examining how cultural differences in individualism–collectivism affect individuals’ susceptibility to social influence. Bond and Smith (1996) argued that individuals socialized in collectivist countries have been socialized to be more motivated by the affiliation motive – which should make them more susceptible to social influence – than individuals socialized in individualist countries. Hence, Bond and Smith (1996) extended the basic social influence model (illustrated in Fig. 1a) by adding the cultural difference of individualism–collectivism as a moderator of the social influence process. Bond and Smith (1996) addition to the basic model of social influence is illustrated in Fig. 1b (in bold). Based on a metaanalysis, Bond and Smith (1996) found overall support for their hypothesis that individuals socialized in collectivist countries were more susceptible to social influence than individuals socialized in individualist countries. However, as the authors noted, many studies did not support this hypothesis. Affect Although Asch (1952a) argued for the role of affect in social influence over 50 years ago, the role of affect has remained largely overlooked in current theories of social influence. When using the term affect, we mean to include both emotion and mood (Petty, Gleicher, & Baker, 1991). We follow Watson (2000), who defines emotion as ‘‘a distinct, integrated, psychophysiological response system; in essence, an emotion represents an organized, highly structured reaction to an event that is relevant to the needs, goals, or survival of the organism’’ (p. 3). More specifically, Ekman (2003) argues that an emotion has a variety of characteristics, including: (1) a feeling or sensation that we experience; (2) a relatively short duration; (3) a specific


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Observing group members’ perceptions of other group members’ evaluations of focal issue Focal Issue Individualism/ Collectivism¹ Observing group members’ evaluation of focal issue 1. Refers to observing group member

Fig. 1b.

A Model of Culture and Social Influence in Groups.

and important target; and (4) an efficient signal – which serves to communicate feelings to others. Mood, on the other hand, is defined as, ‘‘transient episodes of feeling or affect’’ (Watson, 2000, p. 4). Compared with an emotion, a mood is a low intensity, diffuse feeling state that usually does not have a clear antecedent (Forgas, 1992) and lasts longer than an emotion. Unlike emotions, moods do not offer clear signals. Despite the differences, emotion and mood share many similarities. For example, both emotion and mood involve feelings or sensations that are experienced. These feelings are often characterized in terms of degree of pleasantness and degree of activation (Russell, 1979). Mood is also associated with specific emotions. For example, being in an unpleasant mood increases the probability that one will experience an unpleasant emotion in response to particular events or targets (Ekman, 2003). Although mood does not have unique signals, it is often communicated through expressions of emotion associated with the mood. Hence, we use the term affect to loosely capture the notion of feelings and expressions associated with both emotion and mood.

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In using the term affect, we distinguish between the experiential component of affect – which we label experienced affect – and the expressive component of affect – which we label expressed affect. Although expressed affect is often a direct reflection of experienced affect, researchers have noted differences in the degree to which individuals freely express the affect they experience (Asch, 1952a; Gross & John, 1998). We distinguish between experienced and expressed affect because we expect these two aspects of affect to play different roles in social influence.

CULTURE, AFFECT, AND SOCIAL INFLUENCE: THE EXTENDED MODEL In the remainder of this chapter, we extend the existing model of culture and social influence (captured in Fig. 1b) by specifying the affect-focused mechanisms through which social influence occurs. Furthermore, we examine the role culture plays in these affect-focused mechanisms. We suggest two distinct mechanisms through which group members’ expressed affect influences an observing group member’s evaluations of a focal issue. First, we propose that social influence can occur via the perception mechanism – by affecting an observing group member’s understanding of the other group members’ evaluations of a focal issue. Second, we propose that social influence can occur via a contagion mechanism – by affecting an observing group member’s experienced affect which in turn biases that group member’s perception and subsequent evaluation of the focal issue. Finally, we argue that cultural differences play a more important role in the perception mechanism than in the contagion mechanism. Our proposed extension to the existing model of culture and social influence is presented in Fig. 1c. The perception mechanism is represented by the pathway on the left; the contagion mechanism is represented by the pathway on the right. The Perception Mechanism Expressed affect is a type of nonverbal communication (Buck & VanLear, 2002) that can represent information about group members’ inner states – including their opinions and evaluations. More than a century ago, Darwin (1872/1998) proposed that the expression of affect reveals something about the inner state of the expresser. More specifically, Darwin argued that the perception of expressed affect serves a communication function, and



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Group members’ nonverbally expressed affect

Power²

Power Distance¹

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Perception Mechanism

In-group/ Out-group²

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Focal Issue

Individualism/ Collectivism¹

Observing group members’ evaluation of focal issue

1. Refers to observing group member 2. Refers to group members being observed/ who expressed affect

Fig. 1c.

Proposed Model of Culture, Affect, and Social Influence in Groups.

increases the probability of survival. For example, the perception of expressed fear by one group member serves to alert other group members that danger is present and that they should proceed with caution. Perceptions of expressed affect can often communicate more quickly, intensely, and effectively than nonaffective verbal communication (see Ekman, 2003 for further discussion of this point). Darwin argued that these communication functions of expressed emotions are genetically inherited due to their survival properties. More generally, researchers have argued that expressions of affect can communicate the affective component of attitudes. For example, expressions of positive affect can signal a favorable evaluation of a focal issue, and expressions of negative affect can signal an unfavorable evaluation (Jorgeson, 1978).

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Research has confirmed that individuals make inferences about others’ inner states based on the perception of expressed affect. For example, studies have shown that individuals showing anger are perceived to be dominant (Algoe, Buswell, & DeLamater, 2000; Tiedens, 2001) and more instrumental (Algoe et al., 2000) than those showing fear or sadness. In the attitude literature, research shows an individual’s attitude, which can be generally defined as the evaluation of a referent (Petty, 1995), can be identified by looking at how much an individual likes a referent (Rosenberg & Hovland, 1960). How much a person likes or dislikes a referent, in turn, may be perceived by others via expressed positive or negative affect in the presence of the referent. Indeed, researchers have found that individuals infer positive attitudes from positive facial expressions (Mehrabian & Ferris, 1967) and that positive attitudes can be reliably inferred from smiles (Jorgenson, 1978). Based on this evidence, we propose: Proposition 1. The affect expressed by group members will influence an observing group member’s perceptions of other group members’ evaluations of focal issues. Observer will infer the valence of others’ evaluations from the valence of others’ expressed affect. That is, if others express positive affect, observer will infer that others’ evaluations are positive. If others express negative affect, observer will infer others’ evaluations are negative. As discussed in our review of social influence, individuals are susceptible to social influence for multiple reasons – accuracy, affiliation, self-interest regarding material gains, and respect for legitimate authority (Cialdini & Goldstein, 2004; Deutsch & Gerard, 1955; French & Raven, 1959; Kelman, 1961; Milgram, 1974). Based on any or all of these motives, a group member who observes expressions of affect by other group members may change his or her evaluations to match the evaluations he or she perceives to be held by others. Proposition 2. An individual’s perceptions of other group members’ evaluations of focal issues will influence the individual’s evaluations of focal issues. That is, the more an individual perceives that other group members are in favor of an issue, the more that individual will be in favor of that issue. The more an individual perceives that other group members are opposed to an issue, the more that individual will be opposed to that issue. Combining Propositions 1 and 2 yields the following proposition: Proposition 3. The affect expressed by other group members will influence an individual’s evaluations of focal issues, mediated by that individual’s perceptions of other group members’ evaluations of those focal issues.


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Culture and the Perception Mechanism In our proposed perception mechanism, any or all of the four reasons for an individuals’ susceptibility to social influence can account for Proposition 2. However, since culture can influence an individual’s value and goals, culture is likely to play an important role in determining why an individual may be more or less susceptible to social influence via the perception mechanism. Culture has been described as a shared set of assumptions, beliefs, or worldview held by a group of people (Triandis, 1994, 1998). Culture includes the beliefs a group of people share about what constitutes appropriate values and goals for individuals and the group. We use the term culture to describe the shared beliefs and practices of a group of people, whereas we use the term cultural orientation to describe the beliefs of an individual who is part of a particular culture. Cultural orientation is the individual-level manifestation of group culture (Earley & Randel, 1997; Chao, 2000). Scholars have examined a number of dimensions of cultural orientation, including individualism–collectivism, power distance (Hofstede, 1983; Triandis, 1994), uncertainty avoidance, (Hofstede, 1983), orientation to time, relation to nature (Kluckhohn & Strodtbeck, 1961), and universalism– particularism (Trompenaars, 1994). Although many cultural orientations might play important roles in social influence via the perception mechanism, we focus on two cultural orientations that seem most promising: individualism–collectivism and power distance. Individualism–collectivism refers to the extent to which individuals organize their world around in-groups and out-groups; power distance refers to the extent to which individuals organize their world around power and deference to power (Hofstede, 1983). Below we examine in more detail the effect of each of these two cultural orientation variables on social influence via the perception mechanism. Affiliation, Individualism/Collectivism, and the Perception Mechanism. As noted earlier, the majority of previous work on culture and social influence explored the relationship between individualism–collectivism and social influence. As summarized by Bond and Smith (1996), individuals socialized in collectivist cultures tend to have strong affiliation motives, and hence, are more susceptible to social influence. We elaborate that same basic argument here in two ways. First, we examine how in-group/out-group categorizations may moderate social influence processes. Second, we examine differences in individualism/collectivism across cultures and how those differences may further moderate the perception pathway of affective social influence.

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Past studies have shown that an individual’s capacity to attend is limited and individuals do not allocate equal amounts of attention to each person or object in the environment (Fiske, 1995). Rather, individuals consciously choose to allocate more attention to certain stimuli than others (Neuberg & Fiske, 1987; Fiske & Taylor, 1991). As such, in a group, one group member may attend to the affective expressions of certain group members more than others. As a consequence, it is the affective expressions of group members to which an individual selectively attends that are most likely to influence that individual. Furthermore, researchers have argued that individuals attend more to contextual stimuli that are relevant to goal attainment than those that are irrelevant (Berscheid, Graziano, Monson, & Dermer, 1976; Fiske, 1995). James (1890) labeled this active attention. Hence, one might expect group members high in the affiliation motive to actively attend to all other group members. However, researchers have found that individuals do not always consider all group members to be of equal relevance. In social interactions within a group, individuals often categorize other group members into ingroups and out-groups (Tajfel & Turner, 1979). In-group members are those belonging to the same group as the individual, while out-group members are those who do not belong to the focal individual’s group (Devine, 1995). Since an individual and his or her in-group members belong to the same group, in-group members are often considered to be more relevant to an individual than the out-group members. In-group members tend to be those whose social approval is important to the observer. Hence, because an ingroup member’s approval is more relevant to an individual than an outgroup member, that individual is likely to attend more to his or her in-group members than out-group members. As a result, this increased attention to in-group members should lead to more complete and accurate perceptions of in-group evaluations than out-group evaluations: Proposition 4. An individual’s perceptions of other group members’ evaluations should be more complete and accurate for that individual’s ingroup members than for that individual’s out-group members. The key features of a collectivist cultural orientation include, among others, an emphasis on an ‘‘unconditional relatedness’’ (Gelfand, Bhawuk, Nishii, & Bechtold, 2004, p. 443) within the in-group. Within the in-group, social approval and positive relationships are of the utmost importance. Although individuals make in-group and out-group distinctions across different cultures, many studies show collectivists place more importance on the in-group/out-group distinction than individualists (Gomez, Kirkman, &


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Shapiro, 2000; Hui, Triandis, & Yee, 1991). For example, Gomez and colleagues (2000) found that people from Mexico (a collectivist culture) evaluated their in-group members more generously than people from the United States (mostly an individualistic culture). Similarly, Hui et al. (1991) found that people from collectivist cultures gave more generous rewards to their in-group members than people from individualist cultures. Based on this evidence, we propose that the bias to selectively attend to in-group members over out-group members should be stronger for collectivists than individualists. This bias should influence the completeness and accuracy of an individual’s perceptions of other group members’ evaluations. Proposition 5. The relationship proposed in Proposition 4 should be moderated by cultural orientation such that this relationship will be strongest for collectivists and weakest for individualists. The most complete and accurate perceptions of other group members’ evaluations should be formed by collectivists observing in-group members. The least complete and accurate should be formed by collectivists observing outgroup members. Respect for Authority, Power Distance, and the Perception Mechanism. Researchers have not yet explored the role of cultural differences in power distance in social influence. However, differences in power distance have been shown to play an important role in a wide variety of organizational phenomena, including newcomer feedback seeking (Morrison, Chen, & Salgado, 2004), CEO pay (Tosi & Greckhamer, 2004), reactions to job characteristics (Huang & Van de Vliert, 2003), and organizational justice (Lam, Schaubroeck, & Aryee, 2002). Power distance is the degree to which members of a culture accept that certain members of the culture may have much more power than other members (Hofstede, 1980). In high power distance cultures, members are socialized to esteem high-status members and to defer to their authority. Hence, individuals socialized in high power distance cultures tend to learn to respect legitimate authority more than individuals socialized in low power distance cultures. Following the approach used for the affiliation motive and individualism–collectivism, we examine the role of power and power distance in social influence as follows. First, we consider how respect for authority or status may lead group members’ power to moderate the perception mechanism. Second, we consider cultural differences in power distance and how they may further moderate this mechanism. As argued earlier, individuals have limited capacity to attend to all other group members, and individuals’ motives are likely to influence to which

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other group members they focus their attention. Ostensibly driven by respect for status, individuals have been found to distinguish between highstatus (power) and low-status group members – and to selectively attend to high-status group members (Hall, Carter, & Horgan, 2001; Stewart & Vassar, 2000). As a result, this increased attention should lead to more complete and accurate perceptions of the evaluations of high-power group members than the evaluations of other group members. Proposition 6. An individual’s perceptions of other group members’ evaluations should be more complete and accurate for other group members with high power or authority than for other group members without high power or authority. Mulder (1977) defines the cultural orientation power distance as ‘‘the degree of inequality in power between a less powerful Individual (I) and a more powerful Other (O), in which I and O belong to the same (loosely or tightly knit) social system (p. 90).’’ Although largely in agreement with Mulder, Hofstede (1980) further explains that the power distance accepted by I and O and supported by their social system is seen as a characteristic element of that system’s culture. Group members with cultural orientations high in power distance accept that certain group members may have much more power than other group members. Individuals high in power distance are more likely to hold the view that high-power or high-authority individuals are more relevant to goal attainment than low-power or low-authority individuals. Thus, we predict that the bias to selectively attend to other group members high in power or authority will be more pronounced for individuals with cultural orientations that are high in power distance than for individuals with cultural orientations low in power distance. Furthermore, this bias should influence the completeness and accuracy of an individual’s perceptions of other group members’ evaluations: Proposition 7. The relationship proposed in Proposition 6 should be moderated by cultural orientation such that this relationship will be strongest for individuals high in power distance and weakest for individuals low in power distance. The most complete and accurate perceptions of other groups members’ evaluations should be formed by high-power distance group members observing other group members with high power or authority. The least complete and accurate perceptions should be formed by high-power distance group members, observing other group members low in power or authority.


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The Contagion Mechanism In addition to the perception mechanism, we propose a second affect-oriented social influence mechanism labeled the contagion mechanism. We characterize the contagion mechanism as a universal, primitive, and nonconscious process, and hence we propose that conscious motives and cultural differences do not play as central a role in this mechanism as in the perception mechanism. This distinction may be particularly important in terms of understanding inconsistencies in past research. The extent to which culture does, in fact, play an important role in social influence may depend to a large extent on the relative impact of the contagion mechanism versus the perception mechanism. To the extent that the perception mechanism overshadows the contagion mechanism, we expect culture to play an important role. However, to the extent that the contagion mechanism overshadows the perception mechanism, we expect culture to play a minor role. Affective or emotional contagion is a fairly well-established social phenomenon (Barsade, 2002; Doherty, 1998; Hatfield, Cacioppo, & Rapson, 1992). This phenomenon is actually one specific instantiation of a broader social phenomenon referred to as motor mimicry (Bandura, 1977; Dijksterhuis, 2001). Primitive motor mimicry refers to the process whereby an observer nonconsciously mimics the behaviors of a focal actor (see Bavelas, Black, Lemery, & Mullett, 1987 for a review). For example, yawning has been described as being contagious: when a focal actor yawns, it is common for observers to yawn (Provine, 1996, 1997). Researchers have argued that mimicry communicates solidarity and a shared psychological orientation which enables the creation and maintenance of positive interpersonal relationships (Hatfield et al., 1992). Expressions of affect are a particular type of behavior that tends to be mimicked. For example, Bavelas and her colleagues have found that individuals mimic expressions of pain (Bavelas, Black, Lemery, & Mullett, 1986), smiling, laughter, and disgust (Bavelas, Black, Lemery, MacInnis, & Mullett, 1986). Individuals not only mimic expressions of affect – they also tend to experience the affect that they mimic (Duclos et al., 1989). Researchers have long argued that the expression of affect can lead to the experience of affect (e.g. Darwin, 1872/1998). According to the theory of facial feedback, individuals nonconsciously infer their own experiences of affect from their facial expressions. That is, if an individual arranges his face into a smile, he will consequently think he is happy, and hence feel happy. A wide variety of studies have found support for this theory (see Hatfield et al., 1992 for a review). Research has also found support for vocal feedback –

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whereby emotional experience is affected by mimicking vocal characteristics associated with specific emotions (Hatfield, Hsee, Costello, Weisman, & Denney, 1995) and postural feedback – whereby emotional experience is affected by mimicking postural characteristics associated with specific emotions (Bull, 1951; Cacioppo, Priester, & Berntson, 1993; Duclos et al., 1989). A number of empirical studies have provided both direct and indirect support for the relationship between affect expressed by other group members and affect experienced by an observing group member. For example, using a confederate to express affect, Barsade (2002) found that group members’ experienced affect was influenced by the confederate’s expressions. Research on mood convergence in groups provides findings that are consistent with the emotional contagion mechanism. Studies have found that the moods of individual group members tend to become more similar as groups interact (Anderson, Keltner, & John, 2003; Totterdell, Kellett, Teuchmann, & Briner, 1998; Totterdell, 2000). Emotional contagion is one theoretical mechanism that can account for such findings. Based on the emotional contagion process described above, we offer the following foundation proposition, which has been tested and supported in previous research: Proposition 8. The affect expressed by other group members will positively influence an observing group member’s experienced affect. That is, if group members express a particular type of affect (such as happiness) the observing group member is likely to experience the same type of affect. Researchers have argued that experienced affect can influence how an individual perceives and processes information (Bower, 1981; Forgas, 2000). Forgas’ (1995) Affect Infusion Model (AIM) represents one of the most comprehensive models of the relations between experienced affect and social judgments. Forgas (1995) defines affect infusion as: the process whereby affectively loaded information exerts an influence on and becomes incorporated into the judgmental process, entering into the judge’s deliberations and eventually coloring the judgmental outcome. (p. 39)

As Forgas (1995) explains, according to contemporary theorizing, affect infusion occurs via two mechanisms – (1) affect-as-information and (2) affect priming. According to the affect-as-information mechanism, individuals consult their feelings in order to make judgments. If individuals experience pleasant affect while evaluating some social stimulus, they tend to attribute the affective experience to the characteristics of the stimulus, whether or not this attribution is accurate. This attribution leads individuals


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to evaluate the stimulus in a positive fashion. According to the affect-priming mechanism, specific cognitive categories and memories are associated with specific affective states. For example, happy moods are associated with happy memories. Hence, when individuals experience specific affective states, these feelings automatically trigger the associated cognitive categories and memories. These categories and memories are used for acquiring and processing the information required for social judgments. These processes also lead to convergence between the valence of the affective experience and the valence of a judgment. That is, individuals in pleasant moods will evaluate stimuli more positively than those in other moods. We argue that both the affect-as-information and affect priming mechanisms are associated with the accuracy motive. When individuals are under the influence of these mechanisms, they believe their evaluations are accurate – even though they are mistaken. Forgas (1995) proposes that the strength of the affect infusion process varies in systematic ways. The Affect Infusion Model captures the key factors that influence the degree to which affect infusion occurs. Simply stated, affect infusion is most likely to occur when individuals use heuristic or substantive information processing strategies. In the case of heuristic processing, where cognitive short cuts are used, affect-as-information is a likely candidate for such a short cut. In the case of substantive information processing, the affect-priming mechanism is likely to play an important role. The focus of this chapter is decision-making groups in organizations, which we assume are frequently engaged in substantive information processing. Numerous studies have found that experienced affect influences memory and/or judgments. These studies include memories and/or judgments (Doherty, 1998; Bower, Monteiro, & Gilligan, 1978), music (Kenealy, 1997), autobiographical events (Eich, Macaulay, & Ryan, 1994), and job satisfaction (Brief, Butcher, & Roberson, 1995). Based on the theory and empirical evidence presented above, we propose that Proposition 9. An individual’s experienced affect will influence the individual’s evaluations of focal issues such that the valence of the individual’s evaluations will be consistent with the valence of the individual’s experienced affect. For example, an individual’s evaluations of focal issues will be more positive when the individual experiences positive affect and will be more negative when the individual experiences negative affect. Combining our first two propositions yields the following proposition regarding the mediating role of an individual’s experienced affect in the

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relationship between other group member’s expressed affect and the individual’s evaluations of focal issues. Howard and Gengler (2001) found empirical support for this mediation proposition in a study of the formation of product attitudes. Doucet (2004) and Pugh (2001) also found support for this mediation proposition in studies of attitude formation in dyadic service interactions. Proposition 10. The affect expressed by other group members will positively influence an individual’s evaluations of focal issues, mediated by the individual’s experienced affect.

DISCUSSION This chapter has examined the relationships among affect, culture, and social influence. In order to enhance our understanding of the role of culture in social influence, we have introduced two new affect-focused social influence mechanisms – a perception mechanism and a contagion mechanism – and we have suggested that the perception mechanism is more susceptible to cultural differences than the contagion mechanism. By exploring the role of affect in social influence processes, this chapter offers a new perspective for understanding the complex relationships between culture and social influence in groups. First, bringing expressions of affect into the social influence equation reveals another path through which culture can impact social influence processes. In particular, considering the joint effects of cultural variables and perceptions of affective expressions may help account for inconsistencies in past research concerning cultural effects on social influence. We have also extended past research on culture and social influence by considering the effects of dimensions of culture other than individualism–collectivism (i.e. power distance). Finally, we have examined how cultural variables may lead individuals to selectively attend to particular group members and hence be more likely to be influenced by these group members. Our model of culture, affect, and social influence in groups has important implications for future research in the area of culture and social influence. Most importantly, our model moves beyond a purely verbal communication perspective (by incorporating nonverbal forms of communication such as expressed affect) and in doing so provides a more comprehensive, multichannel perspective on social influence. The implication for future research is that scholars should continue to conceptualize culture and social influence


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as a multichannel phenomenon. Furthermore, scholars should investigate the possibility that certain social influence channels are more likely to be influenced by cultural differences than others. Our theoretical model also has implications for managers and members of multicultural groups. As we noted earlier, while the performance of any group is likely to suffer when group members are led to withhold taskcritical information, this may be particularly true for multicultural groups in which cultural differences represent an important intellectual resource for the group to tap. Hence, managers and group members could benefit from our model by understanding the conditions that increase the likelihood that group members might self-censor or conform and thereby withhold important information from the group. Such conditions might include having a group composed of collectivist in-group members or having a group composed of high-power distance members and a high-power individual – both of which represent circumstances in which one group member’s affective displays might elicit strong conformity effects from others. Managers and group members could further benefit from our model by appreciating the importance of attending to their own affective displays, and the social influence effects those displays might engender. Managers in particular may (through their affective displays) unintentionally influence group members’ evaluations, thereby harming the information sharing and performance of the group. With greater appreciation of the power of affective displays, managers and group members could learn to moderate such displays in order to promote more open discussion among group members. Although our proposed model makes important contributions to research on culture and social influence in groups, there are notable limitations to the model. These include a lack of specification of the relationship between the contagion and perception mechanisms of affect-focused social influence featured in our model. It remains to be seen whether these mechanisms operate independently or whether they interact in important ways. Furthermore, our model does not address the relationship between affectfocused (nonverbal) social influence and verbally based social influence. Whether verbal and nonverbal social influence mechanisms interact in important ways also remains an unanswered question. For example, Spain has been described as an affective culture, whereas Japan has been described an affectively neutral culture (Trompenaars, 1994). Thus, in-group settings, expressions of affect may be more influential for Spanish group members than for Japanese. Furthermore, the relationship between affect-focused and verbally based social influence is likely to be of interest when expressed evaluations are inconsistent across these two channels. For example, a

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group member may verbally claim to have a favorable attitude toward a job candidate while displaying feelings of disinterest or disgust. To the extent that affective displays are believed to be more difficult to fake than words, such expressions may well play a critical role in interpreting – and hence being influenced by – evaluative statements. Of course, many of these limitations provide interesting opportunities for future research. Among the possibilities for future research, we find the following ideas to be the more promising. Our model rests on the assumption that observers believe expressed affect reflects inner states – i.e. experienced affect. However, studies have shown that people from certain cultures may attribute the expression of affect to display norms (Ekman, 1978; Ekman & Friesen, 1969). This is another way in which culture may play an important role in affect-focused social influence. Future research should examine systematic cultural differences in the attribution and interpretation of affective expressions that could drive social influence. As a preliminary exploration into the role of affect in the effects of culture on social influence, we have intentionally set aside the differences between mood and emotion. However, studies have shown that mood and emotion differ in many aspects, such as intensity and duration (Watson, 2000; Forgas, 1992). This distinction could be particularly important for the possibility of misattributed affect. Although emotions tend to be stimulusreactive and moods tend to be stimulus-independent, an observing group member may not be able to effectively differentiate between the two. Because our proposed perception mechanism relies on observer interpretation, a mood could be misinterpreted as an affective reaction to a focal issue. Such errors could easily set in motion mistaken social influence processes. Future research should examine the role of issue-specific affect and nonspecific affect in culture and influence. Group size may also play a critical role in determining the effects of cultural orientation variables on affect-focused social influence. Because the cultural orientation differences of individualism–collectivism and power distance are argued to bias the rationing of attention, these effects may be stronger for larger groups, where more social stimuli compete for attention. Another promising avenue for future research involves the issue of in-group advantage in emotion recognition (Elfenbein & Ambady, 2002b). In order for social influence to occur, observers must not only attend to the affective displays of other group members, but must be able to interpret these displays. If observers are able to interpret such displays, they should be more likely to be influenced by them than if they cannot understand these displays. Recent research suggests that observers are better able to interpret


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expressions of affect of cultural in-group members than out-group members (Elfenbein & Ambady, 2002a, b, 2003a, b; Marsh, Elfenbein, & Ambady, 2003). Hence, future research might consider how this ‘‘in-group advantage’’ may impact the effect of culture on affect-focused social influence. Taken together, these new directions provide us with promising opportunities to improve our understanding of affect-focused social influence in multicultural groups.

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QUESTION COMPREHENSION AND RESPONSE: IMPLICATIONS OF INDIVIDUALISM AND COLLECTIVISM Ayse K. Uskul and Daphna Oyserman ABSTRACT We integrate cross-cultural literature with broader literature in survey methodology, human cognition, and communication. First, we briefly review recent work in cognitive survey methodology that advances our understanding of the processes underlying question comprehension and response. Then, using a process model of cultural influence, we provide a framework for hypothesizing how cross-cultural differences may systematically influence the meaning respondents make of the questions that researchers ask, how memory is organized, and subjective theories about what constitutes an appropriate answer and therefore the answers participants are likely to give.

How central are satisfaction with school and marital satisfaction to life satisfaction? Questions like this are almost always answered, but answers are profoundly influenced by context. While we as researchers may think that we


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are learning about the influence of culture and cultural context by comparing answers across countries and samples, responses can be influenced by a much more proximal context: the research context and potentially systematic differences across cultures in how the research context is perceived. Recent advances in integration of survey methodology, human cognition, and communication research have enhanced our understanding of the processes underlying question response (for reviews see Sudman, Bradburn, & Schwarz, 1996; Schwarz, 1999a; Tourangeau, Rips, and Rasinski, 2000). Unfortunately, this work has not yet been well integrated into the cross-cultural field. In the current chapter, we provide a framework for hypothesizing how crosscultural differences may systematically influence the meaning made of the questions asked by researchers and the answers participants are likely to give. Substantive interpretation of the life satisfaction question we opened up with would be quite different if data revealed high or not very high correlations between satisfaction in a specific life domain and satisfaction with life in general. For example, if marital satisfaction and life satisfaction correlate r ¼ 0.67 for adults then one can conclude that marriage is central to the life satisfaction of adults. Conversely, if marital and life satisfaction correlate only r ¼ 0.32 then the conclusion would be that marriage is of no major importance to the general life satisfaction of adults. Similarly, if school-academic satisfaction and life satisfaction correlate r ¼ 0.78 for students then it is more likely to conclude that academic success is central to the life satisfaction of students than if the correlation were say r ¼ 0.53. In fact, each set of divergent correlations come from the same populations randomly assigned to answering the question about satisfaction with life before or after the question about satisfaction with a particular life domain (marital satisfaction results from Schwarz, Strack, & Mai, 1991; academic satisfaction results from Study 2, Haberstroh, Oyserman, Schwarz, Kuhnen, & Ji, 2002). In the following sections, we first outline the conversational logic of the research context. We then outline how subjective theories are employed to reconstruct plausible estimates of past behaviors and the editing processes involved in answering questions. As we will outline in the following sections, by taking into account the meaning participants are likely to make of the researchers’ questions, what is likely to be remembered, and theories participants are likely to use to reconstruct memory; cross-cultural psychologists may avoid making unwarranted substantive interpretations about answers. As a first step toward this goal, we show how culture can influence, how questions are understood, what is remembered, and the editing process utilizing a process model of cultural influences developed by Oyserman, Kemmelmeier, and Coon (2002b).

Question Comprehension and Response

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LIMITATIONS OF SELF-REPORT As cultural and cross-cultural psychologists are aware, self-reports are limited representations of behaviors and attitudes (e.g. van de Vijver & Leung, 1997; Shapiro, Rosenblood, & Berlyne, 1976; Triandis & Triandis, 1962). But cultural and cross-cultural psychologists have not systematically addressed the cognitive processes that underlie self-report methods and therefore the ways that cultural differences may systematically shift the pragmatic meaning of both questions and answers. What are the limitations of self-report? Schwarz and Oyserman (2001) summarize the gap between researchers’ hopes and the reality of the selfreport research context. Researchers hope participants understand the question as intended, identify the behavior, judgment, or attitude of interest, retrieve relevant instances of the behavior or attitude judgments from memory, and honestly communicate them to the researcher. In reality, as Schwarz and Oyserman (2001) note, all questions require interpretation. What is retrieved from memory depends on retrieval cues embedded in questions, response scales, what is routinely paid attention to and what is not and culturally rooted subjective theories about what is normative, what is stable, and what is likely to change. As we outline below, answers are typically constructed on the fly from these cues and theories, particularly when the information requested requires access to behaviors that are habitualized, high frequency, or in other ways impossible to retrieve as a series of discrete occurrences. Prior to communicating these constructed answers, participants may edit them if answers feel culturally wrong. Cross-cultural researchers must ask if there is reason to believe that the members of different cultures will differ systematically in (1) how the question is understood, (2) what is identified as the relevant behavior, judgment, or attitude, (3) what inferences are likely to be made from the research context, the question being posed, or the question framework, (4) how common or habitual the behavior to be identified is, how sensitive the subject matter is, (5) the subjective theories used to reconstruct estimates to provide answers, and (6) what is edited.

THE CONVERSATIONAL LOGIC OF THE RESEARCH CONTEXT To provide appropriate answers to research questions, participants need to have a pragmatic (meaning in context) understanding of the question not

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simply a literal (meaning of the words) understanding (see Mitchell, 1994; Simpson, 1994 for reviews). Participants are likely to use the same tacit assumptions to make sense of research questions as they use to engage in everyday conversations (for reviews see Clark & Schober, 1992; Schober, 1999; Schwarz, 1996). These tacit assumptions were formally presented by Paul Grice (1975) and are often termed Grician conversational logic (for reviews see Schwarz, 1996; Schwarz, Groves, & Schuman, 1998).

Maxims of Conversation According to Grice, conversations are assumed to follow the cooperativeness principle, which he operationalized as the following four maxims: (1) Maxim of relation: Speakers make their contributions relevant to the aims of the ongoing conversation. This means that the communicator is assumed to take contextual information into account and draw on previous utterances in interpreting the later ones. (2) Maxim of quantity: Speakers make their contributions as informative as required, but not more informative than is required. This means that the communicator is assumed to provide answers that fit the question asked, not simply say whatever comes to mind and not repeat information already provided. (3) Maxim of manner: Speakers make their contributions as clear as possible rather than obscure, ambiguous, or wordy. This means that the communicator is assumed to have chosen the clearest culturally appropriate way of phrasing the question and that therefore the culturally obvious meaning must be the correct one. If an obvious meaning does not come to mind, respondents will use contextual cues to figure out the culturally relevant meaning. (4) Maxim of quality: Speakers do not say anything that they believe to be false or lack adequate evidence for. This means that respondents assume that questions and response scales are meaningfully chosen, not arbitrary or nonsensical. In a nutshell, Grician conversational logic suggests that partners to a conversation focus on what is relevant, provide new information, are clear, and do not lie. We will argue that these maxims are likely to be universal; to answer a question, participants always will try to figure out what is relevant, will avoid repeating themselves, will assume that the researcher is trying to be clear and not purposefully being ambiguous or opaque in how questions and response alternatives are worded. Yet, maxims are also applied within a culture frame – what it means to be clear will differ cross-culturally and partners typically assume their conversational partner is using culturally appropriate cues. In this chapter, we will discuss key contextual cues and


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how they are used by respondents to both make sense of what is being asked and to find an appropriate answer. We will argue that cross-cultural difference in focus on social context will be reflected in differential sensitivity to the conversational logic of the research context.

Asking Questions Context Influences Meaning The meaning of questions and what constitutes a reasonable answer shifts as a function of the context in which questions are asked. As Schwarz and Oyserman (2001) note, context can come in the form of the title of the survey, the letterhead on which the survey or its cover letter are printed, or the questions that precede a question. For example, ‘list all the drugs you use’ carries different meaning when it is part of a Health and Retirement Study than when it is part of a Delinquency and School Failure Study. When asked to describe oneself on a survey printed on letterhead of the ‘Institute of Political Research’ respondents generate more social identities than when the letterhead was that of the ‘Institute of Psychological Research’ (Norenzayan & Schwarz, 2005). ‘How often do you fight with your parents?’ when asked in the context of prior questions about fighting (e.g. ‘how often have you hurt someone badly enough that they needed a doctor’) and delinquency (e.g. ‘how often have you stolen something with more than $50?’), results in interpretation of ‘fighting with parents’ as physical fights rather than verbal disagreements (Schwarz & Oyserman, 2001). Preceding Questions Can Influence Subsequent Answers The content of preceding questions can influence respondents’ interpretation of and response to, later, possibly redundant, questions. Following the maxim of quantity (Grice, 1975), respondents will attempt to provide new rather than redundant answers. This is likely to result in responses that shift depending on prior questions. Moreover, following the maxim of quality (Grice, 1975), respondents assume that scales are meaningful (e.g. the middle of the scale refers to what is average in the population). This is likely to result in responses that shift depending on where answers to prior questions fell on the researchers’ scales. A classic example of the former issue comes from use of general and specific questions focused on the same content domain. When asked a general question (e.g. how satisfied are you with your life?) and then a specific question (e.g. how satisfied are you with your marriage?), response to the

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first question may or may not be relevant to the second question – one may (or may not) think about how one’s marriage is going as a way to gauge life satisfaction. When asked the specific question first, however, the information brought to mind definitely is relevant to how one’s life is going. One could simply give the same answer again given that ‘my marriage is going pretty well, I guess my life is, too’. But Grician logic would suggest that the researcher really means ‘aside from your marriage, which you already told me about, how is the rest of your life?’ The question is whether respondents notice the redundancy. Indeed, when first asked about their marriage and then their life, answers were more correlated (marriage once brought to mind, is relevant) than when asked questions in the reverse order (after all, one could answer the general satisfaction question based on other criteria) and correlation between answers depended on whether the redundancy was made obvious or not (Schwarz et al., 1991). Answers to prior questions also set up a meaningful context from which to infer subsequent answers. This can be seen in a number of studies (Schwarz, Hippler, Deutsch, & Strack, 1985, also see Rothman, Haddock, & Schwarz, 2001; Schwarz, 1999b) which manipulate the rating scale on a prior question so that most participants will infer that they are higher (or lower) than the average. This difference from the average in the population is then used to infer subsequent feelings. For example, when first asked to assess television-watching time and then asked to assess satisfaction with leisure time activities, respondents who were made to infer that they watch more than the average amount of television subsequently reported lower than average satisfaction with their use of leisure time. Respondents seemed to be constructing satisfaction with leisure time based on the information about television-viewing time saying in effect ‘I am not really satisfied with my leisure time activities because I seem to be watching more TV than anyone else’ (Schwarz et al., 1985, also see Rothman et al., 2001; Schwarz, 1999b). Response Alternatives and Formats Matter Researchers often attempt to simplify the questionnaire by having a standard response format (e.g. very much agree to very much disagree; never to always) across questions and scales. Unfortunately, respondents anchor these vague quantifiers across questions. They infer what a response like ‘frequently’ means by taking into account how they used it in prior questions. In the context of ‘frequently’ brushing one’s teeth, one is less likely to say that one ‘frequently’ calls home because frequent has just been anchored at multiple times a day. This effect is called the ‘range effect’ (Parducci, 1965).


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Even when response options are varied throughout the questionnaire, they are still used as informational tools by respondents. Following Grician conversational maxims of manner and quality, respondents generally assume that the researcher constructed a meaningful response scale, relevant to the question at hand. Participants use all features of the response scale to make sense of the question. Identically worded questions may acquire different meanings depending on the response alternatives provided (see Schwarz, 1996; Schwarz & Hippler, 1991). The range of responses, number of points on a scale, the time period the scale encompasses, the numeric values used to represent points on the scale, and the words used to represent points on the scale are all useful sources of information for participants. Respondents assume that the range of response alternatives provided reflects the distribution of the behavior in real world, such that values in the middle range of the scale reflect average behavioral frequency, whereas the extremes correspond to the extremes of the distribution (Schwarz & Scheuring, 1992). In essence, they understand the researcher to be informing them of what is average, allowing them to respond by asking themselves whether they are average, below, or above average on the issue involved, then responding appropriately. This pragmatic use of response content means that substantive interpretation of results is likely to be in error if response alternatives with the same meaning are located at different points on the continuum of a response scale. Schwarz et al. (1985) demonstrated this point by shifting, where 2.5 hours a day was located on a frequency of TV watching response scale. More than twice as many respondents reported watching TV for more than 2.5 hours a day when 2.5 was at the low end as when it was at the high end of the scale. When a question is followed by a scale with very high values, this implies that the researcher assumes a high frequency of occurrence (and therefore more commonly occurring behaviors) than if the question is followed by a scale with low values. Respondents report higher frequency of irritation on a high- than on a low-response alternative scale – high-frequency response options led to the inference that the irritation must refer to more minor everyday things, low-response options led to the inference that irritation must refer to more serious things (Schwarz et al., 1998). Just as high-response frequency options lead to the conclusion that the behavior must be common, so does the use of brief time periods (e.g. in the last week) as compared to long time periods (e.g. ever in your life). When a question refers to a brief time frame, respondents infer that the researcher is after more everyday occurrences than when the time frame for recall is longer.

