What's a Masculine Negotiator? What's a Feminine Negotiator? It Depends on the Cultural and Situational Contexts

Abstract

Gender‐related categorization is a key feature of the literature on gender in negotiation. While previous literature focused on context‐free traits such as warmth and competence, we examine how people categorize specific negotiation goals and behaviors as masculine and feminine across the United States and China in different negotiation contexts, illustrating the role of cultural and situational contexts in gender‐related categorization. Two studies found that while American participants categorized competitive goals and behaviors as masculine and cooperative ones as feminine across business‐to‐consumer (B2C) and business‐to‐business (B2B) negotiation contexts, Chinese participants' patterns depended on the negotiation context. In B2C contexts, Chinese participants categorized competitive goals and behaviors as feminine and cooperative ones as masculine; in B2B contexts, they made further distinctions, categorizing competitive goals and behaviors that are socially inappropriate as feminine, but competitive ones that are socially appropriate, and cooperative goals and behaviors, as masculine. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Introduction to the Special Issue on Culture, Communication, and Conflict Management

“…But when U.S. employees had high power distance (culturally incongruent values), their U.S. manager counterparts displayed culturally incongruent behaviors—less priority information exchange. This paper extends existing work linking culture directly to negotiation norms and behaviors (Adair, Taylor, & Tinsley, ) and is consistent with current dynamic constructivist approaches (Shan, Keller, & Imai, ) illustrating the role of context (e.g., negotiator role or same‐ vs. cross‐cultural setting), in predicting culturally normative negotiation behaviors.…”

Are men better negotiators everywhere? A meta‐analysis of how gender differences in negotiation performance vary across cultures

“…For example, in collectivistic societies (e.g., China and Korea), men are more likely to be stereotyped as communal and women as agentic, which represents the opposite pattern found in individualistic cultures (Cuddy et al, ). Accordingly, in some collectivistic societies (i.e., China), relationship‐oriented negotiating behaviors are also more likely to be categorized as masculine, and aggressive negotiating behaviors are more likely to be categorized as feminine, which is in stark contrast to those found in the West (Shan et al, ). These results are based on the premise that male stereotypes are more closely aligned than female stereotypes with each society's core cultural values and practices.…”

“…Recent studies on cultural variation in gender stereotypes, however, suggest that the stereotyping of men as agentic and women as communal is not universal but instead reflects the values and practices that are dominant within each society (Cuddy et al, ; Shan, Keller, & Imai, ). For example, whereas members of individualistic cultures are more likely to stereotype men as agentic, members of collectivistic cultures are more likely to stereotype men as communal, reflecting contrasts in whether cultures value agentic or communal behavior (Cuddy et al, ).…”

Conflicts as Triggers of Personal Growth: Post-Traumatic Growth in the Organizational Setup

“…Despite conflict mediation having taken off as an effective method for relieving the mental load induced by intragroup conflicts, surprisingly little empirical research has been conducted on the effects and implications of mediator style on the process outcomes [29], with conflict parties having drawn most of the attention. Instead, research is biased towards such related topics as: the role of gender as a parameter moderating negotiator behavior [37]; the influence of power on negotiation behavior and cognition [38]; the impact of communication processes as influence on the individual level and of communication strategies on the organizational level [26]; cultural norms surrounding disputants, including sensitivity to collective interests and concern for authority [39]; conflict reactions and conflict management styles [40]; and conflict progression and escalation phases [32]. Only recently has the third-party role as a mechanism controlling either the process or the outcomes [26] attracted interest.…”