Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
ix
x LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS
Japanese and American management is 95 percent the same, but differs in all important
respects.
contribution from many pioneers in this area, and the increasing global-
ization 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 under-
standing cross-national differences and similarities, one thing for sure in the
coming years is that greater conceptual clarity and empirical rigor will con-
tinue 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 cross-
cultural 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 be-
yond the main effect level. Instead, they adopt a more dynamic and inter-
active approach to the examination of cultural factors. Together, they
advocate a culture-moderating perspective – that is, culture factors mod-
erate 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), attri-
butions (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 vol-
ume highlights new exciting topics in the cross-cultural area: power, time,
National Culture and Groups: An Introduction xv
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Ya-Ru Chen
TOWARD AN UNDERSTANDING
OF PSYCHOLOGICAL DISTANCE
REDUCTION BETWEEN
GENERATIONS: A CROSS-
CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE
ABSTRACT
We explore how cultural factors at both socio-economic and psycholog-
ical individual levels affect the present generation’s beneficence toward
future generations in organizations and society. We examine how socio-
economic mechanisms may influence the present generation’s focus on the
future consequences of their decisions. In addition, we examine how self-
construals in different cultures might result in different mechanisms un-
derlying the reduction of psychological distance between generations in
different cultures. Implications of our cross-cultural analysis to inter-
generational decision making within the context of group research in
general are discussed.
and individual levels help identify processes underlying the reduction of em-
bedded psychological distance between the present and future generations.
We will organize our cultural analysis along the intertemporal and inter-
personal 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 intergene-
rational decisions (e.g., Adler, 2002; Kluckhohn & Strodtbeck, 1961). Fur-
ther, 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 in-
directly 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 inter-
generational 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
themselves is generally far more immediate than their impact on other par-
ties. 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.
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 en-
vironment at a given time. For example, Chinese society, which has tradition-
ally 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 rela-
tionship 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 tradi-
tional 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 socio-
economic 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.
10 MORELA HERNANDEZ ET AL.
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,
Toward an Understanding of Psychological Distance 11
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 intergenera-
tional decisions may determine the extent to which individuals define
themselves in terms of their relationship to future others. If cultures embed
12 MORELA HERNANDEZ ET AL.
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,
Toward an Understanding of Psychological Distance 15
when circumstances call for a sacrifice of the individual to benefit the well-
being 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 suffi-
cient 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, deperson-
alized future others) is critical. In line with social identity theory and the
theoretical framework on self-construal, we posit that if the intergenera-
tional 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 phenom-
enon.
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 select-
ing a risky option. This theory posits an implied transfer of responsibility
between generations, which may drive interdependence within collectivistic
16 MORELA HERNANDEZ ET AL.
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 the-
oretical 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 be-
tween 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 intergenera-
tional decision making has made important contributions to our understand-
ing 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
Toward an Understanding of Psychological Distance 17
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
especially thank Maggie Neale and two anonymous reviewers for their
enormously helpful comments.
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CULTURE AND CONTROL:
HOW INDEPENDENT AND
INTERDEPENDENT SELVES
EXPERIENCE AGENCY AND
CONSTRAINT
ABSTRACT
THE MODEL
Independent Stand out from social groups Limit the extent to which the self
motives interferes with the autonomy of
others
Independent Direct self-assertion, self- Avoid requests of favors and
strategies enhancement, and personal information from
confrontation others
Submit to universal laws and
procedures
Interdependent Assert self by preserving Fulfill obligations to the group,
motives relationships and using them maintain group harmony
Interdependent Group agent as a substitute for Self minimizing strategies (Amae,
strategies individual agent modesty, other enhancement,
conflict avoidance, self-restraint,
emotional repression)
Seek ingroup support Adjust/accept
Indirect assertion (e.g.,
withdrawal in negotiation)
Direct personal agency through
effort
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 suc-
cessful 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).
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 fundamen-
tally 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 be-
holden 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).
Agency Perceptions
& 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 situa-
tional factors that might affect their behavior (e.g., he is often late to work
because he is lazy and disorganized) (Ross, 1977). By contrast, interde-
pendent 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
Ingroup Relationships
‘‘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 re-
lationships 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 so-
cialization and it exists in the context of relationships. Indeed, people are
agents, not because of their freedom from others but because of their ‘‘re-
lationships 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 in-
terdependent societies and then describe our own perspective.
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 in-
fluence 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 cultur-
ally 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. In-
terdependent 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 in-
group 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 in-
dividual’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 indis-
tinguishable.
Kitayama and Uchida also note that these internalizations and adjustments
have very different implications cross-culturally. According to Western philos-
ophers, ‘‘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
32 TANYA MENON AND JEANNE HO-YING FU
(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 mean-
ings 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 con-
stitute 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 differ-
ent 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 man-
aged 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 con-
strained 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 philos-
ophers 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 re-
solves 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 assump-
tions from Western philosophy, and in other situations the two wills are
compatible, as in Tomoko’s situation. We examine situations where individ-
ual and group goals align and individuals use the group to substitute for
Culture and Control 33
The key reason why interdependent agency has been obscured in the lit-
erature 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 con-
tains sample items such as: ‘‘To what extent do you agree that: In this
society, social groups and organizations influence what happens in an in-
dividual’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 devel-
opment’’. 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 per-
sonal 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
34 TANYA MENON AND JEANNE HO-YING FU
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 in-
dividuals, 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 partic-
ular, 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.
instance, the hypothesis helps explain why East Asians are particularly likely
to take aggressive stances against outgroups. Leung (1987) finds that Chi-
nese 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 mech-
anism 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 re-
lationships drain individual resources and saddle the individual with obli-
gations, they also facilitate individual 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.