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Respondents report more anger when the time frame is ‘last weeks’ than when it is ‘last years’ (Winkielman, Knaüper, & Schwarz, 1998). Although formally equivalent, response scales using only positive numbers (e.g. 1–5 or 0–10) are not treated the same as scales using both negative and positive numbers (e.g. 2 to +2 or 5 to +5) (Schwarz, Knaüper, Hippler, Noelle-Neumann, & Clark, 1991). Negative numbers are interpreted as the presence of a negative trait or behavior (e.g. failure), while formally equivalent positive numbers are interpreted as the absence of a positive trait or behavior (e.g. lack of success). Presence of a negative trait or behavior feels more negative than absence of a positive trait or behavior, resulting in shift of responses toward the positive side of the scale when a scale with both negative and positive numbers is used as compared to when a scale with only positive numbers is used. This shift results both in higher mean responses and in lower standard deviation because of fewer of the points in the scale are actually used.

Memory Constraints and Subjective Theories Autobiographical Memory Responses are also systematically influenced by autobiographical memory processes – how memories are stored and retrieved. Although researchers hope that respondents will identify the behavior of interest, scan the reference period, retrieve all the instances of the target behavior, count or otherwise organize them to match the response scale, and provide an overall response, autobiographical memory does not work that way. First, memory decreases over time, especially for common or habitual activities that are unlikely to be stored as distinct detailed representations (Belli, 1998). Second, autobiographical memory is not typically stored by themes (Belli, 1998). When asked how many cigarettes they smoked in the past week, for example, respondents cannot open a mental file drawer labeled cigarette consumption and pull up a tally. Instead, respondents literally have to scroll through the days searching for cigarette events – a difficult and time-consuming process. The more difficult it is to retrieve the relevant autobiographical memories, the more likely it is that respondents will rely on question content and response format and other organizing frames (e.g. subjective theories) to infer their response. The easier it is to retrieve the relevant autobiographical memories (e.g. the behavior is rare and important or has to be tallied on an ongoing basis for other consequential purposes), the less likely it is that respondents will need to use these cues to estimate their response (see Menon, 1994; Menon, Raghubir, & Schwarz, 1995).


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Subjective Theories of Stability and Change and of Personality What subjective theories are research participants likely to use? Subjective theories are culturally sanctioned rules of thumb that allow research participants to provide responses in spite of limitations of autobiographical memory (Schwarz & Oyserman, 2001). Subjective theories organize predictions about what must have happened or how one must have felt. A simple rule of thumb that participants can use to respond to questions about past behavior is to provide estimates based on current behavior. To do so, respondents ask themselves ‘Am I the same or different as I was during the time at issue in the question?’ If they see no reason to assume their behavior has changed over time, they can use their present behavior as an estimate of their past behavior. If they do believe their behavior has changed, they adjust the initial estimate based on their current behavior to reflect the assumed change. Culturally sanctioned theories about stability of human behavior make this strategy appear reasonable. To the extent that subjective theories of change and stability over time differ cross-culturally, the estimates based on these theories are likely to differ as well. In addition to using the present to estimate the past, respondents can also rely on their subjective theories about personality to make estimates (Schwarz & Oyserman, 2001). In essence, to answer a question about past behavior respondents ask themselves ‘Am I the kind of person who would do this?’ Cultures that sanction belief in stable personality should increase stable behavioral estimates whether estimating own or a target’s behavior.

Answering Questions Now that we have outlined influences on what is likely to come to mind given questions asked, we turn to responses. Responses that come to mind are not necessarily provided ‘as is’ to the researcher; they may be edited for various reasons. Unlike research on context effects that has shown dramatic shift in responses based on changes in question context (e.g. order and scale), there is less information about the expected size and direction of editing effects. Editing effects have typically been considered errors and handled pragmatically – by making the response situation anonymous, improving fit between question and response to reduce guessing, and accepting that highly involving questions or questions asked of partisans (those who feel strongly about issues) are likely to be answered with the extreme points of the scale. Yet, as we outline below, editing may also be due to the same cognitive processes that influence responding more generally.

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Editing Answers Editing can occur consciously and deliberately or as an automatic result of biased memory search due to a combination of Grician interpretation of questions and answer format and subjective theory-driven estimation techniques (Schwarz & Oyserman, 2001). Edits typically result in more socially desirable responses (see DeMaio, 1984 for a review) and are argued to be motivated by impression-management (Ross & Mirowsky, 1984) or self-enhancement (Lalwani, Shavitt, & Johnson, 2006; Paulhus, 1984) goals. Edited answers are more likely to fit what the respondent believes is the expected response (Marsh, Antill, & Cunningham, 1987). It seems plausible that editing is less likely for questions that do not carry clear social norms for appropriate responses and more likely when the question concerns behavior, attitudes, or experiences that carry a clear value or morality tag in the culture. Social Desirability. Both the immediate social situation (source of the survey, attributes of the interviewer, and interview situation) and cultural norms are likely to influence perceived desirability–undesirability of response. Socially desirable responding is more likely when confidentiality is low (e.g. face-to-face interviews), less likely when confidentiality is high (e.g. self-administered interviews, Krysan, Schuman, Scott, & Beatty, 1994). Respondents may find it embarrassing to admit not engaging in a desirable behavior, resulting in overreporting of desirable behavior; they may find it embarrassing to admit engaging in undesirable behaviors, resulting in underreporting of undesirable behavior. Acquiescence (Yea-Saying). Acquiescence is the tendency to answer affirmatively or systematically over the use of only one extremity of the response scale (see Smith, 2004). Yea-saying is more likely when the issue asked about is one that respondents do not know much about or do not care about or if questions do not carry much social desirability information (see Knowles & Condon, 1999; Cronbach, 1950; Edwards, 1957; Jackson, 1967; Stricker, 1963).

INTEGRATING CULTURE AND CONVERSATIONAL LOGIC How might cultural frame inform the sense made of questions, what is salient and therefore retrievable from memory, and what is not memorable and


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therefore must be inferred, the subjective theories used to make needed inferences, and the editing process? Do some cultures heighten sensitivity to the conversational logic of the research context? Cross-cultural differences have been noted in self-construal (e.g. Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Oyserman, 1993), cognitive processes (Nisbett, Peng, Choi, & Norenzayan, 2001; Oyserman, Coon, & Kemmelmeier, 2002a), and relationality (Triandis, 1994) including how tightly appropriate interactions are scripted (e.g. Triandis, 1994, 1995). All of these may influence how questions are understood and responses provided to them. To examine how culture may influence understanding, memory, subjective theory, and response editing, we use an operationalization of culture focusing on differences in individualism and collectivism.

Overview of Impact of Collectivism and Individualism Individualism and collectivism can be understood via their likely consequences for self-concept, cognitive style, and relationality (Oyserman et al., 2002a). Individualism implies that the self is permanent, separate from context, trait-like, and a causal nexus; that reasoning is a tool to separate out main points from irrelevant background or context; and that relationships and group memberships are impermanent and nonintensive (Oyserman et al., 2002a). Conversely, collectivism implies that the self is malleable, contextdependent and socially sensitive; that reasoning is a tool to link and make sense of the whole rather than disparate elements; and that relationships and group memberships are ascribed and fixed, ‘facts of life’ to which people must accommodate (Oyserman et al., 2002a, b). While cross-cultural difference in self-reported behavior, judgment, and values may reflect substantive difference, differences in culture may also influence how questions are understood and answers given in other ways. How are individualism and collectivism likely to influence how questions are understood and what answers are provided? First, differences in self-concept, cognitive style, and relationality imply differences in likely rules of thumb used to infer behavior. Individualism is more likely to foster rules of thumb assuming individual stability; collectivism is more likely to foster rules of thumb assuming contextual adaptation. An important issue for cross-cultural psychologists is to map out what are the likely subjective theories used by respondents from collectivistic cultures in comprehension of and responses to questions. Second, cultural difference in focus on context is likely to influence how much participants infer from context to create meaning (Gudykunst & Ting-Toomey, 1988). Thus participants in collectivistic contexts should be

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even more sensitive to conversational logic of research than participants in individualistic contexts. Given that the substantive research reviewed in the prior section on conversational logic of the research context is based in the US and Germany, this implies that even bigger effects should be found in collective contexts. Third, collective cultures are likely to enhance sensitivity to appropriate engagement in public behaviors, resulting in differential need to estimate these behaviors in collective vs. individualistic cultures. Finally, and perhaps most obviously, cultures are likely to differ in what constitutes desirable behavior resulting in differences in editing strategies. How Might Individualism and Collectivism Interact with Other Influences on Question Response? Distal Culture. We start with a process model of cultural influences that distinguishes distal from situated and proximal operationalization of ‘culture’ (Oyserman et al., 2002b). Following this model, as graphically displayed in Fig. 1, when culture is operationalized by its distal features – a society’s history, religion, or philosophic traditions, it is likely to have only weak direct impact on current behavior, rather the effect of distal culture is likely to be felt via its impact on features of the current social structures and institutions (termed ‘situated’ culture) and the likelihood that individual vs. collective models for making sense of the self and of the situation are primed in the moment. Because all societies must have mechanisms for their own survival, all must have some collective (work for the common good) features. Because all societies must provide some outlets for choice when this does not undermine the group, all must have some individualistic features. Thus for example, while everyone is able to think about themselves as both separate from and unique and also part of and connected, the frequency

Situated Culture Social Situations

Distal Culture, History, Traditions (Linguistic, Philosophical, Religious)

Fig. 1.

Subjective construal of the situation

Cognitive, affective, behavioral consequences

A Process Model of Cultural Influences.


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with which one or the other of these comes to mind depends on what is relevant in the moment and societies differ in the likelihood that an individualistic or collectivistic lens will be primed, as we will discuss in the next section. Situated Culture. Situated culture refers to social systems (e.g. educational, legal systems), social structures (e.g. transportation, employment, banking), social patterns and practices (e.g. friendship, family, and child-rearing practices), and ways of communicating. Together these create the likely everyday situations a person living in a culture is likely to experience, what is required, what must be paid attention to, what can be ignored. The assumption here is that differences in situated culture are not random but rather are rooted in differences in the extent that the distal culture focuses on individualism and collectivism. Cultures placing greater emphasis on context (high-context communication cultures) focus attention on what is said between the lines, sensitizing participants in these societies to what is implied rather than stated. ‘Tight’ cultures that tightly prescribe appropriate public behaviors and sanction inappropriate behaviors are likely to increase on-going attention paid to what is socially appropriate in the context and what oneself is doing (in absolute terms, relative to social standards, and relative to others in the context) (e.g. Triandis, 1994). ‘Loose’ cultures that permit wide latitude of acceptable public behavior do not require that participants in these societies pay much attention to what oneself is doing (either in absolute terms or relative to others in the context) (e.g., Triandis, 1994). In this way, situated culture structures not only what is considered of value and what is considered normative, but also what is memorable and what is likely to need to be estimated. Proximal Culture. Situated culture influence what typically comes to mind in particular situations. Of particular concern here is what is likely to come to mind in the research context. Of course, research is not a uniform context – as we have described in the previous sections. Indeed, an expanding literature makes clear that it is relatively straightforward in experimental contexts to prime individual vs. collective focus. The context of the research questionnaire can also serve as a prime, making salient individualistic vs. collectivistic focus. For example, priming collectivism increases social content in self-concept descriptions (Gardner, Gabriel, & Lee, 1999), sensitivity to the conversational common ground (Haberstroh et al., 2002), and assimilation of information about others into self-judgment (Stapel & Koomen, 2001, Study 1).

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Collectivism can be primed by language (Chui, 2004; Marian & Kaushanskaya, 2004), and, we will argue, by other features of the questionnaire.

Culture and Sensitivity to Maxims of Conversation Grice’s maxims of relation, quantity, manner, and quality state in essence ‘be relevant to the aims of the conversation’, ‘provide new information’, ‘be clear’, and ‘do not lie’. These maxims were developed in a Western frame. Some have argued that within high-context communication cultures these maxims do not apply because high communication involves use of indirect, implicit, and ambiguous messages (e.g. Gudykunst, 1998; Gudykunst & Ting-Toomey, 1988), including qualifier words such as ‘maybe, ‘perhaps’ and messages that do not reveal speaker’s true intentions and emphasize ingroup harmony rather than speaking one’s own mind and telling the truth (e.g. Okabe, 1983, 1987). We agree that cultures differ in how much attention must be paid to the conversational common ground and emphatically disagree with the argument that Grice applies only in low context, Western cultures. Rather than simplifying Grice to mean ‘interact like an American’ we understand Grician maxims to be relevant for all human conversation. Highcontext communication requires increased sensitivity to the conversational common ground in order to interpret the nuanced cues the other is providing. Only by truly focusing on these contextual cues could a person hope to infer meaning from a ‘perhaps’ or understand what is inferred. Overall, given that the explicit content of messages tends to be less clear in high-context communication settings, speakers are required to attend more carefully to the social cues to infer the message meaning compared to low-context communication settings. To understand how individualism and collectivism are likely to influence answers, taking seriously the increased sensitivity of collectivist respondents to nuances in the questionnaire context is critical. We examine this assertion in greater detail in the following section.

Culture and Asking Questions Culture and Context of the Question Generally, collectivism should increase sensitivity to every aspect of the question as context. When primed or chronically salient, collectivism should increase the likelihood that responses are congruent with the general theme


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of the survey, that respondents rely on the preceding questions to infer the meaning of subsequent questions and response scales, and so on. Of particular impact on cross-cultural research, collectivism should increase shift in responses depending on features of the researcher (as implied in letterhead, in preamble, introduction, or consent forms). A standard part of cross-national surveys is to note the affiliation of the researcher and the fact that the study is taking place cross-nationally; this sets up an implied comparison at the group level ‘‘what do ‘we’ do, say, or think, as compared with ‘them’.’’ The ‘them’ could be the country from which the survey originates as well as more general sense of intergroup comparison; this should increase collective focus and make salient intergroup concerns. The implied standard can come from language – thus, for example, when randomly assigned to Chinese vs. English response conditions, Chinese respondents at a Canadian University reporting in Chinese marked (culturally appropriate) lower selfesteem, than when reporting English (in which case their self-esteem was no different from European heritage Canadian respondents) (Ross, Xun, & Wilson, 2002). When asked to report in Chinese, the respondents may have been cued that the researcher was asking them as representatives of Chinese culture, something that would not be salient if they were asked in English and then might assume that they were asked as individual college students. In the same vein, collectivism should increase sensitivity to the content of previous questions asked in a questionnaire to determine the appropriateness of the responses to later questions, resulting in greater endorsement of the maxim of quantity (Grice, 1975). Haberstroh et al. (2002) tested this possibility. Hypothesizing that interdependence increases sensitivity to the conversational common ground, they expected that interdependent respondents would be more likely to take care to provide non-redundant answers to redundant questions. Indeed, Chinese respondents were more likely to provide non-redundant answers than German respondents. When primed with interdependence, German respondents became as sensitive as Chinese respondents to the implied common ground. Thus, Haberstroh and colleagues demonstrate not only that cross-culture difference is in line with our reasoning on cross-cultural differences in sensitivity to the Grician maxims, but also demonstrate via their priming results that it is in fact interdependent self-focus that activates this sensitivity. Culture, Response Alternatives, and Formats Primed or chronic collectivism should also influence sensitivity to the implied meaning of response alternatives and format. For example, when estimation is necessary, respondents high in collectivism should be more likely

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to use the middle of the scale as the assumed population mean and to interpret the scale extremes as the assume ends of the population distribution. Not only will this greater use of the scale influence response to the question, it will also influence inferences taken to subsequent questions. Similarly, collectivism is likely to be associated with a greater use of prior responses to anchor the meaning of ambiguous scale markers like ‘very much’ or ‘frequently’ as a result of greater attention paid to answers given to previously asked questions using the same response format.

Culture, Memory Constraints, and Subjective Theories Culture and Autobiographical Memory Because the implied meaning drawn from questions, response alternatives, and the like are used in estimating appropriate responses, cross-cultural differences in whether requested information requires estimation are likely to be important in predicting effects. Estimation is not necessary if the information requested can be drawn from memory. This is likely when information is stored in the form requested and is therefore well represented in memory (e.g. Menon et al., 1995) or when one has relevant cognitive schemas that anchor and organize memory search (e.g. Bartlett, 1932). In tight cultures that prescribe appropriate public behavior and sanction inappropriate behavior, respondents should be well aware of their own and others’ public behaviors and therefore be relatively impervious to differences in question order and response format. Because only public behaviors can be monitored by others, only public, visible behavior (not private, nonvisible behaviors, attitudes, and cognitions) should be differentially well represented in by individuals living in collective contexts. Ji, Schwarz, and Nisbett (2000) showed these effects in a comparison of Chinese and American respondents. When asked about the frequency of public behavior (e.g. coming late to class), Chinese were not influenced by response format and response alternatives, while Americans were. Americans seemed to be using the scale to estimate their behavior frequency using the distribution information provided in the scale. This meant that both absolute and relative differences between Americans and Chinese were not stable – depending on Americans using the response options as information. When the frequency of private behaviors were compared (e.g. having a nightmare), Americans and Chinese were equally influenced by the context provided by the scale. Differences in how the self is schematized (connected to or separate from others) should also influence autobiographical memory processes (Markus


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& Kitayama, 1991; Wang, 2001; Wang & Leichtman, 2000). Following Bartlett’s (1932) argument that ‘‘y remembering is ‘schematically’ determined’’ (p. 312), events that are congruent with one’s self-schema are expected to have a perceptual and comprehension advantage over those that do not; indeed, schema-congruent information is remembered more accurately than irrelevant information and missing or ambiguous information is likely to be remembered in terms of the schema (Markus, 1977). Thus, events fitting an interdependent schema would be expected to be better remembered by those with an interdependent self-construal, and events fitting an independent schema would be expected to be better remembered by those with an independent self-construal (Ng & Zhu, 2001). In line with this prediction, Ng and Zhu (2001) found that individuals from Beijing and Hong Kong who scored higher on interdependent self-construal than individuals in Wellington, New Zealand, had a better memory for group-acting situations than for individual-acting situations. Similarly, Wang (2001) found that individuals who were more focused on private aspects of the self in their self-descriptions provided more specific and more self-focused childhood memories than did those who more often described themselves in terms of social roles and group memberships. Language can serve as a prime. For example, when randomly assigned to speak Russian or English with a bilingual research assistant, Russian e´migre´s describing events in Russian, were more likely to include a description of others present and their perspective as compared to when events were described in English in which case others and their perspective were largely absent from descriptions (Marian & Kaushanskaya, 2004). Priming influences not only self-report on behavior and social judgment but also recalls the processing of non-social information (Ku¨hnen & Oyserman, 2002; Oyserman, Sorensen, Cha, & Schwarz, 2006).

Culture, Subjective Theories of Stability and Change and about Personality Can current behavior be used as an estimate of past behavior? Can one use information about oneself in one realm to estimate other things about oneself? These are plausible strategies to the extent that people are assumed to be stable and to the extent that traits are expressed in behavior across settings. Emerging evidence suggests cross-cultural difference in the extent that these assumptions are endorsed, with individualism carrying these assumptions of self-stability and generalizability from behavior to traits, while collectivism carries an assumption of self-malleability in response to context. To the extent that context, not personal trait, matters in predicting behavior,

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then estimates of past behavior will more comfortably be made based on information about the context one was in. When asked to explain why a person committed a crime, Americans focused on the person’s disposition, Chinese on the situation (Morris & Peng, 1994). When asked to explain the behavior of a motorist who did not stop after a fender bender, Indian respondents focused on the situation, while Americans focused on the person (Miller, 1984). Indians suggested that the motorist might have been in a rush to get to work, Americans suggested that the motorist was a thoughtless or heartless person. In their comparison of Chinese and American responses, Ji, Nisbett, and Su (2001) found that Americans predicted more stability and Chinese more change in a variety of events and more change in the direction of trends – that is, for Chinese respondents, the present is a less helpful indicator of the future. Greater change perceived under collectivism should also lead to a reduced reliance on current behavior to infer past behavior when retrieval from memory is difficult. Similarly, when primed with collectivism, respondents were more likely to be influenced by norms rather than personal attitudes in making judgments about the likelihood of future behavior (Ybarra & Trafimow, 1998).

Culture and Answering Questions Questions evoke responses; responses may or may not be filtered or edited prior to being provided as an answer to a research question. A number of studies in the cross-cultural literature have examined response tendencies, either simply comparing countries or comparing countries assumed to be high or low on individualism or collectivism. A few cross-cultural studies that do assess individualism and collectivism report inconsistent findings. Because the studies are not framed in terms of cognitive survey methods, detailed information about the research context, the questionnaire, response formats, and so on are not provided, so inconsistencies are impossible to interpret. In the following sections, we integrate available research with our cultural process model. Culture and Editing Answers Culture and Social Desirability. Social desirability responding means responding in culturally sanctioned ways (Crowne & Marlowe, 1964); in this sense social desirability can be reasonably assumed to be universal (for a review, see Johnson & van de Vijver, 2003). However, as discussed earlier,


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cultures vary dramatically in identifying what is sanctioned and what is not (e.g. Newby, Amin, Diamond, & Naved, 1998), meaning that even if the same process occurs to the same extent cross-culturally, the number and substantive of questions impacted by social desirability should differ crossculturally. Differences in social desirability responding may be moderated by factors such as the cultural relevance of questions, anonymity, and salience of inter-group (or cross-national) comparison. Social desirability responding has been posited to be higher when collectivism is primed or chronically salient, lower when individualism is primed or chronically salient. With regard to collectivism, this is explained as reduced motivation to provide accurate information to outgroup members (Triandis & Suh, 2002), reduced willingness to self-disclose (Smith & Bond, 1998), increased conformity (Bond & Smith, 1996), and face-saving behavior (e.g. Triandis, 1995). With regard to individualism this is explained as a norm of providing an honest, sincere, or self-disclosing response regardless of who is the recipient of communication (Triandis, 1995; van Hemert, van de Vijver, Poortinga, & Georgas, 2002). To the extent that social desirability is differentially likely when collectivism is salient, then responses of collectivists should be more influenced by, for example, format of the scale if the meaning implied by scale anchors is differentially socially desirable or undesirable. When what is being rated is desirable – culturally valued, a low score on a bi-polar (e.g. 5, +5) scale may be more difficult to endorse than a low score on a uni-polar (e.g. 0, 10) scale because low responses on the former scale connote presence of negative traits while equally low responses on the latter scale simply connote absence of positive traits. Moreover, negative responses in general may fit better with some cultural values (e.g. humility) than others (e.g. pull yourself up by your bootstraps). Another possibility is that the mechanism underlying social desirability responding differs by cultural frame, with individualism highlighting the need to present a positive, self-enhancing image to oneself and others, and collectivism highlighting the need to save face in public. Indeed, collectivism is associated with public-image management and individualism is associated with self-image enhancement (Lalwani et al., 2006). Findings in this research were the result of using targeted rather than general scales. This might explain why some research has not found a relationship between collectivism and social desirability or found a relationship only with individualism (e.g. Okazaki, 2000). Similarly, Grimm and Church (1999) observed no relationship between several social desirability indexes and individualism and collectivism as measured by the Individualism-Collectivism scale by Hui (1988). In a study where culture-level variables were examined in relation to

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social desirability, van Hemert et al. (2002) found that the strongest predictor of the lie scores measured by the Eysenck Lie Scale was GNP such that low GNP scores predicted high lie scores. We believe that further research directed to understanding culture-specific processes that might underlie socially desirable responding across cultures and culturally relevant context effects that might impact socially desirable responding is needed to resolve some of the confusion that exists in the current literature on culture and social desirability. Culture and Use of Middle or Extreme Responses. Some authors have speculated that chronic or situationally primed collectivism increases use of a non-committal midpoint response, particularly when the correct response is not clear or when the respondent does not want to offend the interviewer. With regard to collectivism, this is explained as due to salient norms of limiting self-disclosure (Steel, 1991), guarding affective expression (Lai & Linden, 1993), masking feelings (Gross & John, 1998), and greater emphasis on modest and cautious responses (Hui & Triandis, 1989). Asian collectivism, influenced by Confucianism is also thought to be related to midpoint responding as a reflection of moderation, deference, and modesty valued by this philosophical thinking style (Chia, Allred, & Jerzak, 1997; Tu, 1979). These values may be endorsed particularly by those members of the cultures influenced by Confucianism who are high on public self-consciousness which is associated with a greater concern about how one appears to others (Hamid, Lai, & Cheng, 2001). Dialectical thinking – viewing reality as dynamic and changeable, believing that contradictory features can co-exist in the same object or event and that everything is related – as opposed to analytical thinking – paying attention primarily to the object and the categories to which it belongs and using rules such as formal logic to understand its behavior – is also thought to contribute to midpoint responding (Triandis, 2004). While use of midpoint may be due to these cultural values and cognitive styles, it also may be due to use of questions that are differentially involving for individualistic respondents (who would then be more likely to choose extreme answers), while being of little relevance to collectivist participants (who would then be more likely to choose non-committal answers). A general tendency of cultural and cross-cultural research to be focused on the west would create a general tendency of research questions to be relevant to individualists. Questions focused on irrelevant behaviors, judgments, and attitudes are more likely to need to be estimated. If culturally relevant subjective theories focus on context-focused rather than person-focused stability, then


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individuals high in collectivism may be left less sure of their estimated answers. Question irrelevance and difficulty using estimation cues together could produce what would appear to be a tendency to use the midpoint on the part of collectivists. Van de Vijver, Ploubidis, and van Hemert (2004) have found evidence for domain effects; country differences in extreme responding depend on the extent to which a domain involves personal involvement. To the extent that questions are culturally specific, midpoint responding should increase when they are culturally irrelevant. To the extent that questions are universal, midpoint responding should decline. Unfortunately, few studies have explicitly measured individualism and collectivism and examined its link to midpoint and extremity responding. We found two studies. The first study (Johnson, Kulesa, Cho, & Shavitt, 2005) showed no relationship between Hofstede country-level individualism score and individual variability in extreme responding in diverse samples of adults in 19 countries. The second study (Chen, Lee, & Stevenson, 1995) assessed individualism at the individual level and showed both the expected general cultural differences in use of midpoint and at least some evidence that the effect has to do with relevance of questions. Chen et al. (1995) measured individualism in 11th grade students in Japan, Taiwan, Canada, and the US (N ¼ 6,451) who also completed scales inquiring about different school-related domains (e.g. value of education, academic self-concept). Individualism correlated positively with extreme responding and negatively with midpoint responding. In addition, Japanese and Taiwanese students had a significantly greater preference for midpoint responding and significantly lower preference for extreme responding than the US students, but neither Asian group differed from the Canadian group. In addition to general differences by individualism–collectivism and by country, question-specific differences also emerged. Japanese students had a greater preference for midpoint responding when questions asked about social and physical self-concept, but this difference almost disappeared when questions inquired about attitudes concerning math. Similarly, American students had a greater preference than the other three groups for extreme responding when asked about value of education, but had equal preference for extreme points when asked about school anxiety. In addition to question relevance effects, there is some evidence that format-related features of questions influence extreme responding cross-culturally. Unfortunately, studies are not framed in terms of cognitive survey methodology making results interpretable. Hui and Triandis (1989) report increased use of extreme responses in a collectivistic group (US Hispanic supervisors) when presented a 5-point response alternative (response options

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ranging from A to E), but not when provided a 10-point alternative (response options ranging from 1 to 10) compared to an individualistic group (US nonHispanic whites). Grimm and Church (1999) report increased use of extreme responses in a collectivistic group of participants (Philippine students) compared to an individualistic group of participants (US students) when presented with 8- or 9-point response scales, but not when presented with 2-, 5-, and 6-point response scales. Culture and Acquiescence. As is the case for other of the response effects, there is no clear evidence for the size or stability of acquiescence effects as a function of individualism–collectivism. In general, acquiescence or yea-saying is assumed to be a learned and functionally adaptive response, reflecting nonresistance, deference, and a willingness to conform; characteristics that may be more functional in collectivistic societies, especially in those that also put emphasis on the observance of social hierarchy (e.g. Ross & Mirowsky, 1984). Lynch (1973) suggested that collectivism is likely to be associated with acquiesce more than individualism because of the greater value collectivism puts on smooth interpersonal relations. Smith (2004) suggested that acquiescence might be higher in cultures characterized by anxiety and uncertainty. Cultures where many rules and norms are imposed tightly may also promote acquiescent response style (Triandis, 2004). Because acquiescence is likely to increase in the same contexts that enhance social desirability concerns (see Knowles & Condon, 1999), the cognitive and contextual factors we discussed above in relation to social desirability are also applicable here. Similarly, to the extent that positive extreme values can be considered as reflecting an acquiescent tendency, our discussion related to extreme values are relevant to acquiescence. A few studies explicitly examining acquiescence across cultures provide evidence for the individualism–collectivism and acquiescence link. Smith (2004) observed that correlations between estimates of acquiescent bias derived from existing multi-nation studies (Hofstede, 2001; Schwartz, 1994; Smith, Duggan, & Trompenaars, 1996; House et al., 2004) revealed that acquiescent bias was high in countries characterized as high in collectivism. Moreover, Smith showed that that question content made a difference in acquiescent responses such that personally relevant scales (focused on behaviors, attitudes, beliefs, and especially values) were convergent estimates of acquiescence, but that estimates derived from questions inquiring about one’s perceptions of one’s own society as a whole was not correlated with acquiescence. Johnson et al. (2005) also reported that individualism was negatively associated with acquiescent bias, such that individuals from individualistic


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countries were less likely to engage in acquiescent responding. They also observed that that GNP was negatively associated with acquiescence – lessaffluent countries were more likely to manifest acquiescent bias in responding to questions. Van Herk, Poortingda, and Verhallen (2004) examined data from surveys on household domains and personal care in six countries in the EU (Greece, France, Spain, Italy, Germany, and the UK) and found that Greek respondents systematically scored higher in both acquiescence bias and extreme responding than members of other European countries including French and Italian.

SUMMARY In the present chapter, we focused on commonly discussed aspects of individualism and collectivism and linked them to question comprehension and response. Of course culture is not simply individualism and collectivism. As other operationalizations of culture are brought to bear, other influences may be discovered (e.g. influences of future–past orientation as discussed by Armagan and her colleagues in Chapter 6 or of power and hierarchy as discussed by Zhong and his colleagues in Chapter 3 on question comprehension and responses). We applied cognitive survey approaches to understanding how contexts influence answers to make predictions about the implications of the research context on outcomes of cultural and cross-cultural research. By thinking of research as a form of communication between researcher and respondent, the cognitive approach has highlighted first that questions, questionnaires, consent forms, previous questions, response scales, and formats all provide clues as to the meaning of the current question and what would constitute an appropriate response. We proposed that collectivism would, in principle, increase sensitivity to these context effects. By highlighting the interplay between autobiographical memory and responses, we clarified likely culture effects on what would likely be salient vs. have to be reconstructed on the spot as well as likely cultural effects on the subjective theories used to reconstruct appropriate responses. In the final section, we explored possible differential sensitivity to social desirability effects and to response style tendencies. We noted that while the processes were likely to be universal, they were likely to be cued in culturally relevant ways. Collectivism increases sensitivity to situation, influences what is stored and accessible in memory, subjective theories and what is socially desirable and requires extremity or modesty. Collectivism also influences what is salient enough to be memorable and not require estimation.

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As illustrated earlier in Fig. 1, language (a marker of distal culture) and social situations are likely to influence the cultural lens brought to bear on the research questions, but so are features of the questionnaire and research context itself. It is this proximal cultural lens that will be drawn on in responding. To the extent that cultural and cross-cultural researchers fail to pay attention to the impact of the research context on what respondents understand questions to mean and what appear to be reasonable answers to questions, we may dramatically over- or underestimate actual cultural differences in values and behaviors. To the extent that cultural and crosscultural researchers fail to pay attention to the impact of the research context on the strategies respondents use to construct their answers, we may dramatically over- or underestimate actual cultural differences in social and non-social cognition – how we think.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We would like to thank the two reviewers for their helpful and constructive comments as well as Ya-ru Chen for her editorial guidance and suggestions. We also would like to thank the contributors of the Sheth Foundation/Sudman Symposium on Cross-Cultural Survey Research that was held in October 2004 and Norbert Schwarz whose work inspired us to write the chapter. Ayse Uskul was funded by a postdoctoral fellowship of the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada while working on the chapter.

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MANAGING THE INTERCULTURAL INTERFACE: THIRD CULTURES, ANTECEDENTS, AND CONSEQUENCES Wendi L. Adair, Catherine H. Tinsley and Masako S. Taylor ABSTRACT We offer a conceptualization of third culture in intercultural interactions and describe its different forms as well as its antecedents and consequences. Third culture is a multicultural team’s shared schema that contains not only team and task knowledge, but also a shared set of beliefs, values, and norms grounded in the national cultures of the team members. We develop a typology to distinguish third culture schema form on two dimensions: third culture strength and third culture content. We then propose both team process and team composition variables that influence the emergence of these different forms. Furthermore, we use social identity formation and sensemaking mechanisms to propose the effects of these third culture forms on team performance.


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Globalization demands intercultural interaction. Culture, or the collective mental programming of a group of people (Hofstede, 1980, 1991), influences how people approach such interpersonal interaction. Cultural differences in values and norms, for example, account for unique national behavioral repertoires that can clash and make for difficult intercultural interactions due to a variety of misunderstandings, misattributions, and conflict (Brett & Okumura, 1998; Adair, Okumura, & Brett, 2001; Morris et al., 1998; Adler & Graham, 1989; Earley & Mosakowski, 2000; Ravlin, Thomas, & Ilsev, 2000; Thomas, 1999). Consequently, we have many accounts of the importance of understanding cultural differences and the need to manage the intercultural interface (Adler, 1991; Brett, 2001; Graham & Sano, 1989; Salacuse, 1991; Trompenaars & Hampden-Turner, 1998). In a multicultural team, a team member may manage the intercultural interface by adapting his/her ways and beliefs to those of the other parties, by pushing the other parties to adopt his/her ways and beliefs, or by meeting somewhere in the middle (Weiss, 1994; Adair et al., 2001; Adair & Brett, 2005). Through these processes, multicultural teams that come together for a common purpose may develop not only shared knowledge about their team and task and similar behaviors, but also a shared set of values and norms that underlie and guide those behaviors. Such a shared knowledge structure, consisting of team and task knowledge, as well as values and norms rooted in the traditional cultural belief system of one or more team members, is what we call a third culture. In this chapter we investigate the various ways by which multicultural teams develop third culture, the different forms it may take, and the implications of different forms of third culture for managing the intercultural interface. The chapter begins with our conceptualization of third culture as a shared knowledge structure, or said otherwise, a shared schema. We discuss how the inclusion of values, norms, and beliefs rooted in national cultural belief systems makes third culture distinct from other team-level cognitive constructs. We then build on theories of schema formation and change in social cognition (Fiske & Taylor, 1991) to model the process of third culture building and the resultant forms that are distinguishable on two dimensions: third culture strength and third culture content. We propose team composition and team process variables that predict whether team members embrace a common schema or maintain some unique, individual schema elements, thus impacting third culture strength. We then propose team composition and process variables that predict whether team members rely on their preexisting schemas or engage in synergistic thinking that could prompt the evolution of new schema elements, thus predicting third culture

Managing the Intercultural Interface

Team Composition Individualism/collectivism Low/high context Field dependence/independence Experience Cultural intelligence

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Team Homogeneity

Third culture Strength Content

Team Process Sensemaking Identity

Team Outcome Performance

Team Process Relationship conflict Task conflict

Fig. 1.

Model of Third Culture in Multinational Teams.

content. Finally, we build on social identity (Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994; Earley & Mosakowski, 2000) and sensemaking (Levine & Mooreland, 1991; Cannon-Bowers, Salas, & Converse, 1993) functions of third culture to address some of the positive and negative implications of third culture for work teams. The model we will build is presented in Fig. 1.

THIRD CULTURE AS A SHARED SCHEMA We propose that third culture is a shared knowledge structure consisting of team and task knowledge as well as values and norms rooted in the traditional cultural belief system of one or more team members. In this section, we argue that third culture is a form of the broader construct Culture, that resides in the shared cognition of a team that has come together for a specific common purpose. We show that our conceptualization is consistent with prior literature on third culture. We explain why multicultural teams are likely to form a third culture. We define the content of a third culture schema and show how it is different from other team-level cognitive constructs.

Review of Third Culture Literature Culture is generally defined as the values, norms, and beliefs shared by a group of people that defines their identity and coordinates their survival efforts (Kluckhohn & Strodtbeck, 1961; Schein, 1997; Schwartz, 1994). According to Schein’s model, culture resembles an iceberg in that only the tip (behaviors and institutions) is visible, but these artifacts rest on a foundation of values,

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norms, and beliefs that lies underneath. It is the part under water, the cognitive side of culture that resides in the minds of its members, where many theorists have focused their conceptualizations of culture. For example, a common conceptualization of culture is a shared meaning system or mental programming of a group of people (Hofstede, 1980; Geertz, 1973; D’Andrade, 1984; Triandis, 1972) that acts as a lens that filters incoming stimuli and directs outgoing reaction (Erez & Earley, 1993; Triandis, 1989). In other words, culture is a shared schema, which is defined as a knowledge structure representing one’s understanding of an environment that guides interpretation and behavior (Fiske & Taylor, 1991). Although culture is necessarily a shared schema, not all shared schemas are cultures. For example, most people share the event schema for how to eat at a restaurant (getting a table, ordering, etc.), but since it is not a shared schema that embodies values and belief systems that guide behavior for a socially distinct group, it does not represent a culture. Consistent with the cognitive models of culture, we conceptualize third culture as a shared schema. We define third culture as a knowledge structure shared by a team that consists of traditional culture values, norms, and beliefs as well as team- and task-relevant information. As a shared schema, third culture, like other schemas, guides perception and directs behavior. Third culture is a special form of culture that arises when people from different national cultures interact for a specific common purpose. Thus team information, e.g. who performs what functions, and task information, e.g. project goals and timelines, are a part of third culture but may not be part of a general culture schema that consists solely of shared values, norms, and beliefs. Our conceptualization of third culture as a shared schema is consistent with how others have talked about third culture. For example, Useem, Useem, and Donoghue (1963) define third culture as learned and shared behavior patterns of people from distinct teams who are interacting with each other. They note that third culture includes a ‘‘shared understanding’’ that consists of work-related norms and worldviews. To illustrate third culture, they use the example of the United Nations, which has a third culture including norms for diplomacy and values for human rights and the sovereignty of individual nations. These authors note that because third culture is a composite of the individual cultures from which it transcends, it is distinct from but cannot be understood without references to the cultures in which group participants were socialized. Thus, although third culture is a group-level construct that evolves as a function of team interaction, it can only be understood by looking at the teams’ cultural


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composition (Hambrick, Davison, Snell, & Snow, 1998) and the team members’ preexisting values, norms, and belief systems. Earley and Mosakowski (2000) define third culture, which they call a hybrid team culture, as an ‘‘emergent and simplified set of rules, norms, expectations, and roles that team members share and enact [that] offers a common sense of identity that becomes team specific y. And facilitates team interaction.’’ (p. 26). And Casmir (1992) writes that third culture consists of shared frameworks, value systems, and communication systems that evolve when groups of individuals interact to share resources for a common goal. He uses the example of a mixed-culture marriage and notes that such couples develop a shared meaning system that involves the creation of something new that is informed and influenced by each spouse’s individual cultural values, norms, and beliefs. In all of these conceptualizations, third culture exists at the level of cognition – a shared knowledge structure that guides interaction for a specific team purpose. This purpose may be wellbeing and survival, as in the case of a mixed-culture marriage, or task completion and performance, as in the case of work teams. Although theorists have discussed third culture at multiple levels including nations and institutions (Useem et al., 1963), work teams (Earley & Mosakowski, 2000; Earley & Gibson, 2002), and decision-making dyads (Ickes, Stinson, Bissonnette, & Garcia, 1990), the limited empirical work on third culture has focused on similar behaviors or team norms. For example, research on hybrid team cultures (Earley & Mosakowski, 2000) builds on social identity theory (Tajfel, 1982; Turner, 1985; Lau & Murnighan, 1998), and measures team heterogeneity to predict team process and performance. The work on mixed-culture negotiation repertoires (Adair & Brett, 2005) measures dyad composition and sequences of negotiation strategies to predict negotiation performance. Together this work shows that in multicultural settings, people cross cultural boundaries to develop reciprocity and team norms. That cross-cultural teams develop shared and simplified sets of strategies and behaviors may be evidence of third culture at the visible tip of the iceberg. Yet, our tendency to look for third culture and measure it primarily in behaviors has limited our understanding of the underlying cognitive side of third culture, the merging and melding of values, norms, and beliefs often deeply embedded in an individual’s national culture identity. Our work extends this prior work on third culture by modeling the various possible forms of third culture as a shared schema, developing the theoretical mechanisms of third culture building, and explicitly addressing the consequences of third culture strength and composition for team process and outcome.

