{"id":330938,"date":"2010-02-17T12:01:23","date_gmt":"2010-02-17T17:01:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pon.harvard.edu\/?p=9983"},"modified":"2010-02-17T12:01:23","modified_gmt":"2010-02-17T17:01:23","slug":"the-power-of-stereotypes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/330938","title":{"rendered":"The power of stereotypes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Adapted from \u201cCultural Caveats,\u201d first published in the <\/em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.pon.harvard.edu\/tag\/negotiation\/\">Negotiation<\/a> <em>newsletter.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>As professor Cheryl Rivers of Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Australia, points out in a recent literature review, seasoned negotiators often hear stories about the unethical behaviors of people of other nationalities. Perhaps the toughest problems arise surrounding what Rivers calls \u201cethically ambiguous\u201d <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pon.harvard.edu\/tag\/negotiation-tactics\/\">negotiation tactics<\/a>. Ambiguity can lead us to reach sinister conclusions about the motives of our counterparts, particularly when we lack a solid understanding of an opponent\u2019s culture.<br \/>\nRivers summarizes a variety of cultural differences in negotiation. For example, Asians are more likely to view cultivating a relationship with a negotiating counterpart through expensive gifts, entertainment, or personal favors as more ethically appropriate than would Americans or Canadians. Similarly, she notes that although Mexicans have higher standards than Americans about what is ethically appropriate, necessity is more likely to lead Mexicans to violate these standards.<br \/>\nLike any differences between groups, these cultural differences are small, on average. Nonetheless, we tend to overuse the stereotypes that arise from these small differences, and these stereotypes block us from noting important individuating information. Thus, we too often act as if the person on the other side of the table represents the cultural stereotype we\u2019re expecting. From her statements and behaviors, we seek confirmatory information to back up these stereotypes. Perhaps most problematic, when a counterpart uses ethically ambiguous negotiation tactics, we adopt sinister explanations for her motives.<br \/>\nWhen it comes to negotiating behavior, more variance often exists within cultures than between them. Negotiators should seek out information about individual and cultural differences. However, negotiators are more likely to assume that people from other cultures are behaving unethically than they are to realize that standards of ethical behavior vary. Therefore, don\u2019t jump to harsh conclusions about the other side\u2019s motives when more benevolent explanations for their behavior are possible.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Adapted from \u201cCultural Caveats,\u201d first published in the Negotiation newsletter. As professor Cheryl Rivers of Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Australia, points out in a recent literature review, seasoned negotiators often hear stories about the unethical behaviors of people of other nationalities. Perhaps the toughest problems arise surrounding what Rivers calls \u201cethically ambiguous\u201d negotiation [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4300,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-330938","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330938","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4300"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330938"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330938\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330938"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330938"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330938"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}