Effort. One way to interpret evidence that East Asians do not engage in self-
enhancement 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 inter-
pretation 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 diffi-
cult) (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), chil-
dren’s abilities to learn, and math performance. In the case of math per-
formance, the pervasive East Asians (and Asian American) implicit theory
38 TANYA MENON AND JEANNE HO-YING FU
that math ability is not innate but malleable underlie their higher perform-
ance in those subjects relative to North Americans (Holloway, 1988). Fur-
thermore, 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.
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 co-
operate well, but to those who finish first in school and who attain financial
rewards and achievements that signal social status. Values such as ‘‘har-
mony’’ and ‘‘modesty,’’ which have been emphasized in prior cross-cultural
research, could simply be a means to suppress the envy and natural com-
petition that becomes more pronounced among people when they are em-
bedded 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.
Just as groups and relationships saddle the interdependent self with obli-
gations and expectations around what it means to be a proper ‘‘interde-
pendent 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 con-
texts 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 fac-
tors (Barclay, 2000). By contrast, we hypothesize that East Asians feel sim-
ilar 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 con-
sistent 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 in-
terfering with another person’s life and autonomy and appearing helpless
and dependent.
Culture and Control 41
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 uni-
versal 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 re-
lational 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
42 TANYA MENON AND JEANNE HO-YING FU
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-sub-
mitting to obligations from ingroup relationships, in independent societies it
arises from the self submitting to fundamental principles and procedures.
DISCUSSION
Theoretical Implications
Our arguments suggest the need for two directions in cross-cultural theory
development. First, we have identified various theoretical mechanisms by
Culture and Control 43
Methodological Implications
Priming
Whereas priming techniques have captured the contrast between the inde-
pendent 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 evi-
dence suggests that an interdependent self primed with agency is consid-
erably 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.
44 TANYA MENON AND JEANNE HO-YING FU
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, in-
group 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 ex-
plicitly evaluate themselves negatively, they hold positive implicit self-eval-
uations. 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 man-
agers 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) ex-
hibit 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 cross-
cultural 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.
Culture and Control 45
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 tan-
tamount 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 inde-
pendent 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 en-
joy subtle opportunities to better their neighbors and experience envy when
their neighbors better them. Similarly, Americans may declare their inde-
pendence 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
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,
46 TANYA MENON AND JEANNE HO-YING FU
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 sup-
ported 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
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 in-
dependent cultures, whereas it leads to restraint of action in interdependent
1998; Markus & Kitayama, 1991; Nisbett, Peng, Choi, & Norenzayan,
2001). Even within the United States, regional cultures alter the ways in-
dividuals see and approach the world; for example, individuals born in the
South, compared to those born in the Northeast, respond differently to in-
sults at the psychological, physiological, and behavioral levels (Cohen, Nisbett,
Bowdle, & Schwarz, 1996). The consistent emergence of cross-cultural differ-
ences 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
In contrast to the West, the cultural traditions of most East Asian societies
are heavily influenced by Confucian and Buddhist thinking, both of which
Power, Culture, and Action 57
People are dependent on each other for social and material resources (Em-
erson, 1962; Mintzberg, 1983). Further, individuals have different amounts of
control over others’ access to desired resources because of unequal resource
distribution (Fiske, 1993; Fiske & Dépret, 1996). These two concepts, ‘‘de-
pendence’’ 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 be-
lieve that, regardless of culture, power channels behavior toward accomplish-
ing 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
Power, Culture, and Action 59
experience power are more likely to engage in behaviors that are consistent
with currently held goals than those who are powerless and respond to sit-
uational 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 as-
sertive action (Belk et al., 1988; Ellis, Kimmel, Dı́az-Guerrero, Cañas, &
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 com-
munally oriented; as a result power is conceptualized as responsibility, and
therefore power leads to restraint.
(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 un-
derstood 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 pre-
dominant goals in Western cultures (independent actors concerned with self-
interested 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.
Whereas much of the conceptualization of power in the West has been fo-
cused on influence, the conceptualization of power in the East is geared to-
ward 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
62 CHEN-BO ZHONG ET AL.
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.
Westerners
East Asians
Assertive
Action
High-Power High-Power
East Asians High-Power Westerners East Asians
Assertive
Action
Fig. 2. 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
+
+
Goals
Individual vs.
Communal
Fig. 3. Process Model Illustrating that Power Intensifies the Relationship between
Culturally Determined Self-Concept/Goals and Behavior.
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 ac-
cessibility of concepts related to entitlement and reward for these individ-
uals. 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 depend-
ability 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. Spe-
cifically, 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 un-
influenced 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).
66 CHEN-BO ZHONG ET AL.
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 re-
lationships, 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
Power, Culture, and Action 69
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 psy-
chological 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
70 CHEN-BO ZHONG ET AL.
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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 im-
plications for impact of choice on intrinsic motivation. According to this
model, (a) paternalistic organizational control enhances work group cre-
ativity for groups in the East; (b) the impact of paternalistic organiza-
tional 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 mo-
tivation (and subsequently, group creativity) in such a way that organ-
izational control would enhance intrinsic motivation (and creativity) for
groups in the East, but it would inhibit intrinsic motivation (and crea-
tivity) for groups in the West.
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 cap-
ture 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 ob-
jective 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.
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 cre-
ativity in employee groups, by definition employee creativity is conceptually
different from some of the brainstorming research conducted in the be-
havioral laboratory. More specifically, the definition of employee creativity
emphasizes both the novelty and usefulness aspect of creative idea produc-
tion, whereas research on brainstorming typically records fluency and
quantity of ideas generated as creativity. Therefore, compared with work-
place 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 input-
process-output framework posits that a group’s creative output is a direct
80 JING ZHOU
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 creativ-
ity. The development of this model is greatly informed by research on in-
dividual creativity in the workplace. I now turn to a briefly overview of that
body of research.
PATERNALISTIC LEADERSHIP
Empirical and theoretical work on paternalistic leadership has gained mo-
mentum 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.
contexts in the East and the West. Thus, testing Western theories can only
provide evidence concerning boundary conditions of extant leadership the-
ories developed in the West. They suggest that a complementary and per-
haps 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 leader-
ship. Farh and Cheng (2000) define paternalistic leadership as ‘‘y a father-
like 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.