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Why Do Third Cultures Form? In a team context, there are several pressures that prompt a merging of individual schemas into a shared schema. First, teams have naturally occurring tendencies toward consensus that should prompt the movement of individual, idiosyncratic schemas into a shared schema (Levine & Moreland, 1999; Brandon & Hollingshead, 2004). Second, for teamwork, a shared schema is more efficient than a set of unrelated individual schemas (Fiske & Taylor, 1991). Shared schemas help improve information processing (Levine & Mooreland, 1991; Rentsch & Hall, 1994), adaptation to changing task demands (Cannon-Bowers, Salas, & Converse, 1993), sensemaking and the determination and prediction of future events (Rouse & Morris, 1986), and team performance (Walsh & Fahey, 1986; Walsh, Henderson, & Deighton, 1988; Mathieu, Heffner, Goodwin, Salas, & Cannon-Bowers, 2000). Assuming team members have some implicit notion of the advantages of a shared understanding, they should be motivated to develop a shared schema. According to social identity and self-categorization theory, developing a shared understanding or shared schema with team members should also bolster individuals’ sense of self-esteem (Tajfel, 1982; Tajfel & Turner, 1979) and belongingness (Turner, Hogg, Oakes, Reicher, & Wetherell, 1987). Thus again, individuals should be motivated to update their schemas and develop a shared understanding with team members. Earley and Mosakowski (2000), however, note one case when team members may not be motivated to develop a third culture. They found that moderately heterogeneous teams, as opposed to homogenous or highly heterogeneous teams, tended to divide and identify with subgroups instead of creating a superordinate group identity. Yet, we might argue that a third culture is forming, it is simply a smaller third culture (within the subgroups).

Third Culture Schema Content In a work setting, people’s schemas contain information about their task, for example goals, process, and equipment; and about their team, for example roles, responsibilities, and members’ skills (Cannon-Bowers et al., 1993; Levine & Mooreland, 1991). Individual schemas also contain culturally determined values, norms, and beliefs that underlie this knowledge and govern interaction in the domain (Brett & Okumura, 1998; Erez & Earley, 1993; Gelfand & McCusker, 2001). For example, an individual’s schema for a team task includes not only information about who is who, but also the values, norms, and beliefs


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about hierarchy that define how people of higher status should interact with people of lower status in the team. A third culture develops when individuals in a team develop a shared schema that contains not only knowledge about task and team, but also a shared set of beliefs, values, and norms that are rooted in individuals’ national culture and guide interaction and behavior. The recognition that individual schemas contain information not only about task and team but also about cultural values, norms, and beliefs is what allows us to distinguish third culture as a shared schema from team mental models and transactive memory as shared schemas. Transactive memory is ‘‘the shared division of cognitive labor with respect to the encoding, storage, retrieval, and communication of information from different knowledge domains’’ (Brandon & Hollingshead, 2004, p. 633; also Wegner, 1987). Thus, transactive memory is about how people in a team understand who has what expert knowledge and assign responsibility for action. Transactive memory may be part of a team’s third culture related to team and task information, but transactive memory is not third culture because it does not comprise shared values, norms, and beliefs guiding action. Similarly, a team mental model is an emergent, shared, organized knowledge structure that is distinct from third culture because it focuses on categorization of what people ‘‘know’’ (Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994). Transactive memory and team mental models contain task knowledge and team knowledge (Cannon-Bowers et al., 1993; Levine & Mooreland, 1991; Mathieu et al., 2000). Third culture is different because it includes both information about task and team knowledge, but also the cultural values, norms, and beliefs that underlie what they know.

THIRD CULTURE BUILDING In this section, we discuss how third culture forms, its two dimensions, and propose variables that prompt different forms of third culture. We first explain third culture formation through processes of schema updating and adjustment (Fiske & Taylor, 1991). We propose two dimensions which distinguish the forms of third culture: third culture strength and third culture content. We then discuss some team composition and process variables, linking them to third culture forms. Third Culture Formation Although the content of third culture is distinct from transactive memory and team mental models, the form it embodies, i.e. a shared schema subject

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to updating and adjustment, is similar. As Walsh and Fahey (1986) note, a shared schema develops as a function of both individuals’ schemas and the interactions within a team. When an individual encounters a schema-relevant domain (e.g. a person, a situation, etc.), their schema for that domain becomes activated. Then, information that is consistent with their existing schema reinforces and strengthens that schema (Fiske & Taylor, 1991). Information that is inconsistent with their existing schema challenges the schema, and in a process of updating and adjustment, the schema composition can change (Fiske & Taylor, 1991). When multiple individuals encounter the same stimulus domain, individual schemas can change and merge or converge on a shared understanding or team-level schema (Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994). This process of individual schema adjustment and convergence explains how third cultures are formed. Third culture develops when individuals discover, adjust, and integrate new beliefs and values (Casmir, 1978, 1992). People develop a third culture ‘‘by way of their interpersonal relationships, y. By way of the cultural patterns they create, learn, and share’’ (Useem et al., 1963, p. 172). In other words, third culture develops as a function of both the individual team member’s cultures and the interactions within their team. We propose to distinguish the different forms a third culture may take on two dimensions: strength and content. The strength dimension is developed directly from Klimoski and Mohammed’s (1994) work on team mental models and refers to the amount of individual schema overlap or commonly shared information in a team’s third culture. The content dimension distinguishes whether a third culture schema contains only information that previously existed in team members’ individual schemas or contains some information that is created as a function of the team interaction. We explain and illustrate each dimension (Fig. 3) and offer both team composition and team process variables that predict third culture schema form. Team composition refers to the characteristics of individual team members and the level of similarity within the team. Team process variables refer to processes embedded in the team’s interaction.

Third Culture Strength In describing hybrid team cultures, Earley and Mosakowski (2000) note that the more overlap there is across members’ cultures, the stronger the team’s hybrid team culture will be. In the language of schemas, this means that when individuals’ schemas completely merge into a shared third culture


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schema, the third culture should be stronger than when individuals’ schemas only partly merge and some information continues to reside in the individuals’ schemas that are not shared. Two forms from the mental model literature define this dimension of shared schema strength: the overlapping form and the identical form (Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994).1 With the overlapping configuration, some aspects of the members’ schemas are similar and other aspects are different. The third culture shared schema represents some but not all of the information activated in a member’s mind given the team context as a stimulus domain. In contrast, with the identical third culture schema, members share the same schema content and structure. All members would have the same, identical schema activated given their team context as a stimulus domain. Take, as a simplified example, the case of Team Alpha consisting of a Japanese man and a woman from the U.S. (Fig. 2). For the Japanese man, the team context activates a schema that consists of collectivist values, cooperative beliefs, and a norm for indirect communication. He comes together with the U.S. woman whose team schema consists of individualist values, self-interest beliefs, and a norm for direct communication. One example of an identical third culture is when over time, the team members came to place a similar value on collectivism, cooperation, and direct communication (Fig. 3a). In other words, the U.S. woman realizes that in order to work efficiently with her Japanese counterpart, she needs to put more emphasis on collectivism and cooperation. The U.S. member’s individualist goals and self-interest values are no longer salient in this team context. Likewise, the Japanese team member realizes that indirect communication is inefficient in this team environment and direct communication becomes the salient mode of communication when working in Team Alpha. When they are doing work

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related to Team Alpha, an identical third culture schema is activated in both team members’ minds: collectivism, cooperation, and a norm for direct communication. Of course, this is a simplified example that illustrates a small set of values and norms. A true third culture schema should contain a broader set of traditional culture values and norms (e.g. Hofstede, 1980; Schwartz, 1994; Trompenaars & Hampden-Turner, 1998) as well as both team and task information. But the key distinguishing factor for the identical form is that all team members share the same schema form and content with other team members. Using the same case, an example of overlapping third culture is if Team Alpha’s third culture schema consists of norms for direct communication


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and collectivism, but each team member maintains his own distinct conceptualization of goals (self-interest versus cooperative) in the team context (Fig. 3b). Team members’ schemas are overlapping, but not identical. The overlapping information is what constitutes the third culture schema. This form of third culture should be common in cross-functional teams which develop a shared understanding of team information, task information, team goals, and norms, while individual team members simultaneously maintain identity and allegiance with their home department that is not completely released in the team context. Because the overlapping form of third culture involves individuals maintaining some individual schema elements, it is not as strong as the identical form, in which team members have the maximum possible amount of overlap in their shared cognition (Rohner, 1987; Earley & Mosakowski, 2000).

Team Composition and Third Culture Strength As Earley and Mosakowski (2000) note, team member characteristics influence the emergence of a shared culture because ‘‘personal characteristics shape their expectations of appropriate interaction rules y [and] affect expectations of how other members should act.’’ In a team setting, a more dominant cultural trait shared by a majority of the members may influence third culture formation. And just as some individual characteristics make people contribute more or be more influential in a team (Walsh et al., 1988), some individual culture traits may make people more susceptible to influence from others or more open to identify and embrace differences with others. We propose that team members’ desire for ingroup harmony and awareness of others that is captured in several well-known cultural values and norms should impact third culture strength. Collectivism Third culture is likely to develop whenever individuals work toward a common team goal. However, third culture strength should vary depending on the members’ orientation toward team membership. Cultural values for collectivism (Hofstede, 1980; Schwartz, 1994) go along with strong ingroup identification and harmony that should prompt embracing others’ schemas and developing an identical third culture. The counterpart of collectivism, individualism, reflects a strong sense of self and independence that should prompt preservation of one’s own schemas and developing an overlapping third culture.

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Individualism–collectivism refers to the degree to which one’s self-concept is defined as a unique individual or according to group membership (Triandis, 1995; Markus & Kitayama, 1991). Because collectivists are more likely than individualists to have an interdependent self-concept, they are more likely to strive for harmonious interpersonal relationships and adjustment to others (Singelis & Brown, 1995; Morling, Kitayama, & Miyamoto, 2002). In contrast to individualists, collectivists are more likely to pursue interests of the group (Parsons & Shils, 1951) and make individual goals subordinate to group goals (Kluckhohn & Strodtbeck, 1961; Triandis, 1995). While they may also be prone to discriminate against outgroup members, in a multicultural team context intercultural members, otherwise considered outgroup members may recategorize each other into an ingroup member as they strive for a common team goal. Because collectivists are more likely than individualists to embrace the interests and goals of the group, they should also be more likely than individualists to embrace a common team third culture. Individualists, on the other hand, will be more likely than collectivists to maintain some elements of their individual schema that are not integrated with the team’s third culture. Proposition 1a. Teams whose members rank higher on collective values are more likely to develop an identical third culture than teams whose members rank higher on individualist values. Proposition 1b. Teams whose members rank higher on individualist values are more likely to develop an overlapping third culture than teams whose members rank higher on collectivist values. High-/Low-Context Communication Another cultural dimension that covaries with collectivism (Adair & Brett, 2004; Singelis & Brown, 1995) and has implications for the emergence of third culture is high context communication. Communication is an important antecedent to the development of team mental models like third culture (Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994; Casmir, 1992), and some note it is critical to the development of shared meaning systems in general (Donnellon, Gray, & Bougon, 1986). Low–high context is a cultural dimension that defines the degree to which people are in tune with others in interpersonal communication. In high context cultures, people prefer indirect forms of communication and they have an ability to intuitively understand others (Hall, 1976). They are able to convey and gather information from subtle non-verbal, situational, and contextual cues. This is in contrast to low-context cultures,


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where people prefer to use direct communication, using explicit words to convey meaning (Hall, 1976). When team members have high-context communication norms, they are more likely to be able to ‘‘read’’ and understand other team members’ values, goals, and interests, even when they are not revealed directly with words. Therefore, they should be able to read and incorporate schema elements from other team members and develop a third culture more effectively than when team members have low-context communication norms. This should be particularly evident in face-to-face teams because in virtual teams, it is uncertain the degree to which high-context communication is hindered by context-free communication media (Eyring, 2001). In contrast, when teams have low-context communication norms, they may have trouble understanding others’ schemas and developing a strong third culture. Proposition 2a. Teams whose members rank higher on high-context communication norms are more likely to develop an identical third culture than teams whose members rank higher on low-context communication norms. Proposition 2b. Teams whose members rank higher on low-context communication norms are more likely to develop an overlapping third culture than teams whose members rank higher on high-context communication norms. Field Dependence/Independence The culturally based cognitive style of field dependence/independence (Witkin & Berry, 1975; Witkin & Goodenough, 1979) dominant in a team may also have implications for third culture forms. Field dependence/independence explains the different ways in which people process information to guide their behaviors. While field-independent individuals rely on impersonal information that is detached from the social context, field-dependent individuals tend to take into consideration the social context when interpreting information (Gibson, 2003). For example, field-independent individuals focus on technical and physical information. They view the elements of an environment analytically and are more able to separate parts from a background field. As analytical processors, they may pay little attention to the social aspects of intercultural interaction and be less sensitive to the schema elements of the other party. Field-dependent individuals, on the other hand, are highly sensitive to social context. They view the environment more holistically with greater dependence on the referent others. These individuals will more likely attend to the values, norms, and beliefs of

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their other team members and consequently be more likely to develop an identical third culture. Proposition 3a. Teams whose members rank higher on field dependence are more likely to develop an identical third culture than teams whose members rank higher on field independence. Proposition 3b. Teams whose members rank higher on field independence are more likely to develop an overlapping third culture than teams whose members rank higher on field dependence. Team Homogeneity Because team process is a function of both individual-level characteristics and the interaction between individuals (Turner, 1987; McGrath, 1984), we propose that team homogeneity with respect to the individual-level characteristics introduced above will moderate the relationships proposed in Propositions 1–3. For example, when all team members value collectivism, a team is more likely to develop a strong identical third culture than when some but not all team members value collectivism. When all team members have high-context communication norms, a team is more likely to develop a stronger third culture than when some but not all team members have highcontext communication norms. Thus, we propose that team homogeneity moderates the effect of individual-level culture attributes on the strength of third culture. Proposition 4. Team homogeneity with respect to individual level culture attributes moderates the attributes’ effects on third culture strength, in a way that the effect will be stronger for more homogeneous teams. Team Process and Third Culture Strength Just as team members’ cultural characteristics may influence third culture strength, the nature of team process should also influence the degree to which team members merge and integrate their individual schema elements. Teams engaged in processes that facilitate the development of common cultural values, norms, and beliefs and common task and team information should be more likely to develop an identical third culture than an overlapping third culture. Relationship Conflict Conflict is one team process that can either be detrimental and/or beneficial to team performance and satisfaction (Tjosvold, 1993; Jehn, 1995). The two


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primary forms of conflict in teams are task conflict, that focuses on work content and goals, and relationship conflict that focuses on interpersonal relationships (Pinkley, 1990; Jehn, 1995). Of the two, we propose that relationship conflict impacts third culture strength, because it takes away from team sharedness. In contrast, task conflict has implications not for schema strength but for schema composition, which we explain later. Relationship conflict is related to interpersonal dynamics and is negatively linked to performance and morale (Jehn, 1995, 1997), because members spend time and energy in emotional battles rather than the tasks at hand (Amason, 1996; Jehn, 1995, 1997; Jehn, Northcraft, & Neale, 1999; Pelled, 1996). Relationship conflict is likely to distract members’ schema integration and detract from the development of a strong third culture. Thus, teams experiencing relationship conflict should be less likely to discover and integrate team members’ different schemas into an identical third culture. Proposition 5a. Teams with low levels of relationship conflict are more likely to develop an identical third culture than teams with high levels of relationship conflict. Proposition 5b. Teams with high levels of relationship conflict are more likely to develop an overlapping third culture than teams with low levels of relationship conflict. Third Culture Content The second dimension we propose to distinguish the different forms that third culture may take is its content. Third culture content refers to the actual elements of the third culture shared schema. We propose that one important way to distinguish shared schema content is whether it consists solely of elements that previously existed in the individual’s schemas or includes schema elements that were not previously represented in individuals’ schemas. While individuals’ existing culture may have an important role in building third culture, some elements of third culture may not come from any of the members’ national cultures. In other words, there may be components of a team’s shared schema that are not native to any of the members’ national cultures. We use the dimension third culture content to distinguish an intersection form, comprised of schema elements that previously existed in team members’ mind from an emergent form, comprised of elements that previously existed in team members’ minds plus some unique elements derived from the interaction itself.

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With an intersection third culture, team members develop a shared understanding that is identical in each individual’s mind but is comprised merely of elements that previously existed in each individual’s schema. Using our Team Alpha example, an intersection third culture would consist of collectivism, cooperation, and direct communication (Fig. 3a) or maybe just collectivism and direct communication (Fig. 3b). What distinguishes the two intersection forms of third culture is third culture strength. In contrast, an emergent third culture also contains unique elements derived through the interaction itself. Using our same example, an emergent third culture may contain a shared focus on collectivism, direct communication, and also values for tradition and norms to look for precedent (Fig. 3d). For example, when the U.S. and Japanese counterparts begin working together, they realize that embracing tradition and looking for previous team behaviors as guiding precedents enable them to work more efficiently. Their shared third culture thus contains some schema elements that evolve from and are a function of their working together. Alternatively, a stronger form of emergent third culture is evident in the overlapping model (Fig. 3c). Next we propose several team composition and process variables that should affect whether third culture content takes on an intersection or an emergent form.

Team Composition and Third Culture Content Team composition variables that should affect third culture content are those that affect individuals’ tendencies for creative and synergistic thinking. We propose that experience and cultural intelligence (CQ) are two team characteristics that should impact whether a team’s third culture schema contains elements that are created and emerge as a function of the team interaction. Experience Prior research suggests that team norms develop as a function of members’ previous experience and experience with one another (Bettenhausen & Murnighan, 1985). Likewise, the form of a team’s collective mind depends on members’ experiences with one another (McClure, 1990; Earley & Mosakowski, 2000). Hence, it is common for cross-cultural misunderstandings to decrease as experience with another culture increases (Martin & Hammer, 1989). The more experience one has working with members of another national culture, the better one should be at recognizing differences


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and managing those differences by minimizing them or turning them into cross-cultural synergies (Adler, 1991; Weiss, 1994). Creating cross-cultural synergies is similar to creating an emergent third culture. The process consists of noting and integrating schema similarities while also noting and building off of schema differences to create something more than just the sum of the individuals’ schemas. Team members with more experience with the other cultures represented in the team should be better at creating synergies or developing an emergent third culture than team members with less experience with the other cultures. The opposite may be true for experience working together as a team. Literature on team process suggests that teams have strong tendencies toward convergent thinking or thinking that moves toward a single answer as opposed to divergent thinking or generating something new and different. One reason for conformity in teams is the desire to be liked by others (Leary, 1995). Thus team members’ concern for how other team members are judging them can inhibit idea generation in teams (Camacho & Paulus, 1995). We propose that pressures for conformity in teams may cause teams to rely on schema elements that are familiar as opposed to exploring new values, beliefs, team, or task information. And over time these pressures for conformity should narrow rather than expand the potential for new schema elements emerging as a function of the team process. Proposition 6a. Teams whose members rank higher on experience working with the other cultures represented are more likely to develop an emergent third culture than teams with less cultural experience. Proposition 6b. Teams whose members rank higher on experience working together are more likely to develop an intersection third culture than teams with less experience working together. Cultural Intelligence Cultural intelligence (CQ) reflects one’s ability to adapt to new cultural settings (Earley & Ang, 2003) and, like experience, should be related to one’s ability to truly integrate and develop something synergistic from distinct, individual schemas. People with high CQ can travel around the world and make friends, fit in, and solve problems in any cultural environment. CQ consists of cognitive skills (e.g. knowledge of how others do things), motivational factors (e.g. desire to engage others), behavioral repertoires (e.g. ability to speak a language), and metacognition (e.g. ability to integrate differences and discover new approaches). We propose that metacognitive CQ has implications for third culture content. People with high cognitive,

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behavioral, and motivational CQ should have knowledge of differences and the ability to adopt different behavioral norms, suggesting that they would develop third culture in general. However, people with metacognitive CQ have an additional ability to create synergies. For example, when a team seems to have two distinct problem-solving styles, someone high in metacognitive CQ would not select one style for the team to embrace or use a combination of the two approaches, but rather come up with a third way that all team members can utilize effectively (Earley & Ang, 2003). The metacognitive level of CQ describes the processes of both schema integration and creating a new understanding that characterizes emergent third culture. Therefore, people with high metacognitive CQ should be particularly strong at developing an emergent third culture. Proposition 7. Teams whose members rank higher on metacognitive CQ are more likely to develop an emergent third culture than teams whose members rank lower on CQ. Homogeneity As with the individual culture attributes and third culture strength, we propose that homogeneity within a team will moderate the relationship between experience and CQ and third culture content. When all team members have high culture experience, the team will be more likely to form an emergent third culture than when just some team members have high culture experience. When all team members have high metacognitive CQ, the team will be more likely to form an emergent third culture than when just some team members have high metacognitive CQ. Proposition 8. Team homogeneity with respect to cultural experience and metacognitive CQ moderates the attributes’ effects on third culture strength, in a way that the effects will be stronger for more homogeneous teams. Team Process and Third Culture Content One of the strengths of intercultural teams is the potential for creativity and better decision making when members take advantage of the varied resources that they bring to the team. As such, processes that build on cultural differences should lead to an emergent third culture. Task conflict is one process that is known to build positively on differences.


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Task Conflict Task conflict is related to how work is done and can be quite functional by generating insights and creativity that boost team performance (Pelled, 1996; Jehn, 1995, 1997). Task conflict is focused on work content and goals rather than interpersonal dynamics. As we noted earlier, whereas relationship conflict may have a negative effect on team process, task conflict can actually boost team performance. One reason is that task conflict can cause divergent thinking (Nemeth, 1994). For example, teams in which a single member suggests an unusual solution generate more problem-solving strategies and original arguments than teams that lack a vocal minority (Nemeth & Kwan, 1987). In this way, task conflict can cause new insights into how best to get the work done (Jehn, 1995, 1997). Task conflict should likewise generate creative and synergistic thinking that should lead to the team’s adoption of novel schema elements. Therefore, teams experiencing task conflict should be more likely to develop an emergent third culture. When there is low task conflict, members agree on work content and goals, and divergent or synergistic thinking is not stimulated. As such, low task conflict should be more closely related to the intersection form of third culture content. Proposition 9a. Teams with high levels of task conflict are more likely to develop an emergent third culture than teams with low levels of task conflict. Proposition 9b. Teams with low levels of task conflict are more likely to develop an intersection third culture than teams with high levels of task conflict.

CONSEQUENCES OF THIRD CULTURE Third culture development is generally assumed to be a useful process in intercultural interaction (Earley & Mosakowski, 2000; Earley & Gibson, 2002). Researchers have proposed a variety of reasons why a shared understanding should promote effective teamwork (Hackman, 1987; Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994), such as the fact that a shared understanding generates positive affect, a propensity to trust (Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994), and group efficacy (Bandura, 1997). Hence a greater overlap in shared schemas should lead to better prediction of team needs, adaptation to changing internal and external demands, and coordination of activity (Cannon-Bowers et al., 1993). Shared collective belief structures should also improve the speed, flexibility, and implementation of a team decision (Walsh & Fahey, 1986).

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Empirical work on shared schemas and team performance has been limited but supports the hypothesis that schema similarity improves team process and outcome. Many authors measure shared schemas indirectly, for example through self-reports of team identity or communication (Earley & Mosakowski, 2000) or explicit planning and coordination (Orasanu & Salas, 1993). However, a few researchers have measured sharedness at the team level using multidimensional scaling and cognitive mapping techniques. For example, in a business decision-making simulation, teams with a focused and shared understanding of the business decision environment were found to generate optimum decisions and maximize firm performance (Walsh et al., 1988). In a computer-simulated flight-combat mission, a greater shared understanding of both task attributes and teamwork were also found to improve team strategy coordination, cooperation, and coordination as well as team performance (Mathieu et al., 2000). In a negotiation with integrative potential, dyads with more similar negotiation schemas were more likely to generate high mutual gain solutions than dyads with less similar negotiation schemas (van Boven & Thompson, 2003). This previous work on shared schemas suggests that third cultures will improve team process and performance through such mechanisms as team identification, efficacy, and sensemaking. Yet, third cultures may be dysfunctional as well. Though third cultures will obviously enhance the level of shared understanding among a team of culturally different people, there may be hazards in assuming a larger level of shared understanding than what actually exists. Also, focusing too much on commonalities and shared information may prevent teams from capitalizing on individual expertise, the common knowledge effect (Stasser, 1992; Gigone & Hastie, 1993). When individuals in teams have schemas that are too similar, individual contribution, creativity, and team performance may suffer (Walsh et al., 1988; Cannon-Bowers et al., 1993; Earley & Gibson, 2002). A strong third culture may influence the future information processing on a team, leading to inaccuracies and inabilities to adapt. To understand when third culture will result in positive consequences for team process and outcome, we focus on the different forms that third culture may take and subsequent implications for sensemaking and group identity. We also address how third culture content may affect the impact of third culture on team performance.

Third Culture Strength and Team Performance The assumption that shared schemas will improve team process and outcome is based on two primary mechanisms: sensemaking and group identity


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(Fig. 1). According to the sensemaking argument, teams with a shared understanding of task and social knowledge will be better able to assign work, anticipate conflict, and coordinate decision making (Levine & Mooreland, 1991; Cannon-Bowers et al., 1993; Walsh et al., 1988; Hackman, 1987; Rouse & Morris, 1986). According to the group identity argument, in teams with a shared understanding of task and social knowledge, team members will have a strong social identity. Although a group social identity can exist side by side with individual identities that are salient in other contexts, in the team context a strong social identity fosters self-esteem that should bolster trust, positive affect, and cooperation (Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994; Earley & Mosakowski, 2000; Bandura, 1997). The identical form of third culture is a strong third culture because team members’ schemas are completely shared (Rohner, 1987; Earley & Mosakowski, 2000). Because the identical form offers the highest degree of shared cognition, sensemaking should be simpler. Teams with an identical third culture should agree upon goals, norms, roles, etc., which should improve team processes, such as information exchange and coordination, and outcome more than for those with the intersection third culture. Thus, according to the sensemaking mechanism, an identical third culture should lead to more efficient team process than an overlapping third culture. In contrast to predictions based on a sensemaking mechanism, social identity arguments suggest that limited sharedness is better for team performance than complete schema overlap. According to social identity theory a strong social identity leads to self-efficacy (Turner, 1985; Tajfel, 1982) that promotes positive interpersonal processes in teams (Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994). Brewer’s theory of optimal distinctiveness (1991) goes on to suggest that the strongest form of social identity occurs when individuals have some shared and some unique identity elements. According to this theory, people have needs for both inclusion and individuality, and they trade off these needs in a team setting (Brewer, 1991). Social identity and team loyalty are hypothesized to be strongest for a self-categorization that provides both a sense of belonging and a sense of distinctiveness (Brewer, 1991). Because the overlapping third culture allows for both individual and shared schema elements, it should produce a stronger social identity than an identical third culture. Thus, optimal distinctiveness theory suggests that an overlapping third culture will impact cooperation, trust, and positive affect and subsequent team processes more than an identical third culture. Together, these theories offer different predictions for the identical versus overlapping forms of third culture through distinct mediating variables.

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Proposition 10a. An identical third culture will generate more efficient team processes and outcomes through sensemaking than an overlapping third culture. Proposition 10b. An overlapping third culture will generate more efficient team processes and outcomes through strong social identity than an identical third culture. Third Culture Content and Team Performance Theory on cross-cultural synergy suggests that emergent third culture should be more beneficial than intersection third culture for team process and performance. The idea behind cultural synergy is that ‘‘the very differences in the world’s people can lead to mutual growth and accomplishment that is more than the single contribution of each party to the intercultural transaction’’ (Moran & Harris, 1981, p. 3). In other words, by taking advantage of the best of each culture involved and creating something new at the system level, cross-cultural synergy can generate potential that could not be realized by any one culture alone (Adler, 1980, 1991). The formation of cross-cultural synergy involves both identifying and embracing differences and then merging differences to create a novel approach that both unites and propels teams forward (Adler, 1991). This formation process and the notion of synergy is similar to our emergent third culture form. An emergent third culture occurs when individual team members identify differences in their schemas, integrate schemas where similar, and create something new in their shared understanding. By integrating schemas and creating novel, shared approaches, multinational teams with an emergent third culture can create a shared schema that embodies the most effective and efficient team, task, and culture elements for their identity and purposes. Therefore, the emergent third culture form should be more effective in promoting efficient team process and maximum potential outcome than the intersection third culture form. Proposition 11. An emergent third culture form will generate more positive team process and outcome than an intersection form.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS The prevalence of intercultural interactions in organizational life both at home and abroad demands understanding of what happens at the intercultural interface. Our framework of third culture offers some first steps in modeling


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the complex ways that multicultural minds may converge in a team setting and the possibilities for team process and outcome. Drawing from the schema theory and prior research on third culture, we define third culture as a shared knowledge structure that includes traditional cultural cognitions as well as task and team knowledge. Thus, we move beyond prior research on third culture focused primarily on the behavioral manifestations of sharedness (e.g. Earley & Masakowski, 2000). We use schema theory to elaborate a theory of third culture form and development. First, we explain that third culture strength can be distinguished by the identical versus the overlapping forms. Then we propose that third culture content can be distinguished by the intersection versus emergent forms. We discuss how various team composition and process variables can influence the emergence and form of third culture. The team-level aggregation of individual members’ collectivism, high-context communication, field dependence, CQ, and angbexperience will all influence the form of third culture created. Member homogeneity in these attributes is proposed to moderate the relationships. The presence of conflict will also affect how a third culture forms. Each form of third culture has implications for team process and outcome. We propose that an identical third culture will generate more positive team processes and outcomes through sensemaking, while an overlapping third culture will generate better processes and outcomes through an optimal distinctiveness social-identity mechanism. Also we draw from the findings on cultural synergy to suggest that the emergent form of third culture should lead to efficient team process and high performance. Our framework for third culture provides ample opportunities for future research. Propositions need to be operationalized and empirically tested in the area of multinational work teams and intercultural negotiations. We hope future research will expand and clarify the theoretical mechanisms predicting third culture strength and content. For example, values for tradition or discomfort with newness is a dimension we did not explore that might explain why some teams stick with an intersection third culture and others create synergies and develop something completely new in their third culture. Moreover, our framework may further be extended to include additional moderating factors. For example, task uncertainty may moderate the relationship between different third culture forms and team performance. Finally, future research might address the conditions that would suggest deviations from our model. For example, when does supervisory intervention in group process hinder or help the development of a third culture. Future research along these lines should continue to refine and test our proposed model of third culture in intercultural interactions.

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NOTES 1. Klimoski and Mohammed (1994) also distinguish a distributed form, in which group members each have a unique mental model for their team context. In fact, the only thing shared may be the conceptualization of common group membership. Since this form includes a common understanding of team membership but no other shared knowledge (i.e. values, norms, beliefs), we argue that there is not a form of third culture comparable to the distributed team mental model.

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MANAGING CHALLENGES IN MULTICULTURAL TEAMS$ Kristin Behfar, Mary Kern and Jeanne Brett As a result of the increasingly global business environment, many companies are building teams that cross-national borders and/or include members from different countries of origin. Although many of these teams are designed to pool resources and increase operational efficiencies, the cultural diversity of team members may create a longer learning curve for establishing effective processes than culturally homogeneous groups (Gibson & Vermeulen, 2003). The small groups literature, for example, has documented the propensity for process losses and conflict to increase as teams become more demographically diverse (Bettenhausen & Murnighan, 1985; Jehn, Northcraft, & Neale, 1999; Steiner, 1972; Williams & O’Reilly, 1988). Managers and members of multicultural teams are therefore faced with the challenge of how to access and utilize individual member’s strengths, while at the same time minimizing coordination losses from communication problems, language differences, varying work styles, and misunderstandings. While the use of multicultural teams is a growing organizational reality (Earley & Erez, 1997), our knowledge of how to most effectively manage them is somewhat limited.

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This research was supported by a grant from the Dispute Resolution Research Center at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University.


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In this chapter, we explore such management issues by first comparing the typical challenges faced by same-culture teams to those faced by multicultural teams. Our purpose is to explore which kinds of challenges are common across teams in general, and which may be unique to multicultural teams. We then focus on strategies used to address various types of multicultural team challenges. Specifically, we discuss the conditions under which managers must intervene to address challenges, when team members can create solutions for themselves, and when team members choose to exit. We conclude with a discussion of opportunities for research that go beyond our specific propositions but that were inspired by our analysis.

APPROACHES TO UNDERSTANDING MULTICULTURAL TEAM CHALLENGES There are two broad approaches in the literature to studying challenges faced in multicultural teams. One approach is to examine the effects of demographic differences among individual team members (e.g., gender, ethnicity, age) on group process. This literature supports the notion that compositional heterogeneity can be both positive and negative in terms of successful group process (Ely & Thomas, 2001). On one hand, heterogeneity increases the chances that a group will bring a wide range of experiences and consider multiple perspectives in solving problems (Ancona & Caldwell, 1992; Jehn et al., 1999). On the other, heterogeneity makes it more difficult for groups to establish effective group process. For example, it is more difficult for heterogeneous groups to communicate and to develop work norms (Bettenhausen & Murnighan, 1985). They are also more prone to conflict (Jehn & Mannix, 2001; Jehn et al., 1999). So, although the theoretical benefits of diversity to pool unique perspectives and resources exist, they are more difficult to attain and sustain in practice. The second approach to studying the challenges faced by multicultural teams is to study how members’ cultural orientations, or dimensions of behaviors that reflect norms in their country of origin, impact their preferences for group process (e.g., Earley & Mosakowski, 2004; Hofstede, 1980). For example, different cultural orientations reflect varying levels of tolerance for uncertainty, cooperation, and confrontation of conflict – all of which are important aspects of coordinating group process (Hofstede, 1980). People from individualistic and low-context cultures prefer direct confrontation of conflict, while those from collectivistic and high-context cultures prefer indirect confrontation (Brett, 2001). Multicultural team

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members with stronger values for collectivism tend to be more cooperative, productive, and empowered in self-managing work teams than team members with weaker values for collectivism (Kirkman & Shapiro, 2001). Teams with members who have a strong value for hierarchy prefer having a strong team leader, whereas teams with members who value egalitarianism prefer participative team leadership (Leung, 1997; Tinsley & Brett, 2001). Both of these approaches focus on understanding differences among individual team members to predict the challenges faced by teams. In this chapter, we move away from an analysis of individual team members’ diversity and cultural orientations, and instead document culturally based, team-level challenges and how those challenges can be addressed. That is, we focus on identifying challenges and responses at the team level instead of postulating which specific team composition variables created specific challenges. Our goal is to develop an understanding of how culturally diverse teams get past their differences to get work done, rather than how their differences can potentially get in the way of getting work done. Other than having participants from a variety of cultures, we were not concerned with participants’ cultural orientations as an explanation for why or how they perceived a challenge. Therefore, we do not seek to draw conclusions parallel to the research traditions mentioned above (e.g., the differences between individualists versus collectivists). Instead, we seek to identify challenges that are unique to multicultural teams, and to generate a better understanding of the conditions under which management techniques might vary. In the next section of this chapter, we compare the typical challenges faced by same-culture teams to challenges typically faced by multicultural teams. We make these comparisons based on research from two different exploratory studies using the same methodology. The first study was based on interviews with 40 managers who were members of multicultural teams (Behfar, Kern, & Brett, 2005). We compare these results to a second study exploring challenges facing 65 same-culture teams (Jackson, Mannix, Peterson, & Trochim, 2002).

MANAGEMENT CHALLENGES: COMPARING SAMECULTURE AND MULTICULTURAL TEAMS Overview of Studies Both studies1 used the same concept-mapping procedure described by Jackson and Trochim (2002). This procedure is a card sort based text analysis method

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that combines multivariate analysis with participant judgment about how to represent structure in the data. The method can be thought of as a ‘‘participatory content analysis’’ and a brief overview of the steps in the method include: Statements generated by participants are written on note cards, participants are asked to sort these cards into conceptually similar piles, then multidimensional scaling and cluster analysis is performed to produce a final map with categories containing the participant-generated statements. Students enrolled in MBA programs were sampled in both studies from which we make comparisons, and they had similar backgrounds in terms of age (average age approximately 28) and work experience (average approximately 6 years). The sample of MBA teams we use as the ‘‘same-culture’’ group can be considered culturally homogenous because the majority of members were either from the United States or had significant periods of residence and work experience in the United States. These 65 teams consisted of four to six members, and worked together intensely in four of their core courses. Data were generated from these teams’ responses to an open-ended question asking them about the challenges they faced while working together. The sample of MBAs we used in the multicultural teams study consisted of 40 individuals with multicultural team experience in a variety of organizational settings, including military, legal, high-tech, and business. Participants had worked in a variety of countries on all continents except Antarctica. Culturally, 47% were American/Canadian, 15% Latin American, 15% Asian (including Indian and Turkish), and 23% were European. In order to identify typical challenges faced by these managers in their multicultural teams, we conducted telephone interviews and asked each participant to describe a challenging multicultural team experience as well as how the challenge was addressed or managed. We recognize that these two samples come from different organizational contexts and that the teams were working on different types of tasks. In addition, the same-culture MBA teams are highly homogenous in background, whereas the multicultural teams sample represents a wide variety of cultures and functions. Thus, in this section we seek to identify high-level differences rather than draw definitive conclusions about the differences between these samples or the individuals in the teams. Both samples generated data about typical challenges and/or problems the teams faced while engaging in team work. These challenges are the focus of our comparison.


