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CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Individual Differences II:
Personality and Abilities

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Early Research on Individual
Differences and Negotiation
Four explanations for contradictory and
inconclusive early research:
• The effects of individual differences are subtle
and elusive
• The wrong kind of tasks were investigated
• Research methods were flawed or inconsistent
• Individual difference factors were poorly
conceptualized

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Eight Approaches to Studying
Personality in Negotiation
1. Conflict management
style
2. Social value
orientation
3. Interpersonal trust
4. Self-efficacy and locus
of control
5. Self-monitoring
6. Machiavellianism
7. Face threat sensitivity
8. The “Big Five”
personality factors

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Conflict Management Style
• Two levels of concern underlie the five conflict
management styles
– Degree of concern a party shows for his or her own
outcomes
– Degree of concern the party shows for the other’s
outcomes
• Two personality dimensions represent these levels
of concern
– Degree of assertiveness
– Degree of cooperativeness

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Conflict Management Style
Five major conflict management styles:
• A competing style—high on assertiveness and low
on cooperativeness
• An accommodating style—low on assertiveness and
high on cooperativeness
• An avoiding style—low on both assertiveness and
cooperativeness
• A collaborating style—high on both assertiveness
and cooperativeness
• A compromising style—moderate on both
assertiveness and cooperativeness

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Conflict Management Style

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Social Value Orientation
Preferences regarding the kinds of outcomes
people prefer in social settings where
interdependence with others is required
• Two orientations:
– Proself or egoistic: primarily concerned with
personal outcomes
– Prosocial or cooperative: preference for outcomes
that benefit both self and others

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Interpersonal Trust
Determined by the experiences that people
have in dealing with others
• Individuals differ in levels of interpersonal trust
– High trusters: believe that others will be trustworthy
and that they need to trustworthy themselves
– Low trusters: believe that others cannot be trusted to
observe the rules and may feel less pressure
themselves to trust others

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Self-Efficacy
A judgment about one’s ability to behave
effectively
• Plays an important role in complex interpersonal
behavior, including negotiation
• Higher levels of self-efficacy lead to higher
outcomes and setting higher goals
• One’s perceived level of competence at
negotiation may increase the likelihood that
collaborative problem solving will occur

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Locus of Control
The extent to which people perceive that
they have control over events that occur:
– High external locus of control: attributes the cause of
events to external reasons (e.g., luck)
– High internal locus of control: attributes the cause of
events to internal reasons (e.g., ability)
• In a distributive negotiation, “internals” had
higher resistance points than “externals”
• Locus of control appears to influence negotiator
aspirations, preferences and outcomes

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Self-Monitoring
The extent to which people are responsive
to the social cues that come from the
social environment
• High self-monitors:
– Attentive to external, interpersonal information
– Inclined to treat this information as cues to how one
should behave
• Low self-monitors:
– Less attentive to external information that may cue
behavior,
– Guided more in their behavioral choices by inner,
personal feelings

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Machiavellianism
• Those scoring high in Machiavellianism:
– Tend to be cynical about others’ motives
– More likely to behave unaltruistically and
unsympathetically
– Less willing to change their convictions
under social pressure
– More likely to tolerate behavior that violates
social norms
– More inclined to advocate the use of
deception interpersonally

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Face Threat Sensitivity
The concept of “face” refers to the value people
place on their public image or reputation
• Some people are more susceptible to reacting in a
negative way to threats to face
• Threats to one’s image will make a negotiator
competitive in a situation that might otherwise benefit
from cooperative behavior

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The "Big Five" Personality Factors
• Extraversion –sociable, assertive, talkative
• Agreeableness –flexible, cooperative, trusting
• Conscientiousness –responsible, organized,
achievement oriented
• Emotional stability –secure, confident, not
anxious
• Openness –imaginative, broad-minded, curious

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The "Big Five" Personality Factors
• Negotiators higher in extraversion and
agreeableness were more likely to do
worse in distributive bargaining
• Effects of personality were lessened when
negotiators had high aspirations for their
own performance
• These elements of personality did not
affect how well negotiators did in
complex integrative bargaining

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Abilities in Negotiation
Three kinds of abilities and negotiation
behavior:
• Cognitive ability
• Emotional intelligence
• Perspective-taking ability

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Cognitive Ability
Synonymous with the general notion of
intelligence, cognitive ability has been
shown to influence:
– Reasoning
– Decision making
– Information processing capacity
– Learning
– Adaptability to change, particularly in novel
or complex situations

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Emotional Intelligence
Encompassing a set of discrete but related
abilities:
 Perceiving and expressing emotion accurately
 Accessing emotion in facilitating thought
 Comprehending and analyzing emotion
 Regulating appropriately one’s own emotions and
those of others
• Empirical research studies of its role have yet
to appear in the academic literature

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Perspective-Taking Ability
“A negotiator’s capacity to understand the
other party’s point of view during a
negotiation and thereby to predict the
other party’s strategies and tactics”
• Negotiators with higher perspective-taking
ability
– Negotiated contracts of higher value
– Appear to be able to increase the concessions that the
other party is willing to make

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Behaviors of Superior Negotiators
During prenegotiation planning:
• Consider more outcome options for the issues being discussed
• Spend more time looking for areas of common ground
• Think more about the long-term consequences of different
issues
• Prepare goals around ranges rather than fixed points
• Do not form plans into strict, sequential order

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Behaviors of Superior Negotiators
During face-to-face bargaining
• Make fewer immediate counterproposals
• Are less likely to describe offers in glowingly positive terms
• Avoid defend-attack cycles
• Use behavioral labeling, except when disagreeing
• Ask more questions, especially to test understanding
• Summarize compactly the progress made in the negotiation
• Do not dilute arguments by including weak reasons when
trying to persuade the other party

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Behaviors of Superior Negotiators
During postnegotiation review:
• Reserve time to review what is learned from
the negotiation