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 individ-
ualistic. 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.
Paternalistic Organizational Control and Group Creativity 83
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, aggre-
gating 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 re-
lationship with top management. As a collective entity, the group as a whole
would have a high level of collective intrinsic motivation when top man-
agement exerts paternalistic organizational control. On the other hand,
when a group of employees in the West experiences paternalistic organi-
zational 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. Draw-
ing 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.
Paternalistic Group
Organizational Control Group Creativity
Intrinsic Motivation
National Culture
(East vs. West)
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 organi-
zational 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 di-
mension 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 or-
ganization 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 mem-
bers, 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 neg-
atively 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, &
Paternalistic Organizational Control and Group Creativity 87
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 manage-
ment), 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 manage-
ment does exhibit controls, the groups may interpret this ‘‘control from
above’’ as coaching and mentoring, because top management is paying at-
tention to their groups and providing directions, thereby fulfilling the man-
agement’s obligation of taking care of their subordinates. Consequently, the
groups’ collective intrinsic motivation is boosted. As suggested by the cre-
ativity literature (e.g., Amabile, 1988), intrinsic motivation leads to crea-
tivity. Thus, I propose:
Proposition 2. In the East, group intrinsic motivation will mediate the re-
lationship between paternalistic organizational control and group creativity.
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.
DISCUSSION
Several major creativity theories have discussed issues related to group cre-
ativity. 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
Paternalistic Organizational Control and Group Creativity 91
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 organ-
izations.
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 aggre-
gating group members’ self-reported intrinsic motivation. Alternatively,
92 JING ZHOU
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DYNAMICS OF TRUST IN
GUANXI NETWORKS
ABSTRACT
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 net-
work 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 dis-
tinction 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 97
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
Dynamics of Trust in Guanxi Networks 99
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 rel-
atively 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 busi-
ness engagements. In an extreme manifestation of this ideology, behavior at
the workplace is supposed to be efficiency and effectiveness oriented yet im-
personal. Thus, in a work context, Americans are likely to place more em-
phasis 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
102 ROY YONG-JOO CHUA AND MICHAEL W. MORRIS
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, Con-
fucian societies are characterized by kinship affiliation and familial collec-
tivism (Bond & Hwang, 1986) with clear delineation of the types of
Dynamics of Trust in Guanxi Networks 103
Economic Resource
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 ex-
ample, 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 in-
dividual 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 re-
sources 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 finan-
cially 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 relation-
ships 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 affect-
based trust such that friendship is positively related to affect-based trust.
Dynamics of Trust in Guanxi Networks 105
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 dem-
onstrated 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.
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 indi-
vidual’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 em-
ployee 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 pos-
itive 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
106 ROY YONG-JOO CHUA AND MICHAEL W. MORRIS
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 sim-
ilarity 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 sug-
gests that a dense social network provides clarity of norms and social sup-
port (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 socio-
emotional 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 pos-
itive 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 how-
ever 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 ad-
dition, because social ties are relatively more particularistic in the Chinese
culture, Chinese people do not forge relationship easily with strangers.
Dynamics of Trust in Guanxi Networks 107
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 affect-
and 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 busi-
ness transaction. However, even as China improves her legal infrastructure,
there does not appear to be a decline in the importance of personal con-
nections (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 com-
prehensive 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 di-
mension 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
Dynamics of Trust in Guanxi Networks 109
the extent to which people are willing or feel comfortable to mix both con-
siderations 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 affect-
based 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 di-
mensions 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 net-
work context serves to not only elucidate cultural differences in network
dynamics but also reveal areas of similarity.
Practical Implications
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 com-
munist party members in one’s network has positive effects on one’s man-
agerial 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 mem-
bers for both emotional and instrumental support in times of need. In con-
trast, 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.
Dynamics of Trust in Guanxi Networks 111
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 cognition-
based 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 phar-
maceutical/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
ABSTRACT
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 tem-
porality 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 con-
text 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 agree-
ment has to be reached, when negotiations are one-time vs. multiple-time
events, or when negotiations involve explicit temporal dependencies. One cir-
cumstance 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 de-
creased 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 ex-
perience 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 sta-
bility 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 nego-
tiation 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
Temporality and Culture in Negotiations 117
National
Environment
Culture
Nation
Cultural Negotiation National
Level
Temporality Paradigm Stability Variables
Individual
Perceptions of Negotiation Negotiation
Level
Time Process Outcomes Variables
Saunders, Barry, & Minton, 2004), highlighting situations where the social
nature of decision making is important such that the outcome of the collab-
orative 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 lit-
erature (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 repre-
sentations 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 sta-
bility 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 differ-
ences 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 nego-
tiation paradigms individuals hold. We conclude with a discussion including
implications for negotiations and avenues for future research.
Although an ideal literature review for this paper would encompass research
that explored the influence of culture on temporality in intra-cultural ne-
gotiations, such a literature is scarce (see Foster, 1992). Therefore, our lit-
erature 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.
Temporality and Culture in Negotiations 119
Table 1 provides a brief summary of how Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S.
compare on a variety of important aspects of national environment includ-
ing 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). Further-
more, these three countries and their citizens also vary in terms of individ-
ualism–collectivism, with Portugal at the collectivist end of this scale, the
U.S. at the individualistic end, and Turkey ranking as a moderately col-
lectivistic society (Cavusgil, Civi, Tutek, & Dalgic, 2003). We argue that the
differences between these countries in terms of the broader national envi-
ronment meaningfully distinguish these nations from one another in sig-
nificant 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.
Temporality and Culture in Negotiations 121
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.
In Portugal, Turkey, and the U.S., the legal systems operate in different
ways, potentially leading to differences in the way individuals view the fu-
ture 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 pay-
ments rather than credit or other forms of delayed payments), even pro-
viding 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.