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MANAGEMENT CHALLENGES IN SAME-CULTURE TEAMS Concept mapping analysis (Jackson & Trochim, 2002) revealed that sameculture teams typically faced five main challenges in working together: (1) personality and communication conflict, (2) differences of opinion about work, (3) deciding on a work method or approach, (4) issues with timing and scheduling, and (5) problems with member contribution and workload distribution. Each is described briefly below. Personality and Communication Conflict This category reflected interpersonal tension between members, ego clashes, emotionally charged discussions, and anger or feelings of irritation between team members. These conflicts were usually expressed or manifested explicitly and verbally with a condescending tone of voice, sarcasm, aggressive or bullying delivery and/or language, and direct accusations. This type of problem was also expressed implicitly and non-verbally through rolling eyes, deep sighs of frustration, aggressive or angry facial expressions, and closed or aggressive body language (e.g., folding arms, jumping out of a seat and pacing, etc.). All of these behaviors were associated with aggression, tension, and irritation and were reported as causing problems for the group in terms of getting work done. These types of behaviors are commonly referred to as relationship, or emotional, conflict in the teams literature (Jehn, 1995, 1997). Differences of Opinion about Work These challenges had to do with differing viewpoints about facts and priorities for the task at hand. For example, team members had different opinions about how to frame an argument, what to stress in building a persuasive argument, which facts were considered true and most valid, and how to discuss the pros and cons of each idea. Study participants mentioned that this kind of challenge was constructive if emotion was kept out. However, if discussion was charged with emotion then this type of challenge became disruptive (see De Dreu & VanVianen, 2001; DeChurch & Marks, 2001 for similar results). This type of challenge is often categorized in the teams literature as task conflict (Jehn, 1995, 1997).

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Deciding on a Work Method or Approach This category was similar to the ‘‘differences of opinion’’ category, but with a more procedural focus. For example, there were differences in opinion about how to best structure a discussion, with approaches ranging from starting with everyone stating ideas at once, to evaluating one idea at a time, to writing down opinions and passing them by e-mail. There were also differences of opinion about how to approach the writing process, including what constituted good editing or an efficient editing methodology, establishing appropriate decision rules (e.g., consensus versus voting), and how to reconcile different problem solving and writing styles. This type of challenge is often categorized in the teams literature as administrative or procedural conflict (Jehn, 1995, 1997). Issues with Timing and Scheduling These challenges also had a procedural focus, but had more to do with how to spend team time, such as deciding how much time to spend on different tasks and in meetings and when to spend time on different parts of the task (e.g., beginning, middle, or end of work cycle). For example, some team members preferred to hold group meetings for hours until the task was accomplished, while others preferred quick meetings for the purpose of coordinating (not accomplishing) work. Other teams had differences about how to pace their work – some liked to do a lot of planning and work methodically toward a deadline, other teams preferred to concentrate their efforts closer to the deadline. This type of challenge is also categorized in the teams literature as administrative or procedural conflict (Jehn, 1995, 1997). Problems with Contribution and Workload Distribution This category had to do with concerns over members disrupting group process, such as lack of member commitment or members not upholding responsibilities. For example, members often arrived late to meetings or had to leave early, they did not complete their work and stalled group progress, or they came with low-quality work and the group had to revisit the task rather than proceed. This caused some members to have to do more work in order to compensate for members who did not follow through on their commitments. This type of challenge is also categorized in the team’s literature as administrative or procedural conflict (Jehn, 1995, 1997).


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MANAGEMENT CHALLENGES: MULTICULTURAL VERSUS SAME-CULTURE TEAMS The challenges that were mentioned by the multicultural teams were fairly different from those described by the members of the same-culture teams. Participants described a variety of culture-related challenges ranging from those arising within their teams, to challenges stemming from the need to coordinate between their team and other divisions of the organization, to challenges stemming from the need to interact with clients, customers, and counterparts from other cultures. Some interesting patterns, however, emerged that indicate there are common teamwork problems that anyone (from any culture) needs to address during teamwork. Concept mapping analysis (Jackson & Trochim, 2002) resulted in nine categories of multicultural team challenges, which we discuss below and compare to the sameculture team results. Direct versus Indirect Confrontation This category of challenge involved cultural differences in preferences for open disagreement and confrontation in communication versus a more consensus building approach. Teams reported facing challenges when team members with a preference for verbally ‘‘aggressive’’ communication styles worked with members with a preference for more ‘‘consensus building’’ in expressing their points of view. This challenge was associated with escalating interpersonal tension and a tendency to focus more on the delivery of a message rather than the content of the message. The existence of interpersonal tension expressed both verbally and nonverbally was a similarity between the challenges experienced by both sameculture (the personality and communication conflict category) and multicultural teams. Overly aggressive delivery and non-verbal cues expressing annoyance seemed to increase the perceptions of incompatibility in both same- and multicultural teams. The main difference seemingly caused by culture was in how conversation tone and direct confrontation were perceived. For example, managers from individualistic, low-context cultures tended to interpret the ‘‘consensus building’’ style of team members from high-context, collectivistic cultures as ‘‘less efficient,’’ ‘‘passive,’’ or as attempting to evade the problem (especially in willingness to report bad news). In contrast, managers from high-context, collectivistic cultures often perceived the individualistic, low-context managers’ communication style as

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‘‘impatient,’’ ‘‘bullying,’’ and unnecessarily rushed and rude. In egalitarian cultures with emphasis on participative decision making, where everyone is contributing ideas and challenging each other to try to identify the best idea, open questioning of opinions and ideas is less likely to be interpreted as personal disrespect than in more hierarchical cultures (Brett, 2000; Hofstede, 1980). So, beyond interpreting the personal idiosyncrasies of each team members’ communication styles, multicultural teams also had to deal with different normative cultural expectations about what constituted an appropriate expression of disagreement as well as attributions about the other-culture’s level of engagement in problem solving.

Norms for Problem Solving and Decision Making This category of multicultural team challenge identified differences in preferences for a more analytical problem solving and relationship building process versus a more efficiency focused approach to decision making. For example, some members preferred to focus on the numbers and ‘‘hard facts’’ involved in the task, while others wanted to include ‘‘soft’’ variables in decision making (e.g., labor relations, face saving, etc.). Some preferred a more ‘‘holistic’’ and methodological approach, while others preferred a more linear ‘‘checklist’’ and efficiency approach (see Hall, 1976, 1983). These challenges did not seem to escalate interpersonal tensions, as they were more easily identified by participants as being influenced by differences in cultural preferences for structuring work. Although teams experiencing these challenges realized they had to manage cultural differences, advocacy for one approach versus another was not perceived as interpersonally too aggressive or too passive because they were equated with larger cultural customs. Establishing norms for approaching work was a challenge faced by both the same-culture (the work method and approach category) and multicultural teams. Deciding how to structure and proceed with work is part of any team’s process. These basic task strategies are part of coordinating work, regardless of whether the team is same-culture or multicultural. The distinction is that the same-culture teams were challenged by more routine procedural issues such as different writing styles and how to best evaluate ideas. The multicultural teams’ challenges were compounded by fundamental procedural differences regarding legitimate approaches to problem solving. It is possible these teams also dealt with differences in writing style and evaluation, however, our participants indicated that their attention was directed toward the more fundamental problems of process legitimacy.


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Time, Urgency, and Pace These challenges focused on cultural differences in expectations for project deliverable timelines, including what constituted delivering ‘‘on-time’’ versus ‘‘late.’’ The most severe of these challenges had to do with meeting deadlines for deliverables and creating realistic timelines. For example, in some countries a reasonable timeline was defined as six weeks, whereas in others a reasonable timeline for the same project was six months. These challenges usually had significant consequences because they had measurable and tangible costs (e.g., producing component parts, filing purchase orders, disrupting a serial process, breaking contracts, etc.). Anger, misunderstandings, and reputation often hung in the balance when these types of timing challenges arose and perceptions that the ‘‘other’’ group either had unreasonable expectations or was working too slow or inefficiently were pervasive (e.g., Tajfel & Turner, 1986). An important part of teamwork is coordinating the efforts and outputs of individual members, so it is not surprising that both same-culture and multicultural teams faced this challenge. Issues of work pace, or how much time to spend on different tasks, are endemic to group tasks and an important part of clarifying team-level task strategies (Hackman, 1990). The additional layer of complexity added by culture seemed to be about the size of the gap in expectations for what a reasonable timeline was (e.g., Triandis, 1976). That is, although same-culture teams had to reconcile differences about more benign timing issues, multicultural teams faced differences in time orientation (e.g., Hofstede, 1980). For example, same-culture teams faced basic challenges (from the timing and scheduling category) such as deciding whether to spend 2 h versus 4 h in a meeting. The multicultural teams had to address asymmetries in time estimates that differed by significant time periods. For example, some considered a reasonable deliverable date to be one month, while others considered a reasonable deliverable date to be one year; or in some countries teams were under pressure to report quarterly sales, while in other countries the reporting structure was not as time sensitive. Differences in Work Norms and Behaviors This category identified cultural differences about acceptable workplace behavior and expectations for the separation of personal and business time. The more benign of these challenges stemmed from national customs. The custom of taking a siesta, for example, presented challenges for meeting deadlines and organizing schedules. There were also etiquette norms in different countries, such as not eating during meetings, different perceptions

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of being ‘‘on time,’’ and norms for not interrupting others with questions. The more serious challenge was in differing normative expectations for separating versus not separating business and social time. For example, what constituted ‘‘billable hours’’ or how to protect personal time away from work (e.g., what constituted too many social events). This issue usually escalated interpersonal tension because it induced perceptions about unfair requirements or raised questions about a person’s commitment to the team. The same-culture teams did not face these challenges with as much force as the multicultural teams. Same-culture teams had problems with members arriving to meetings late or failing to complete work on time (from the contribution and workload category), but this was more of a violation of team expectations rather than having cultural roots. For example, in the same-culture teams there was usually one way to interpret a member arriving late to a meeting: the latecomer does not value the time of other members and is wasting or disrupting team time. In the multicultural teams, there were differing perceptions. For example, our participants from Latin America and Turkey described an on-time arrival to events as rude whereas German and Dutch participants described late arrival to events as offensive (Hofstede, 1980; Triandis, 1976). The more complex time-related challenge faced by the multicultural teams was differing expectations for separating personal and business time. For example, team members from more collectivistic cultures expected that personal time after work hours would be spent building relationships with clients and other team members, or that all team members would stay at work and maintain a united front until the team’s work was completed. In contrast, team members from more individualistic cultures expected to put in their work effort only between commonly agreed upon work hours (typically an 8–12 h work per day) and to leave work when their part of the task was complete. Violations of Respect and Hierarchy This set of challenges was caused by differing respect for status, the chain of command, and business practices that created unorthodox power differentials. The most serious violation of respect and hierarchy was not respecting the chain of command – usually involving inappropriate contact by junior managers from a low power-distance culture with senior management from a high power-distance culture (Hofstede, 1980). These violations were acutely visible and associated with important consequences (e.g., losing a contract), so senior management usually intervened with dramatic symbolic displays of respect for the other party such as sending a top-level executive


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to the other country with an apology. Unorthodox reporting relationships created by special organizational projects also posed status threats to reporting relationships. This typically included members from high powerdistance cultures being put on a project requiring them to report to a younger, lower ranked person (often from corporate headquarters). Our same-culture teams did not report experiencing these challenges. This is most likely because the teams studied were from the same organization, composed of similar age members, and all had equal status. It is possible that these status/respect-related challenges (especially around age or tenure-related issues) might arise in same-culture teams with status differences.

Inter-Group Prejudices The challenges in this category stemmed from pre-existing (and non-work related) hatred, anger, and distrust seeping into the workplace. The most common problems were from pre-existing prejudice and discrimination along divisions of gender, religion, and ethnicity. Sexism, primarily directed at women by other-culture male superiors, was a problem that the participants in our study were never able to resolve. These challenges ranged from outright quid pro quo sexual harassment to more subtle and directed criticism of women by male managers. Resentment over observing religious practices (e.g., missing Friday work days due to prayer requirements or not being able to have certain foods in the break room) were things team members learned to accept, primarily because organizations created official policies to respect these differences. However, resentment over what was perceived to be a ‘‘privileged’’ status granted by these policies never really dissipated. More commonly, there were serious stereotypes and prejudices between the groups from countries with histories of political conflict or when there were current clashes of ideology between countries. These challenges of sexism, ethnic hatred, and religious differences were never mentioned by the same-culture teams. Again, this was primarily a function of the same-level, homogenous MBA sample we used. Another reason for this may have been that the same-culture teams we studied had inwardly focused tasks (as opposed to client or venture shared tasks) where the pre-existing prejudices and stereotypes that plagued multicultural teams would be unlikely to be activated. Racially homogeneous teams working in a racially heterogeneous environment might experience these same intergroup types of challenges as the multicultural teams we studied.

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Lack of Common Ground (Language and Credit) This category contained challenges stemming from behaviors or business practices that interfered with coordinating work, but that were not based on innate prejudices (e.g., sexism or racism). That is, the challenges arose from behavior and practices that enhanced the perception of distance between team members – not from pre-existing prejudices that generated mistrust. For example, teams reported that challenges with language fluency often lead to unfairness in practice. Often, more fluent members got a disproportionate amount of credit because they were better able to articulate their thoughts in client meetings than those who were using their second or third language. Alternatively, less technically competent members were often given the more prestigious work assignments because of their accents. One participant, for example, employed at a London-based British bank expressed frustration that those who spoke proper Queen’s English were given ‘‘fast track’’ appointments and face-time with clients despite the fact that others without that accent may have been more qualified. The same-culture teams did not report experiencing these problems. The same-culture team members all spoke fluent English. The additional complexity of managing multicultural teams seemingly stems from the indirect messages resulting from language differences. Team members who are all fluent and proficient in the same language can contribute equally to conversations and articulate their points (without being held back by language processing delays), therefore there is no special privilege or status granted based on language ability. Fluency (Accents and Vocabulary) This category described challenges caused by negative reactions to accents and the different meanings of some words. The more serious challenges stemmed from members equating lack of fluency with lack of intelligence. This was common within teams and with clients or customers, and was usually associated with increased interpersonal tension. Within teams, less fluent members were commonly shown less respect or treated with more impatience because they were more difficult to understand. With customers or clients, it was common for managers to receive complaints equating difficult accents with low-quality customer service. A less serious challenge was when team members used words with different connotations across cultures. For example, one team of Indian accounting auditors used the word ‘‘assessment’’ in their communications to their American counterparts. In India


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this indicates a pending investigation, in the United States this means that a fine has already been levied. Similarly, one manager wrote a letter of recommendation describing an employee as ‘‘ambitious.’’ To the manager this was a positive attribute, however, in the employee’s culture this word had the connotation of being overly political and backstabbing. The same-culture teams did not face these fluency or language problems. In considering the challenges from this category and the previous category together, language issues definitely seemed to add a layer of process complexity that go beyond just being able to communicate with each other – language differences create the need for multicultural teams to deal with perceptions of unfair privilege, status, appropriately granting credit for work, and how to allocate work (e.g., based on skill and qualifications versus who has the ‘‘right’’ accent, see Beyene, 2005, for a good overview of language problems in multicultural teams). Thought you had Agreement? Implicit versus Explicit Communication This category contained challenges about differences in interpreting the level of commitment behind agreements. For example, in America ‘‘yes’’ means ‘‘I agree,’’ in Japan ‘‘yes’’ often means ‘‘Yes, I am listening’’ (Triandis, 1976). Similarly, when previously agreed upon issues were revisited, some ‘‘checklist-oriented’’ managers perceived this as signaling a lack agreement – and thus experienced a great deal of frustration – and other ‘‘holistic’’ managers perceived this as a simple procedural norm. The same-culture teams did not struggle with these issues. First, they were primarily working in a face-to-face environment (although they did occasionally work over e-mail, a face-to-face meeting was readily available and there were no associated travel costs). In addition, since the same-culture teams were based in the United States, there were no distinguishing culturally based preferences for procedures. Summary The challenges faced by the multicultural teams were more complex and often invoked more serious consequences than the challenges faced by the same-culture teams. Part of this is a function of the samples used for comparison. There were, however, four main similarities the teams shared as outlined in Table 1a. These similarities represent fundamental, perhaps universal, aspects of teamwork. At the same time, they demonstrate the additional complexity caused by cultural differences.

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First, perceptions of disrespect generated by stylistic differences in publicly expressing or confronting different perspectives were either the direct or indirect causes of anger and perceived incompatibility in both types of teams. The complexity added by culture extended beyond the personality differences experienced in same-culture teams. Different cultural preferences for confrontational versus consensus-building communication lead to attributions of either being indecisive and passive or being overly aggressive and bullying. Second, both types of teams experienced challenges around how to structure group process. The multicultural teams had to overcome different ideas about what constituted a legitimate approach to decision making (holistic versus checklist), whereas the same-culture teams had to overcome more simple individual style issues. Third, both types of teams had to create and adhere to timelines in accomplishing and coordinating work. The sameculture teams had to deal with more simple issues about how to manage meetings, whereas the multicultural teams faced larger asymmetries around what constituted a fair and legitimate period for accomplishing work. Fourth, both types of teams had to create agreements about appropriate team and workplace behavior. The same-culture teams had to address disruptive individual behavior such as being late to meetings. The multicultural teams had to address more fundamental issues such as how to separate work versus personal time and work around observing cultural customs. The unique culture-based challenges originated either from pre-existing stigmas among team members or from team behaviors that increased the salience of in-group versus out-group distinctions (Tajfel & Turner, 1986). Table 1b outlines these five main challenges. Violations of respect and hierarchy pervaded teams where members were either unfamiliar with normative communication protocols or the structure of special project teams violated reporting relationships. Inter-group prejudices such as sexism, different perceptions of religious practices, and tension among team members from politically conflicting countries often spilled over to the workplace in the form of being hyper critical, overtly devaluing one party’s contributions, or socially ostracizing one or more members. Language and fluency issues also created unique challenges beyond having difficulty understanding one another and misunderstandings of certain words. Perceived favoritism, devaluation of intelligence, and perceptions of unfair work assignments were directly related to different levels of fluency among members. Finally, teams were greatly challenged by differing perceptions of having reached a secure agreement, and the commitment they could expect from those agreements. These teams had to deal with the frustration and anger that resulted from a seeming inability to reach negotiated agreements.


Table 1a.

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Multicultural Team Challenges Not Unique to Multicultural Teams and Responses to those Challenges.

Multicultural Team Challenge Direct versus. indirect confrontation: Stylistic differences in publicly expressing and/or confronting different points of view, resulting in escalation of interpersonal tension

Norms for problem solving and decision making: Differences in preference for a more slow-paced analytical problem solving and relationship building process versus a more efficiency focused approach

Time, urgency, and pace: Differences in time estimates to deliver products and the definition of ‘‘on-time’’ delivery

Differences in work norms and behaviors: Differences about what is acceptable workplace etiquette stemming either from national customs or national norms for separating personal time and work time

Multicultural Team Response Team adapts: if the other style cannot or will not adapt. Members learn to work within their differences Manager intervenes: to refocus group on the superordinate goal, to smooth over interpersonal tensions, or serve as the final decision maker Team adapts: if it is able to blame cultural influences rather than individual preferences. Allows different approaches to co-exist, even uses different approaches to get different perspectives on the problem Manager intervenes: to impose structure when team is blocked by such differences Team adapts: if it recognizes it cannot change culturally based time structure like siestas, religious holidays, and nationally mandated vacations Manager intervenes: to make a final decision about how long work should take Team adapts: if it can blame etiquette violations on culture, ‘‘didn’t know any better;’’ and socializes member whose norms are different Manager intervenes: when offender will not be socialized, to set expectations about norms for attendance, lateness, etc., and to monitor or enforce adherence to those expectations

In the next section, we discuss five broad conditions under which multicultural teams are able to address these challenges for themselves – and four broad conditions under which multicultural teams require the intervention of a manager.

STRATEGIES FOR MANAGING MULTICULTURAL TEAM CHALLENGES The strategies we report in this section for managing multicultural team challenges come directly from interview participants. Note that ‘‘managed’’

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Table 1b.


Challenges and Responses Unique to Multicultural Teams.

Multicultural Team Challenge Violations of respect and hierarchy: Challenges stemming from different expectations for respecting hierarchy and other status indicators Inter-group prejudices: Challenges stemming from innate or pre-existing stigma, prejudices, and judgments spilling over into the workplace Lack of common ground (language, credit): Challenges stemming from perceived favoritism or lack of recognition for contribution based on how or how well members expressed themselves

Fluency (accents and vocabulary): Challenges caused by negative reactions and/or misunderstandings due to language issues such as heavy accents and words with different connotations

Thought you had agreement? Implicit versus explicit communication: Challenges stemming from differences in interpretation about the level of commitment and/or agreement reached

Multicultural Team Response Team adapts: if unorthodox practices can be ‘‘blamed’’ on special situations. Team member exits if this can not be done Manager intervenes: to show respect where violations have occurred Team adapts: (i.e., accepts prejudice) because cannot change organizational policy Manager intervenes: to create a very deliberate and structured process of getting work done that may use subgroups Team adapts: if offensive practices can be ‘‘framed’’ as providing some type of advantage for the team. If not interpersonal tension escalates and requires managerial intervention Manager intervenes: to assign work according to principles that team may consider unfair, but which move task accomplishment forward Teams adapts: if it is able to recognize how words with double meanings originated from differences in social or legal systems Manager intervenes: to stop the escalation of interpersonal tension by rejecting the idea that a lack of fluency indicates lack of competence Team adapts: when it is able to recognize cultural root of the problem such as ‘‘yes’’ did not mean ‘‘yes I agree’’, it means ‘‘I am listening’’ Manager intervenes: to encourage or enforce that parties listen to each other. Manager takes over and essentially imposes agreement on the team

does not necessarily mean ‘‘resolved,’’ or that the team’s outcome was successful. The methods of the interview study do not allow for a formal evaluation of resolution effectiveness. The management strategies reported here are what teams and their managers did to address the challenges they faced. We categorize the management strategies identified by the participants in three general approaches: adaptation, intervention, and leave or exit.


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Adaptation Adaptation refers to the team adjusting to a challenge without managerial intervention. Teams seemed best able to adapt under five broad conditions. A common theme among these conditions was that the teams were able to attribute the cause of the challenge to external cultural factors that were ‘‘bigger’’ than the team or individual members personalities. Adaptation Condition #1 First, when there was a ‘‘home court advantage,’’ teams seemed to be able to adapt. For example, when teams would meet in the home country of some of the members, it was common for members of that culture/country to numerically dominate meetings or to have high-status members attend only those meetings. Minority members were often able to ‘‘write off’’ and accept majority dominance as due to a numerical advantage rather than perceive it as overly aggressive – and to attribute high-status attendance of these meetings only in the interest of saving travel costs and time. However, some teams adapted by correcting for the numerical majority with attendance or ‘‘invitation only’’ rules for meetings that might be easily dominated by a subgroup. Adaptation Condition #2 On a related note, when there was a dominant numerical coalition (regardless of location) with an aggressive communication style, less-aggressive team members reported adapting by being more vocal and assertive in support of their same-culture teammates (or those with a similar culturally based profile) than they ordinarily would have been if the dominant majority did not exist. In this way, they were able to help each other get ‘‘air time’’ during meetings and react to the dominance without an escalation of interpersonal emotion. Adaptation Condition #3 A third condition that fostered team-initiated adaptation was when members realized they could not ‘‘beat’’ the other style. This commonly arose when the typical Western ‘‘checklist’’ approach to decision making clashed with the Eastern ‘‘holistic’’ approach to decision making. Those with a more ‘‘checklist’’ approach realized they could not force a meaningful agreement without adapting to the more holistic approach. For example, Western participants often reported that the ‘‘holistic’’ approach could be, and often was, used as a tool to stall and frustrate them into agreement. They reported

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either learning to be patient or learning how to use the style to their advantage. One participant, for example, described how his team would either withhold information or under-bid on initial negotiation issues because they knew once the next issue was addressed, all previous agreements would be revisited. Adaptation Condition #4 A fourth condition for adaptation occurred when teams could blame the source of the problem on a factor such as national customs (e.g., taking a siesta), country-specific work practices (e.g., different accounting practices), or when a mandate came from headquarters (e.g., this helped team members ‘‘explain away’’ violations in status in project-based reporting relationships). This made it easy for teams to recognize that challenges stemmed from a source larger than the team or any of the individuals in it, therefore making it easier not to take differences personally. Adaptation Condition #5 Finally, teams were able to adapt when they were able to set norms to eliminate offensive or disruptive behavior (e.g., setting a common language standard, agreeing not to tell political jokes, setting guidelines for notifying about lateness, etc.).

Intervention Many challenges identified by interviewees described incidents that required managerial intervention. Managerial intervention refers to the active involvement of a manager or leader in dealing with the challenge. Managerial intervention was required under four broad conditions, which have the common theme of decreasing interpersonal tension and increasing perceptions of fairness. Intervention Condition #1 First, when emotions or behaviors distracted team members or disrupted the process of getting work done, manager intervention was necessary. This commonly happened when aggressive communication styles were perceived as insulting or disrespectful, when the goal clarity of the team began to fade (often as a result of interpersonal tension and blame), and frustrations stemming from different perceptions about commitments behind agreements escalated.


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Intervention Condition #2 Second, when language issues resulted in perceptions of disrespect or injustice, managerial action was required. For example, lack of fluency was often equated with lack of skill, customers often equated difficult accents with a lack of concern for customer service quality, and more fluent members often received a disproportionate amount of recognition because they were better able to articulate their thoughts to clients. In these cases, managers intervened to recognize and remind team members and customers of team member qualifications and to set norms that encouraged team members to seek clarification during communication (rather than pretend to understand accents out of politeness). Many participants mentioned that this type of norm setting intervention was more successful than, for example, giving team members dialect training. Intervention Condition #3 Third, managerial intervention was required when irreconcilable differences became apparent, such as when pre-existing prejudices spilled over into work behaviors or when serious violations of status were committed. These events required strong structural intervention by a manager to rebuild trust through carefully controlled and monitored group process. For example, one participant we interviewed was part of a four-country peace-keeping military operation where one of the military groups was considered ‘‘low status,’’ but had the most expertise for the task at hand. The commanding officer recognized this problem and decided to create task forces composed of one member from each country to work on elements of the task. Officers interacted with their multicultural subgroups and then returned to their respective same-culture base camps. Not surprisingly, they compared experiences, and the expertise of the ‘‘low-status’’ members slowly became recognized. Only through a carefully controlled set of circumstances were the groups able to work beyond their prejudices. Intervention Condition #4 Finally, managers tended to intervene when there was a challenge with a considerable and measurable consequence (either financial, human resource, or relationship). This usually happened when there were differences about how to set timelines and what constituted an ‘‘on time’’ deliverable. Again, these differences tended to increase interpersonal emotion, lead to competition or sabotage in the teams, communicate a lack of respect, or cause a ‘‘loss of face’’ – all forces for which managerial intervention was necessary to correct.

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Leave or Exit Finally, if neither adaptation nor managerial intervention were possible or effective, team members relied on a third strategy – they left the team. This strategy was most commonly applied to larger system challenges that team members were not willing to ‘‘take on’’ such as sexism or racism. Team members also decided to exit if they felt the team was not willing to, or effective at, accommodating them.

DISCUSSION This chapter set out to identify how multicultural teams manage or address the additional layer of complexity they often encounter due to cultural differences. Although multicultural and same-culture teams face similar procedural and interpersonal challenges, the sources and consequences of multicultural teams’ challenges are more complex. Our analysis of the challenges, and the approaches that team members and managers took to deal with these challenges, has left us with a set of propositions to be formally tested in future research. In the previous section, we outlined conditions under which teams addressed their management challenges through (1) adaptation, (2) managerial intervention, or (3) leaving or exiting the team. This section translates these conditions into testable propositions.

Adaptation Adaptation occurred in response to a variety of different challenges that had a common underlying characteristic: the challenge can be characterized as arising from factors beyond individual team members’ control. When team members recognized that for whatever reason (e.g., cultural embeddedness, a headquarters mandate, or national customs) the challenge was beyond their control, teams were able to avoid escalation of interpersonal tension by attributing their differences to an ‘‘external source’’ rather than an individual motive or personality. This allowed them to engage in creating solutions, norms, or procedures that minimized the impact of cultural differences without a manager’s intervention. In some instances it appears that this ‘‘external blame’’ mechanism may give multicultural teams a better way of managing some problems than same-culture teams who do not have culture as an excuse. Same-culture teams were more likely to attribute challenges to


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individual personality, with concomitant risks of increased emotional conflict. Therefore, our first proposition stipulates that when multicultural team members can classify a challenge as caused by a larger ‘‘external source’’ rather than as a ‘‘personal affront,’’ they will be more successful in independently managing that challenge. A1. When team members are able to attribute the cause of a challenge to factors beyond their control, they are able to successfully adapt their practices without the intervention of a manager. This proposition is embedded in attribution theory and is enhanced by research that has studied attributions across cultures. Attributions are causal interpretations of events (Kelly & Michela, 1980). They answer the social interaction question, Why did this event occur? that is extremely important when interpreting novel or equivocal events and motivating subsequent behavior (Brett & Gelfand, 2005). There are two dimensions of causal attributions, situational and dispositional, that have different implications for change, and that occur with differential frequency across cultures. People making causal attributions about events, including others’ behaviors, frequently make the fundamental attribution error – they underestimate the impact of situational factors and overestimate the impact of dispositional factors (Ross, 1977). Ironically, in individual motivational or learning situations it is the attribution of setbacks and negative outcomes to situational factors that inhibits change (Kelly & Michela, 1980). Something like ‘‘since I did nothing wrong, I’ll just do the same thing again in the next, hopefully more supportive environment.’’ Yet, in multicultural teams the attribution of challenges to situational factors beyond team members’ control – that is, the attribution of causation to situational factors – seems to facilitate change. The presence of multicultural team members from cultures that tend to make more situational attributions than is typical in the U.S. (Morris & Peng, 1994) may also facilitate this phenomenon. Although in theory adaptation can take many different guises (Janssens & Brett, 2005), in the research cited here the pattern of adaptation was primarily one of some members of the group conceding to the approach taken by others. This mainly occurred when there was a numerical majority or dominant coalition, when team members accepted the reality posed by a particular situation, or when it became clear that one preference could not ‘‘beat out’’ a more engrained or persistent preference (e.g., the Eastern ‘‘holistic approach’’ for problem solving versus the Western ‘‘checklist’’ approach for problem solving). Again, as stated in Proposition A1, these forms of adaptation seemed to be associated with an ability to ‘‘blame’’ a

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source bigger than individual team members. However, team members seemed to be more willing to adapt when they recognized that (a) not only was the source of the problem bigger than the team, but also (b) that stimulating a change in the other party’s behavior was impossible, therefore making it necessary to find middle ground in order to get work done. For example, American managers often reported feeling frustrated by the Eastern ‘‘holistic’’ problem-solving approach, yet they realized that using tactics to force their ‘‘checklist’’ approach (e.g., trying to impose written documents to secure increments of agreements, or imposing ultimatum time deadlines) were rarely successful in moving agreements forward. Similarly, when team members with a less confrontational communication style were outnumbered by members with a more confrontational communication style, they tended to adapt by expressing more verbal support for their similar- or same-culture team members than they otherwise would have felt comfortable doing. Therefore, building on Proposition A1, we propose that when team members realize they are up against a highly embedded or engrained cultural difference, they will recognize the need to adapt their own behavior in order to create functional team work processes or norms. A1a. When some team members simply will not change their behaviors, the rest of the group will adjust to work with those behaviors. This second proposition is consistent with the research on social motives and behavior in prisoner’s dilemma games, in that it recognizes that initially unsuccessful attempts to cooperate with the other party will result in an adaptation or behavioral change. For example, research suggests that a strategy driven by a cooperative motive is more fragile or changeable than one driven by an individualistic motive (Kelley & Stahelski, 1970a,b; McClintock & Liebrand, 1988; Schlenker & Goldman, 1978). Kelley and Stahelski (1970b) proposed that cooperative players would be more likely to shift from cooperation to competition when confronted with an opponent making competitive choices, than an individualistic player would be likely to shift from competition to cooperation when confronted with an opponent making cooperative choices. They suggested this asymmetric behavior occurs because cooperative players are more sensitive than individualistic players to the social motives of others (Kelley & Stahelski, 1970b; Van Lange, 1992). Cooperative players encourage cooperation by signaling their cooperative motive with an early cooperative move, but if their cooperative signal is not reciprocated, they are quick to shift their strategy to avoid exploitation. Thus, cooperative players are facile at shifting their strategy depending on the actions of the other player (Kelley & Stahelski, 1970a,b).


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There is evidence of these shifts in other literatures as well. For example, Weingart, Brett, and Olekalns (2004) show that in four person mixed-motive negotiation groups, cooperatively oriented team members adjusted their use of integrative and distributive strategy in response to the social motive composition of the group. Adair and Brett (2005) show that in negotiations between people from high- and low-context communication cultures, communication patterns parallel those of same-culture low-context negotiations more than those of high-context negotiations. They explain their findings by suggesting that low-context communication which is direct and context free is the lowest common denominator for understanding; that people from low-context communication cultures do not have the history and contextual knowledge to be able to correctly interpret high-context communication, so high-context communicators adapt. Management Intervention Managerial intervention took a variety of forms in addressing the multicultural team challenges discussed in this chapter, but there seemed to be a common characteristic to the challenges that were approached in this way. Managerial intervention was necessary to resolve interpersonal tension in order to ‘‘save face’’ of members in the team. For example, sometimes managers used the power of their positions and made substantive decisions that unblocked the group and let it move forward. This was particularly important when teams had reached an impasse about procedures, agreements, responsibilities, and timelines. Other times managers imposed strong process control or structure on the multicultural team. This seemed important when there were pre-existing prejudices, a severe lack of trust, or a lack of respect among members. Structures worked sometimes because they buffered warring team members from one another, and sometimes because they forced team members to see beyond their cultural stereotypes and understand each other’s value to the team. Managers also tried to reduce emotional tensions in the group by taking specific group members aside to talk, by reminding the group of its superordinate goal, and by conveying respect and legitimacy to certain group members. Each of these tactics served to restore perceptions of justice, reduce interpersonal tension, and help members recover from the indignities they perceived. Therefore, our third proposition is MI1. When face needs to be saved, managerial interventions into team processes are necessary.

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This proposition is consistent with the literature on face saving and procedural justice in a cultural context. Face as used in Asian psychology seems best translated into Western psychology as respect. When groups get into a tangle and emotions of one or more members are running high, the conflict management literature suggests that it is very difficult for the group members involved to deescalate it themselves (Ting-Toomey, 1988, 1998). This is because once negative emotions have been engaged, two factors emerge that make it difficult to un-engage. The first is disrespect or loss of face. Negative emotions, whether conveyed verbally or non-verbally, convey disrespect (Hecht & LaFrance, 1998). They signal that each individual’s ideas, as well as the individual him or herself, are unworthy of the team. Such a signal is likely to be perceived as an injustice and to stimulate reciprocity and revenge, which is the other factor that makes it difficult for parties to disengage from a spiraling exchange of negative emotions. For example, prior research on disputes has found that parties engage in cycles of reciprocal negative emotion (Brett, Lytle, & Shapiro, 1998; Friedman et al., 2004), although some other research (and a good deal of lay theorizing) suggests that a signal of negative emotion might also be answered by a concession (Van Kleef, De Dreu, & Manstead, 2004). There seem to be two underlying mechanisms that explain why managerial interventions are needed and should be helpful in such situations. The first stems from the procedural justice literature where it has been shown repeatedly and in many different settings that a third party who treats parties with respect is often able to restore feelings of justice (Lind & Tyler, 1988) and help them resolve their differences (Shapiro & Brett, 1993). Simply stated, managers and mediators need to listen to convey respect. The more theoretical explanation is that the behavior of the third party provides relational information about status and membership in the group (Tyler & Lind, 1992). The second reason why managerial intervention should be helpful in these situations where group members have become emotionally entangled is that the party listening is not a peer but a manager. In egalitarian cultures, like the United States, there may be a stigma associated with involving a manager in a conflict between peers. However, in hierarchical cultures, like Asian cultures, deference is given to higher level managers and it is normative to involve them in the resolution of conflict (Tinsley & Brett, 2001). As Brett (2001) explains, acquiescing to the desires of a higher level manager in hierarchical cultures preserves relationships and restores respect between emotionally entangled peers, because – and note the similarity with proposition A1 – neither person imposed the outcome on the other. Once again when the outcome is out of people’s hands, they adapt to the manager’s solution.


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Leaving or Exiting Members of multicultural teams who are unwilling to adapt either to the initiatives of the group itself or of management may leave. This is the exit voice and loyalty strategy made famous by Mancur Olson in his book, The Logic of Collective Action (1971) that identified options for disgruntled employees. In our research, we saw team members leaving groups when the team adapted but they personally could not; when managerial intervention was unsuccessful; and when environment or system pressures were such that managerial intervention was impossible. The leave or exit option was not the dominant response to the challenges of being a member of a multicultural team; it was also understandably not an option that happened immediately. Team members who left the team to go back to a former job risked being stigmatized as not being a ‘‘team player.’’ Members who left teams and/or organizations supporting those teams frequently waited until they had another option. However, there were occasions when team members found themselves so marginalized (an American woman assigned to a storage closet as her workspace during her assignment in Japan) that they had no choice but to leave the team. We have speculated whether in such a situation the team member should just leave quietly, or whether there is anything to gain, versus too much to lose, by evoking Olsen’s voice option very loudly (Olson, 1971). L1. Team members will leave when the team adapts but they cannot; managerial intervention is unsuccessful in reintegrating them into the team; or managerial intervention does not or cannot occur.

CONCLUSIONS As with any research, our conclusions should be interpreted with caution. However, we believe that our findings identifying the challenges faced by multicultural teams, the similarities and differences of these challenges to those faced by same-culture teams, and the management strategies used in association with these challenges make important contributions to the literature on multicultural teams. First, we have identified nine challenges that managers and members of multicultural teams face. Although a different array of multicultural teams and a different methodology would likely generate a somewhat expanded or contracted set of challenges, the challenges we identified are consistent with

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prior research on multicultural teams. For example, the challenges around respect/hierarchy violations closely resonate with cultural differences in hierarchy versus egalitarianism (Hofstede, 1980). The differences in commitment behind agreements and aggressiveness in communication style reflect cultural differences in high- versus low-context communication styles (Hall, 1976, 1983). In addition, some of the team adaptation strategies, such as norm setting or the creation of rules, have been reflected in previous studies (e.g., Earley & Mosakowski, 2000). Our findings regarding the use of subgroups to manage challenges in multicultural teams is consistent with research by Gibson and Vermeulen (2003). Subgrouping is not a panacea, but Gibson and Vermeullen argue that to be successful subgroups need to be linked with multiple ties. Beyene (2005) reviews language challenges in multicultural teams that are consist with our findings. Second, by contrasting the findings from the multicultural team study to those of a same-culture team study using similar methodology, we were able to identify challenges that appear to affect teams regardless of their cultural heterogeneity. The delivery style of a message, deciding on a work approach, setting and adhering to timelines, and agreeing on acceptable team behavior are universal elements of teamwork (e.g., Hackman, 1990; Homans, 1950). Our results show that same-culture and multicultural teams share these challenges, but that multicultural teams have to overcome an additional layer of complexity due to culture-related differences. Challenges that were identified as unique in the multicultural teams study included pre-existing prejudices or specific behaviors that exacerbated the perceptions of incompatibility among team members, such as perceptions of disrespect and unfairness from team decisions, blatantly disrespectful behavior toward women or religious practices, and unfairness around language fluency (e.g., determining how work assignments were made, giving appropriate recognition, making offensive jokes or using offensive words). Tying the challenges experienced by multicultural teams to the management strategies they used to address these challenges allows us to begin to isolate the circumstances when members of a multicultural team can adapt and respond to challenges for themselves versus when they need managerial intervention. This distinction seemed to depend on the degree to which cultural differences were perceived as ‘‘a personal affront’’ versus ‘‘a fact of life/work.’’ When the challenge could be framed as a fact of life/work, teams were more likely to adapt because they could blame it on a source ‘‘bigger’’ than the team. But, when the challenge was accompanied by the perception of a personal attack or a perceived injustice, managerial intervention was required.


