Effect of gender composition and negotiation support systems in dyadic setting: An empirical study

Master'sMASTER OF SCIENC

Across the great divides: Gender dynamics influence how intercultural conflict helps or hurts creative collaboration

Ministry of Education, Singapore, Social Science Research Thematic Gran

The Effect of Dyad Interaction and Marital Adjustment on Cognitive Performance in Everyday Logical Problem Solving

The theory of formal operations as a final stage of adult development has come under criticism for various reasons, primarily the overemphasis on logical thought processes which are based on invariant and absolute rules within a closed system. Everyday problems, in contrast, are typically open-ended and are defined by the context in which they are embedded. The purpose of this study was to investigate cognitive behaviors that occurred between two individuals as they cooperatively worked together to solve logical problems. Of interest were the effects of marital adjustment on cognitive performance, the relation between social behaviors, marital adjustment, and cognition, and the influence of familiar versus a stranger dyadic problem-solving setting on cognitive behaviors. It was hypothesized that well adjusted married and stranger dyads would not only demonstrate mastery of problem-solving tasks at the formal operational level, but would also demonstrate more relativistic and/or dialectical problem solving, and more facilitative social behaviors, than poorly adjusted married and stranger dyads. Forty couples between the ages of 35 and 50, who had been married between five and thirty years, were prescreened for verbal intelligence and marital adjustment. They were then randomly assigned to participate in one of four dyadic settings, that is, maritally well versus poorly adjusted couples solving problems in either married or unmarried/stranger dyads. Dyads were administered five formal operational problems. Two of the five were formal logical, or mathematical in nature, while three problems contained both mathematical and interpersonal, or social elements. Each dyad was videotaped during the problem-solving process, beginning with the instructions. Participant averaged about 1 hour and 15 minutes to complete five problems. Analyses of variance were performed on marital adjustment and dyadic setting as related to formal and relativistic cognitions. There were no marital adjustment or dyadic setting differences in overall ability to use formal operations. However, maritally well adjusted stranger and married dyads evidenced significantly more relativistic cognitions, particularly on problems involving a social/everyday element, than poorly adjusted married and stranger dyads. These differences also held constant across each of three increasingly complex levels of relativistic behaviors. Multivariate analyses were performed on four separate social behavior scales as related to formal and relativistic cognitions, as well as marital adjustment and dyadic setting groups. Again, formal operations did not distinguish between the differing social behaviors; however, the social behavior scales, particularly avoidant versus cooperative behaviors, were strongly related to marital adjustment and relativistic thinking

Gender Differences in Virtual Collaboration on a Creative Design Task

Collaboration is an important activity in every organization because it fundamentally affects work processes and organizational outcomes. Diversity adds complexity to the mechanism of virtual teams because teams routinely operate virtually by spanning temporal, geographic, national, and cultural boundaries. One important way to decode such complexity is to understand gender differences and their impacts on virtual modes of collaboration. In this research, we examine gender differences and how they influence outcomes and attitudes on virtual collaboration in the context of team gender composition. Phase one of our study involved male-male dyads and female-female dyads that collaborated virtually in Second Life. The preliminary results show that impression management and team effort both have significant positive impacts on team outcomes (trust and satisfaction). Phase two of our study is on dyads of mixed gender