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 uncer-
tainty for individuals. For example, some scholars have speculated that close
relationships can substitute for other governance mechanisms, such as con-
tractual 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 par-
ties involved in the negotiation. However, close relationships may have an-
other interesting temporal effect. Some have observed that one way to
establish or build close relationships is by extending trust. In these situations,
124 SUNGU ARMAGAN ET AL.
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 be-
come 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 in-
volving 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 re-
lationship 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, per-
haps 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 differ-
ent 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 individ-
ualistic 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
Temporality and Culture in Negotiations 125
that emerge from ethnic and regional differences. This heterogeneity of cul-
tures 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 ac-
count 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 under-
standing 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 insti-
tutional, 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 nego-
tiations.
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 hard-
ship 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 cooper-
ation over delayed issues can increase the chances of reaching impasse or
prevent negotiators from identifying the integrative potential in an agree-
ment. Further, compared to those in present-oriented cultures, negotiators
embedded in future-oriented cultures may be more likely to take into ac-
count 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 pros-
perous 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 ne-
gotiators 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
130 SUNGU ARMAGAN ET AL.
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 com-
munity 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 negoti-
ating 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, ne-
gotiators 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 tem-
poral 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.
that individuals in a given culture hold and that are used to make sense
of the negotiation activity. These negotiation paradigms influence the spe-
cific processes and outcomes associated with temporality in any given
negotiation.
and desires to the other party while taking less time to reach an agreement
than the Turks.
DISCUSSION
Implications
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 op-
portunities 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 differ-
ent negotiating behaviors when negotiating intra-culturally than when they
engaged in cross-cultural negotiation. This is a positive indication that man-
agers 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 sur-
rounding 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
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
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 exclu-
sively 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 proc-
esses 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 inter-
actions 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 neg-
atively 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 trans-
formational 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 ex-
pressed affect in social influence.
150 LU WANG ET AL.
Group members’
verbally expressed evaluations
of focal issue
Focal
Issue
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, psychophys-
iological 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
Culture, Affect, and Social Influence in Decision-Making Groups 153
Group members’
verbally expressed evaluations
of focal issue
and important target; and (4) an efficient signal – which serves to commu-
nicate feelings to others. Mood, on the other hand, is defined as, ‘‘transient
episodes of feeling or affect’’ (Watson, 2000, p. 4). Compared with an emo-
tion, 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 ex-
perienced. These feelings are often characterized in terms of degree of pleas-
antness 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.
154 LU WANG ET AL.
Group members’
Group members’
verbally expressed evaluations
nonverbally expressed affect
of focal issue
In-group/
Out-group²
Individualism/
Contagion Mechanism
Perception Mechanism
Collectivism¹
Power²
Observing group
Power members’
Distance¹ experienced
affect
Focal
Individualism/ Issue
Collectivism¹
Fig. 1c. Proposed Model of Culture, Affect, and Social Influence in Groups.
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 val-
ues 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 orientat-
ions that seem most promising: individualism–collectivism and power dis-
tance. Individualism–collectivism refers to the extent to which individuals
organize their world around in-groups and out-groups; power distance re-
fers 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 in-
fluence via the perception mechanism.
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 in-
groups 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 in-
group member’s approval is more relevant to an individual than an out-
group 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:
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.
Respect for Authority, Power Distance, and the Perception Mechanism. Re-
searchers 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 dis-
tance cultures tend to learn to respect legitimate authority more than in-
dividuals 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 differ-
ences 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
160 LU WANG ET AL.
other group members they focus their attention. Ostensibly driven by re-
spect for status, individuals have been found to distinguish between high-
status (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.
relationship between other group member’s expressed affect and the indi-
vidual’s evaluations of focal issues. Howard and Gengler (2001) found em-
pirical 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.
DISCUSSION
This chapter has examined the relationships among affect, culture, and so-
cial 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 ex-
amined 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, multi-
channel perspective on social influence. The implication for future research
is that scholars should continue to conceptualize culture and social influence
Culture, Affect, and Social Influence in Decision-Making Groups 165
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 assump-
tion that observers believe expressed affect reflects inner states – i.e. expe-
rienced 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 inter-
pretation 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 pos-
sibility of misattributed affect. Although emotions tend to be stimulus-
reactive 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 interpreta-
tion, 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 non-
specific 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 dis-
plays. If observers are able to interpret such displays, they should be more
likely to be influenced by them than if they cannot understand these dis-
plays. Recent research suggests that observers are better able to interpret
Culture, Affect, and Social Influence in Decision-Making Groups 167
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QUESTION COMPREHENSION
AND RESPONSE: IMPLICATIONS
OF INDIVIDUALISM AND
COLLECTIVISM
ABSTRACT
How central are satisfaction with school and marital satisfaction to life sat-
isfaction? Questions like this are almost always answered, but answers are
profoundly influenced by context. While we as researchers may think that we
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 com-
munication research have enhanced our understanding of the processes un-
derlying question response (for reviews see Sudman, Bradburn, & Schwarz,
1996; Schwarz, 1999a; Tourangeau, Rips, and Rasinski, 2000). Unfortu-
nately, this work has not yet been well integrated into the cross-cultural field.
In the current chapter, we provide a framework for hypothesizing how cross-
cultural 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 corre-
lations 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 impor-
tance 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 par-
ticipants are likely to use to reconstruct memory; cross-cultural psycholo-
gists 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 175
LIMITATIONS OF SELF-REPORT
Maxims of Conversation
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 differ-
ence in focus on social context will be reflected in differential sensitivity to
the conversational logic of the research context.
Asking Questions
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 informa-
tion 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).
Respondents report more anger when the time frame is ‘last weeks’ than
when it is ‘last years’ (Winkielman, Knäuper, & 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, Knäuper, 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 neg-
ative 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 num-
bers 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.
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, autobio-
graphical 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).