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Our analyses suggest several areas for future research. It seems to us that responding to challenges in multicultural teams often requires a patient, iterative, deliberate response, and occasionally a rather dramatic intervention, if differences in work norms, racial and ethnic prejudices, communication styles and language fluency are to be managed. One interesting idea for future research might be to investigate the underlying mechanisms that create challenges in multicultural teams. In our sample, strong reactions developed around challenges stemming from pre-existing stereotypes as well as prejudices or attributions that emerged out of group process. They often required an equally strong intervention. Another area for future research is to investigate whether managerial interventions and the different types of team adaptation mentioned in this study represent long-term versus shortterm solutions – and to better isolate when team adaptation strategies actually serve as substitutes for leadership. Finally, many of our participants mentioned that the training they received from their organizations was not effective. They mentioned that training about cultural differences often did little more than increase awareness about why others were different from one’s native culture, rather than identifying how to manage those differences. The broad conditions we identified for team adaptation versus managerial intervention suggest that training team members and managers to identify work conditions that require managerial intervention can save a lot of frustration and money, and make coordinating work across cultures much more satisfactory.

NOTES 1. Full results and detailed description of the methodology are abbreviated in this chapter, but can be found for the same-culture MBA study as reported in Jackson, Mannix, Peterson, and Trochim (2002), and for the multicultural teams study as reported in Behfar, Kern, and Brett (2005).

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AN EMOTION PROCESS MODEL FOR MULTICULTURAL TEAMS Hillary Anger Elfenbein and Aiwa Shirako The impact of emotion in organizations has been an increasingly popular – and increasingly popularized – topic in recent decades. In light of the oftensweeping claims that have been made in the name of ‘‘emotional intelligence’’ (e.g., Goleman, 1995), excitement among practitioners, academics, and the public alike has brought greater attention to the affective element of workplace life. Emotion is a particularly important concept for teams – in which members work interdependently toward a common goal, with emotions often running high as teammates experience, for example, affection, delight, interest, relief, disappointment, irritation, and rage. The emotional life of a team is an area in which national differences among members can make a uniquely challenging impact. Although emotion is an evolutionary adaptation of the human species, largely universal across cultural groups, the cultural differences that do arise can be both pervasive and insidious. Given the automatic and fundamental nature of emotional processes, we can be profoundly aware of the result of a cultural difference with little awareness of its source. Colloquially when one refers to emotion, typically this entails the feeling state that can accompany a noteworthy experience. However, rather than referring broadly to emotion as a single concept, researchers in psychology have developed component process models (e.g., Frijda, 1986; Scherer, 1984) that map the stages of emotion into a series of separate chronological steps. These steps unfold so quickly that they can appear together to represent a National Culture and Groups Research on Managing Groups and Teams, Volume 9, 263–297 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1534-0856/doi:10.1016/S1534-0856(06)09011-6

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single phenomenon. However, each is distinct, and researchers’ attempts to develop theory concerning the role of emotion in teams benefit from considering separately each step and its potential impact on team members. The current chapter attempts to make two contributions to the literature on emotion and culture in teams. The first goal is to present an integrated process model of emotion and to review succinctly the psychological research on cultural differences that are infused into each stage of the emotion process. The second goal is to examine multicultural teams through the lens of this emotion process model and, in doing so, to shed light on some of the challenges and opportunities for the culturally diverse team. The emotion process model draws heavily from Frijda (1986), Mesquita and Frijda (1992) and Scherer (1984), and further incorporates components elaborated by Ekman (1972), Gross (1998b, 2001), and Matsumoto (1989). Component models generally focus on particular processes of interest to theorists. However, because each component or stage of emotion is relevant to the effective functioning of teams, we attempt to achieve breadth by integrating past descriptions into a single model. The emotion process model builds upon previous conceptualizations by incorporating the processes from all stages, and reviewing the cultural differences present at each. Fig. 1 illustrates this emotion process model, in which each box represents an event that takes place during the chronological sequence. The next four sections of this chapter define and describe each major stage in turn: emotional appraisal, experience, expression, and recognition. Each stage is part of a sequential process through which emotions unfold. Although these stages are distinct, they are interconnected with each other, such that similar processes can affect more than one stage in the model. In the sections that follow, we discuss cultural differences in both the core automatic component of each process, as well as the regulation processes that include all of the ‘‘conscious and non-conscious strategies we use to increase, maintain, or decrease one or more components of an emotional response’’ (Gross, 2001, p. 215). Although models of emotional intelligence often consider emotion regulation to be a unitary concept (Law, Wong, & Song, 2004; Mayer, Salovey, Caruso, & Sitarenios, 2001), as with the core processes, each stage of the emotion process corresponds to distinct and interrelated processes of regulation (Gross, 1998b; Campos, Campos, & Barrett, 1989; Mesquita & Frijda, 1992). To conclude each stage in the process model, we discuss its implications for multicultural teams. The second section of the chapter discusses how multicultural teams are impacted by the cultural differences that arise in each stage of the emotion process. Diversity, and diversity in particular in terms of national origin, is

1. Appraisal Automatic components

Stimulus

Controlled Components (regulation)

Situation Selection

-Attention -Schema -Feeling rules

2. Emotional Experience

3. Emotional Expression

-Feeling state -Physiology

Suppression

Person B

4. Emotion Recognition -Special case of appraisal

Display Rules

Reappraisal

Decoding Rules

etc.

An Emotion Process Model for Multicultural Teams

Person A

Responses Action tendencies: Instrumental behavior Cognitions: Affect-asinformation

Fig. 1.

An Emotion Process Model. 265

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growing as the modern workplace becomes increasingly multicultural (Black & Mendenhall, 1990; Milliken & Martins, 1996). Multicultural teams face unique challenges in that cultural background is often visible and highly salient. It is the salience of these differences among team members that strongly encourages members to draw categories and create distinctions between those in the in-group versus out-group (Tsui, Egan, & O’Reillly, 1992; Williams & O’Reilly, 1998), with a general preference for those who are in-group members (e.g., McPherson, Smith-Lovin, & Cook, 2001; Newcomb, 1956). The challenges faced by teams that are demographically diverse – such as communication difficulties, failure to understand new perspectives, and misunderstandings resulting from different values and norms (Bond & Smith, 1996; Earley & Ang, 2003) – are likely to be amplified for groups that differ in terms of members’ national culture. Despite these challenges, few researchers have opened up the ‘‘black box’’ of organizational demography (Lawrence, 1997) to explain exactly how diversity inhibits effective organizational outcomes. There is relatively little guidance in particular on the processes that differentiate the single-culture team from the multicultural team. In this chapter, we attempt to address this gap by examining the intra-personal and inter-personal aspects of the emotion process model in an effort. We argue that with increasing cultural diversity comes diversity in emotional dynamics. Because the emotional dynamics of teams are inherently social, after outlining each step in the emotion process model we identify and elaborate on two themes relating to the social sharing of emotion – the communication of internal states through the expression and perception of emotion, and group mood that can result from the convergence of emotional states across individual members.

STAGES OF THE EMOTION PROCESS MODEL Emotional Appraisal Emotional appraisal is an act of sense making: What does a particular event mean for me? It is not the event itself – but rather an individual’s subjective evaluation of the event – that elicits and shapes emotions (Scherer, 1997b). Thus, appraisal is the crucial first step in the emotion process, and describes how we attend, interpret and ascribe meaning to a given event or stimulus. First, emotional appraisal requires attention; given cognitive limits, we must prioritize which events are even worthy of our notice. Second, we must code the event, interpreting its meaning, and in particular its implications for the


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self (Mesquita & Frijda, 1992). If another person in a team environment is being rude, how one interprets the personal significance of this behavior may change significantly the emotional response – for example, whether the rude individual is a teammate, a customer, a supplier, or a competitor, and whether the rude behavior is directed at an innocent bystander or an instigator. Likewise, a bear approaching a campsite may elicit fear, but the same bear in a zoo could result in delight. Often the cognitive evaluation of stimuli associated with emotional appraisal occurs so quickly and automatically, before our conscious awareness, that we may be unaware of this individual component of the unfolding process. However, even in such cases, we can see the role of appraisal processes by examining, for example, how emotional reactions change over time and vary from person to person. An event that may have caused great embarrassment during youth might in adulthood leave one unfazed, and an event that makes one person angry might make another person sad. Indeed, it can be the lack of conscious awareness of the appraisal process – and the sense that appraisal is clear and lacking a subjective interpretive lens – that prevents individuals from questioning and evaluating it. This results in a particular challenge to reconciling colleagues’ often vastly differing emotional appraisals. Models of the appraisal process focus on the schema we use to convert evaluations of events into corresponding emotional states, by considering the personal meaning of events in terms of a series of dimensions. Scherer (1984) elaborated a stimulus evaluation check model that focuses on the questions posed by events, for which the answers determine the resulting emotional state. For example, we ask ourselves whether an event has positive or negative implications for the self, who caused the event, and how well we are able to respond. Further efforts have extended these categorization systems, and the models have been tested to varying degrees across cultural groups (Campos, Frankel, & Camras, 2004; Karasawa, 1995; Mauro, Sato, & Tucker, 1992; Mesquita & Walker, 2003; Scherer, 1997a; Smith & Ellsworth, 1985). Relevant dimensions within these models include novelty, pleasantness, goal relevance, goal compatibility, and responsibility and control. For example, an event must be novel to result in surprise, it must be pleasant to result in joy, and it must connect with relevant goals to result in eagerness. The dimension of control distinguishes a number of emotions. Given a team facing a major failure such as the loss of a client or a botched presentation, the perceived locus of control might distinguish among experiences of anger (control by others), guilt (control by the self), or sadness (control by no one). In this manner, differentiated emotional states arise from the outcomes of stimulus evaluation checks.

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Cultural Differences in Emotion Appraisal Cultural groups can differ dramatically in the events that capture the attention. That is, what even counts as a stimulus? Triandis (2000) argued for cultural differences in this fundamental process, noting ‘‘members of different cultures sample with diverse probabilities different kinds of things in their environment’’ (p. 145). Masuda and Nisbett (2001) argue that cultures differ in context sensitivity, such that individuals in some cultures pay attention to objects as part of their larger context, whereas others pay attention only to the object itself. What elicits emotion in one culture may escape notice entirely in another (Mesquita & Frijda, 1992). In a multicultural team, for example, one member might accept a phone call in the middle of a meeting. Some teammates may not appraise this event as significant or direct any attention to it. Others may be mildly irritated by the teammate’s lack of respect, and others may be angered. Thus, the same antecedent event can be appraised in various ways. It is our expectations about the ordinary state of the world – often culturally derived – that determine which events we appraise in a team environment, and how we appraise them. Appraisal theorists have argued that there is a universal tendency to categorize events in terms of a series of stimulus evaluation checks. Evidence for these claims results largely from studies in which participants from various cultures describe examples of antecedent events leading to specific emotions, and later participants from other cultural groups judge with good accuracy the emotional state resulting from the descriptions of antecedent events (e.g., Boucher & Brandt, 1981; Mauro et al., 1992). Many antecedent events, particularly extreme events, are shared universally – if someone dies, most people will be sad. However, many stimuli are more complicated, more open to interpretation, and therefore more difficult to appraise. In these situations, individuals will often rely on situated cognition to make sense of a situation (Fiske & Taylor, 1991), and in the process will rely upon their cultural norms. Just as there are situations that appear to result in the same emotions across cultures, there are dimensions of appraisal that appear to be used across cultures as well. This is particularly the case for the most basic dimensions of appraisal. For example appraising the pleasantness of a stimulus tends to result in the same emotions cross-culturally (Mauro et al., 1992). By contrast, cultural differences emerge more strongly for dimensions requiring more complicated evaluation processes, such as control, responsibility and anticipated effort (Mauro et al., 1992; Scherer, 1997b; Mesquita & Walker, 2003). Not only are these dimensions more challenging to evaluate, their meaning is more open to culturally specific scripts. For example,


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control can be difficult to determine – who is to blame for what takes place? Members of individualistic cultural groups attribute greater agency to the individual (Morris & Peng, 1994), and thus may evaluate events to have greater attributed control, resulting in greater anger and less disappointment. Together, these findings imply that complex events with multiple potential meanings for those involved are the most likely stimuli for members of multicultural teams to appraise differently – with different resulting emotional states – following the same event. Differing cognitive appraisals of the same events can lead to conflict for team members (Fisher, 1998; Garcia-Prieto, Bellard, & Schneider, 2003; Pinkley & Northcraft, 1994). Lest this discussion of the emotional appraisal process make it seem excessively analytical, it is worth noting that appraisal occurs with emotional goals in mind. Feeling rules guide one’s aspirations for emotional experience, and these rules tip the appraisal process in favor of desired states. Feeling rules can differ greatly across cultural settings (e.g., Campos et al., 1989). For example, individualistic cultures such as those of Western Europe and the United States have been found to think about emotions largely in terms of positive versus negative states – and to value positive experiences – whereas collectivistic cultures such as China and Japan more often think of emotions in terms of socially engaged (e.g., anger) versus disengaged states (e.g., pride) – and to value engaged experiences (Kitayama, Karasawa, & Mesquita, 2004; Kitayama, Markus, & Kurokawa, 2000; Scollon, Diener, Oishi, & Biswas-Diener, 2004). If the leader of a team praises one member publicly for great work, depending on the feeling rules engaged, the member could appraise this praise to result in pride for standing out, or embarrassment for not better fitting in. Although attention, schemata, and feeling rules are theoretically distinct constructs, they are intertwined and mutually reinforced. We pay attention to those events that our schemata argue have the greatest potential importance and impact on us. Likewise, feeling rules describing our desired states influence the schemata we use to determine those states, and therefore the events that we are vigilant to notice. Regulating the Emotional Appraisal Process One of the most powerful methods for ensuring adaptation to one’s environment is to select environments for which one is already well adapted. The chronologically earliest form of regulating emotion is to limit exposure to situations that evoke undesired emotions, and to increase exposure to those evoking desired states. Situation selection by individuals, or nitchpicking, is the tendency of individuals to select preemptively the situations to which

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they wish to expose themselves, often without conscious knowledge of doing so (Campos et al., 1989, 2004). Although appraisal is an intrapersonal process, individuals may regulate their interpersonal environments as a means of regulating appraisal. For example, teammates may avoid those individuals whose emotional reactions they find aversive. Individuals are more likely to find others’ reactions aversive if they lack the meta-cognitive awareness required to anticipate those reactions in a multicultural environment – a key component of cultural intelligence (Earley & Ang, 2003). Accordingly, team members tend to self-select into positions and roles that require more or less exposure to stressful situations. Affective events theory argues that nitchpicking within teams or organizations can lead to a kind of emotional division of labor across individuals (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996). For example, a team norm dictating impersonality in certain business relationships may limit exposure for some employees to situations where others act in an affectively charged manner. Nitchpicking also rises to the level of national cultures, leaving an imprint on members’ typical exposure and habituation to the range of emotion-eliciting events. Differences in feeling rules that encourage the experience particular states lead, over time, systematically to differences across cultures in the presence of elicitors for those states. Once an individual is exposed to an event, next in the regulation of the appraisal process is the choice of whether to notice. Attention deployment is the process by which individuals selectively choose to attend to elements of the situation (Gross, 1998b). Whereas situation selection involves altering exposure to a situation, attention deployment involves selectively attending to the situation. For example, upon receiving both good and bad news from a colleague, a team member may choose to ignore the negative information and attend to only the positive feedback. Such attention deployment can occur consciously – as it does in a conversation that ends with the individual putting the outcome out of his or her mind – or can occur automatically and with little awareness. Differences in attention deployment at the cultural level may result from cultural differences in beliefs about the importance of given events (Triandis, 2000). That is, we tend to scan the environment for what we believe is important, and such beliefs are informed by cultural norms. For example, some firms in Silicon Valley encourage employees to bring their dogs to the office. Although a dog walking into a room with a team meeting might not draw attention from members of some cultural groups, this may attract significant attention from members of cultures in which dogs are considered dirty, and it could evoke feelings of disgust. What may have first


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seemed novel and elicited emotion can become, if repeated, hardly worth excitement. On the other hand, for someone who finds the dog sufficiently aversive, its continuous presence may produce a negative reaction that builds over time. In both cases, we are more likely to attend to stimuli that seem outside of the ordinary, and the novelty of stimuli varies across cultural groups. The next step chronologically for individuals to regulate their appraisal process is to revise their schemata for appraising emotions. For example, a teammate may be horrified by a colleague’s outburst the first time, but then develop a situation-specific schema to dismiss such outbursts from the same colleague in the future. Because change to the schema itself typically occurs after an emotion is experienced, we discuss this phenomenon more in the section on regulating emotional experience.

Emotional Appraisal in Groups and Teams Taken together, cultural differences in situation selection, attention deployment, and the application of schemata to the emotion appraisal process have powerful implications for diverse teams. Members of multicultural teams can work in the same objective environment yet find their emotions driven by different stimuli within that environment, and they may even have a range of different emotions evoked by precisely the same stimuli. For example, team members from different cultures will have different norms for events as simple as daily pleasantries. ‘‘How are you?’’ in the US is generally answered with ‘‘good, and you?’’ On the other hand, Germans ask the same question only when they truly want to know how the other feels. German members of a team might feel that Americans behave superficially by asking a caring question without actually wanting to know the answer. A German team member who is unaware of American norms might appraise the lack of follow-through to the question as an insult, while American team members might be taken aback by a German who provides a genuine response to this rhetorical question or who stops and listens after asking it. These differences in norms will lead to the same event resulting in different appraisals, and consequently eliciting different emotions. It is important to note that appraisal is only the first step in the emotion process. Although, for the sake of conceptual clarity, we examine each stage in the process as distinct – in practice it is nearly impossible to separate the implications for teams of this one stage in the process without examining all others. In order to continue this discussion, therefore, we move to the next stages in the emotion process model.

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Emotional Experience Emotional experience is the closest process to what is colloquially described as emotion. This is the stage associated with the psychological and physiological sense of being affected emotionally by an event (Frijda, 1986). Although there is a long debate regarding whether mental awareness precedes physiological arousal or vice versa (e.g., Zajonc, 1998; James, 1884; Schachter & Singer, 1962), the experience of a situation and the physiological aspects of emotion cannot easily be separated. Indeed, James (1884) argued that fear without awareness of one’s heartbeat, breathing, muscle tenseness and trembling can hardly be thought of as fear. Experience is a crucial stage of the emotion process because it is experience that leads directly to the behavioral and cognitive responses to emotion. One evolutionary role for emotion is to respond to survival challenges with action – captured in the origin of the term emotion from the Latin word promotionem, to move forward. Emotions are means to move us, to propel us to response. Action tendencies are ‘‘action and the impulse for action, or their absence y one wants to hit, destroy, or retaliate, or jump and shout, to regain a lost person’’ (Frijda, 1986, p. 231). In addition to these behavioral action tendencies, emotion has an impact on cognition by providing information about the world around us (Clore & Tamir, 2002; Schwarz & Clore, 2003). For example, the sensation of fear provides information about the likely safety of surroundings. Thus, emotional experience serves a valuable role for adaptation. Cultural Differences in Emotional Experience Although there is great overlap in the emotional experience of individuals from diverse cultural groups (Scherer & Wallbott, 1994), cultural differences in appraisal processes result in cultural differences in the tendencies to experience different emotional states. For example, focusing on the appraisal dimension of control, Soloman (1978) explained the low incidence of anger among the Utku Eskimos by citing a reluctance to blame another person for a negative event. Although this example may be extreme, it serves to illustrate how cultural groups can vary widely in their norms about the appropriateness of experiencing various emotional states, which feeds into the frequency of actual experience. We focus primarily on those cultural differences in experience that result from differences in the chronologically earlier process of emotional appraisal. However, it is also possible for people from different cultural groups to differ in their habitual emotional experience due to the presence of systematically different elicitors – for example,


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as close-knit communities offer more opportunities than war-torn regions to experience joy. Further, it is also possible for members of different cultural groups to appraise the same emotional state and yet experience it in subtly different ways (Matsumoto, 1993). A variety of studies have catalogued variation across cultural groups in the frequency of particular emotional states and the intensity of those states (e.g., Aune & Aune, 1996; Buunk & Hupka, 1987). Culturally influenced feeling rules can govern variation in the typical emotional states experienced. Theoretically based approaches have focused on the ways in which higherorder dimensions of culture can influence conceptions and categorizations of emotional experience. We focus here on three such accounts, the classification of emotions in terms of valence, social engagement, and dialecticism. As discussed above, individualistic cultures tend to classify emotions largely in terms of positive versus negative valence, and value positive experiences more highly. By contrast, collectivistic cultures tend more to classify emotions in terms of those that are socially engaged – that is, emotions that ‘‘belong to the self–other relationship rather than being confirmed to the subjectivity of the self’’ (Mesquita, 2001, p. 73) – which are more desirable than socially disengaged emotional states signifying independence from others (Kitayama et al., 2004). Members of collectivistic cultures tend to rate their emotional lives as less pleasant (Mesquita & Karasawa, 2002), but more socially engaged (Scollon et al., 2004). This tendency results, for example, from the tendency of members of interdependent groups to rate emotions like shame as more desirable than pride, given the inherent disengagement of a state like pride that sets one apart from the group. A variety of empirical studies have replicated such findings, albeit using a range of terminology to explain these effects (e.g., Grazzani-Gavazzi & Oatley, 1999; Kitayama et al., 2004; Mesquita, 2001; Tsai, Simeonova, & Watanabe, 2004). Dialecticism refers to comfort with the simultaneous experience of states or traits that might be considered contradictory (Nisbett, Peng, Choi, & Norenzayan, 2001; Peng & Nisbett, 1999). Members of individualistic groups tend to categorize emotions in an oppositional or bipolar manner, largely considering multiple emotional states to be mutually exclusive, whereas members of collectivistic groups more often report multiple emotions simultaneously (Bagozzi, Wong, & Yi, 1999). Along these lines, empirical findings show a generally negative correlation for the experience of positive and negative emotion among Americans, but a generally positive correlation among Chinese (Bagozzi et al., 1999). Although much of cross-cultural research has taken place in the individualistic–collectivistic dimension, recent research has connected cultural

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differences in values with the appraisal and experience of different emotions (Rozin, Lowery, Imada, & Haidt, 1999). Rozin and his colleagues build on Shweder, Much, Mahapatra, & Park (1997) rhetoric of morality – focusing on the values placed on community, autonomy, and divinity – and argue that different cultures have differential patterns for defining and appraising morally unacceptable behavior. In a series of studies, they show that experiences of contempt, anger, and disgust, which are three moral emotions critical to relationships with others, are linked to the appraisal of a situation based on a culture’s moral rhetoric (Rozin et al., 1999). For example, in a culture such as India where purity is central to the moral code, morally inappropriate behaviors related to purity can elicit feelings of disgust (Shweder et al., 1997). In the US where autonomy is prized, including individual freedoms and rights, moral violations of autonomy results more often in feelings of anger. Thus, underlying differences in something as fundamental as moral perceptions of what is right and wrong can result in differences across groups in the frequency of experiencing particular emotions. Regulating Emotional Experience Once we experience an emotion, the regulation of that experience can take two forms: reappraisal – changing how we think about a situation – and suppression – attempting to banish the feelings themselves (Gross, 2001). Reappraisal involves cognitively transforming a situation to alter its emotional impact (Gross, 1998b). For example, a teammate may be upset initially that an important meeting has been rescheduled. That individual might rethink this reaction and decide that, perhaps, rescheduling is helpful for allowing additional time to prepare. Over time, attempts at reappraisal are incorporated into the very appraisal schemata governing initial evaluations. By contrast, suppression does not attempt to turn back the clock of the emotion process model and to revisit the appraisal process – a deep method of regulation – but attempts to exert individual control at the stage of emotional experience, by muting or denying the emotion. For example, the teammate upset about being rescheduled may decide to try not to think about the meeting. Despite attempts at suppression being relatively common, studies show that they are rarely successful and often result in leakage. In fact, through ironic processes, attempting to deny an emotion often backfires into increased physiological activity (Gross & Levenson, 1997). On a routine basis using suppression to regulate one’s emotional states generally corresponds to negative health, decreased job satisfaction and greater intentions to quit a job (Gross & Levenson, 1997; Gross, 1998a; 2001; Cote´ &


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Morgan, 2002). By contrast, reappraisal appears to be a more healthy method of handling undesired emotional states, associated with positive health benefits and job satisfaction (Gross, 1998a; Cote´ & Morgan, 2002). It would seem likely that cultural differences in appraisal process would lead to corresponding cultural differences in reappraisal as well – governed by the same schemata and feeling rules. Those cultures in which feeling rules are the most strong and tightly governed would be likely to exercise greater regulation over emotional experience. Members of independent cultures may be less inclined to suppress their emotions, and may react to unpopular emotional states either by choosing to change them through reappraisal or standing firm in their experience. By contrast, members of interdependent cultural groups would likely attempt greater regulation in order to adapt to the expectations of others (Ekman, 1972). Indeed, in an interdependent cultural context, attempts at suppression may not be associated with negative health problems. Given a more dialectic form of emotional experience, members may feel no discomfort with the contradiction arising from feeling an emotional state that is different from the one considered appropriate. Thus, even if members of a culturally diverse team are in the same situations, and appraise them the same way, they may differ in the extent to which they manage their resulting experience of emotion. Emotional Experience in Groups and Teams Much of the research on emotion in teams has focused on the experience component within the emotion process. We argue that it would be valuable to extend this research to culturally diverse contexts. Although every person is capable of a wide range of emotional experiences, there are also systematic individual differences in the frequency of experiencing particular states. This construct of affectivity – largely conceptualized in terms of positive versus negative tendencies (Watson Clark & Tellegen, 1988) – has been a powerful influence on the field. Staw et al. (e.g., Staw & Barsade, 1993; Staw, Sutton, & Pelled, 1994; Wright & Staw, 1999) found that individuals who selfreported more frequent positive emotional experience tended to be more effective in their workplaces. Within teams, affectivity has been an increasingly powerful lens for studying emotion. Groups frequently converge in the tendencies of individuals to experience particular emotional states and this convergence generally has beneficial consequences for teams (e.g., Barsade & Gibson, 1998; Barsade, Ward, Turner, & Sonnenfeld, 2000; Bartel & Saavedra, 2000; George, 1990; Kelly & Barsade, 2001; Totterdell, 2000). A limitation of the existing body of studies is the sampling exclusively from Western cultural groups, so the applicability to other cultures remains

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untested. We hypothesize that group convergence will be less likely to occur in multicultural teams – in which team members are less likely to start by sharing the same emotional state following the same events, and in which team members are less likely to ‘‘catch’’ each other’s feelings through emotional contagion. We discuss this hypothesis in greater detail below. Given these types of differences, members of multicultural teams may differ in their likelihood of experiencing particular emotional states and combinations of states (Aune & Aune, 1996; Bagozzi, Verbeke, & Gavino, 2003; Zammuner & Fischer, 1995). Taken together, differences in the frequency, intensity and type of emotions experienced by different cultures leave the potential for mismatch in the emotions experienced by individuals in multicultural teams. The above discussion focuses on stages of the emotion process that are largely intra-personal. That is, these first stages takes place within a single person’s perception and experience. However, given that emotion adapted largely for us to manage our relationships with others, in the next section we begin a discussion of the inherently interpersonal elements of the emotion process.

Emotional Expression Emotional expression consists of the outward displays of one’s internal state, taking place largely via nonverbal channels such as facial expressions, vocal tone, and body posture and movement. This is perhaps the most crucial component of emotional functioning in team contexts, given that emotional expressions are visible directly to others, and therefore have the most potential to affect teammates’ interpersonal interactions. Psychologists within a social functionalist perspective have even argued that emotions evolved largely for their signaling value, providing an adaptive mechanism for individuals to communicate and thus coordinate their relationships and interactions with others (DePaulo & Friedman, 1998; Ekman, 1992; Keltner & Haidt, 1999; McArthur & Baron, 1983). As such, the expression of emotion is an act of social sharing – a message intended to provide others with information to use as feedback. Indeed, this feedback function is so strong that, according to the facial feedback hypothesis, individuals themselves experience emotion resulting from their own facial expressions, vocal tones, and body postures (Blairy, Herrera, & Hess, 1999; Hatfield, Hsee, Costello, & Weisman, 1995; Zajonc, Murphy, & Inglehart, 1989).


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Although there is an active debate regarding the extent to which emotional expressions appear spontaneously as accurate readouts of one’s internal state – versus the extent to which they serve as emblems with an intended social audience (Ekman, 1972; Fridlund, 1991; Hess, Banse, & Kappas, 1995; Kappas, 2003) – members of teams are impacted by both these phenomena; the presence of spontaneous readouts of members’ emotional states as well as intentional acts attempting to portray such states. Cultural Differences in Emotional Expression The scientific study of emotion has been intertwined with the question of emotional expression’s universality versus cultural specificity. Clearly, a large component of expression must be universal: for example, people from different cultures can watch foreign films and understand much of their original feeling. Likewise, people can develop strong bonds with pets while communicating largely through nonverbal displays of emotion. Thus, messages on an emotional level can cross barriers of culture and even species. Classic studies have supported this intuition, demonstrating that posed photographs of facial expressions from the United States are recognizable in many countries around the world, even to those groups with nearly no exposure to western civilization (Ekman, 1972; Ekman, Sorensen, & Friesen, 1969; Izard, 1971; but see also Fridlund, 1994 and Russell, 1994 for critiques of this work). Much of the empirical evidence used to support claims that emotional expressions appear identically across cultures has been indirect, coming from research on the recognition rather than expression of emotion. If facial expressions are well recognized across cultural groups, many theorists have concluded, they must be produced identically across groups as well (e.g., Ekman, 1972). After all, it would be difficult to recognize a display that is completely different from anything produced nearby. Additional research recording spontaneous facial expressions across cultures and coding the expressions’ muscle movement has focused on patterns of convergence across cultural groups, documenting great similarity in responses to similar stimuli provoking the expressions (Camras, Oster, Campos, Miyake, & Bradshaw, 1997; Ekman, 1972; Ekman & Rosenberg, 1997). On the basis of these and related studies, many psychologists have concluded that emotional expression has a largely biological basis, with relatively little room for differences across cultural groups. However, the presence of commonalities in expressive style does not preclude systematic local variations across nations as well, with large overlap yet also subtle distinctions. Further, subtle cultural differences in emotional expression can have important implications for the members of teams.

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Taking as a starting point Tomkins and McCarter’s (1964) metaphor that cultural differences in emotional expression are like ‘‘dialects’’ of the ‘‘more universal grammar of emotion’’ (p. 127), a recently proposed dialect theory of emotion argues for the presence of automatic and spontaneous differences in the style of expression across cultures that are subtle enough to allow generally accurate communication across groupsyet substantive enough to result in greater potential for miscommunication (Elfenbein & Ambady, 2002, 2003). Even in laboratory tasks in which participants attempt to pose expressions with the goal to be clear and intelligible to others – thus revealing culturally normative styles – systematic yet subtle differences in expression style emerge across national groups (Elfenbein, Beaupre´, Leveque, & Hess, 2005). These expressive dialects may have a particularly strong impact on emotions that frequently signal social intent to an audience, such as anger and contempt, rather than those that are more biologically determined – for example, strongly linked to reflexes or highly similar across species – such as surprise and fear (Elfenbein et al., 2005). As such, dialects may impact those emotional states most frequently communicated in team settings. Dialects may also be particularly strong for those aspects of nonverbal communication that are under greater conscious control, and therefore used the most voluntarily within a team interaction. Given the largely automatic nature of emotional expression, it can be challenging to develop the meta-awareness of one’s culturally influenced style (Earley & Ang, 2003) needed to select elements from one’s expressive repertoire that are clear and intelligible to teammates from other cultural groups. Regulating Emotional Expression Deliberate regulation processes are another source of variation – at times dramatic – in emotional expression across cultural groups. Ekman (1972) referred to display rules as ‘‘management techniques’’ (p. 225) allowing individuals to ‘‘decouple their expressions from their feelings.’’ (p. 127). They are defined ‘‘as procedures learned early in life for the management of affect displays and include deintensifying, intensifying, neutralizing, and masking an affect display. These rules prescribe what to do about the display of each affect in different social settings; they vary with the social role and demographic characteristics, and should vary across cultures’’ (Ekman et al., 1969, p. 87). That is, display rules interrupt the coherence between the emotional experience and the emotion that is displayed. Display rules can become over-learned to the point where the expressor is barely aware of their impact on modulating an emotional display. Even under such circumstances, however, they are distinct from cultural dialects in that display rules


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change the intensity or category of emotion displayed, whereas dialects are qualitative differences in the appearance of the same intended emotion. Thus, the two concepts are independent of each other. Examples of display rules abound in teams even within a single culture. Display rules include an airline flight attendant smiling at a rude passenger (Hochschild, 1983), or a bill collector showing anger to an indifferent debtor but a sympathetic display to an apologetic debtor (Rafaeli & Sutton, 1989; Sutton, 1991). In teams, norms can emerge regarding the appropriateness of expressing various emotional states. Display rules are thus adapted to serve a function within social relations. Corresponding to social goals that can differ tremendously across cultures, display rules in emotional expression vary greatly across cultures as well. For example, Ekman (1972) argued that display rules in collectivist societies such as Japan serve to promote greater harmony and cooperation by suppressing the display of negative sentiment. Display rules are connected closely to feeling rules; individuals are more likely to intensify or use as a mask those emotional states consistent with feeling rules, and to deintensify, neutralize, or mask over the display of emotions against those rules. Individuals from some cultures do not expect their feeling to match their expressions, but instead they expect to express what is appropriate, no matter how they feel.1 For example, there are crosscultural differences in the extent to which individuals feel a need to follow emotional regulation norms (Gordon, 1989; Grandey, Fisk, & Steiner, 2005, p. 895). In customer service jobs, the ‘‘impulsively’’ oriented French, who value authentic emotional expression, and consequently less need for regulation, experience less pressure to adhere to ‘‘service with a smile’’ norms. In contrast, members of the U.S. are more ‘‘institutionally’’ oriented, suggesting ‘‘strong norms about regulating emotions to fulfill institutional roles and standards’’ (Grandey et al., 2005, p. 895). Thus, multicultural teams are likely to include wide variation among members in their emotional expressions – resulting both from differences in underlying feelings as well as the regulation of their outward displays. Even those experiencing the same emotional state may express it slightly differently, not express it at all, or express a different emotion entirely. Emotional Expression in Groups and Teams Cultural differences in emotional expression can have profound effects on culturally diverse teams. Although cultural differences in appraisal and experience are important, largely their impact is downstream in that such differences lead to visible behaviors. The expression of emotion is a signal that is available for consumption by colleagues. Members of multicultural

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teams can be confused by differences in emotional expression that violate their expectations. For example, Japanese businesspeople often respond to unreasonable requests with the display of smiles and affirmative nods as a display rule to signify politeness rather than agreement. The misinterpretation of these displays as assent has created confusion for many US team members who have expected their Japanese counterparts to follow through with these requests. One might expect similar difficulties in a team comprising of American and French members, in which French are less likely to adhere to norms of regulating emotional display (Grandey et al., 2005). In this case, members of both cultural groups might experience surprise and confusion over the perceived emotional experience of the other group. These perceptions of difference may heighten the already-salient cultural differences that may, in turn, lead to negative outcomes such as dissatisfaction and desire to leave the group (Milliken & Martins, 1996; Tsui, Egan, & O’Reillly, 1992).

Emotion Recognition The expression of emotion does not occur in a vacuum; rather, other people are inherently connected as an audience. Although people can and do express emotions alone, indeed often when this occurs there is another person in mind, an implicit audience member (Fridlund, 1994). The impact of emotional expression is not direct, but rather mediated through others’ perception. Emotion recognition is the flip side of expression’s coin – if the display of emotion is an act of social sharing, then the question arises whether others get the message. As such, the outward expression of person A’s emotion may serve as a stimulus for person B, inspiring the repetition of the chronological stages of the emotion process in another person. Thus, individual sensitivity to others’ emotional states – frequently automatic, implicit and unaware – is the building block for dyadic-level phenomena such as empathy, and group-level emotional phenomena such as group mood and emotional contagion (e.g., Barsade, 2002; Bartel & Saavedra, 2000; George, 1990). Even for primitive contagion processes that are mediated by the unconscious mimicry of others’ expressions (Hatfield, Cacioppo, & Rapson, 1994), at some level facial feedback via mimicry still requires others’ expressions to appear similar enough to our own that their mimicry results in an expression that evokes a particular emotional state. In team settings, perceiving the expressive behavior of the people around us is a window into their reactions and attributions, their


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inclinations and intentions, their likely future behaviors, and at a basic and evolutionary level whether they should be approached or avoided. Even in the modern world, knowing when someone is having a bad day can greatly improve survival. Understanding the emotions of others can assist in coordinating activities and in working interdependently, can facilitate in the construction of effective interpersonal networks, can make relationships more predictable, and can provide a powerful source of feedback (e.g., Ashkanasy, Hartel, & Zerbe, 2000; Fineman, 1993; Riggio, 2001). These social functions are particularly important for high-functioning teams. A teammate may wonder, for example, whether or not colleagues support a proposal, whether a particular colleague is angry about a mistake or disappointed by the quality of a work product, and whether a remark was sarcastic versus sincere. As these examples illustrate, the emotion being perceived is often related directly to the content of a team’s work. Given its functional value, most people develop reasonable accuracy at detecting the emotional states of others. However, there are also individual differences. The ability to perceive emotion is a core component of emotional intelligence (EI), (Mayer, Caruso, & Salovey, 1999; Mayer, DiPaolo, & Salovey, 1990), and so far it is the component of EI with the most reliable and extensively validated measures (Ciarrochi, Chan, & Caputi, 2000; Davies, Stankov, & Roberts, 1998; Roberts, Zeidner, & Matthews, 2001). Some of the most robust evidence for EI’s predictive validity in organizational settings has come from the positive relationship between job performance and emotion recognition accuracy (Elfenbein, Marsh, & Ambady, 2002). For example, in one study, business executives and Foreign Service officers who were better at identifying the emotional content expressed in voice samples and video clips also achieved greater performance ratings and were promoted to higher-level positions (Rosenthal, Hall, DiMatteo, Rogers, & Archer, 1979). The overall positive association between nonverbal decoding skill and workplace effectiveness has replicated in counseling settings (Campbell, Kagan, & Krathwohl, 1971; Costanzo & Philpott, 1986; Schag, Loo, & Levin, 1978), medical settings (DiMatteo, Friedman, & Taranta, 1979; Tickle-Degnen, 1998), and public service settings (Elfenbein & Ambady, 2002b). Cultural Differences in Emotion Recognition Given the importance of recognizing others’ emotions accurately for effectiveness in team settings, it is worth considering cultural variations in accuracy levels. Although much of an emotional message is retained across cultural barriers, some does appear to get lost along the way. The loss can

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present a challenge for multicultural teams. Much of the evidence for cultural differences in the recognition of emotion come from the same classic studies, described above, that were designed to demonstrate its universality. Although participants from many nations recognized posed emotion expressions better than one would expect by chance, samples outside the United States rarely achieved accuracy rates as high as American samples when viewing these American stimuli. For example, Ekman et al. reported accuracy rates ranging from 86% for Americans (Ekman, 1972) down to 53% for tribespeople in New Guinea (Ekman et al., 1969) when viewing American emotional expressions. In the most extreme case, the Bahinemo tribe they tested could not respond to the individual photographs, and labeled them all as ‘‘angry’’ (Sorensen, 1975). In a meta-analysis of crosscultural research on emotion recognition using a wide range of methods, Elfenbein and Ambady (2002a) found evidence for an in-group advantage, in that individuals were better at recognizing emotions expressed by members of their own cultural group. Greater geographical proximity and/or opportunities for cross-cultural contact seemed to reduce the extent of this advantage. This pattern had gone largely unnoticed due to the Western background of most researchers and experimental materials, and a goal among researchers to demonstrate that work originating in the West was ‘‘universal’’ (Matsumoto & Assar, 1992). The recently developed dialect theory attempts to reconcile within a single conceptual framework the range of empirical evidence for cultural universals and differences in the expression and recognition of emotion. Elfenbein et al. (Elfenbein & Ambady, 2003) have argued that subtle dialects in the universal language of emotion result in a potential for greater misunderstanding when communication takes place across cultural boundaries. Judgments of other people’s emotional expressions are faster and more accurate for perceivers familiar with these subtle dialect variations. Although prototypical displays of emotion are recognizable in many countries around the world, they are recognized with lower rates of accuracy outside of the country in which researchers developed these displays. This suggests a limit to inferring indirectly that emotions must be produced identically across groups due to their recognition across groups. According to dialect theory, emotional expressions can still be largely recognizable to perceivers from foreign cultures, even if the perceivers themselves might produce a slightly different display. Dialect theory emphasizes cultural learning as a source of differences in emotion recognition across national groups. Although evidence is mixed whether acquaintance with any given individual improves the accurate


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perception of that individual’s displays (e.g., Ansfield, DePaulo, & Bell, 1995; Kenny & Acitelli, 2001; Sabatelli, Buck, & Dreyer, 1982; Zuckerman, Lipets, Koivumaki, & Rosenthal, 1975), across cultural groups there is consistent evidence that greater exposure and familiarity improves emotion recognition (Ducci, Arcuri, Georgis, & Sineshaw, 1982; Elfenbein & Ambady, 2003; Sorensen, 1975). These findings provide a hopeful message, in that greater cross-cultural contact for the members of multicultural teams can serve to reduce the challenge of perceiving accurately each other’s emotional states. Even when the cultural differences in perceiving emotion are relatively subtle, they can still have important real-world consequences. Elfenbein and Ambady’s (2002a) meta-analysis revealed that in-group nation judgments of emotions were, on average, 16% more accurate than out-group nation judgments. Small misunderstandings can accumulate over time, and can lead to cross-cultural interactions that are slightly less smooth than sameculture interactions. In some cases, the nature of a misunderstanding can be dramatic. In Bond, Omar, Mahmoud, and Bonser (1990), perceivers from the USA and Jordan were unable to distinguish between displays in which out-group posers attempted to convey great liking versus great disliking for another person.2 In their study, within-culture judgments were relatively accurate, whereas cross-cultural judgments were basically no better than flipping a coin. A team could be derailed by misattributions on such a basic level.

