Research on multicultural groups has typically extended monocultural group research rather than building on prior cross-cultural research. This article brings together the literature on cross-cultural and multicultural groups to look at the experience of Russian-American collaboration. In this exploratory study, American (n = 17) and Russian (n = 18) informants described their experiences in on-going, business-related small groups. Qualitative and descriptive analysis suggested that cultural differences did impede collaboration, although mutual benefits to heterogeneous groups were also identified. The strongest cultural factor appeared to be the influence of external stakeholders on the group. These findings suggest that future research on multicultural groups needs to use a more complex approach to combine the findings of several bodies of literature.
This field study of international managers demonstrates the utility of projective measures of motivation for research on difficult-to-reach populations. Three motives (Achievement, Affiliation, Power) were measured through content analysis of interview narratives. Findings suggest that projective measures are sensitive enough to document smaller changes in motivation over the course of the interview. For the managers in this sample, frequency of communication was significantly associated with higher power motivation (especially face-to-face, fax and telephone) and modestly associated with higher affiliation (face-to-face and e-mail). The achievement motive was not associated with communication frequency.Communication is motivational: People motivate one another through interaction. Generally, we would measure this motivation with a standard pre-test, treatment, posttest and rely on a self-report questionnaire where subjects would indicate their level of motivation. Unfortunately, it is expensive and difficult to arrange such experiments particularly with non-student subjects.There is an alternative, however, that is sensitive enough to map changes in motivation over the course of an interaction and does not introduce the methodological error of a contrived experiment. Social psychologist David McClelland and his colleagues have been mining communication data for information about motivation over the past 50 years (see McClelland, 1987 for comprehensive review). They have developed a reliable and valid measurement process for a variety of motivations through content analysis. As psychologists, their assumption is that talk emerges as a symptom of an underlying motivational state. However, as communication scholars we might also argue that talk is a mechanism for persuasion or changing one's motivational state.Projective The present study documents use of McClelland 7 s projective measures for motivation on a difficult-to-access, non-student sample and shows how these relate to communication frequency and media choice. The purpose of this report is to document the utility of such measures for future communication research. Thus, the findings are noteworthy from a methodological and heuristic perspective, rather than for their theoretical proofs.
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