Question Comprehension and Response 181
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 pragmat-
ically – by making the response situation anonymous, improving fit between
question and response to reduce guessing, and accepting that highly involv-
ing 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.
182 AYSE K. USKUL AND DAPHNA OYSERMAN
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 tech-
niques (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-en-
hancement (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 ed-
iting 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 sur-
vey, attributes of the interviewer, and interview situation) and cultural
norms are likely to influence perceived desirability–undesirability of re-
sponse. 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 un-
derreporting of undesirable behavior.
How might cultural frame inform the sense made of questions, what is salient
and therefore retrievable from memory, and what is not memorable and
Question Comprehension and Response 183
therefore must be inferred, the subjective theories used to make needed in-
ferences, 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 pro-
vided to them. To examine how culture may influence understanding, mem-
ory, subjective theory, and response editing, we use an operationalization of
culture focusing on differences in individualism and collectivism.
Situated Culture
Social Situations
Cognitive,
Distal Culture,
affective,
History, Traditions Subjective construal behavioral
(Linguistic, of the situation consequences
Philosophical,
Religious)
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 indi-
vidualistic or collectivistic lens will be primed, as we will discuss in the next
section.
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 com-
parison 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 self-
esteem, 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 appropriate-
ness 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 re-
spondents 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.
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 distribu-
tion. 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.
& Kitayama, 1991; Wang, 2001; Wang & Leichtman, 2000). Following
Bartlett’s (1932) argument that ‘‘y remembering is ‘schematically’ deter-
mined’’ (p. 312), events that are congruent with one’s self-schema are ex-
pected to have a perceptual and comprehension advantage over those that
do not; indeed, schema-congruent information is remembered more accu-
rately 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 fit-
ting 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 indi-
viduals 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
émigrés describing events in Russian, were more likely to include a descrip-
tion 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 influ-
ences not only self-report on behavior and social judgment but also recalls
the processing of non-social information (Kühnen & Oyserman, 2002;
Oyserman, Sorensen, Cha, & Schwarz, 2006).
social desirability, van Hemert et al. (2002) found that the strongest pre-
dictor 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 spec-
ulated 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 collectiv-
ism, 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 dy-
namic 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 cat-
egories to which it belongs and using rules such as formal logic to under-
stand 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 in-
dividualists. Questions focused on irrelevant behaviors, judgments, and at-
titudes are more likely to need to be estimated. If culturally relevant subjective
theories focus on context-focused rather than person-focused stability, then
Question Comprehension and Response 193
individuals high in collectivism may be left less sure of their estimated an-
swers. 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 de-
pend on the extent to which a domain involves personal involvement. To the
extent that questions are culturally specific, midpoint responding should in-
crease 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 re-
sponding 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 for-
mat-related features of questions influence extreme responding cross-cultur-
ally. 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
194 AYSE K. USKUL AND DAPHNA OYSERMAN
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 non-
Hispanic whites). Grimm and Church (1999) report increased use of extreme
responses in a collectivistic group of participants (Philippine students) com-
pared to an individualistic group of participants (US students) when pre-
sented 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-say-
ing 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 col-
lectivism 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 acquies-
cence is likely to increase in the same contexts that enhance social desir-
ability 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 de-
rived 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 be-
haviors, 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 acqui-
escence. Johnson et al. (2005) also reported that individualism was negatively
associated with acquiescent bias, such that individuals from individualistic
Question Comprehension and Response 195
SUMMARY
In the present chapter, we focused on commonly discussed aspects of indi-
vidualism 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 compre-
hension and responses). We applied cognitive survey approaches to under-
standing how contexts influence answers to make predictions about the
implications of the research context on outcomes of cultural and cross-cul-
tural 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 collec-
tivism 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 ex-
tremity or modesty. Collectivism also influences what is salient enough to be
memorable and not require estimation.
196 AYSE K. USKUL AND DAPHNA OYSERMAN
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
ABSTRACT
We offer a conceptualization of third culture in intercultural interactions
and describe its different forms as well as its antecedents and conse-
quences. Third culture is a multicultural team’s shared schema that con-
tains 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 iden-
tity formation and sensemaking mechanisms to propose the effects of
these third culture forms on team performance.
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,
208 WENDI L. ADAIR ET AL.
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 program-
ming 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 rep-
resenting one’s understanding of an environment that guides interpre-
tation 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 cul-
ture 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 infor-
mation, 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
Managing the Intercultural Interface 209
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 con-
sists 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 well-
being 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 pre-
dict 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 strat-
egies 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 mech-
anisms of third culture building, and explicitly addressing the consequences
of third culture strength and composition for team process and outcome.
210 WENDI L. ADAIR ET AL.
In a team context, there are several pressures that prompt a merging of in-
dividual 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 de-
mands (Cannon-Bowers, Salas, & Converse, 1993), sensemaking and the de-
termination 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 under-
standing, 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 de-
velop 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).
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
Managing the Intercultural Interface 211
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 do-
mains’’ (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 mod-
els 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.
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
Managing the Intercultural Interface 213
schema, the third culture should be stronger than when individuals’ schemas
only partly merge and some information continues to reside in the individ-
uals’ 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 mem-
ber’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 com-
munication when working in Team Alpha. When they are doing work
Collectivism
Individualism Cooperation
Self interest Indirect
Direct communication
communication
Japanese team
U.S. team member’s
member’s schema
schema
Intersection
Collectivism
Collectivism Self Direct Com. Cooperation
Cooperation Interest
Direct
communication
Third Culture Content
c. d.
Tradition
Precedent Precedent
Tradition
Emergent Collectivism
Cooperation
Direct Com.
Self Collectivism
Direct Com. Cooperation
interest
and collectivism, but each team member maintains his own distinct con-
ceptualization 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).
Collectivism
Third culture is likely to develop whenever individuals work toward a com-
mon 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.