Regulating Emotion Recognition Regulation processes also impact the recognition of emotion, and provide a platform for further cultural differences. Decoding rules (Buck, 1984) refer to norms about the appropriate perception of others’ emotions. Matsumoto (1989, 1992) argued that negative emotion can be so damaging for social harmony that members of collectivistic cultural groups do not merely attempt not to experience it and attempt to limit its display, but they also inhibit their ability to understand such displays that do occur. Likewise, in a workplace setting, the flip side of Hochschild’s (1983) airline flight attendants display rule to smile at rude passengers is the decoding rule of overlooking these passengers’ hostile behavior. Note that decoding rules can be deliberate – such as a team member telling another that they should ignore an unintended blurt – or, as with display rules, they can be over-learned and practiced so frequently that they occur largely outside of the perceiver’s awareness. The regulation of emotion at this stage is sometimes difficult to

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distinguish, because the individual can regulate emotion recognition or regulate the reactions that occur upon recognizing others’ emotions. A further regulated process in the recognition of emotion comes from the preconceived notions that perceivers may have about the emotional repertoire of another individual, for example based on the individual’s cultural group. Indeed, the first researchers to note an in-group advantage in their data referred to it as ethnic bias (e.g., Kilbride & Yarczower, 1983; Markham & Wang, 1996), suggesting that individuals may be less motivated to decode accurately emotional expressions from members of visibly different cultural groups. This notion fits with evidence that decoders are more accurate in their judgments of emotions the experimenter leads them to believe have been expressed by in-group rather than out-group members (Hess, Senecal, & Kirouac, 1996; Thibault, Bourgeois, & Hess, 2005), presumably due to greater engagement in the task. Likewise, in a multicultural team, colleagues may be more attentive to the emotional states of in-group members, due to greater motivation to understand and respond to them. Further, stereotypes about the likely emotions experienced by members of different cultural groups (Hess et al., 2000) may introduce specific biases that alter the base rates of the states attributed to individuals across cultural groups. For example, African American team members may find themselves presumed to be angry more often than their peers. In a judgment study, participants more frequently rated Japanese expressions as happy or neutral, and American expressions as angry or fearful (Elfenbein, Mandal, Ambady, Harizuka, & Kumar, 2002). Individuals are particularly less likely to attribute to outgroup members those secondary emotions that are uniquely human characteristics, such as the experience of love (Leyens et al., 2000, 2001). To the extent that these stereotypes are incorrect, perceivers who use them will decrease their accurate recognition of colleagues’ emotional states. Emotion Recognition in Groups and Teams The recognition of emotional expression is crucially important in teams, where teammates depend on these subtle signals in order to work independently with colleagues. However, in teams with members from multiple cultural groups, such signals can get crossed, with negative consequences for the team. For example, in a case study of Russian and American business collaborations, researchers found that both groups frequently cited communication and misunderstanding as a primary source of frustration with their work together (Millhous, 1999). Speaking to the importance of recognizing emotional expressions, the Russians in this sample reported examples of frustration going unnoticed, e.g., ‘‘we finally asked the Americans


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to say goodbye properly before they raced out the door, but it took them a while to catch on’’ (p. 305). Minor and major difficulties may arise when members of cross-national teams fail to understand their teammates’ emotional signals.

IMPLICATIONS FOR MULTICULTURAL TEAMS At this point in the chapter, we turn from a discussion of the stages of the emotion process model to their implications for multicultural teams. Particularly relevant to team functioning are the inherently social elements of the emotion process, the stages of emotional expression and recognition. Indeed, the earlier components of appraisal and experience are represented as upstream inputs to these two downstream processes, in that appraisal results in experience, which feeds into expression. Thus, we focus the discussion below on two themes that relate to the social sharing of emotion. First, we discuss the communication of internal states through emotional expression and recognition, and in particular the misunderstandings that arise more frequently in cross-cultural settings. Second, we discuss the impact of cultural differences on the phenomenon of group mood that results from the convergence of emotional states across group members.

Understandings and Misunderstandings The group differences that arise at every stage of the emotion process leave the members of multicultural teams vulnerable to misunderstand each other. Consider the example of a team holding a meeting at which Member A arrives 10 min late, and Member B gets angry and later discusses this with Member C. At the level of appraisal, being late to a meeting may attract different levels of attention across teammates, who may or may not even direct their attention to lateness as an emotion-eliciting stimulus. Member C might remark to B, ‘‘I didn’t even notice that A was late.’’ Next, teammates may apply different schemata to being late, as one national group might consider 10 min of lateness a sign of disrespect and irresponsibility, another might consider it within the range of normal, and another might even consider it early. ‘‘It wasn’t a big deal’’, Member C might recall. These differences in appraisal lead correspondingly to different emotional experiences, in this case with Member A clearly irritated and Member C indifferent. Another teammate might have been surprised, or saddened by a perceived

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lack of respect for those who sat waiting. Member B may have sat through the meeting seething, but containing her anger, and A assumed nothing was wrong because A himself would certainly have made his feelings known had he been that irritated. Perhaps even though Member B tried to suppress the outward expression of her anger, some signs might have leaked through inadvertently. However, being from a different cultural group, A could have been challenged to recognize these signals. Diversity in members’ moods can be confusing. To the extent that others’ emotions provide information to help interpret one’s social environment (e.g., Schwarz & Clore, 2003), receiving a host of mixed messages can bewilder a sensitive teammate. Sometimes these messages appear mixed only due to miscommunication. Even when team members from different cultural backgrounds appraise an event similarly, experience the same emotion, and express it openly, cultural differences in their style of emotional expression can lead to breakdowns in interpersonal understanding. If the accurate perception of others’ expressive behavior provides a valuable window into their reactions in the team environment, then the greater difficulty of achieving such accuracy across cultures presents a challenge for multinational teams. Effective interpersonal functioning can suffer greatly from the basic misunderstanding of emotional signals – imagine, for example, a team consisting of Bond et al.’s (1990) perceivers from the USA and Jordan unable to distinguish much better than a coin flip between each others’ expressions of great like versus great dislike for another person. It could be hard for members of such a group to coordinate hiring, client contacts, sales leads, or multi-party negotiations, unable to recognize each other’s most basic signals. It is worth noting that increased exposure to different cultures can lead members of multicultural teams to learn to recognize better their teammates’ emotional displays. Indeed, research shows that the in-group advantage in emotion recognition decreases with greater exposure to a host culture (Elfenbein & Ambady, 2003). Indeed, George and her colleagues suggest that experience negotiating with members of other cultures may allow individuals to develop schemas that allow them to deal successfully with members of that other culture (George, Jones, & Gonzalez, 1998) – and these schemas may encompass many if not all of the components of the emotion process. Perhaps for this reason, longitudinal research has shown that the impaired performance of culturally diverse teams is most pronounced when the teams are newly formed, but that these negative performance effects tend to disappear over time (Bond & Smith, 1996; Thomas, 1999; Watson, Kumar, & Michaelsen, 1993). It may be that the ability to adapt to new cultural settings (Earley & Ang, 2003) helps individuals to


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learn about the emotional norms of new cultural groups. Earley and Ang’s (2003) model of cultural intelligence suggests that not only will exposure to a single new culture help individuals learn to recognize the emotional expressions of that culture, but that it may also help individuals to develop metaperceptions that increase adaptability to learn the emotional nuances of other cultures as well.

Cultural Diversity as Emotional Containment and Amplification When multicultural teams first come together, cultural differences in emotion at the stages of appraisal, experience, expression, and recognition are individual level phenomena. These individual-level misunderstandings and discord can iterate as team members respond to each other, so that soon the team experiences not only the cumulative sum of these individuals’ differences, but also the development of group-level norms. These group norms that emerge may be dominated by the norms of one particular cultural group, or they may be new hybrid norms incorporating numerous cultures represented (e.g. Earley & Mosakowski, 2000). The type of norms that emerge may depend on the composition of the group, where the group is located, the host culture, and power asymmetries. For example, in a team in a Singaporean branch of a US multi-national that is dominated by US expatriates, the emergent norms might follow a Western model. However, the same group might develop a more Eastern model if the parent company is also Singaporean. A US software firm located in the Silicon Valley might find its teams populated by a diverse population of multi-ethnic Americans and expatriates from various parts of the world. In such an environment, the emergent team norms might not follow the cultural norms of one group but rather might take a hybrid form. We argue that these group-level norms can serve either to accentuate or to ameliorate the underlying differences among individuals. A dampening function on group emotion can result from barriers to sharing. If, as discussed above, individual sensitivity to others’ emotional states is the building block for team-level phenomena such as group mood and emotional contagion (e.g., Bartel & Saavedra, 2000; Barsade, 2002; George, 1990), then decreased sensitivity to the emotions of members of other cultural groups serves to weaken these phenomena. Examining the convergence and spread of emotional states across team members in terms of each step in the process model, first members are likely to have greater initial diversity in their emotional states. Having noticed different stimuli

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and appraised stimuli using different schemata and feeling rules, their initial emotional experiences are more likely to vary. Further, the mechanisms for increasing convergence are impaired. Across cultural boundaries team members are less likely to perceive subtle signals of colleagues’ emotional states, and thus less likely to respond in kind by mimicking and adopting those states. Having said this, cultural diversity can also serve as an amplifier of emotion within teams. First, cultural diversity itself is a stimulus, one that can create anxiety and discomfort – but also excitement and eagerness – in the face of working closely with colleagues from unfamiliar backgrounds. Cultural diversity can act as a further stimulus when team members find that their colleagues do not act in predictable ways and violate their expectations for responses to their own emotions. Further, just as individuals can catch the moods of those around them (Hatfield, Cacioppo, & Rapson, 1994), in the case of errors in emotion recognition we argue that individuals may catch the moods that those around them appear to – but do not actually – experience. If biases and stereotypes lead colleagues to misunderstand each other’s states, they may read signal into the noise of everyday interaction and create convergence toward a state that was never originally present. These factors can lead multicultural teams to be more emotionally intense environments for their members. Are teams better off with containment or amplification of emotion? We argue that the spread and convergence of emotion among teammates can be a double-edged sword. Researchers exploring affective diversity have found that teams can benefit from similarity in emotional states among members (Barsade et al., 2000). Barsade et al. (2000) argued that the relationship between mood convergence and team performance is curvilinear – at low levels of convergence, members of teams cannot come together, but at excessively high levels they may be distracted by the emotional intensity. Thus, emotional similarity may be beneficial in moderate doses, but not in overdose. Accordingly, Tuncel and Doucet (2005), who suggest that mood diversity is related to greater accuracy in decision-making. In culturally diverse teams, the cohesion and productivity that can result from effective coordination among team members is likely to suffer if members do not achieve synchrony in terms of their moods. However, we argue that taken to an extreme, being emotionally in sync can produce a kind of groupfeel – the emotional equivalent of groupthink (Janis, 1982). Groupfeel can be defined as the dysfunctional overextension of a functional process. We distinguish groupfeel from more beneficial emotional synergy in the sense that – up to a point – it can be beneficial to the on the ‘‘same page’’ as others


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emotionally. However, this can grow to be dysfunctional to the extent that the natural diversity of emotional reactions becomes disallowed. Individuals need to be able to maintain at least some degree of their spontaneous emotional states, lest they begin to suffer the negative health outcomes suggested by those who study the negative effects of suppression (Cote´ & Morgan, 2002; Grandey et al., 2005; Gross, 1998a; 2001; Gross & Levenson, 1997). These results suggest that team members should not be forced to package their feelings; rather, they should be comfortable being authentic. We argue that this is more likely in multicultural teams. However, at levels of mood convergence below that of groupfeel, synchrony among teammates in their emotional states can be valuable for teams. To the extent that cultural differences serve to limit the convergence of positive emotion in a team, or create negative emotion in a team, multicultural teams may suffer. On the other hand, to the extent that negative emotion may also spread less when it is misunderstood, the dampening function of cultural diversity may serve to benefit teams.

CONCLUSION Our goal in the current chapter has been to present a model of cultural differences in emotion, and to draw on this model to discuss challenges that result for teams working across cultural boundaries. We began by presenting an integrated component process model of emotion, outlining the chronological steps that unfold as an event is noticed and appraised, the resulting emotional state experienced, and outwardly displayed for others to recognize (or not). Cultural differences are infused into each step in the emotion process, and each step in turn is relevant to the effective functioning of teams. We hope that this chapter helps to import from psychology into organizational behavior an emphasis on the theoretical distinction among different components of the emotion process. In doing so, we hope also to encourage additional research on some of the stages of studied less often in team settings, such as emotion recognition. We use this model as our lens to discuss the impact of culture on the emotional functioning of multicultural teams. Given the coordination and communication necessary for effective teamwork, we identify two areas in which to expect culture to affect interpersonal interactions. First, we argue that members of multicultural teams will experience greater misunderstanding at a basic level due to the differences that emerge at each emotion stage. Second, we argue that cultural differences serve as both a dampener and an

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amplifier of emotional states across teammates. In both cases, our primary prediction is that cultural differences serve as a challenge for effective teamwork. However, particularly for emotional convergence we argue there may also be a benefit to greater diversity, in the case in which cultural differences serve to contain the spread of emotion and such spread is not always for the better. Empirical work in this area would be welcome, to refine and test such ideas. We close by arguing that it is the hidden and automatic nature of emotional processes that, ironically, often makes their impact at times so bold and noticeable. The individual steps of the emotion model occur so quickly they largely go unnoticed and unquestioned. This speed can give us the sense that we perceive the world directly, unmediated through a series of steps shaped by our cultural background. Our goal has been to make the case that culture imprints each stage of the process of noticing events, appraising their meaning, experiencing emotion, expressing ourselves, and understanding the expressions of others. These are among the building blocks of the effectiveness of teams.

NOTES 1. We thank Lorna Doucet for this point. 2. Although this study is atypical for its extreme findings, it is also noteworthy for using methodology with unusually high ecological validity, involving the judgment of spontaneous moving expressions in a field of work often dominated by still photographs of the face.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT The authors are grateful to the organizers and participants of the RMGT conference for their feedback. We thank Cameron Anderson, Lorna Doucet, Christopher Earley, Adam Galinsky, Katherine Williams Phillips, Catherine Tinsley, and Batia Wiesenfeld for their helpful comments.

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CULTURAL INTELLIGENCE AND THE MULTINATIONAL TEAM EXPERIENCE: DOES THE EXPERIENCE OF WORKING IN A MULTINATIONAL TEAM IMPROVE CULTURAL INTELLIGENCE? Lisa M. Moynihan, Randall S. Peterson and P. Christopher Earley ABSTRACT In this chapter, we explore the interrelationships between team member cultural intelligence (CQ) and multinational team functioning and performance. We argue that CQ, an individual’s capability to adapt to different cultural contexts, can be enhanced through experience working in a multinational team, suggesting that CQ is not simply a stable individual difference. We propose a conceptual framework, and demonstrate empirical support through a longitudinal study, that links the effectiveness of team experience to shared norms and positive performance feedback. Additionally, we present evidence that mean level of team


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member CQ predicts intragroup trust, cohesion, and performance for the multinational team.

Multinational teams need to achieve three interrelated goals in order to be successful. They need to (1) create a shared culture (Earley & Mosakowski, 2000; Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994), (2) manage team conflict effectively (Jehn, 1995), and (3) motivate members to invest time on behalf of the team (Gibson, 1999; Gibson & Earley, 2005). Achieving these three goals simultaneously is not easy for any team, but is particularly problematic for the multinational team (see also Behfar, Kern, & Brett, 2006). One of the special challenges in achieving these goals compared to culturally homogeneous teams, of course, is the need to disentangle the specific impact of national culture from organizational culture and/or individual member personality. If team members do not understand, for example, that Indian culture is highly focused on power differences and its potential implication for a team having Indian members, they are likely to have difficulty working with other Indians and conducting business in India. This challenge becomes even greater when considering that any particular Indian team member reflects both cultural and personal experiences such that multiple team members from the same culture may have very different reactions to the same situation. In this chapter, we describe the ability to disentangle these kinds of problems as cultural intelligence (CQ), develop propositions for how experience in multicultural teams affects CQ, and describe how team-level CQ affects team performance and why. Cultural intelligence is the tri-partite construct that suggests that individuals will be successful in new cultural environments to the extent that their cognitions and metacognitions (thinking, learning, and strategizing), motivation (efficacy and confidence, persistence, value congruence, and affect for the new culture), and behavior (social mimicry and behavioral repertoire) all align with interests in learning about new cultures (Earley, 2003; Earley & Ang, 2003; Thomas & Inkson, 2004). Unlike personality, cultural intelligence is an aptitude that is thought to be able to grow and develop over time, and is associated with successful cross-cultural experiences (see Earley & Ang, 2003). What we know little about, however, is how cultural intelligence can become manifest, or developed over time. We are interested to know, for example, whether experience in a multinational team will improve average individual cultural intelligence. Or whether teams might need to provide a particular kind of experience for cultural intelligence to be enhanced by the multinational team experience.

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We start from the view that CQ is an important capability for individuals who seek to have successful global business careers (e.g., Earley & Peterson, 2004; Thomas & Inkson, 2004). But we also argue here that CQ is an important characteristic for individual team members to have in order to promote optimal functioning of multinational teams. In short, we suggest that self-managed multinational teams with members who have high average cultural intelligence are most likely to be successful because they are more likely to be able to manage the tri-partite challenge outlined at the beginning of this chapter to (1) create a shared hybrid culture, (2) manage team conflict, and (3) motivate team members to invest in the team. To do this, we begin by examining the concept of CQ in greater detail, followed by a discussion of how we think CQ can be developed through multinational team experience, and then move onto why the team level of CQ may facilitate effective team processes and performance in multinational teams. In the final segment of this chapter, we support our arguments with an illustrative empirical demonstration.

CULTURAL INTELLIGENCE AS A CONSTRUCT Cultural intelligence captures a person’s capability to adapt effectively to new cultural contexts and it has both process and content features (Earley, 2002; Earley & Ang, 2003; Ng & Earley, 2006; Thomas & Inkson, 2004). Its general structure consists of three facets including metacognitive/cognitive, motivational and behavioral elements and we depict them in Fig. 1. In this section, we describe these facets. Metacognitive and Cognitive Facet The first facet of CQ refers to cognitive processing aspects of intelligence drawing from self-awareness and knowledge of others as well as focusing on how individuals can obtain such knowledge. The knowledge held (and mechanisms through which it is processed) reflects cognitive CQ, while the manner through which the knowledge is acquired in novel circumstances reflects metacognitive processes. Put another way, cognition reflects what is known, while metacognition reflects how we acquire new knowledge. An important aspect of the meta/cognitive facet of CQ is tied to an individual’s self-concept. The self may be conceptualized through a schematic representation (Erez & Earley, 1993; Gati & Erez, 2005; Markus & Kitayama, 1991). Self-schemas are derived from past social experiences and

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Cultural Intelligence

Cognitive • • • • • •

Declarative Procedural Analogical Pattern Recognition External Scanning Self Awareness

Fig. 1.

Motivational • • • • •

Efficacy Persistence Goals Enhancement/Face Value Questioning and Integration

Behavioral • • • •

Repertoire Practices/Rituals Habits Newly Learned

Cultural Intelligence (Adapted from Earley & Ang, 2003).

it consists of both structure and process. As such, the self is both the knower and what is known (Markus & Wurf, 1987). The content of self-conceptions and identities form the structure, and anchors the self in the social system, and self-evaluation deals with the dynamic dimension of the self (Erez & Earley, 1993; Gecas, 1982). Knowing oneself is insufficient for high CQ, however – awareness does not guarantee flexibility. Cognitive flexibility is critical to CQ since new cultural situations require a constant reshaping and adaptation of self-concept to understand a new setting. Flexibility of selfconcept and ease of integrating new facets into it are associated with high CQ since understanding new cultures may require abandoning pre-existing conceptualizations of how and why people function as they do. High CQ also requires a capability of reformulating one’s self-concept (and concept of others) in new complex configurations. Thus, flexibility and a capability to inductively reorganize one’s self-concept is necessary. High CQ requires strong reasoning skills as well. Given that exposure to a new culture often requires a type of detective work to ascertain significant cues in the environment, clearly inductive reasoning is very important. Inductive reasoning is an important capability as a person attempts to sort out, and make sense of, a multitude of social and environmental cues. A person having high CQ has good inductive reasoning since many new cultural contexts provide, at best, ambiguous and, at worst, misleading, cues for what is happening. An important aspect of cognitive functioning in relation to CQ refers to the meta-level strategies that sojourners have for understanding a new


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culture. These higher level cognitive processes are part of a person’s metacognition. Metacognition refers to thinking about thinking, or knowledge about cognitive objects (Flavell, 1987). Metacognition can be further broken down into two complementary elements: metacognitive knowledge and metacognitive experience. Metacognitive knowledge refers to one’s acquired world knowledge that has to do with cognitive matters and it reflects three general categories of knowledge (Flavell, 1987). First, it reflects the person aspects of knowledge or the cognitions that we hold about people as thinking organisms. Second, it refers to task variables, or the nature of the information acquired by an individual. A person learns things about how the type of information encountered influences how it should be dealt with in various contexts. Third, it reflects strategy variables, or the procedures used to achieve some desired goal. Whereas a cognitive strategy might be something such as adding a set of numbers to attain a total, a metacognitive strategy might be to add the numbers up several times to ensure that the total is correct. The original addition procedure gives a ‘‘correct’’ answer to the problem but the successive checks on the total function differently. The follow-up operations are intended to reassure that the correct answer has been found. Metacognition is a critical aspect of CQ since much of what is required in a new culture is putting together patterns into a coherent picture even if one does not know what this coherent picture might look like. To do so requires a higher level of strategy about people, places, and events. It is for this reason that many cultural training programs fail since they overemphasize the specific example at the expense of a more general learning principle. Many companies train their expatriates by providing country-specific information (e.g., a ‘‘Top 10’’ list of rules for survival in the host country). This approach is not only limited by a person’s involvement in the training method but it does not prepare adequately an expatriate for understanding and mastering novel situations – the rules cannot, of course, provide guidance in every new situation. With an effective metastrategy this problem is overcome. Cultural intelligence reflects cognitive processing capabilities in a number of ways (Earley, 2002). Cultural intelligence captures a person’s self-concept and degree of differentiation. Incorporating new information and using the self as a complex filter for understanding new cultural settings is critical. Inductive reasoning is central to CQ since many new cultural situations require that a person steps beyond their existing knowledge in order to fully understand what is going on around them. This is not merely empathy – cues determining another person’s affective state relied upon by an empathetic

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individual may be absent or conflicting with what is expected. Emotional expression may be misleading since it is the underlying emotional states that are truly reflective of a person’s feelings (Mesquita & Frijda, 1992). A highCQ person must inductively create a proper mapping of the social situation to function effectively. Finally, CQ captures metacognition and higher-order learning for an individual. Motivational Facet It is not sufficient to have knowledge of another group’s ways of dealing with the world. One must be able (and motivated) to use this knowledge and produce a culturally appropriate response. In Sternberg’s (1983) formulation of the triarchic theory of intelligence, he diverged from a traditional view and posited the importance of alternative aspects of psychological functioning for understanding intelligence. His triarchic model has three sub-theories including a componential, experiential, and contextual subtheory. The componential sub-theory includes a performance component to it that focuses on the proper execution of actions similar to the behavioral element. A person’s norms and values are related to CQ and they are an important aspect of the self as they guide what features of the social environment that a person attends to and what she values (Schwartz, 1992, 1993). The role of values and norms (from a motivational perspective) for CQ is that they guide our choice of activities as well help define our evaluation of them. A person having strong group-based values is likely to avoid situations requiring personal actions. Further, such a person is likely to evaluate negatively an individual’s idiosyncratic behavior. Thus, cultural adjustment may be impaired by one’s cultural values and norms. In discussing the influence of a person’s motivation as a component of cultural intelligence it is important to return to a person’s self concept (Epstein, 1973; Erez & Earley, 1993; Gati & Erez, 2005; Greenwald, 1980; Markus & Wurf, 1987; Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Markus et al., 1997). That is, cultural intelligence reflects self-concept and directs and motivates adaptation to new cultural surroundings. Self-efficacy is a key facet of the self (Bandura, 1997; Erez & Earley, 1997). Perceived self-efficacy is ‘‘a judgment of one’s capability to accomplish a certain level of performance’’ (Bandura, 1986, p. 391). People tend to avoid tasks and situations which they believe exceed their capabilities. Efficacy judgments promote the choice of situations and tasks with high likelihood of success, and eliminate the choice of tasks that exceed one’s capabilities.


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Self-efficacy plays an important role in CQ because successful intercultural interaction is based on a person’s sense of efficacy for social discourse in a novel setting. A person who does not believe in her own capability to understand people from novel cultures is likely to disengage after experiencing early failures (and failure is likely to occur early in such encounters). If the motivational facet of cultural intelligence is weak, adaptation will not occur. A person’s proactive engagement of new cultural circumstances is highly influenced by a sense of self-efficacy. Some individuals are highly efficacious concerning unfamiliar social settings, and how to mix and learn more about people from unfamiliar cultures. Further, high efficacy means that as individuals confront obstacles, setbacks, or failures, they will re-engage with greater vigor rather than withdraw (Bandura, 1997). This feature of efficacy is critical for a cultural sojourner because much of discovering and adapting to a new culture means overcoming obstacles and setbacks. Highly efficacious people do not require constant rewards to persist in their actions (Bandura, 1997). This is critically important because not only may rewards be delayed, they may appear in a form that is unfamiliar (and thereby, often not obviously as a reward). People having low-efficacy expectations are unable to maintain commitment to a course of action under such duress. An additional benefit of efficacy is derived from a heightened sense of confidence, namely, a strategic way of thinking and problem solving (Bandura, 1997; Locke & Latham, 1990). Individuals who have a strong sense of efficacy engage in a problem solving and strategic approach to overcome obstacles and this is very important in intercultural encounters since immediate and obvious answers to dilemmas may be absent. High-CQ people have a strong efficacy with regard to intercultural encounters and so they ‘‘work smart as well as hard.’’ Behavioral Facet The third facet of CQ refers to the behaviors that a person engages in. The behavioral aspect of CQ suggests that adaptation is not only knowing what and how to do (cognitive) and have the wherewithal to persevere and exert effort (motivational); it requires having in one’s behavioral repertoire responses needed for a given situation. Lacking these specific behaviors, a person must have a capability to acquire such behaviors. Cultural intelligence reflects a person’s capability to acquire or adapt behaviors appropriate for a new culture. Difficulties in acquiring a new language can be important to cultural adjustment such as accurate pronunciation of tones

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and phonemes in languages such as Mandarin or Thai. Given that language conveys many subtleties of a person’s culture, it is our argument that people who lack an aptitude for acquiring languages, at least at some reasonable level of proficiency, will have low CQ. In a sense, language acquisition is a work sample of various types of behavior that one might need to acquire to be successful in an expatriate work context. A person’s behavior is tied to CQ in more indirect ways as well. There are instances in which a person may know and wish to enact a culturally appropriate behavior but he cannot do so because of some deep-set reservation. For example, imagine a global manager who is provided with a plate filled with a local delicacy of live insects (widgety grubs) in the outback area of Australia but who is unable to overcome his revulsion and eat. This type of response (or lack of it) can be thought of in behavioral terms (Luthans & Kreitner, 1985). That is, the specific reinforcement history of an individual bears strong relevance to her execution of particular actions in a new cultural setting. In an intercultural encounter, even if a person is able to provide a desired response eventually, it remains a problem that the host may detect hesitation and react negatively. Behavior properly executed requires a willingness of a person to persist over time. Persistence is necessary for the acquisition of new skills and so is a person’s aptitude to determine these new skills. That is, it is not merely enough to be willing to try and learn new behaviors; a high-CQ person has an aptitude to determine where new behaviors are needed and how to execute them effectively. Role modeling provides an important contribution to behavioral CQ. A person with high CQ is able to adapt his behavior to be appropriate to any given cultural context. Adapting behavior to be consistent with a target culture is an important aspect of intercultural adjustment and interaction. It is not just acting the same as others to pretend to be a member of another culture; it is engaging in actions that put people from another culture at ease and comfortable (Earley & Mosakowski, 2004). This adaptation of one’s personal actions to suit a new context has a number of positive benefits. One consequence of enacting culturally appropriate behavior is to put others at ease. However, there is a potentially more important effect through that of mimicry. A myriad of cues are provided through observing others, and observing their reactions as you interact with them; a person high in behavioral CQ integrates and mimics these cues and behaviors (Bargh & Chartrand, 1999; Chartrand & Bargh, 1999). Work on mimicry suggests that the effective mimicking of another person’s behavior, even if done unconsciously, results in an increased satisfaction with the interaction. Mimicry is subtle and even unconscious (Chartrand & Bargh, 1999) but it


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results in generally positive effects in a social encounter. A high-CQ person is a talented mimic although such mimicry may be largely unconscious. If mimicry is used purposely then it constitutes a type of cognitive strategy as well as a behavioral intervention. It is not simply enough that a person is an effective actor able to control personal displays and actions but she must be able to use the various behavioral cues provided by others to interpret their actions and underlying motives. What is particularly difficult about such inferences is that these behaviors often occur in highly unfamiliar settings and as part of unfamiliar rituals. Cultural Intelligence and Related Constructs There are a number of intelligence theories using a multifaceted construct approach (e.g., Gardner, 1983, 1993, 1998; Salovey & Mayer, 1990; Sternberg, 1985). Gardner proposed and popularized the idea that there are multiple facets to intelligence (Gardner, 1983, 1998). He argued that his intelligences exist on the basis of their cultural significance and their relation to underlying brain structures and functioning. This departure from the dominant view of intelligence as consisting of an underlying construct, ‘‘g’’, is reflected in a number of other scholars’ works as well. Sternberg’s Triarchic Model (Sternberg, 1985) is an important example of a multifaceted framework for understanding intelligence. A central part of this discussion focuses on the idea of social intelligence; that is, there exists a social intelligence separate from the cognitive skills often thought to underlie intelligence. Social intelligence refers to the capability of a person to adjust to and interact with others in an effective fashion. People having a high social or emotional intelligence are thought to be relatively more able to empathize, work with, direct, and interact with other people. In essence, high social intelligence reflects a person’s capacity to perform actions (such as problem solving) with and through others. Social intelligence is the ability to get along with people in general, knowledge of social matters, ease with others, empathy of others, and insights concerning others. A concept related to social intelligence having received a great deal of attention in the popular as well as academic pages is emotional intelligence. This concept, popularized by Goleman (1995) in his book, Emotional Intelligence, refers to a person’s capability to detect others’ emotional states, introspect and regulate one’s own emotions, and to use emotions to enact desired action. Salovey and Mayer (1990) describe various aspects of emotional intelligence and they have conducted numerous studies on this construct as well as developed a research assessment tool.

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What, then, might cultural intelligence add to this expansive list of intelligences? Earley and Ang (2003) argue that social and emotional intelligence (those facets most strongly related to cultural intelligence) are limited by a cultural boundedness. By this it is meant that social and emotional intelligence are meaningful within a given cultural context, but they do not necessarily apply in new cultural settings. This is due to a number of reasons. First, the rules for social interaction within a culture are limiting and social intelligence does not necessarily imply that a person possesses effective metacognitive strategies. For example, it may be appropriate and desirable within France for a male supervisor to compliment his female subordinate about her clothing and appearance.1 Further, a given French supervisor might be able to sense that his subordinate enjoys such compliments a great deal. As an emotionally intelligent supervisor he may choose to compliment his subordinate when he desires her to provide customers with good service (that is, if she is in a positive mood, her service to customers will be improved). However, this practice would be ill advised in an American workplace since the compliment might easily be misinterpreted as harassment or a proposition. With emotional intelligence, the rules of the game (cultural) are well known and relatively consistent. Although it is true that some employees may react differentially to a personal compliment within France, such a compliment will not likely be misconstrued. For a manager reassigned from Paris to Lyon, the basic norms for behavior are still, ultimately, French. Across individuals, the French manager must determine the likely reaction of his subordinates to a personal compliment. However, in doing so, he again has a consistency of reaction according to general cultural rules of interaction. Perhaps a rule he has identified for himself is that if a woman has on a fully coordinated outfit and that she is in a good mood that she will enjoy a compliment about her appearance. This heuristic can be applied to various French women across various contexts by the manager. Further, let us assume that this manager has been very successful at using his heuristic and he is considered by his female employees to be a very positive influence on their work and attitude. If the French manager now is assigned to a facility for his company in Columbus, Ohio, he needs a way of determining if his heuristic applies to Ohio women. Having high emotional intelligence he applies his heuristic by assessing whether or not his new subordinate’s outfit is coordinated (it is) and if she is in a good mood (she is). He now compliments her on her personal appearance and tells her that she really looks good to him. A few days later, the manager receives a complaint through the human resources department of the company for putting his subordinate into an uncomfortable position.


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What are lacking in this example are the metacognitive strategies for determining how to develop new heuristics and rules for giving personal compliments. A person having high social or emotional intelligence relies on existing heuristics and cultural rules for determining how to influence others and to assess their emotions. Unfortunately, these rules and heuristics may not at all be appropriate in a new culture. Cultural intelligence means that a person has metacognitive strategies that are employed to overcome strange new social contexts attributable to intercultural interactions. Second, a high social or emotional intelligence does not provide a framework for understanding how one acquires knowledge used in new social settings. Cultural intelligence specifically captures the processes through which we acquire new rules and information. The metacognitive strategies central to CQ are essential when a new culture is encountered since much of what a person must do is to look beyond their own cultural lens to comprehend another cultural frame. In the example of the French manager, he must possess a metacognitive strategy to determine the significance of compliments given by men to women and how/when it is appropriate to do so. Further, he must have a metacognitive strategy for figuring out to learn more about social interactions (such as complimenting a work colleague) in a new culture. Third, emotional and social intelligence models are largely limited to cognitive processing and they mostly ignore the motivational and behavioral aspects of action. In an organizational setting, it does not make a lot of sense to speak of intelligent action without considering the importance of personal motives and behavioral capability. Cultural intelligence requires that a person be willing to persevere during difficult times or having received failure feedback. Motivational states are not incorporated into traditional faceted models of intelligence. Similarly, the behavioral display and engagement necessary for CQ is left unspecified largely in most models of social or emotional intelligence.