Collaborators and Competitors Negotiating in Gains and Losses

The economy is driven by everyday negotiations between sellers and buyers. Electronic Negotiation Systems (ENSs) are embedded with features and methods that help users better manage their negotiation processes, and work with their counterparts in order to achieve superior outcomes. As ENSs inevitably mediate the information exchange, the representation of this information plays a crucial role in decision support. Still, there is a lack of empirical research on ENSs, especially on the impact of information framing on the process, as well as on the outcomes of interactions. Research in this area is further complicated when the interactions of users with dissimilar motivations are taken into account. This project aims at investigating how framing by the ENS impacts the negotiation process and outcomes for different motivational orientations. It proposes a research framework that examines the effects of ENS framing of outcomes (i.e., as gains or losses) and motivational orientation (i.e., competitive or collaborative) on the negotiation process and consequences at the dyadic and individual levels. An experimental 2X2 factor design was used to test the underlying hypotheses, which: (1) examined the outcomes (i.e., higher joint outcome and contract balance) and the process (i.e., greater number of offers and cooperativeness) affected by different ENS frames for different motivational orientations; (2) contrasted the difference between the gain and loss frames for collaborative and competitive dyads; and (3) detailed the impact of ENS framing and motivational orientation on individual perceptions (i.e., cognitive effort, discussion climate, outcome satisfaction and relationship). The experiments were conducted in two environments (laboratory with 276 and quasi-field with 490 participants) to increase external validity of the results. In general, the findings showed that: (1) collaborative dyads have higher joint outcome in the loss than gain frame, while the opposite was found for competitive ones (i.e., higher joint outcome in the gain rather than loss frame); (2) the impacts of ENS framing was stronger for collaborative dyads; (3) loss frame caused less disparities in terms of number of offers and joint outcome between the two orientations; and (4) negotiators did not perceive any differences of framing despite the dissimilarities in objective measures (e.g., joint outcome and number of offers)

The role of affect and affective congruence in perceptions of leaders: an experimental study

Based on the idea that emotional exchanges determine symbolic meanings in interpersonal exchanges, we hypothesized that displays of positive and congruent affect determine members' ratings of leaders in a simulated performance appraisal context. To test the hypotheses, 537 participants viewed videotapes of four male and female leaders giving positive and negative feedback, and with facial expressions of affect that were either congruent or incongruent with the verbal message that they were delivering. Results supported hypotheses that positive and message-congruent leader affect results in more positive member ratings of the leader, assessed using a seven-item measure of members' perceptions of the leader's negotiating latitude. The least positive ratings of negotiating latitude were given when positive feedback was delivered with negative facial affect. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Inc. All rights reserved

Role of Status in Group Processes

[Excerpt] This chapter organizes the other chapters of the volume around a fundamental status-affirmation principle, namely, that status differentials generate corresponding differences in performance expectations which, in turn, produce behaviors that affirm performance expectations. The chapters in this volume elaborate that proposition by showing how information exchange, patterns of privilege, and the accuracy of power perceptions reflect or strengthen the status-affirmation process. Several chapters also suggest conditions that forestall or weaken this process such as claims to expertise and communication styles. Other chapters can be construed as offering applications of the status-affirmation principle to the performance of corporate project teams and to the relationships between standard and nonstandard employees in the workplace. Overall, the chapters reflect the strength and vitality of the tradition of work on group processes

Comprehension and performance in second language acquisition : a study of second language learners' production of modified comprehensible output.

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:D95515 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Leadership in the locker room: How the intensity of leaders' unpleasant affective displays shapes team performance.

Research has documented conflicting evidence about the relationship between a leader's unpleasant affective displays and team performance. Drawing on the dual threshold model of anger, we propose a novel explanation for this paradox such that the positive relationship between leaders' unpleasant affect and team performance turns negative at high levels of intensity. We examined our hypothesis in a multilevel field study of 304 halftime locker room speeches involving 23 high school and college basketball teams and a follow-up experiment. Our results show support for the prediction and suggest that the curvilinear effect of leaders' unpleasant affective displays may be explained by team members' redirection of attention and approach, which is positively associated with team members' effort at moderate levels of leader unpleasantness but leads to lower effort at high and low levels of leader unpleasantness. We discuss the theoretical contributions for scholarship on leadership, emotions as social information theory, and practical implications of the results. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved)

Resources for Friendship Intervention

Programs affecting friendship patterns can be implemented at the individual, dyadic, network, immediate environment, community, or societal level. Literature specifically focused on friendship intervention is scarce. The relevance of other resources for the design and assessment of friendship interventions at each of these levels is described.Practitioners who design social interaction interventions are prompted to familiarize themselves with the friendship literature and to apply the findings. Even if the goal is not to manipulate friendship patterns specifically, interventions should at least be designed not to undermine existing relationships