216 WENDI L. ADAIR ET AL.
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 impor-
tant 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 communi-
cation. In high context cultures, people prefer indirect forms of communi-
cation 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,
Managing the Intercultural Interface 217
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
Managing the Intercultural Interface 219
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 in-
tegrate 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.
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 misunderstand-
ings 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
Managing the Intercultural Interface 221
Homogeneity
As with the individual culture attributes and third culture strength, we pro-
pose 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 expe-
rience. 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.
One of the strengths of intercultural teams is the potential for creativity and
better decision making when members take advantage of the varied re-
sources 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.
Managing the Intercultural Interface 223
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 relation-
ship 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 strat-
egies 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.
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 exam-
ple, 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 mecha-
nisms 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 cul-
turally 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.
The assumption that shared schemas will improve team process and out-
come is based on two primary mechanisms: sensemaking and group identity
Managing the Intercultural Interface 225
(Fig. 1). According to the sensemaking argument, teams with a shared un-
derstanding 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 im-
prove team processes, such as information exchange and coordination, and
outcome more than for those with the intersection third culture. Thus, ac-
cording 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 per-
formance 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 & Moham-
med, 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.
226 WENDI L. ADAIR ET AL.
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 rela-
tionships. The presence of conflict will also affect how a third culture forms.
Each form of third culture has implications for team process and out-
come. 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 op-
timal 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 tra-
dition 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 ad-
ditional moderating factors. For example, task uncertainty may moderate
the relationship between different third culture forms and team perform-
ance. Finally, future research might address the conditions that would sug-
gest 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.
228 WENDI L. ADAIR ET AL.
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$
$
This research was supported by a grant from the Dispute Resolution Research Center at the
Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University.
APPROACHES TO UNDERSTANDING
MULTICULTURAL TEAM CHALLENGES
Concept mapping analysis (Jackson & Trochim, 2002) revealed that same-
culture 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.
These challenges had to do with differing viewpoints about facts and pri-
orities 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. How-
ever, 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).
238 KRISTIN BEHFAR ET AL.
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, estab-
lishing 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).
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 co-
ordinating (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).
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 multicul-
tural team challenges, which we discuss below and compare to the same-
culture team results.
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 ar-
riving 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 col-
lectivistic 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 indi-
vidualistic cultures expected to put in their work effort only between com-
monly agreed upon work hours (typically an 8–12 h work per day) and to
leave work when their part of the task was complete.
This set of challenges was caused by differing respect for status, the chain of
command, and business practices that created unorthodox power differen-
tials. 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
Managing Challenges in Multicultural Teams 243
Inter-Group Prejudices
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 rec-
ommendation 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 com-
plexity 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).
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 com-
parison. 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.
246 KRISTIN BEHFAR ET AL.
Direct versus. indirect confrontation: Stylistic Team adapts: if the other style cannot or will
differences in publicly expressing and/or not adapt. Members learn to work within
confronting different points of view, their differences
resulting in escalation of interpersonal Manager intervenes: to refocus group on the
tension superordinate goal, to smooth over
interpersonal tensions, or serve as the final
decision maker
Norms for problem solving and decision Team adapts: if it is able to blame cultural
making: Differences in preference for a influences rather than individual
more slow-paced analytical problem preferences. Allows different approaches to
solving and relationship building process co-exist, even uses different approaches to
versus a more efficiency focused approach get different perspectives on the problem
Manager intervenes: to impose structure
when team is blocked by such differences
Time, urgency, and pace: Differences in time Team adapts: if it recognizes it cannot change
estimates to deliver products and the culturally based time structure like siestas,
definition of ‘‘on-time’’ delivery religious holidays, and nationally
mandated vacations
Manager intervenes: to make a final decision
about how long work should take
Differences in work norms and behaviors: Team adapts: if it can blame etiquette
Differences about what is acceptable violations on culture, ‘‘didn’t know any
workplace etiquette stemming either from better;’’ and socializes member whose
national customs or national norms for norms are different
separating personal time and work time 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 mul-
ticultural teams are able to address these challenges for themselves – and
four broad conditions under which multicultural teams require the inter-
vention of a manager.
Violations of respect and hierarchy: Challenges Team adapts: if unorthodox practices can be
stemming from different expectations for ‘‘blamed’’ on special situations. Team
respecting hierarchy and other status member exits if this can not be done
indicators Manager intervenes: to show respect where
violations have occurred
Inter-group prejudices: Challenges stemming Team adapts: (i.e., accepts prejudice) because
from innate or pre-existing stigma, cannot change organizational policy
prejudices, and judgments spilling over into Manager intervenes: to create a very
the workplace deliberate and structured process of getting
work done that may use subgroups
Lack of common ground (language, credit): Team adapts: if offensive practices can be
Challenges stemming from perceived ‘‘framed’’ as providing some type of
favoritism or lack of recognition for advantage for the team. If not
contribution based on how or how well interpersonal tension escalates and requires
members expressed themselves managerial intervention
Manager intervenes: to assign work according
to principles that team may consider unfair,
but which move task accomplishment
forward
Fluency (accents and vocabulary): Challenges Teams adapts: if it is able to recognize how
caused by negative reactions and/or words with double meanings originated
misunderstandings due to language issues from differences in social or legal systems
such as heavy accents and words with Manager intervenes: to stop the escalation of
different connotations interpersonal tension by rejecting the idea
that a lack of fluency indicates lack of
competence
Thought you had agreement? Implicit versus Team adapts: when it is able to recognize
explicit communication: Challenges cultural root of the problem such as ‘‘yes’’
stemming from differences in interpretation did not mean ‘‘yes I agree’’, it means ‘‘I am
about the level of commitment and/or listening’’
agreement reached 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 suc-
cessful. The methods of the interview study do not allow for a formal eval-
uation 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.