CULTURAL INTELLIGENCE AND THE MULTINATIONAL TEAM EXPERIENCE The reliance upon teams composed of managers from a range of different countries is now a commonplace practice in multinational firms (Bartlett & Ghoshal, 1998). And although groups researchers have long been interested in composition effects, this interest has focused on observable individual skills and easily visible demographic characteristics such as age, sex, race,

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functional background, or nationality (e.g., Williams & O’Reilly, 1998) as ‘inputs’ to group process (Hackman, 1987; McGrath, 1984). This research has, however, overlooked the less observable but key composition variable of CQ. Researchers interested in composition have been drawn to the use of demographic variables because of the relative ease of data collection and have often assumed that these variables are proxies for an individual’s values, perspectives, or cognitive orientation that affect group process and performance (e.g., Pfeffer, 1983; Williams & O’Reilly, 1998). These assumptions are tenuous at best; however, and risk relies on stereotypical views of individual differences. While age, sex, race, and functional background may shape values and orientations, they are not the primary roots of individual differences. The appropriateness of using demographic variables as indicators of deeper-level differences is therefore questionable. For example, a number of recent studies have found little or no differences in values according to sex (Bengston & Lovejoy, 1973; Sanders, 1993; Rowe & Snizek, 1995). High levels of variation in values and attitudes have also been found across individuals of the same race (Block, Roberson, & Neugen, 1993). Thus, because demographic characteristics are not consistent indicators of values, perspectives, or cognitive orientations, it is important to measure these attributes more directly (Moynihan & Peterson, 2001). One key method for digging more deeply into individual differences in motivation and cognition about members from other cultures is through the use of CQ. The importance of CQ as a more predictive composition variable than demographic characteristics should also increase with the rise of multinational team-based work in firms. Recent social cognition research has revealed, in fact, that the demographic characteristics of other group members become less salient over time as members of a group or team get to know each other better, while underlying personal characteristics, such as CQ, become more salient (Harrison, Price, & Bell, 1998; Levine & Moreland, 1998). Empirical findings show that over time, surface-level demographic differences in a group will be transcended by deeper-level differences in things such as personality, personal values, and CQ (e.g., Lawrence, 1997; Watson, Kumar, & Michaelsen, 1993). The development of any latent aptitude such as CQ requires experience and practice. Cultural intelligence reflects a capability or aptitude that can be developed through such experience and practice. For example, enhancing the motivational aspect of CQ can be achieved by introducing simple mastery experiences for a sojourner. In a training program for expatriate and


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global managers, the third author has a manager select four or five simple activities that are found to be comforting in a daily or weekly routine such as buying a cappuccino or newspaper, grocery shopping, etc. The manager is assigned the task of figuring out how to perform these simple actions in the first two weeks of being in a new culture. This simple mastery experience provides a base for efficacy so that when more significant challenges are faced (e.g., providing a performance appraisal to a local subordinate) and possibly failed, the manager has a buffer of efficacy mastery experiences from which to draw strength. The experience of being part of a truly multinational team where each team member is from a different culture can be a form of ‘‘on-the-job training,’’ which is often an effective learning mechanism. On-the-job training is effective because individuals learn by doing and get immediate and ongoing feedback about the correctness of their behaviors and performance (Wexley & Latham, 2001). In the case of developing CQ, having daily interactions with members from other cultures in order to get work done provides a context where team members can receive feedback on the effectiveness of their communication and working style in the group and have the opportunity to gather information, or cues, about the other member’s behavior. Being in a multinational team also provides a context for which team members can practice their identification and testing of cultural clues. Practice is critical in facilitating the conversion of an aptitude into a skill. For example, we can learn about how an individual might acquire cultural intelligence by drawing on research about chess players. Although the stereotypical image of a chess player may seem to be far removed from the average professional manager, what we know about expertise and development of a latent talent can be learned from chess players. Many studies have examined the acquisition of expertise by studying chess players. In studies that compare experts and novice chess players, experts have greater memory organization structures and perceptual skills compared to novices. Although experts and novices have similar memory constraints, limited to a few ‘‘chunks’’ or clusters of information that they can bring to bear in any problem-solving situation (such as positions of chess pieces), experts’ chunks consist of larger perceptual units. Novices might only have one piece in their chunk. In contrast, experts stored familiar patterns of pieces, or groups of patterns, as a single chunk (Chase & Simon, 1973; DeGroot, 1966). In fact, scholars who have studied the development of expertise in chess players note that although there must clearly be a set of specific aptitudes (e.g., handling spatial relations and problem solving) that encompass a talent for chess,

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individual differences in aptitude are complemented by individual differences in experience playing chess (Chase & Simon, 1973). The organization of the master’s sophisticated repertoire of information takes thousand of hours to build in chess, and in any skilled task such as playing a musical instrument, speaking a second language, or understanding people from different cultures. In the case of working in a multinational team, experiences gained through various interactions among team members will enhance team members’ cultural intelligence for several reasons. First, team members must seek to understand one another’s perspectives and priorities to work together. Second, team members are motivated to work with one another and their experiences will enhance confidence at dealing with others, ceteris paribus. Finally, mutual interaction provides members with an opportunity to acquire new behaviors and actions from fellow members’ different cultures. Thus experience in highly diverse multinational teams provides the context and opportunity to build cultural intelligence. Proposition 1. Team member cultural intelligence will increase with experience in a highly heterogeneous multinational team (MNT).

Team Processes that Enhance a Multinational Team Experience Although we expect that any kind of experience in multinational teams can promote cultural intelligence, there are also reasons to believe that teams that adopt particular processes provide even better opportunities for cultural intelligence to be enhanced by the team experience. Diverse teams can benefit from their members various skills, knowledge, and perspectives (Williams & O’Reilly, 1998), but such teams also experience more difficulty working together because its members do not intrinsically share the same mental models (Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994) and thus have a harder time developing norms of behavior. Agreement about norms is important for work unit effectiveness (Argote, 1989). Earley and Mosakowski (2000) argued that although multinational teams do not necessarily begin with shared meaning systems, successful ones create hybrid team cultures over time. By hybrid team culture, they refer to an emergent and simplified set of rules, norms, expectations, and roles that team members share and ‘‘enact.’’ This emergent culture offers a common sense of identity that becomes group specific, provides a basis for team member self-valuation, and facilitates team interaction and performance (Casmir, 1992; Klimoski & Mohammed,


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1994). Earley and Mosakowski (2000) found that teams with very high or very low levels of diversity were most successful at creating hybrid team cultures. There is likely, however, to be variance within highly diverse multinational teams on their ability to develop a shared emergent and simplified set of norms. We expect that because hybrid norms provides a basis for team member self-evaluation, multinational teams with stronger norms will do more to promote the development of cultural intelligence of its members than teams with weaker norms. Proposition 2. Team member cultural intelligence will increase more in multinational teams with stronger hybrid norms than weaker ones. Individuals may be more likely to increase their level of CQ when working in teams that have a high level of open communication. Open communication exists in a group when all feel it is easy to talk openly to each other in a non-threatening interpersonal atmosphere (cf. Edmondson, 1999 on creating a sense of psychological safety). Being in a team that gives and receives information freely and everyone feels free to express their opinion has been shown to increase individual motivation and often productivity (Kanfer, 1990). In the multinational team, this is likely to allow team members greater access to information about cultural differences and thus increase their level of CQ more than in teams with lower levels of open communication. Proposition 3. Team member cultural intelligence will increase more in multinational teams with higher levels of open communication than ones with low levels of open communication. The extent of positive feedback team members get from experiencing high levels of performance could also effect the development of cultural intelligence. If a team has a history of success it builds collective efficacy and team spirit that unites members (e.g., Bandura, 2000). Team productivity increases group cohesiveness, which reduces tension among group members and provides a supportive environment (Mullen & Copper, 1994). In short, positive feedback about performance enhances cooperative team processes often associated with future performance success (e.g., Peterson & Behfar, 2003). Members of successful teams become more committed to the team, and persist longer in working for the team, when obstacles and setbacks occur. This, we believe, is likely to increase motivation to understand each other better even if there are significant cross-cultural difficulties. It could be, for example, that experience in a multinational team that has performed

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poorly could lead potentially to reduced motivation for cultural interactions and therefore reduced cultural intelligence. Proposition 4. Team member cultural intelligence will increase more in multinational teams having higher levels of team performance than those having lower levels of performance. While the multinational team experience should have important effects on the development of cultural intelligence of its team members, it is also true that the initial level of CQ that exists in the team will have an important influence on a multinational team’s ability to develop effective group processes. Teamwork skills stem in part from team members attributes and motivations that affects individual preferences for behavior and in turn shape intragroup relations (Yeatts & Hyten, 1998). The Role of Member CQ in Creating Team Processes Cultural intelligence represents individual-level cognition, motivation, and behavioral processes that shape group-level tasks and interpersonal process behaviors in teams (Bales, 1958; Jackson, May, & Whitney, 1995) and, ultimately, team-level information processing and cohesion (Hackman, 1987). Cultural intelligence may operate in an additive way, meaning that the more savvy and urbane high-CQ individuals in the group can compensate for the shortcomings of a less culturally sophisticated members and facilitate group processes. The group level of CQ can be examined as an emergent construct comprised of the CQ of its members. Cultural intelligence is an important team composition variable to promote optimal functioning of multinational teams. Diverse groups, such as multinational teams, often fail to benefit from their varied experience and viewpoints because of poor interpersonal understanding, miscommunication, lack of identification in the group, and conflict (cf. Behfar et al., 2006). Trust is often difficult to develop in demographically diverse groups. Cultural intelligence can, however, be an important factor mitigating the difficulties diverse groups face and can aid in the development of trust in the group. The level of trust in a team is the degree to which team members perceive team-wide expectations of truthfulness, integrity, and living up to one’s word. It also includes a shared sense of respect for each group member’s competence. Higher levels of intra-team trust are associated with successful information sharing and decision making because task conflict is less likely to be misinterpreted as relationship conflict (Simons & Peterson, 2000). Relationship conflict represents the degree of interpersonal incompatibility


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and typically includes tension, annoyance, and animosity among team members. Research has shown that relationship conflict among members of a team generally leads to poor-quality decisions and team member dissatisfaction (De Dreu & Weingart, 2003). The influence of team member CQ to team trust occurs through a variety of mechanisms. For example, high CQ means that team members are more likely than not to identify key features of one another’s cultures necessary for effective interaction. Additionally, high CQ means that team members will adopt the behaviors of one another to enhance interpersonal communication. Both effective interactions and communication are perquisites for trust. Thus, we propose Proposition 5. Average team-level cultural intelligence is positively related to intragroup trust. Average team-level cultural intelligence should also promote cohesion, which is the extent to which team members like and value each other. Team members having high CQ are able to appreciate others’ diversity and they are more attracted to these differences. Cohesion acts to emotionally attract members to be committed to the team and is generally an important factor for a team’s success (see Mullen & Copper, 1994). Proposition 6. Average team-level cultural intelligence is positively related to team cohesion. The Role of Member CQ in Improving Team Performance These team characteristics of trust and cohesion are important for group coordination, group efficacy, innovative problem solving, and extent to which team members learn from each other over time. Team coordination represents the extent to which team members can accomplish group tasks smoothly and efficiently without confusion. Coordination develops over time in groups. Groups that fail to develop coordination need to backtrack and re-start often. Collective efficacy, or team confidence, is very important in multinational teams and can result from the trust and cohesion built up by CQ. Highly efficacious teams believe they can take on any task and tackle any problem. This usually results from positive team dynamics built through trust and cohesion and low levels of relationship conflict. Positive team dynamics resulting from high team levels of CQ can lead to important cognitive functioning and problem solving of the group. Team innovation results from team members suggesting new ideas or approaches

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for doing things and experimenting with new ideas, even when things are running smoothly. This requires that team members work together to find a solution when a non-routine problem arises. The degree to which team members feel they are exchanging knowledge and learning from each other is also an important outcome in a multinational (or any) team. These team characteristics of trust and cohesion are important for group coordination, group efficacy, innovative problem solving, and extent to which team members learn from each other as the group matures. Average team-level CQ should therefore promote performance. Proposition 7. Team-level cultural intelligence will predict multinational team performance. We summarize these propositions in Fig. 2 and offer it as a preliminary multilevel framework for understanding how cultural intelligence might operate in a multinational team context. In the next section of the chapter, we provide an illustration of our framework with data drawn from 48 multinational teams.

A SUPPORTING EMPIRICAL ILLUSTRATION In order to provide some preliminary support for our model, we examined the cultural intelligence development of MBA students who are required to work in highly diverse multinational teams. The sample consists of 302 MBA students who worked in 48 multinational teams for the first year of their MBA program. These MBA students are on average 28 years old and have five years of work experience. Each team of six includes members from each of the four major regions of the world (Europe, Asia, North America, and South America). These multinational teams work together for an entire year and are responsible for producing group projects for their various courses. Thus, these are teams for whom some degree of cultural intelligence is both required for success, and where one can reasonably expect individuals who will have to deal with cross-national issues as they work together. We measured initial team member cultural intelligence at the start of the students’ orientation to the program and before they worked in their teams using a scale developed by Ang, Ng, Tan, Lee, and Earley (2003).2 We also measured team member cultural intelligence after four months of working in these teams. We collected data on their group process at several time periods over the course of the year to track how the teams’ processes were evolving over time. Team performance on a key group project, a live client fieldwork

Norms

Feedback

Individual Cultural Intelligence Time 1 (pre-team experience)

Fig. 2.

Team Level Cultural Intelligence

Team Relational Processes Trust

Cohesion

Team Performance and Effectiveness


Multinational Team Developmental Experience

Individual Cultural Intelligence Time 2 (after team experience)

Multilevel Model Linking Multinational Team Experience and Cultural Intelligence.

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project, was also collected. The field project was an ‘‘Organizational Audit’’ for which the teams needed to analyze a functioning organization and apply theirs from their organizational behavior course (motivation, rewards, organizational design and structure, etc.). This project requires a high degree of social interaction both among team members as well as between team members and the client organization. We use these data to illustrate and test our general framework proposed earlier. T-test results confirmed Proposition 1 as we found that the mean level of cultural intelligence was significantly higher after four months of working in the multinational teams compared to students’ initial level prior to starting the program. Thus, we found support for the idea that experience in a multinational team can increase the CQ of its members. Proposition 2 which stated that cultural intelligence will increase more in multinational teams with stronger hybrid norms was supported. We conducted this as well as the following individual-level analysis by structural equation modeling as well as regression analysis with team cluster adjustments. We found that team norms are significantly positively related to individual CQ after four months of working in the multinational teams after controlling for their CQ level prior to joining the teams. Proposition 3, that CQ will increase more in multinational teams with higher levels of open communication, was not supported. The average team member CQ was unrelated to the perceived nature of open communication in the teams. Proposition 4 which stated that CQ will increase more in multinational teams with higher levels of team performance was supported. We found that team performance on the organizational audit project is significantly positively related to individual CQ after four months of working in the multinational teams, after controlling for their CQ level prior to joining the teams. We examined Propositions 5–7 that are concerned with the effects of a team’s level of CQ on its subsequent processes and performance by examining correlations of the team average CQ with measures of group processes and performance taken at three points in time over a four-month period. Team level of initial CQ (time 1) positively correlated with group cohesion and trust three months later (time 3). It was also positively correlated with hybrid norms although this was not proposed in our framework. Thus, Propositions 5 and 6 were supported. These important process variables were significantly positively correlated with current and subsequent processes of group coordination, group efficacy, strength of hybrid norms, innovation, and extent of learning in the team. Further, the mean team level of CQ after


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working together for four months was significantly positively correlated with team performance on the audit project, supporting Proposition 7.

CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS Cultural intelligence is an important capability or aptitude for today’s global business professionals. Although it is a latent aptitude, our model and data both suggest four key ideas. First, member CQ can be developed through experience working in a multinational team. Second, this process can be especially strengthened if that multinational team experience is characterized by strong hybrid norms and positive performance feedback. Third, base levels of member CQ encourage trust and cohesion in the multinational team. And finally, member CQ can usefully predict longer-term team performance. These ideas have important implications for the scholar and practitioner alike. For the scholar, our work suggests that CQ is a potentially important breakthrough in thinking about the multinational team. Most importantly, this perspective suggests some of the psychological mechanisms by which cross-cultural experience and success can be developed. For the practitioner, our work also suggests both that CQ is trainable, but also suggests a way forward in how to do some of that training. Multinational teams can be an important source of CQ development, provided they operate under certain conditions that will encourage the development of CQ – most specifically strong hybrid team roles and a positive feedback experience. Of course, much remains to be done by way of developing the CQ idea. Future research should begin to focus on a larger and more carefully developed study of our hypotheses. Such studies should focus not only on scale, but also causal ordering of constructs to answer questions such as: Is multinational team performance improved by member CQ because of the increased levels of trust and cohesion, which themselves have been shown to improve group performance more generally? or Does member CQ have a direct effect on the performance of multinational teams? Future research on group-level CQ also needs to consider alternative meanings of CQ as a group versus individual-level construct and how it should be aggregated. For example, in this paper we have assumed that group level of CQ is theoretically an additive and compensatory construct. That is, high-CQ members compensate for those who may be lower on CQ in the group. If however, that is not theorized to be the way CQ operates in a group, it is important to remember that individual group members’ scores

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can be aggregated in many different ways to fit the researcher’s theoretical position. For example, drawing on Steiner’s (1972) typology of group task types, aggregating based on the mean is most appropriate only for tasks that are additive, meaning that the group outcome is a result of the summative combination of the contributions of all group members. Use of the minimum individual score in a group is most appropriate if the task is conjunctive, meaning that the group’s task is highly interdependent and performance is dependent on the level of the lowest member (or weakest link). For example, one person very low on CQ may disrupt an entire group’s interpersonal processes, regardless of the level of overall CQ in the group (see LePine, Hollenbeck, Ilgen, & Hedlund, 1997; Moynihan & Peterson, 2001). Use of variance is most appropriate when testing hypotheses about diversity (or consensus) on team outcomes (Chan, 1998). Use of the score of the team leader may be most appropriate when the group outcome is determined by the performance of the leader. These are alternative theoretical views of group level CQ that should be explored in the future.

NOTES 1. This example was adapted from Earley (2002). 2. The scale used in this empirical illustration is available from the third author upon request. Alternatively, Ang, Van Dyne, and Ng who have developed a shortened version of the survey that is available by contacting the first author. Finally, another variation on the scale is available in Earley, Ang, and Tan (2006).

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GLOBAL WORK CULTURE AND GLOBAL IDENTITY, AS A PLATFORM FOR A SHARED UNDERSTANDING IN MULTICULTURAL TEAMS Efrat Shokef and Miriam Erez ABSTRACT As part of the globalizing work environment, new forms of organizations have emerged, ranging from international to multinational and transnational organizations. These forms of organizations require high levels of cross-national interdependence, and often the formation of multicultural teams (MCTs), nested within multinational organizations. Employees who operate in the global multinational context should share common meanings, values, and codes of behaviors in order to effectively communicate with each other and coordinate their activities. What helps global multicultural team members create the social glue that connects them to each other, above and beyond the national cultures to which they belong? We propose that a more macro-level meaning system of a global work culture, which is the shared understanding of the visible rules, regulations, and behaviors, and the deeper values and ethics of the global work context, that is formed outside of the level of national cultures, binds members of MCTs. At the National Culture and Groups Research on Managing Groups and Teams, Volume 9, 325–352 Copyright r 2006 by Elsevier Ltd. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved ISSN: 1534-0856/doi:10.1016/S1534-0856(06)09013-X

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individual level, the representation of these global work values in the self leads to the emergence of a global identity, which is an individual’s sense of belonging to and identification with groups (such as MCTs), operating in the global work environment of multinational organizations. The chapter focuses on the potential influence of a global work culture, and of a global identity on the effectiveness of MCTs.

INTRODUCTION Research on work teams has commonly taken place within the boundaries of one culture. In most of the early research on teams, the cultural factor was not even an issue (i.e., McGrath, 1984). As part of the increased dominance of multinational organizations (MNO), global multicultural teams (MCTs) have been formed. Global MCTs consist of ‘‘individuals from different cultures working together on activities that span national borders’’ (Snell, Snow, Canney-Davidson, & Hambrick, 1998). Most team processes that take place in teams in general also characterize global MCTs (Ilgen, LePine, & Hollenbeck, 1997). Yet, global MCTs differ from other teams in their team composition and their communication patterns. Therefore, they face additional challenges that they need to cope with. An in-depth study of the challenges faced by 40 managers working in MCTs revealed that similar to any other team, they cope with interpersonal tensions, and disagreements about work pace, fairness in the workload distribution, and procedures to get the work done (Behfar, Kern, & Brett, 2006). Nevertheless, in addition, other issues emerged. These are related to cultural differences such as differences in work norms and behaviors, violation of respect and hierarchy, lack of common ground, language fluency, and ways of communicating, whether implicit or explicit. An important factor in overcoming many of the above challenges is the existence of a shared meaning system that would allow team members to understand each other and interpret each other’s intentions and behaviors (Earley & Gibson, 2002). Individuals working in same culture teams have a common cultural ground. Yet, team members working in the global work environment of MNOs need to develop a shared meaning system that reflects a common global work culture, beyond their different national cultures (Erez & Gati, 2004; Leung, Bhagat, Buchan, Erez, & Gibson, 2005). Culture is a shared meaning system (Erez & Earley, 1993). Cultural values are represented in the self and help the individual evaluate the meaning of managerial and motivational approaches in terms of their contributions to a

Global Work Culture and Global Identity

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person’s sense of self-worth and well-being. Positive evaluations will result in enhanced effort and performance, while negative evaluations will mitigate effort and performance. Yet, people coming from different value systems may attribute different meanings to the same managerial approach and react to it in different ways. Employees working in the same local national culture share the same national meaning system (Hofstede, 2001), which supports their adaptation to their local organization. Yet, employees working in MNOs encounter a mosaic of other cultures that hinders the shared understanding and their ability to correctly interpret the behavioral responses of other team members. The question is how members of global MCTs develop a shared meaning system that enables them to effectively communicate with each other, to correctly interpret the meaning of the other members’ responses, and to share knowledge and understanding of how they should all act toward achieving their group goal. Therefore, the first objective of this paper is to examine what helps global MCT members create the social glue that connect them to each other, beyond what connects each member to the national cultures to which they belong. Building upon Erez and Gati (2004)’s multi-level model of culture, we propose that a global work culture reflects a macro-level meaning system, beyond national cultures. This macro-level work culture is defined as the shared understanding of the visible rules, regulations and behaviors, and the deeper values and ethics of the global work context. The second objective of the present study is to understand how the representation of the global work values in the self creates a global identity, defined as an individual’s sense of belonging to and identification with groups (such as MCTs), operating in the global work environment of MNOs. Finally, this chapter examines the impact of the emergent global work culture, and the formation of a global identity on an MCT performance. In the next sections, we define what MCTs are, review the research literature, and generate research propositions that lead to possible answers to the above questions.

MULTICULTURAL TEAMS A growing number of employees in MNOs work as part of global MCTs. Members of these teams are natives of different cultural environments, and they hold diverse cultural identities. These factors affect their understanding, interpreting, and way of responding to various situations (Erez & Earley, 1993; Markus & Kitayama, 1991).

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MCTs have emerged in response to the needs of MNOs (Bartlett & Ghoshal, 1989). Truly, MNOs no longer operate their business only from their home country, as was traditionally done, and they cannot separate their functions according to national locations. Rather, companies are recognizing the need to leverage the diversity of their employees in order to sustain their competitive advantage in the global marketplace (Ely, 2004; Jehn & Bezrukova, 2004; Thomas & Ely, 1996). MNOs form MCTs that pool global talents and meet organizational goals of reaching overseas’ markets and implementing complex business strategies (Joshi, Labianca, & Caligiuri, 2002). MCTs are typically formed when specialized skills are possessed by experts who are situated in different places (Prieto & Arias, 1997). MCTs can be recomposed and reassigned to respond to shifting opportunities in global markets (Solomon, 1995), in order to meet everchanging task requirements in highly turbulent and dynamic global business environments (Jarvenpaa & Leidner, 1999; Mowshowitz, 1997; Snow, Snell, & Davidson, 1996).

Shared Meaning Systems in MCTs One of the challenges faced by organizations operating globally is to create MCTs that work effectively (Montoya-Weiss, Massey, & Song, 2001). The highly diverse nature of MCTs may either facilitate or inhibit group performance. On the one hand, the culturally diverse composition of MCTs enables a broad range of perspectives, skills, and insights, which can increase the group’s creativity and problem-solving capabilities, thereby enhancing performance (Cox, 1993; Cox & Black, 1991). On the other, MCTs can also have high levels of conflicts and misunderstandings (Armstrong & Cole, 1995; Behfar et al., 2006; Jehn, Northcraft, & Neale, 1999; Joshi et al., 2002; Salk & Brannen, 2000; Shenkar & Zeira, 1992). In-group conflicts mitigate the ability of the group to perform effectively over time, and to provide satisfying experiences for its members (De Dreu & Weingart, 2003; Earley & Mosakowski, 2000; Ravlin, Thomas, & Ilsev, 2000). This process loss potentially results from different perceptions, attributions, and communication patterns that vary by national cultures (Adler, 1991). Furthermore, most people have a preference for interacting with similar others and find such interactions easier, reinforcing, and more desirable compared to interactions with others who are different (Williams & O’Reilly, 1998). Similarity among team members is positively associated with team effectiveness and interpersonal attraction (Hambrick & Mason, 1984; Tsui,


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Egan, & O’Reilly, 1992). Members of homogeneous teams report a stronger affinity for their team members compared to members of heterogeneous teams (Ibarra, 1992). Therefore, creating a shared meaning system in MCTs may help overcome the negative impact of cultural diversity, as it helps overcome frictions and team conflicts (Earley & Gibson, 2002). A shared meaning system at the team level develops through socialization to the team and through contacts and interactions among team members. A team culture develops over time in response to common goals that the team strives to accomplish (Earley & Gibson, 2002). The shared team culture results in decreased variability in the team’s values and behavioral patterns (Erez & Earley, 1993). The strength of the team culture is determined by the degree of homogeneity in the perceptions, values, and behavioral norms held by its members (Chan, Gelfand, Triandis, & Tzeng, 1996; Schwartz & Sagie, 2000). Working together enables team members to develop a shared mental model, which is a shared psychological representation of the team’s environment. This, in turn, helps the members communicate and coordinate their activities effectively (Klimoski & Mohammed, 1994). The strength, or the degree of homogeneity of the team members’ shared mental model and culture, was found to have a positive effect on team performance (Kotter & Hasket, 1992; Gorden & DiTomaso, 1992; Mathieu, Goodwin, Heffner, Salas, Cannon-Bowers, 2000). For example, Earley and Mosakowski (2000) showed that effective teams had a strong team culture that facilitated team communication and team performance. They showed that national heterogeneity was detrimental to performance during the initial interaction phase of MCTs. However, over time, heterogeneous teams improved their communication and appeared to create a common identity that reduced the detrimental effect of team heterogeneity on team performance. Klimoski and Mohammed (1994) showed that over time teams developed shared mental models that increased the propensity to trust each other and hence, improved team performance. Thus, for a group to be integrative and effective it must develop, share, and enact a simplified set of rules and actions. Earley and Mosakowski (2000) referred to the unique team culture developed in MCTs as a hybrid culture, which is ‘‘an emergent and simplified set of rules and actions, work capabilities, and expectations shared and enacted after mutual interactions’’ (Earley & Gibson, 2002, p. 61). Others referred to it as a team synergy (Adler, 1991), or as a third culture (Casmir, 1992) defined as an emergent simplified set of cognitions and behaviors that provide an identity to an MCT that shares and enacts them (Adair, Tinsley, & Taylor, 2006). Third cultures exist when a group develops shared schemas containing not only the knowledge of the group and its task, but also a

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shared system of beliefs, values, and norms, providing a group identity (Adair et al., 2006). The third culture approach is often characterized by behaviors facilitating trust, mutual respect, and cooperation (Graen, Hui, Wakabayashi, & Wang, 1997). Following the above discussion, we propose Proposition 1. MCTs with a shared team culture perform better than MCTs without a shared team culture. These models of a hybrid culture (Earley & Gibson, 2002) and third culture (Adair et al., 2006; Casmir, 1992) focus mainly on the processes taking place within the MCTs to create the unique team culture that may facilitate its success. We, however, argue that these teams do not necessarily develop an exclusive third culture, as they are nested within the MNO and they internalize its corporate values. MNOs operate beyond national cultures. Therefore, their cultural values should reflect the characteristics of the global work context, and should accommodate the cross-cultural diversity of their labor force. In the next section, we discuss the characteristics of the global work environment and examine the shared meaning system of members of MNOs and MCTs that provides them with a common ground for understanding one another, and for overcoming possible misunderstandings.

IS THERE A MEANING SYSTEM SHARED BY INDIVIDUALS WORKING IN MNOs? Groups are commonly nested within organizations, which are nested within nations. Hence, the values and norms adopted by group members are shaped to some degree by the cultural values of their organizations, and the latter are shaped to some degree by the surrounding national culture (Erez & Gati, 2004). MCTs are part of MNOs, which operate above and beyond one’s national culture. MNOs emerge in response to global competition (Govindarajan & Gupta, 2001), and are major actors in the global work environment (Bartlett & Ghoshal, 1994). They make important contributions to globalization by creating economic interdependence among countries via the increased cross-border flow of goods and services, capital, know-how (Govindarajan & Gupta, 2001), and human resources (Erez & Gati, 2004). Simultaneously, the MNO culture is shaped by the globalization it is helping to establish. Globalization has accelerated as a result of advances in telecommunication, and a rapid increase in economic and financial interdependence among different cultures and world regions (Arnett, 2002). This process leads to


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greater interdependence and mutual awareness among economic, political, and social units in the world, and among actors in general (Guillen, 2001), and by which cultures influence one another through trade, immigration, and the exchange of information and ideas (Arnett, 2002). Contrary to the national environment, the global environment exists outside the usual reference to geographical territory, is considered as not being tied to specific place or time (Featherstone, Lash, & Robertson, 1995; Morley & Robins, 1995), and as being in continuous motion and change (Appadurai, 2001). Work organizations differ in their level of global involvement. They range from domestic organizations with some international involvement (e.g., importing or exporting), through international organizations (Abbas, 2000), and up to MNOs and transnational organizations (Bartlett & Ghoshal, 1989; Ghoshal & Nohria, 1993). Organizations involved in global activities differ than domestic organizations by being geographically dispersed, multicultural, and operating in more than one country (Miroshnik, 2002; Thurow, 2003). MNOs confront an external environment that is more complex, dynamic, and competitive than local environments (Francesco & Gold, 1998). They face different systems of foreign currency, taxation, customs regulations, and so forth, and at the same time, they must comply with a global system that has its own set of international laws and standards that regulate all the MNOs’ global operations, linking all these local contexts together into one global organization (Miroshnik, 2002). As a major factor in the global environment, MNOs are considered to be important repositories of resources and knowledge. They are a key source of wealth generation as they continuously improve their productivity and competitiveness. Moreover, their share in defining, creating, and distributing values makes MNOs one of society’s major agents of social change (Bartlett & Ghoshal, 1994). We argue that while individual MNOs have their own unique organizational characteristics, as a group these organizations operating in the same external global environment, share some common characteristics. Building upon an ecological approach (Berry, Poortinga, Segall, & Dasen, 1992), these common characteristics of MNOs shape the values, which guide the behaviors of individuals working in MNOs and create a shared global work culture.

A Global Work Culture Culture is often defined as a set of shared meaning systems (Schweder & LeVine, 1984), a set of mental programs (Hofstede, 1980), or as a shared

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knowledge structure that results in decreased variability in values and behavioral patterns (Erez & Earley, 1993). It is what a group learns over a period of time while it solves its problems of survival in an external environment and its problems of internal integration (Schein, 1992). Culture has different layers of depth, ranging from the most visible layer of artifacts, practices, and behaviors, to the less visible layer of values, and down to the least visible layer of basic assumptions (Schein, 1992). A shared meaning system can be formed at different levels, from the micro level of the group, the meso level of organizations, and up to the macro level of nations and beyond. A cultural system can also be formed by members of global organizations who transcend national cultural borders in sharing a common understanding of what it means to operate in the global work environment (Erez & Gati, 2004). This macro level of a global work culture, developed over time, is based on the experience gained by individuals, groups, and organizations working in the global work environment as they solve their problems of survival in the global, multicultural environment. Although not all MNOs corporate cultures are the same, we suggest that they have a common denominator, shared by individuals working in MNOs and other forms of international organizations, which differentiates them from local organizations by virtue of them being part of the same context. Therefore, we define a global work culture as the shared understanding of the visible rules, regulations, and behaviors, and the deeper values and ethics of the global work context.

Values of the Global Work Culture Culture is often conveyed by its values (Hofstede, 1980; Schwartz, 1992). Following an ecological perspective, it can be said that cultural values facilitate adaptation to the environment (Berry et al., 1992). Building upon this approach, we suggest that the global work culture consists of the values that facilitate the adaptation to the global work environment. These global work values can be derived from the characteristics of the global environment (Berson, Erez & Adler, 2004; Shokef & Erez, 2006a). Table 1 summarizes major unique characteristics of the global environment and the values derived from them. The global environment of MNOs is known to be highly competitive (Govindarajan & Gupta, 2001). Consequently, emphasis on a competitive performance orientation was identified as a major cultural value of this environment. A competitive performance orientation involves a strong emphasis


Table 1.

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Global Values Derived from the Characteristics of the Global Work Environment.

Characteristics of the Global Work Environment Globally competitive

Highly dynamic with high uncertainty Geographical dispersion and culturally diverse

Global Values Competitive performance orientation Quality Customer orientation Innovation Openness to change Learning orientation Interdependence and coordination Openness to cultural diversity Trust and ethical behavior

on quality, customer orientation, and innovation (Kilduff & Dougherty, 2000). Furthermore, the global context is considered to be highly dynamic, characterized by a high level of uncertainty. Adaptation to this context is facilitated by low-uncertainty avoidance, high flexibility, openness to change (McKinley & Scherer, 2000), and a learning orientation. Operating successfully in a geographically dispersed and culturally diverse environment necessitates high levels of interdependence and coordination among the various organizational units to assure that they all accomplish the shared organizational goals (Berson et al., 2004; Bhagat, Kedia, Harveston, & Triandis, 2002; Leung et al., 2005; Naisbitt, 1994). Adherence to, and compliance with international agreements, laws and standards regulate the MNOs’ activities beyond national borders. Moreover, these also facilitate the shared understanding of what is ‘good or bad,’ permitted or restricted. Finally, the culturally diverse environment, internal to the MNOs as reflected in their diverse workforce, and external to it, as shown by their diverse markets and customers, promotes the value of openness to cultural diversity. In this varied environment, where members of one culture have limited or no familiarity with others, and where the likelihood of conflicting interests and misunderstandings is quite high, trust and ethical behavior become key factors in the smooth integration and communication among the various organizational branches (Friedman, 2000), units, and members. While some of these values have been part of existing typologies of organizational culture, others, such as competitive performance orientation, openness to cultural diversity, trust and ethical behavior, emerge out of the direct characteristics of the global work environment. We suggest that these values are shared not only by MNOs and other international alliances, but

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also influence the cultures of domestic organizations with some international involvement that may have stakeholders, suppliers, or customers that are not necessarily locally based. These proposed global work values, derived from the characteristics of the global work environment of MNOs, were supported by the findings of two recent studies. First, Berson et al. (2004), in an empirical study conducted in a large MNO, distinguished between global and local managerial roles. Global managerial roles include strategic planning and managing innovation and change. These were homogeneously perceived by managers from different cultures. In contrast, managers across cultures differed in their perceptions of local managerial roles, reflecting their relationships with their subordinates in terms of people-focused and task-focused leadership. Furthermore, Berson et al. (2004) analyzed CEO communication as shown in their speeches and in the company’s annual reports, and found that the CEOs espoused the values of diversity, performance orientation, and individualism as well as interdependence, low power distance and low uncertainty avoidance. Recently, Shokef and Erez (2006a) conducted a content analysis of MNOs’ cultural values based on the public information on the Internet sites of 77 MNOs appearing on the 2003–2004 Fortune Global 500. The analysis was based on the proportion of MNOs that included each of the above-mentioned values in their declared MNO culture. The values that appeared most frequently on companies’ website consisted of competitive performance orientation, quality, customer orientation, innovation, openness to change, and learning. Others referred to relational focused values emphasizing interdependence and teamwork, openness to diversity, trust and ethical behavior, and social and environmental responsibility (Shokef & Erez, 2006a). The findings of these two studies suggest that indeed MNOs share some of the values derived from the characteristics of the global environment in which they operate, suggesting that there is a global work culture embodied in MNOs and other international alliances operating in the global work environment. Such global work values seem to be shared by members of MCTs working in MNOs, helping them to relate to each other, and understand each others’ work norms and codes of behavior. Proposition 2. Members of MCTs, working in MNOs, share a set of global work values that differentiate them from teams working in localdomestic organizations. MCTs will attribute higher importance than local homogenous teams to the global cultural values of: competitive performance orientation, quality, customer orientation, learning and innovation,


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openness to change, openness to diversity, trust, and social and environmental responsibility. Proposition 3. MCTs whose members share the global work values will be more effective than MCTs whose members do not share these values. This macro-layer global work culture is internalized by the members of MCTs, and is represented in the self. Individuals hold multiple identities that correspond to the roles and social groups to which they belong (Brickson, 2000; Hitlin, 2003). We contend that members of MCTs develop a global selfidentity. In the next section, we elaborate on the construct of global identity, its relationship to the global work culture, and its emergence in MCTs.

Global Identity Basic questions such as ‘‘Who am I? ‘‘Where do I belong?’’ and ‘‘How do I fit (in)?’’ reflect self-identity (Oyserman, 2004). They represent both the personal and social self, conveying what we know or can know about ourselves (Neisser, 1993; Stryker, 1980; Stryker & Burke, 2000; Tajfel, 1981). The personal or private self contains notions about one’s own attitudes, traits, feelings, and behaviors, while the social self contains affiliations and group memberships (Trafimow, Triandis, & Goto, 1991). Selves are created within contexts and take into account the values, norms, and mores of the others likely to participate in that context (Oyserman, 2004). Working in the global work environment provides individuals with additional answers to the above questions of ‘‘Who am I?’’ For example, people may start defining themselves as ‘‘a member of an MNO’’, ‘‘a world traveler’’, ‘‘a cosmopolitan’’, ‘‘a member of a multicultural team’’, etc. These possible answers reflect a person’s sense of belonging to groups existing in the global work context, which we define as a global identity. A global identity is individual’s sense of belonging to and identification with groups (such as MCTs), operating in the global work environment of MNOs. Often, MCTs and other groups operating in the global work environment are virtual in their nature (Jarvenpaa & Leidner, 1999). We infer that in order for an individual to develop a social identity related to a specific group, that group should have a psychological meaning to that individual (Tajfel, 1978). Nonetheless, the meaning does not necessarily have to include physical interaction with any of its members. In a study conducted on virtual groups, McKenna and Bargh (1998) showed that participation in a virtual newsgroup had significant effects on the transformation of an individual’s social identity.

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Increased involvement led to increased salience of the virtual group, followed by increased self-acceptance of the group identity (McKenna & Bargh, 1998). Thus, non-physical, virtual group identities can become an important part of the self (Earley & Gibson, 2002). Being part of a global work team with team members of diverse cultural backgrounds is different than being a member of a culturally homogeneous team, to which most people belong in their local cultural settings. A person may hold multiple identities, reflecting his/her belonging to multiple groups (Stryker & Burke, 2000; Tajfel & Turner, 1979). Therefore, a global and a local identity do not necessarily compete with each other. Rather, individuals may hold both types of identities, and sample the relevant identity depending on the situation. Following Stryker’s (1980) identity theory, a global identity and a local identity may become salient in different situations according to the level of commitment of the individual to the social network in which the identity is played out. The level of commitment is influenced by the costs of not expressing the identity-based roles and behaviors relevant to the salient social network (Stryker, 1987; Stryker & Burke, 2000). In the work environment, employees respond to role-expectations in line with the most salient identity in a given situation. When a work situation stimulates two identities that conflict with each other, the one with the stronger commitment determines the behavioral responses (Stryker, 1987; Stryker & Burke, 2000). For example, in an MCT there is a higher probability that a global identity will become salient, whereas, in a homogenous, same culture team, the local identity will be dominant. Furthermore, individuals are motivated to become valued by virtue of their ability to maintain relationships with their team members, and to avoid being rejected. Social inclusion or acceptance versus social exclusion or rejection contribute to a person’s positive self-concept (Kirpatrick & Ellis, 2004), and a sense of belonging positively influences self-esteem (Baumeister & Leary, 1995). Social identity theory (Tajfel, 1981; Tajfel & Turner, 1979; Turner, 1984) focused on the meaning of belonging to a psychological group, and proposed that a shared social identity emerges when people’s perceptions of their mutual and collective similarities are enhanced. Along these lines, members of global organizations and, in particular, those working in MCTs are also motivated by the need to maintain relationships with others on their team and to overcome cultural barriers. Once MCT members develop close relationships with each other, they reduce prejudice toward others and increase the sense of inclusion (Aron, Aron, & Norman, 2004).