Managing Challenges in Multicultural Teams 249
Adaptation
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 (regard-
less of location) with an aggressive communication style, less-aggressive
team members reported adapting by being more vocal and assertive in sup-
port of their same-culture teammates (or those with a similar culturally
based profile) than they ordinarily would have been if the dominant ma-
jority 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 mem-
bers 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
250 KRISTIN BEHFAR ET AL.
either learning to be patient or learning how to use the style to their ad-
vantage. 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
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 agree-
ments escalated.
Managing Challenges in Multicultural Teams 251
Intervention Condition #2
Second, when language issues resulted in perceptions of disrespect or in-
justice, 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 mem-
bers often received a disproportionate amount of recognition because they
were better able to articulate their thoughts to clients. In these cases, man-
agers intervened to recognize and remind team members and customers of
team member qualifications and to set norms that encouraged team mem-
bers 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 exam-
ple, 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 expe-
riences, and the expertise of the ‘‘low-status’’ members slowly became rec-
ognized. 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 compe-
tition 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.
252 KRISTIN BEHFAR ET AL.
Leave or Exit
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 chal-
lenges, 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) ad-
aptation, (2) managerial intervention, or (3) leaving or exiting the team. This
section translates these conditions into testable propositions.
Adaptation
Management Intervention
This proposition is consistent with the literature on face saving and pro-
cedural 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 mem-
bers 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 re-
venge, which is the other factor that makes it difficult for parties to dis-
engage 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 mana-
gerial 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). Sim-
ply 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 hier-
archical cultures preserves relationships and restores respect between emo-
tionally 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.
Managing Challenges in Multicultural Teams 257
Leaving or Exiting
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
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 interven-
tion, if differences in work norms, racial and ethnic prejudices, communi-
cation 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 short-
term solutions – and to better isolate when team adaptation strategies ac-
tually 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 differ-
ences. The broad conditions we identified for team adaptation versus man-
agerial 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
Responses
Action tendencies:
Instrumental behavior
Cognitions: Affect-as-
information
265
266 HILLARY ANGER ELFENBEIN AND AIWA SHIRAKO
Emotional Appraisal
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 disappoint-
ment. Together, these findings imply that complex events with multiple
potential meanings for those involved are the most likely stimuli for mem-
bers 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 ap-
praise 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 impor-
tance 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.
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 Experience
Emotional Expression
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 ex-
press 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 per-
son A’s emotion may serve as a stimulus for person B, inspiring the rep-
etition of the chronological stages of the emotion process in another person.
Thus, individual sensitivity to others’ emotional states – frequently auto-
matic, implicit and unaware – is the building block for dyadic-level phe-
nomena 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 emo-
tional state. In team settings, perceiving the expressive behavior of the
people around us is a window into their reactions and attributions, their
An Emotion Process Model for Multicultural Teams 281
present a challenge for multicultural teams. Much of the evidence for cul-
tural 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 cross-
cultural 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 mem-
bers 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 univer-
sals 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 misunder-
standing when communication takes place across cultural boundaries.
Judgments of other people’s emotional expressions are faster and more ac-
curate 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
An Emotion Process Model for Multicultural Teams 283
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’ emo-
tional signals.
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 con-
sider it early. ‘‘It wasn’t a big deal’’, Member C might recall. These differ-
ences 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
286 HILLARY ANGER ELFENBEIN AND AIWA SHIRAKO
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 be-
wilder a sensitive teammate. Sometimes these messages appear mixed only
due to miscommunication. Even when team members from different cul-
tural backgrounds appraise an event similarly, experience the same emo-
tion, 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 win-
dow into their reactions in the team environment, then the greater difficulty
of achieving such accuracy across cultures presents a challenge for multina-
tional 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 in-
dividuals 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 pro-
nounced when the teams are newly formed, but that these negative per-
formance 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
An Emotion Process Model for Multicultural Teams 287
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 expres-
sions of that culture, but that it may also help individuals to develop meta-
perceptions that increase adaptability to learn the emotional nuances of
other cultures as well.
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 emo-
tion 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 ex-
cessively high levels they may be distracted by the emotional intensity. Thus,
emotional similarity may be beneficial in moderate doses, but not in over-
dose. 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 distin-
guish 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
An Emotion Process Model for Multicultural Teams 289
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 misunderstand-
ing 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
290 HILLARY ANGER ELFENBEIN AND AIWA SHIRAKO
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 pho-
tographs 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?
ABSTRACT
Cultural Intelligence
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 self-
concept 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 pro-
vide, 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
Cultural Intelligence and the Multinational Team 303
culture. These higher level cognitive processes are part of a person’s meta-
cognition. 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 think-
ing organisms. Second, it refers to task variables, or the nature of the in-
formation 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 some-
thing 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 in-
formation (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 guid-
ance 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
304 LISA M. MOYNIHAN ET AL.
Motivational Facet
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 intelli-
gence reflects a person’s capability to acquire or adapt behaviors appropri-
ate for a new culture. Difficulties in acquiring a new language can be
important to cultural adjustment such as accurate pronunciation of tones
306 LISA M. MOYNIHAN ET AL.
What, then, might cultural intelligence add to this expansive list of intel-
ligences? 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 intelli-
gence are meaningful within a given cultural context, but they do not nec-
essarily 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 meta-
cognitive 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 subor-
dinate 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). How-
ever, 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 uncomfort-
able position.
Cultural Intelligence and the Multinational Team 309
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 frame-
work 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 com-
prehend another cultural frame. In the example of the French manager, he
must possess a metacognitive strategy to determine the significance of com-
pliments 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.
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 train-
ing is effective because individuals learn by doing and get immediate and on-
going feedback about the correctness of their behaviors and performance
(Wexley & Latham, 2001). In the case of developing CQ, having daily in-
teractions with members from other cultures in order to get work done
provides a context where team members can receive feedback on the effec-
tiveness 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. Prac-
tice is critical in facilitating the conversion of an aptitude into a skill. For
example, we can learn about how an individual might acquire cultural in-
telligence by drawing on research about chess players. Although the ster-
eotypical image of a chess player may seem to be far removed from the
average professional manager, what we know about expertise and develop-
ment 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,
312 LISA M. MOYNIHAN ET AL.
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 mul-
tinational 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.
The extent of positive feedback team members get from experiencing high
levels of performance could also effect the development of cultural intel-
ligence. 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
314 LISA M. MOYNIHAN ET AL.
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
316 LISA M. MOYNIHAN ET AL.
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 mem-
bers 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 mul-
tinational teams.
Fig. 2. Multilevel Model Linking Multinational Team Experience and Cultural Intelligence.
317
318 LISA M. MOYNIHAN ET AL.
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, or-
ganizational 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 con-
ducted this as well as the following individual-level analysis by structural
equation modeling as well as regression analysis with team cluster adjust-
ments. 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 pos-
itively related to individual CQ after four months of working in the mul-
tinational 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 ex-
amining correlations of the team average CQ with measures of group proc-
esses 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
Cultural Intelligence and the Multinational Team 319
working together for four months was significantly positively correlated with
team performance on the audit project, supporting Proposition 7.
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 short-
ened 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
ABSTRACT
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 dom-
inance 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, viola-
tion 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 cul-
tures (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 327
MULTICULTURAL TEAMS
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 inter-
nalize its corporate values. MNOs operate beyond national cultures. There-
fore, 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.
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 cre-
ating 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
Global Work Culture and Global Identity 331
Global Identity
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’ iden-
tification 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 mem-
bers’ sense of a global identity.
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 collecti-
vistic 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 uncer-
tainty-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
Global Global
High
Acceptance
of the global
work values
Low
Marginal Locall
Low High
Preservation of one’s
one’ ownn
local national va
values
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 indi-
viduals (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 tight-
ness/looseness (Chan et al., 1996) of culture with respect to different
Global Work Culture and Global Identity 341
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 fo-
cused on managing their employees, their tasks, and missions. These find-
ings 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 integra-
tion 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 sta-
ble environments. However, the global environment in which MCTs op-
erate 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 re-
placed by, added to, or mixed with methods of other team members.
We argue that in order for MCTs to have the ability to allow coex-
istence 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 cre-
ate 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.
342 EFRAT SHOKEF AND MIRIAM EREZ
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 shar-
ing develop overtime, as team members learn to work with each other, learn
who knows what, and share a common organizational knowledge that al-
lows 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 sys-
tem 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 psycholog-
ical 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 en-
countered 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,
Global Work Culture and Global Identity 343
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 sup-
ported the positive effect of an MCT’s global identity on team performance.
Participants in this study were 288 MBA students from seven different coun-
tries around the world who worked in multicultural, virtual teams on a joint-
class 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 elec-
tronic 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, open-
ness to diversity facilitates the emergence of a shared culture in MCTs. Aware-
ness 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.
344 EFRAT SHOKEF AND MIRIAM EREZ
90
Team Performance
85
80
75
70
Low High
Team Global Identity Prior to the Project
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
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
Global Work Culture and Global Identity 345
adaptation to and the adoption of global work values. We propose that mem-
bers of MCTs hold multiple cultural meaning systems, and multiple identities
that help them adapt to multiple work contexts. We analyze the interrelation-
ships 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, be-
yond 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, cus-
tomer 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, enhanc-
ing 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 main-
tain 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
346 EFRAT SHOKEF AND MIRIAM EREZ
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 employ-
ees, 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 cul-
tures (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 interrela-
tionship, and their effects on MCT performance. We integrated two lines of
theories and research: theories of teams – composition, structure and proc-
esses, 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 per-
spectives. 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 man-
aging cultural variation.
The chapters in this volume either explicitly or implicitly adopt this mid-
dle 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 under-
standing the emotional life of groups (Chua & Morris; Wang, Doucet, &
Northcraft; Elfenbein & Shirako), interpersonal communication (Uskal &
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, & Wade-
Benzoni), 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 culture-
in-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 illus-
trated 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 var-
iance 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 in-
fluence 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
Bringing Culture to the Tabley 355
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
356 MARILYNN B. BREWER
of the global economy, this focus on East–West differences may have prac-
tical as well as historical justification. But the increasing globalization of
commerce and economic exchange and the expansion of multinational cor-
porations across the world calls for a more geographically diversified pro-
gram 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 po-
tential 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-cul-
tural researchers. This aspect of national culture has been captured suc-
cinctly in the distinction between individualism and collectivism as broad
cultural orientations (Hofstede, 1980; Triandis, 1995). Although this di-
mension 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 intercon-
nected and embedded in interdependent social relationships, along with
normative prescriptions and values about the priority to be given to indi-
vidual and group interests. Not surprisingly, this aspect of culture is seen as
central to questions of how culture influences group processes in the work-
place. 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 inter-
pretation 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 re-
sponse to conflict (Behfar, Kern, & Brett).
Despite acknowledging the central importance of the individualism–
collectivism distinction, the chapters in this volume also challenge the
Bringing Culture to the Tabley 357
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 re-
sponsibilities specified at the dyadic level. On the other, groups may be
conceived as collective entities with interests that supersede those of indi-
vidual 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 rela-
tionships 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 group-
based collectivism (Brewer & Roccas, 2001), as described in the chapter by
358 MARILYNN B. BREWER
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 out-
groups 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 partici-
pants 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) sug-
gested 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 distinc-
tions 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’’ em-
bedded 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 in-
group for East Asians is cognitively represented as a relatively stable and
structured network of relationships among group members rather than a
depersonalized social category.
360 MARILYNN B. BREWER
Although the theme reflected in the title of the present volume is national
culture and groups, it is clear that the conceptualization of culture repre-
sented in the content of the chapters is not restricted to national or ethnic
group units. As emphasized explicitly by Shokef and Erez, culture – con-
ceptualized 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
Bringing Culture to the Tabley 361
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 environ-
ment 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 asso-
ciated 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 ‘‘monocul-
tural’’ 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.
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