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Global identity and global work values are closely related. Theories of identity disagree on the casual link between social identity and social values. Social identity theory proposes that one’s identity affects what one thinks, feels, and does in all social domains (Gergen, 1991; Hogg & Terry, 2000; Meal & Ashforth, 1992; Tajfel & Turner, 1979). The belonging to specific groups is prior to the acceptance of the groups’ norms and values. Yet, other theories suggest that acceptance of organizational values influences employees’ identification with their organization (O’Reilly, Chatman, & Caldwell, 1991), and that cultural values, through a process of socialization, are represented in the self (Erez & Earley, 1993). Most likely, the relationships between global identity and global work values in MCTs are reciprocal, and that having a global identity influences the acceptance of the global work values, which reciprocally influence the development of global identity. Once employees work in an MNO or an MCT, they develop a sense of belonging to that group and learn what is expected of them as part of their role as employees in this environment. This brings them to adopt the values of the global work culture. Reciprocally, individuals endorsing the values of the global work culture, such as openness to diversity, are more likely to feel at ease in multicultural groups. Once they are part of such groups, they are likely to develop a global identity. Thus, we expect that as employees gain experience in working for MNOs and MCTs, their global identity emerges in parallel to their adoption of the global work values. Preliminary findings of a recent study showed that experience in working as part of MCTs enhanced the development of a global identity, and that MCTs whose members had a strong global identity performed better than others (Shokef & Erez, 2006b). Furthermore, participants’ global identity in this study was also positively related to the number of languages they spoke, whether they lived in different countries for more than a year, and the extent to which they traveled around the world (Shokef & Erez, 2006b). These additional effects on global identity suggest that the sense of identity can develop on the basis of a more general experience in being part of the global environment. Therefore, we propose Proposition 4a. Experience in working in MCTs enhances the team members’ sense of a global identity. Based on the reciprocal relationship between a global identity and a global work culture, we propose Proposition 4b. Members of MCTs will adopt the global work values more than members working in local homogenous work teams.

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LOCAL CULTURES AND ADAPTATION TO MCTs The emergence of a global identity and the adoption of global work values as part of working in MNOs and MCTs are likely to be affected by the cultural background of the team members. Harzing and Hofstede (1996) proposed that the values of power distance, collectivism, and uncertainty avoidance strengthen the resistance to change, while individualism, low power distance and low uncertainty avoidance reduces it. Unlike individualistic cultures, collective societies foster collective perceptions, which are harder to change than individual perceptions, and they develop a strong sense of belonging to a smaller number of groups than individualists (Triandis, 1995). In a collectivistic culture, developing a sense of belonging to a group outside one’s own culture may put at risk one’s group membership. In contrast, in individualistic societies that endorse the value of independence, changing one’s reference groups is perceived as possible and natural (Harzing & Hofstede, 1996). Similarly, in cultures with high power distance, where people comply with the authority figures, they are less likely to deviate from the norms and relate to a new social group than people in societies of low power distance. In some cultures, people are inherently more anxious about the unpredictability of the future than people in other cultures (House, Hanges, Javidan, Dorfman, & Gupta, 2004; Steensma, Marino, & Dickson, 2000). Members of high uncertainty-avoidance cultures may be less likely to adopt new values and develop a sense of belonging to a new social context, and hence a global identity than members of low uncertainty-avoidance cultures. The level of tightness–looseness is also related to the willingness to adopt new cultural values and belong to new groups. Tight cultures are less tolerant to deviant behaviors, and therefore, are less likely to accept a new set of norms and rules of behavior (Chan et al., 1996) as may be presented by MNOs. On the other hand, cultures of high tolerance for uncertainty are more likely to accept a new set of norms, and adapt to it. Individuals from loose cultures, who endorse the values of individualism, low power distance, and low uncertainty avoidance, may be more open to adopt the global work values and to adapt to the global work environment than their counterparts. Hence, we propose Proposition 5a. The strength of one’s global identity differs as a function of one’s national cultural values: employees coming from cultures of low collectivism, low power distance, and low uncertainty avoidance will get more easily involved in global activities, such as working in MCTs, and will develop a stronger global identity than employees coming from


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collectivistic cultures, with high power distance and of high uncertainty avoidance. Proposition 5b. The adoption of global work values differs as a function of one’s national cultural values: employees coming from cultures of low collectivism, low power distance and low uncertainty avoidance will be more likely to adopt new values of the global work culture than employees coming from collectivistic cultures, with high power distance and of high uncertainty avoidance.

Acculturation to the Global Work Environment Individuals working in MCTs are exposed to the global work context while at the same time they continue to belong to groups of their cultures of origin as they often work in the MCTs from their home country. The global work values and the norms of working in MCTs often differ from those of individuals’ national cultures, and the question is whether employees acculturate themselves to the roles of the global environment. ‘‘Acculturation refers to cultural and psychological change brought about by contact with other people belonging to different cultures, and exhibiting different behaviors’’ (Berry et al., 1992, p. 19). Different forms of acculturation may emerge depending on two factors, the level of attraction to the new culture, and the importance of preserving one’s own values. The integration type of acculturation occurs when people are highly attracted to the new culture, but also preserve their own culture. The segregation type means that people preserve their own values and reject the new cultural values. Assimilation occurs when people adopt the new culture and reject their own cultural values. When people are not attracted to the new culture, but at the same time degrade the value of their own culture, they become marginalized. Berry’s (1980) general model of acculturation could serve for generating a specific model of acculturation to the global work culture of MCTs, as shown in Fig. 1. Membership in local national groups and a high preservation of one’s local values, combined with a low acceptance of global work values, is typical for the local type who has a strong local identity but a weak global identity, avoiding adaptation to global groups. Acceptance of the global work values combined with a low preservation of one’s own local national values connotes the global identity type, who fully adopt the values and the sense of belonging to the global work context, while abandoning

Acceptance of the global work values

High


Global

Global

Low

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Marginal

Locall

Low

High

Preservation of one’s one’ own n local national va values

Fig. 1.

A Model of Acculturation to the Global Work Environment of MCTs.

his/her local culture. Employees who preserve their own local national values while accepting the global work values comprise the ‘‘glocal’’ identity type, consisting of both a local and a global identity, and integrating both local and global values. ‘‘Glocal’’, does not mean that individuals hold a third identity that is neither local nor global. Rather, it represents both a strong global identity as well as a strong local identity. Employees holding a ‘‘glocal’’ identity hold both the values of their local national groups and the values of the global work culture endorsed in their global groups, drawing upon each identity, based on its salience at a given situation. Integration is considered as the best way of coping with change and adaptation to a new culture (Berry, 1980). In the global context, MCTs are more successful when they manage to preserve the cultural diversity of their members and allow the coexistence of differences (Janssens & Brett, 2006). Bi-cultural managers also seem to adapt more successfully to global organizations than mono-cultural individuals (Hofstede, 2001). Therefore we propose Proposition 6. MCTs members who adopt the global work values while preserving their local national values will better adapt to work in MCTs and show higher coping behaviors, compared with employees holding other forms of acculturation. How could MCTs nested within MNOs enable their employees to maintain their local cultural values, and identity, while at the same time socialize them into the global work culture, and develop their global identity? One effective strategy could be to have different levels of tightness/looseness (Chan et al., 1996) of culture with respect to different


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cultural values. For example, Berson et al. (2004) found that managers in MNOs had similar global role perceptions about the dimensions of innovation and change, and planning and strategizing, across cultures. Yet, they differed with respect to their micro management roles that focused on managing their employees, their tasks, and missions. These findings suggest that the balance between the global and local identities can be maintained by enforcing homogeneity with respect to the global role components, and allowing for heterogeneity with respect to how managers manage their employees and their immediate tasks. These findings support the notion that MNOs operating in a dynamic environment, and MCTs nested within them need to respond to the forces of both global integration and of local responsiveness (Rosenzweig & Singh, 1991). A strong culture may not leave room for responsiveness to local needs, as facilitated by the acceptance of cultural diversity. Recently, Sorensen (2002) found that strong cultures contribute to organizational performance only in stable environments. However, the global environment in which MCTs operate in, is far from being stable. Thus, we propose that although cultural strength has been proven to facilitate performance in MCTs, there is a need to diversify the level of tightness/looseness, requiring a tight culture with respect to some values, and a loose culture with respect to other values. Finding a way to accept the coexistence of differences in MCTs (Janssens & Brett, 2006) is not enough. According to Janssens and Brett (2006), a fusion model of collaboration and coexistence of cultural differences is characterized by flexibility of choosing compatible preconceptions about teamwork, based on one’s cultural background. Global teams choose the most compatible work method, relevant at that time to the task. These methods, anchored in team members’ cultural backgrounds, may be replaced by, added to, or mixed with methods of other team members. We argue that in order for MCTs to have the ability to allow coexistence of differences and channel them into productive team performance, there is a need to build a common ground. In line with the fusion model, building a common ground does not mean disrespecting members’ diverse cultural backgrounds. This duality can be obtained by having MNOs create a global corporate value system that fits in with the global context, while at the same time respecting the diversity of the local cultures. This enables the members of MCTs to develop a sense of belonging to their MCT – a global identity – while in parallel it allows them to preserve their diverse local identities, embracing both their local and global work values.

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Can Shared Global Work Values, and a Shared Global Identity Enhance MCT Performance? Differences between experienced teams and newly formed teams reveal that a shared meaning system, a shared cognitive map (Mathieu et al., 2000), and a transactive memory (Liang, Moreland, & Argote, 1995) facilitate team performance. New teams often face the threat of interpersonal conflicts, uncertainty about the group norms, lack of knowledge about their relative strengths (Moreland & Myaskovsky, 2000; Moreland, Argote, & Krishnan, 1998), and lack of a psychological safety when they have to openly express themselves (Edmondson, 1999). These team processes and knowledge sharing develop overtime, as team members learn to work with each other, learn who knows what, and share a common organizational knowledge that allows them to predict their team members’ behaviors. The need to develop a shared meaning system becomes even more crucial for MCTs, as their a priori shared knowledge is relatively small. Earley and Gibson (2002) suggested that after mutual interactions, members of MCTs develop a shared hybrid culture, composed of an emergent and simplified set of rules and actions that facilitate team interactions (Earley & Gibson, 2002). This hybrid culture develops in a specific MCT and may not be shared by other MCTs. An alternative approach suggests that MCTs also share a common meaning system that conveys the global work value. This meaning system is common to all employees working in the global work context, thus, providing MCT members with a general shared meaning system that is not specifically tailored as a hybrid culture of their immediate MCT. For example, employees who share the global work culture endorse the global work value of openness to diversity, they respect each other’s diverse culture and work methods, which in turn increases their psychological safety, their motivation to work together, and their sense of belonging to the MCT, thereby improving the MCT’s performance. We suggest that the relationship between an MCT’s success and global identity is reciprocal. While positive experiences of team members in MCTs facilitate the development of a global identity, a strong global identity shared by members of MCTs can facilitate the MCT’s effectiveness. Hambrick, Davison, Snell, and Snow (1998) demonstrated that members of effective MCTs were ‘‘internationalists’’. When placed in the MCT, these people encountered relatively few nationality-based difficulties in functioning. Cultural intelligence, which is an individual’s capability to deal effectively in situations characterized by cultural diversity (Earley & Ang, 2003), was also found to enhance MCT performance. In their study of multicultural MBA teams,


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Moynihan, Peterson, and Earley (2006) showed that the mean level of cultural intelligence measured at the formation of the MCT, was positively correlated with the levels of group cohesion and trust three months into the joint project (Moynihan et al., 2006). In addition, the mean level of the team cultural intelligence was positively related to team performance. A recent study by Shokef and Erez (2006b) conducted on 69 MCTs supported the positive effect of an MCT’s global identity on team performance. Participants in this study were 288 MBA students from seven different countries around the world who worked in multicultural, virtual teams on a jointclass project. The project assigned to all teams was to develop guidelines for an expatriate who visits a host country, selected by the team members. In addition to the guidelines, the teams were also asked to analyze the difficulties that managers from their own countries may encounter while visiting the host country, and to compare the challenges faced by each of them, as a native of his/her own culture. They were also asked to reflect on their team processes. Team members communicated mainly by using computer-mediated tools, such as a website prepared especially for the project, which lasted for three weeks. The final products of all the teams were powerpoint presentations that were evaluated by the instructors, and by independent evaluators. The average mean evaluation score served as the team performance measure. Data on team members’ characteristics, and team processes were collected by means of electronic questionnaires that were administered twice – once before the beginning of the project and again after the teams submitted their projects. Using HLM analyses, the findings showed that after controlling for class membership, team size, and number of nationalities represented on the team, teams with a priori higher mean levels of global identity achieved higher performance levels and were more satisfied with their team as a whole than other teams (see Fig. 2). Furthermore, the level of global identity was positively related to the level of the individual’s openness to diversity, referring to the degree of receptivity to perceived dissimilarity (Hartel, 2004). Similar to the teams’ levels of global identity, teams whose members scored high, rather than low, on openness to diversity, achieved higher performance levels and were more satisfied with their teams. Working as part of an MCT increases the likelihood of learning about diverse cultures, and hence, of becoming open to diversity. Reciprocally, openness to diversity facilitates the emergence of a shared culture in MCTs. Awareness of cultural variations and openness to cultural diversity are crucial factors in achieving effective cooperation across cultural borders (Govindarajan & Gupta, 2001; Maznevski, 1994). Interestingly, the level of local identity, although significantly higher than the level of global identity, was not related to team performance and satisfaction.

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Team Performance

90

85

80

75

70 Low

High

Team Global Identity Prior to the Project

Fig. 2.

The Effect of Prior Global Identity on the Team Performance.

These findings suggest that experience and exposure to the global work context through working as part of an MCT facilitate individuals’ adaptation to the global multicultural work environment. It is often suggested that familiarity with other cultures may temper misunderstandings (Martin & Hammer, 1989), and thus enable the development of a global identity. Global identity becomes salient in the context of MCTs, and it evokes and facilitates attitudinal and behavioral responses that are adaptive to the global work context, such as mutual respect, trust, openness to change, and openness to diversity (Shokef & Erez, 2006a; Van Oudenhoven & Van der Zee, 2002). Based on the reciprocal relationship between global identity and global work culture, we propose Proposition 7. The global work values shared by members of MCTs, and the global identity expressing the sense of belonging to the MCT increase MCT performance.

DISCUSSION The purpose of this chapter was to introduce the concepts of a global work culture and of a global identity, as mechanisms that increase adaptation to the global work context, and the effectiveness of MCTs. This chapter builds upon the multi-level model of culture (Erez & Gati, 2004), and the model of cultural self-representation (Erez & Earley, 1993) to further understand the process of


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adaptation to and the adoption of global work values. We propose that members of MCTs hold multiple cultural meaning systems, and multiple identities that help them adapt to multiple work contexts. We analyze the interrelationships between these multiple cultures and identities by using the multi-level model of culture. Following this model, members of MCTs hold three cultural systems: (a) The hybrid culture of their immediate team that serves as the immediate social glue, enabling team interdependence; (b) The national culture, representing the cultural diversity of the MCT composition. This cultural level conveys the differences rather than the similarities, and therefore, may hinder cultural adaptation. However, in our view this level is essential for cultural adaptation, as it conveys the MCT members’ self-definitions as persons, beyond their work context; and (c) The global work culture, which represents the most macro level of culture above national cultures. This level helps overcome cultural diversity by creating the common ground for a shared understanding, and for a sense of belonging to the MCT. Working in the global context provides a meta-culture that defines what is right and wrong, and what types of behaviors are most adaptable to this environment. We propose that the values that facilitate adaptation to the global work context are: competitive performance orientation, quality, customer orientation, learning and innovation, openness to change, openness to diversity, trust and ethical behavior, and social and environmental responsibility (Berson et al., 2004; Shokef & Erez, 2006a; Leung et al., 2005). This shared meaning system of global work values creates the similarity among MCT members, on which they could build a common ground for working as one team, and for overcoming their national differences. Values serve for evaluating the meaning of managerial and motivational approaches in terms of their contribution to a person’s sense of self-worth and well-being, and are represented in the self (Erez & Earley, 1993). A person’s self consists of multiple facets (Tajfel & Turner, 1979). We assert that the values of the global work culture are represented in the facet of a global identity, enhancing the sense of belonging to the MCT, and clarifying the role expectations of members of MCTs. Once they belong to an MCT, members of such teams are motivated to be valued by other team members, as positive evaluations strengthen their overall sense of self-worth and well-being. The desire to maintain relationships with other team members, and to be valued by them, helps the MCT members overcome cultural barriers, and strengthens their role definition. The reciprocal relationship between values and identities suggests that these two attributes reinforce each other. The adoption of global work values enables people to develop a sense of belonging to the global work context, and this sense of belonging facilitate the adoption of global work values. Holding a

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global identity and endorsing the global work values assist the adaptation of individuals to the global work environment. In parallel, individuals continue to hold their local national identity, among other identities, drawing on each identity according to the situation (Stryker, 1980; Tajfel & Turner, 1979). The successful integration of global and local identities requires a delicate balance between the two sets of values. MNOs develop this balance by respecting the local national cultures of their employees, while at the same time socializing them into the global work culture. These two sets of values support the sense of belonging to the two environments. A ‘‘glocal’’ identity represents both a strong global identity as well as a strong local identity, and it seems to enable individuals to shift from one social context to another. It is not clear whether the ‘‘glocal’’ identity is a third identity, similar to the third culture that emerges in the interface between members of different cultures (Casmir, 1992; Graen, Hui, Wakabayashi, & Wang, 1997), or are the local and global identities two independent identities that co-exist and their salience varies across situations, depending on their relevance for a particular context. Theories of identity (Stryker, 1987; Tajfel & Turner, 1979) and Triandis’ (1995) theory of the self suggest that multiple identities can coexist. Yet, their coexistence may lead to a meta-type of a multifaceted person who is more adaptable to the changing nature of the work environment. Future research may take up the challenge of answering these questions. In this chapter, we generated a series of propositions pertaining to the two constructs of a global work culture and a global identity, their interrelationship, and their effects on MCT performance. We integrated two lines of theories and research: theories of teams – composition, structure and processes, and theories of culture – values and their representation in the self. However, there is very little empirical research that explores the issues raised in this chapter. We hope that the propositions in this chapter will stimulate and challenge researchers to explore new research areas, and enrich our theories and their practical implications for new work contexts.

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BRINGING CULTURE TO THE TABLEy Marilynn B. Brewer How might thinking about culture influence theory and practice in the management of teams and work groups? Do cultural differences make a difference and, if so, at what level of theory must cultural factors be taken into account? At one extreme, some might contend that cultural differences run so deep that management theory must be culture-specific, essentially developed from scratch in each new cultural context. At the other extreme, cultural differences may be viewed as superficial variations in behavioral practices that can easily be accommodated within existing theoretical perspectives. Somewhere between these extremes is the position that cultural differences do have a profound effect on cognition, values, and behavior, but that there are fundamental principles of social interaction and decision making that provide a substrate for illuminating, understanding, and managing cultural variation. The chapters in this volume either explicitly or implicitly adopt this middle ground in approaching the issue of culture and its impact on group process. Each starts from some general feature of interpersonal process or decision making and then explores how known cultural differences might systematically shape how those processes are played out in organizational settings. Across the chapters this approach is brought to bear on understanding the emotional life of groups (Chua & Morris; Wang, Doucet, & Northcraft; Elfenbein & Shirako), interpersonal communication (Uskal &


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Oyserman; Wang, Doucet, & Northcraft), group efficacy (Menon & Fu; Zhou), the enactment of power and authority (Zhong, McGee, Maddux, & Galinsky; Zhou), temporal aspects of group process and decisions (Armagan, Ferreira, Bonner, & Okhuysen; Hernandez, Chen, & WadeBenzoni), the emergence of shared mental representations (Shokef & Erez; Adair, Tinsley, & Taylor; Moynihan, Peterson & Earley), and conflict and conflict management (Behfar, Kern, & Brett). In each case, cultural factors are postulated to play a significant role in moderating relationships among variables or augmenting or dampening dynamic processes. In general, a simple ‘‘main effects’’ approach to understanding cultural differences is eschewed in favor of more dynamic, interactive views of the role of culturein-context (see Hong, Morris, Chiu, & Benet-Martinez, 2000). The various chapters in this volume also illustrate different models for incorporating cultural factors into existing theory. One model is best illustrated by the approach taken by Behrar, Kern, and Brett in their analysis of negotiation and conflict in multicultural teams. They start their analysis with a general framework for identifying challenges that all decision making or work groups face in negotiating differences and distributing workload, regardless of group composition. Within this framework they look first at what is common to both monocultural and multicultural teams, which then provides a backdrop for identifying sources of difficulty that are unique to multicultural situations. The result is an expanded set of factors that must be considered in our models of conflict resolution in groups. This approach to theory building is analogous to a measurement model that partitions variance among units into common (in this case, culture-general) and specific (in this case, culture-specific) components. A second model for incorporating culture into theory is to take an existing structural model and ‘‘plug-in’’ cultural influences at various stages or links in the model. This approach is illustrated in several chapters in this volume, including Wang, Doucet, and Northcraft’s analysis of affective social influence in groups, Uskal and Oyserman’s analysis of encoding and decoding processes in self-report assessments, and Elfenbein and Shirako’s model of emotional contagion in groups. We might think of this form of theorizing as building ‘‘culturally infused’’ models of group process and social behavior. A third model of theory development is elicited when a hypothesis that has been developed and tested in one cultural setting fails to replicate when tested in a different culture. One way to resolve such inconsistencies across cultures is to raise the level of abstraction of the original theory in order to incorporate different outcomes. A good illustration of this is represented in the chapter by Zhong, McGee, Maddux, and Galinsky. Taking the

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hypothesized power–action relationship developed in the context of Western societies into an East Asian context, the authors note an apparent contradiction in findings: in the United States, higher power is associated with greater action orientation, but in China, higher power is associated with greater caution and restraint. In order to resolve this contradiction, the authors come to restate the original hypothesis in a more inclusive form: power engages culturally valued goals (e.g., assertiveness goals associated with action in the West, deliberative goals associated with responsibility and restraint in the East). A similar expansion of the inclusiveness of theoretical constructs is seen in Menon and Fu’s analysis of the relationship between personal versus group agency. By taking into account different cultural models of agency, group agency can be understood as facilitating (rather than constraining) personal agency. Across these variations in hypothesis generating and theory building, the overall lesson is clear: incorporating cultural factors not only informs but modifies and enriches theories of social behavior by forcing researchers to cope with the expanded variability generated by cultural differences in values, practices, and social arrangements.

ADVANCING OUR UNDERSTANDING OF CULTURE Throughout this volume, the authors have clearly taken as their task assessing how management theory and practice can be improved by understanding cultural differences in cognition, emotion, and interpersonal processes. And, as noted above, they have been generally successful in demonstrating that findings from cultural research have significant implications for management theory. But I would like to look at the products of this volume from a slightly different perspective and ask how thinking about culture in terms of management issues might impact research and theory on cultural differences. In particular, I will consider how the chapters in this volume might help us go beyond some traditional understandings of the nature of cultural differences. Beyond East–West One of the first things that strikes a reader of a volume such as this is that national culture is almost always operationalized in terms of differences between Western European (primarily the United States) and East Asian (primarily China and Japan) cultures. Given the current geographic centers

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of the global economy, this focus on East–West differences may have practical as well as historical justification. But the increasing globalization of commerce and economic exchange and the expansion of multinational corporations across the world calls for a more geographically diversified program of research on national culture and cultural differences. Although many of the chapters in the second section of the volume that deal with multicultural teams certainly include groups with representatives from all over the world, only one chapter (Armagan et al.) explicitly considers features of a national culture (Turkey) that falls outside the traditional East–West axis. But even this one case serves to illustrate how different dimensions of comparison and sources of variation are introduced as one expands the range of cultures that are taken into account.

Beyond Individualism–Collectivism Among the challenges that any stable society must meet is resolving potential conflicts between individual self-interest and collective welfare by defining the rights and obligations that group members hold vis-a-vis other group members. Thus, it is not surprising that this particular dimension of cultural differences has occupied a great deal of attention from cross-cultural researchers. This aspect of national culture has been captured succinctly in the distinction between individualism and collectivism as broad cultural orientations (Hofstede, 1980; Triandis, 1995). Although this dimension has been defined in different ways by different theorists, there is general consensus that it refers to variations across cultures in whether individuals are viewed as separate and autonomous entities or as interconnected and embedded in interdependent social relationships, along with normative prescriptions and values about the priority to be given to individual and group interests. Not surprisingly, this aspect of culture is seen as central to questions of how culture influences group processes in the workplace. In the chapters in this volume, many draw on the individualism– collectivism distinction to derive predictions about how cultural factors will influence all aspects of group functioning, including expression and interpretation of emotion (Wang, Doucet, & Northcraft; Elfenbein & Shikaro), bases for trust in other group members (Chua & Morris), task motivation (Zhou), sensemaking (Adair, Tinsley, & Taylor; Armagan et al.), and response to conflict (Behfar, Kern, & Brett). Despite acknowledging the central importance of the individualism– collectivism distinction, the chapters in this volume also challenge the


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assumption that this is the only feature of culture that might impact group dynamics and outcomes. Among the other important cultural differences that are implicated in this volume are variations in temporal orientation (Armagan et al. Hernandez et al.), emotional expressiveness (Elfenbein & Shirako), beliefs about agency (Menon & Fu), and power distance (Zhou; Wang, Doucett, & Northcraft; Shokef & Erez). In addition to calling attention to other dimensions of cultural variation, the study of group process also reveals that the individualism–collectivism distinction itself may be over-simplified and in need of modification. As Hernandez, Chen, and Wade-Benzoni point out, interdependence in groups (and the connections between individuals and others) may be conceptualized in at least two different ways. On the one hand, groups may be conceived as networks of interpersonal relationships, with mutual obligations and responsibilities specified at the dyadic level. On the other, groups may be conceived as collective entities with interests that supersede those of individual group members or relational ties, with obligations to others defined at the level of the welfare of the group as a whole. Further, members of individualistic cultures clearly exhibit elements of collectivistic orientation in the form of group loyalty, concern for collective welfare, and need to belong (Brewer & Yuki, in press; Oyserman, Coon, & Kemmelmeier, 2002). Both of these observations complicate any simple classification of cultures along an individualism–collectivism continuum. Elsewhere, I have argued that the concept of the interdependent self should be further differentiated into the relational self and the collective self (Brewer & Gardner, 1996). The relational self is the self defined in terms of connections and role relationships with significant others. The collective self is the social (collective) identity in the theoretical tradition of social identity theory and self-categorization theory (Tajfel & Turner, 1979; Turner, Hogg, Oakes, Reicher, & Wetherell, 1987). One defining distinction between these two social selves is that the relational self is personalized, incorporating dyadic relationships between the self and particular close others, and with networks of interpersonal connections via the extension of these dyadic relationships. By contrast, the collective self involves depersonalized relationships with others by virtue of common membership in a symbolic group. Collective identities do not require interpersonal knowledge or interaction, but rely on shared symbols and cognitive representations of the group as a unit independent of personal relationships within the group. The distinction between relational and collective selves gives rise to a parallel distinction between relationship-based collectivism and groupbased collectivism (Brewer & Roccas, 2001), as described in the chapter by

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Hernandez, Chen, and Wade-Benzoni. Across all societies, individuals maintain close personal relationships, small-group interpersonal networks, and membership in large, symbolic groups (Brewer & Caporael, in press). But cultural systems rely more or less heavily on these different forms of social connection as the primary locus for defining the social self and exercising social control over individual behavior. What differs among people across cultures is the salience and priority of these different forms of social embeddedness. The form of collectivism dominant in East Asian collectivist societies, such as China, Korea, and Japan, is probably best characterized as relational collectivism, with a strong emphasis on personal ties, such as guanxi (as discussed by Chua & Morris), and interpersonal harmony. On the other hand, the form of collectivistic orientation often found in largely individualistic societies such as the United States, is best characterized as the more depersonalized, group-based collectivism. Teams and work groups are clearly the locus of interpersonal relationships as well as collective entities. Further, group members (and managers) are often faced with the necessity of resolving conflicts between relational interests and group interests. Interpersonal harmony is not always compatible with achievement of other group goals, and reciprocal obligations to benefit particular others (friends and family) may not work to the benefit of the group as a whole. Thus, understanding cultural differences in the priority assigned to individual interests, maintenance of relational ties, or group welfare has important implications for predicting how cultural values will influence group process and shared understandings. One implication of recognizing the distinction between relational and group collectivism is to challenge the commonly held assumption (represented in several chapters in this volume, including Wang, Doucet, & Northcraft; Uskal & Oyserman) that members of collectivist cultures are more sensitive to ingroup–outgroup distinctions and exhibit more ingroup bias than members of individualistic cultures. As it is most generally understood, individualistic cultures are characterized by an emphasis on autonomy and differentiation of the individual self from others, whereas collectivist societies are characterized by social embeddedness and interdependence. In terms of self-definition, individualists are assumed to focus primarily on the distinction between self and others (me versus not me) and collectivists on the distinction between ingroup (us) and outgroup (them), with little differentiation of the individual self within the ingroup. As a consequence, collectivists are expected to show high levels of ingroup–outgroup discrimination in their social behavior, whereas individualists are expected to be more universalistic and nondiscriminatory. In actuality,


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however, ingroup bias exists in both cultural contexts, but what differs is the nature and bases of ingroup identity (Brewer & Yuki, in press). There is, for example, abundant and highly consistent evidence showing that (individualistic) Americans exhibit group enhancement and protection tendencies, and make clear distinctions between their ingroups and outgroups in ways that favor their own ingroups. Cross-cultural studies testing the assertion that collectivists make sharper distinctions between ingroups and outgroups than individualists (Triandis, 1989, 1995) also have found that American individualists show no less, if not more, ingroup favoritism than East Asian collectivists. For instance, Bond and Hewstone (1988) found that British high school students in Hong Kong had more positive images of their ingroup than did Chinese students. Similarly, Rose’s (1985) cross-national comparative study found that Americans had more favorable views of their country than did Japanese. Moreover, Snibbe, Kitayama, Markus, and Suzuki (2003) found less ingroup bias among Japanese football fans, compared with their American counterparts, even though both cultural groups equally identified with their university and the sports team. Finally, Chen, Brockner, and Katz (1998) found no average cultural difference in ingroup favoritism between Chinese and American participants across all experimental conditions; the only condition where greater ingroup favoritism among the Chinese was observed was when participants individually performed well, while their ingroup performed poorly. A follow-up study by Chen, Brockner, and Chen (2002) also found that American and Chinese students favored their ingroup over an outgroup to a similar extent. Whether Westerners or East Asians show greater ingroup bias depends, ultimately, on what type of ingroup is being referred to. Drawing on the distinction between relational and collective social selves, Yuki (2003) suggested that the typical characteristics of group cognition and behavior for East Asians may be qualitatively different from those of Westerners. Whereas people in Western cultures tend to emphasize categorical distinctions between ingroups and outgroups, East Asians may have a stronger tendency to think about groups as predominantly relationship-based. In group contexts, East Asians tend to perceive themselves as a ‘‘node’’ embedded within a network of shared relationship connections (i.e. family members, friends, colleagues, acquaintances, friends of friends, etc.) rather than within strict, bounded groups per se. Within this framework, the ingroup for East Asians is cognitively represented as a relatively stable and structured network of relationships among group members rather than a depersonalized social category.

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Consistent with this view, a number of comparative studies have supported the idea that members of East Asian cultures differentiate between friends and strangers more than do individuals from Western cultures. For example, Leung (1988) found that, in response to conflict scenarios between two disputants, Hong Kong Chinese college students were less likely to pursue a conflict with an ingroup disputant (close friends) and more likely to pursue a conflict with an outgroup disputant (strangers) than were American students. Similarly, studies on distributive justice have shown that people from collectivist cultures apply different reward allocation norms to ingroup and outgroup. Leung and Bond (1984), for instance, found that Chinese participants shared the rewards more equally with the friends, but with an outgroup stranger they adhered to the equity norm more closely than did the Americans. The distinction between relational versus group collectivism also makes it possible to recognize that both individualists and collectivists are part of a group-oriented human species, and, therefore, capable of showing grouporiented behaviors and attitudes such as ingroup trust, albeit for different reasons. A recent study by Yuki, Maddux, Brewer, and Takemura (2005) provided a direct test of this possibility. Specifically, they found that Americans tended to trust strangers based on a common group category membership, whereas stranger trust for Japanese was contingent on whether the target person shared a direct or indirect relationship link with a close other. The presence of a potential relationship connection crossing group boundaries had a stronger effect on outgroup trust for Japanese than for Americans, but participants from both cultures trusted strangers who were members of their ingroup. Consistent with arguments made by Chua and Morris in their chapter in this volume, what differs across cultures is whether the basis of this trust was primarily affective and relational or cognitive and categorical.

Beyond National Culture Although the theme reflected in the title of the present volume is national culture and groups, it is clear that the conceptualization of culture represented in the content of the chapters is not restricted to national or ethnic group units. As emphasized explicitly by Shokef and Erez, culture – conceptualized as a system of shared meaning, symbols, values, and practices – exists at multiple levels of social organization. Large complex nations are often characterized as multicultural, differentiated into multiple (and often


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cross-cutting) subcultures based on significant ethnic, religious, economic, and political groupings. We also speak of ‘‘organizational culture’’ and, at yet a lower level of aggregation, of ‘‘work group culture’’ or even ‘‘team culture.’’ Although some may complain that treating culture as such a multilevel construct strips it of any real meaning, it seems to me that thinking of culture at each of these levels retains essential elements of culture as an emergent group property, a system of shared meaning involving interrelated beliefs, values, and behavioral norms, and a basis for distinctive group identity. Of course, not all groups develop a unique culture, but the emergence of culture as a function of social interaction over an extended period in the context of cooperative interdependence appears to be a universal feature of human social life. Several of the chapters in this volume deal with the emergence of shared understandings and norms in multicultural teams where the normal processes of developing a common model of group task and process is complicated by the variability in cultural background and prior assumptions among team members. Moynihan, Peterson, and Earley speak of the development of ‘‘hybrid culture’’ within such teams, which mixes elements of different national cultures in a unique blend that constitutes a new form of team culture. Adair, Tinsley, and Taylor refer to such emergent shared schemas within multicultural teams as ‘‘third cultures’’ and go on to identity three different models by which cultural elements may be combined to generate a unique team culture. Third cultures may be created from the additive combination of relevant elements from the national cultures of team members (the union model) or be restricted to that set of elements that participants from different cultures already share in common (the intersection model). Of particular interest is the concept of an emergent third culture that contains novel elements not traceable to any of the parent cultures represented by group members, perhaps generated by the need to negotiate differences in values, perceptions, and expectations not typically encountered in monocultural team development. As Adair, Tinsley, and Taylor argue, the successful negotiation of a shared third culture in multicultural teams may be essential to the processes of sensemaking and group identity building that contribute to group performance and outcomes. Perhaps more important, however, is the idea that the experience of participating in and developing shared schemas in multicultural teams generalizes beyond the specific team and its unique accommodations. At the level of the individual, Moynihan, Peterson, and Earley discuss the development of ‘‘cultural intelligence’’ as a set of motives, values, and skills that facilitate multicultural negotiation and the emergence of

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hybrid culture in new team contexts. Going beyond the individual level, Shokef and Erez document the creation of a global corporate culture that emerges from multicultural interaction but transcends particular work groups or multinational organizations. Corresponding to the emergence of shared culture at the global level is the development of a global social identity, facilitated by experience and involvement in the global environment of business and politics. Shokef and Erez coined the term ‘‘glocal’’ to capture the idea that individuals can have strong social identities at different levels of inclusiveness, as representatives of local cultures and a global community at the same time. The idea that, through participation in multicultural, multinational work groups, individuals come to adopt elements of a global culture and associated global identity raises the interesting question of how such experiences influence group process ‘‘back home,’’ in their culture of origin. Is global identity activated only in the context of multinational interactions, or do individuals bring elements of their global culture into groups composed solely of individuals from the same nation – effectively turning ‘‘monocultural’’ work groups into ‘‘multicultural’’ teams. If the analyses of emergent cultures developed in several of the chapters in this book are correct, future volumes on the role of culture in managing teams and work groups will be taking account of the joint contributions of national and global culture on group process within nations as well as in multinational contexts.

CULTURE AND SOCIAL IDENTITY As noted in the section above, bounded, interdependent social groups are the locus of culture, and such groups are also sources of social identity for group members. Thus, it is not surprising that culture and social identity are often represented as somewhat interchangeable constructs – as two sides of the same coin so to speak. And it is certainly true that the development of shared meanings, norms, and symbols contributes significantly to identity building in groups and, conversely, that the existence of shared group identity greatly facilitates communication and emergence of shared culture (Brewer, 2001). Nonetheless, I will argue that it is important to recognize that culture and social identity are distinct constructs with different implications for interpersonal processes in multinational teams and work groups. Culture, as defined previously, is a system of shared meaning and practices that emerges from social interaction and the need for coordination, structure, and common understanding among individuals within an


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interdependent social group. Culture may contribute to a sense of group identity but individuals do not necessarily need to recognize that they are members of a common group in order to share culture. Social identity is the explicit cognitive representation of the group as a social entity, i.e., categorizing self and others as interchangeable members of a shared social category (Turner et al., 1987). Most important, social identity entails differentiating the world into bounded ‘‘ingroups’’ (social categories that include the self; the cognition of an ‘‘us’’) and ‘‘outgroups’’ (social categories that do not include the self; the cognition of ‘‘them’’). Social categories, in effect, create we–they, us–them distinctions. When such categorizations also have emotional significance for an individual’s self-concept, the motivational components of ingroup–outgroup distinctions are engaged. These include ingroup loyalties and favoritism, implicit intergroup rivalries, and negative stereotypes and distrust of outgroup members (Brewer, 1979; Schopler & Insko, 1992). When individuals from different cultural backgrounds come together in interacting groups, cultural differences may lead to miscommunication, misunderstandings, and failures of coordination. But when groups are composed of members with different social identities – i.e. when social category distinctions are salient and acknowledged within the group – ingroup–outgroup processes come in to play that may have even more serious consequences for work group cooperation and effectiveness. Social category distinctions within work groups create barriers to interpersonal communication and trust, apart from any actual group differences in goals, values, or practices. Further, when there are any real group differences, these are accentuated when they correspond to social identity distinctions (Miller & Prentice, 1999). In their excellent chapter on managing conflict in multicultural groups, Behfar, Kern, and Brett mention the potential value of attributing differences among team members in expectations and norms to cultural background. Ascribing disagreements to culture in effect provides an external attribution that depersonalizes the conflict and helps to motivate accommodation and adaptation to differences. But from the perspective of social identity processes, this mechanism may be a two-edged sword. By calling attention to cultural distinctions among group members, one risks making ingroup–outgroup social categorizations salient and thus introducing intergroup tensions into the team building process (Brewer, 1995). My own research on cooperative workgroups in the laboratory suggests that personalizing team members (i.e. getting to know fellow group members as complex individuals rather than as representatives of social groups) is the

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most effective way of reducing or eliminating ingroup–outgroup discriminations in diverse groups. But given the findings reported by Behfar, Kern, and Brett, this, too, may be a dual-edged sword. Personalization may lead to attributing differences in perceptions and behavior to internal, dispositional factors rather than recognizing the cultural origins of certain practices and expectations. In this case, personalizing may exacerbate interpersonal conflicts that could otherwise have been diffused by acknowledging cultural differences. Herein lies the conundrum that besets all multicultural exchanges. How do we recognize and respect cultural influences and cultural identities without reifying cultural groups as rigid social categories? Collectively, the chapters in the present volume may help us to find a middle course that gets us out of this dilemma. By decomposing national culture into elements of cognition, expectations, social goals, and behavioral practices that individuals carry with them when they participate in multinational work groups, we can recognize cultural influences as sources of individual differences that group members bring to the table. By recognizing and acknowledging the cultural bases for some of the interindividual variance within groups, differences can be accommodated through informed interpersonal negotiation or group decision making. Further, if the process of accommodation leads to an emergent group culture that transcends local cultural differences, it contributes to the development of a shared multicultural (global) identity that supersedes categorical distinctions within the group (and beyond). Thus, bringing culture to the table may not only inform management theory but also contribute to cultural change that befits a globalized system.

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