Search results

This paper investigates the information dilemma in negotiations: if negotiators reveal information about their priorities and preferences, more efficient agreements may be reached but the shared information may be used strategically by the other negotiator, to the revealers' disadvantage. We present a theoretical model that focuses on the characteristics of the negotiators, the structure of the negotiation, and the available incentives; it predicts that experienced negotiators will out‐perform naive negotiators on distributive (competitive) tasks, especially when they have information about their counterpart's preferences and the incentives are high—unless the task is primarily integrative, in which case information will contribute to the negotiators maximizing joint gain. Two experiments (one small, one large) showed that the revelation of one's preferences was costly and that experienced negotialors outperformed their naive counterparts by a wide margin, particularly when the task and issues were distributive and incentives were large. Our results help to identify the underlying dynamics of the information dilemma and lead to a discussion of the connections between information and social dilemmas and the potential for avoiding inefficiencies.

We present a conceptual model of ethical behavior in groups and the role of group cohesion in enabling unethical behavior. We make the distinction between unethical actions that benefit an individual's work group, and actions that benefit the individual to develop a typology of unethical actions. We propose that cohesion influences unethical actions of group members through three mechanisms – giving group members social support, enabling group members to diffuse responsibility for their actions throughout the group, and providing a rationale upon which group members can justify their actions to themselves. We hypothesize that group cohesion increases the likelihood of unethical actions that benefit the group, as well as the individual, while not affecting the group. In contrast, we expect cohesion to reduce the likelihood of unethical actions that harm the group. We also present boundary conditions by specifying how group norms and the status of the individual within the group affect the relationships that we propose. In a preliminary test of the hypotheses using scenarios, we found support for some parts of the model. We discuss the implications of our findings for ethical behavior in groups and organizations.

Many, if not most, academic researchers interested in international business have worked on teams made up of individuals from many different countries. Ironically, there has been little research attempting to explain the unique dynamic of such teams and their advantages and disadvantages. The goal of this paper is to develop a model of international academic research teams with an aim towards understanding how they can be managed more effectively. We highlight some of the important variables that affect team functioning and discuss their relationships with both antecedents and outcomes. Specific propositions are developed and their implications are discussed.

This paper investigates the impact of some of the underlying dynamics of volunteering choices in organizational contexts, focusing on individual, group, and organizational level causes. Three scenario‐based experiments manipulate individuals' standing within their organization (i.e., whether they are doing well or poorly) in combination with variables such as the expected efficacy of one's team and positive or negative organizational performance. In comparison to other recent volunteering studies, all three current experiments focused on an explicit organizational context and found much stronger intentions to volunteer, particularly when a person's standing was good. The combination of poor standing with expectations of poor performance by one's group or one's organization led to reductions in these otherwise strong intentions to volunteer. The results also show that feelings of obligation, expectations of extrinsic rewards, and identifying with one's organization are all significantly related to volunteering choices.

This study aims to explore the objectivity in third-party ratings. Third-party ratings are often based on some form of aggregation of various experts' opinions with the assumption that the potential judgment biases of the experts cancel each other out. While psychology research has suggested that experts can be unintentionally biased, management literature has not considered the effect of expert bias on the objectivity of third-party ratings. Thus, this study seeks to address this issue.

Ranking data from the US News and World Report between 1993 and 2008, institution-related variables and, to represent sports prominence, NCAA football and basketball performance variables are leveraged in testing our hypotheses. A mediating-model is tested using regression with panel-corrected standard errors.

This study finds that the judgments of academicians and recruiters, concerning the quality of universities, have been biased by the prominence of a university's sports teams and that the bias introduced to these experts mediates the aggregated bias in the resultant rankings of MBA programs. Moreover, it finds that experts may inflate rankings by up to two positions.

This study is particularly relevant for university officials as it uncovers how universities can tangibly manipulate the relative perception of quality through sports team prominence. For third-party rating systems, the reliability of ratings based on aggregated expert judgments is called into question.

This study addresses a significant gap in the literature by examining how a rating system may be unintentionally biased through the aggregation of experts' judgments. Given the heavy reliance on third-party rating systems by both academics and the general population, addressing the objectivity of such ratings is crucial.

The purpose of this paper is to identify how the design of a performance appraisal system (PAS) affects the perceived justice of academic employees (AE) about their performance appraisal (PA) and how this is associated with organizational effectiveness in terms of organizational leadership (OL).

The study subjects are two economic faculties of two Estonian public universities. The data for the study were collected using the PA Survey with a total of 82 AEs, OL Capability Questionnaire with a total of 72 AEs and the organizations' documents to analyze PAS. Assessment and analysis of the data included: the measurement of PAS design; the measurement of perceived justice from PA; the measurement of organizational leadership capability; analysis of the results gained from studying perceived justice from different PAS designs and organizational effectiveness in terms of OL.

Ultimately, the study reveals that PAS design affects academic employees' perception of distributive justice and organizational external effectiveness in terms of OL but does not affect academic employees' perception of procedural justice and organizational internal effectiveness in terms of OL.

This study suggests that organizational effectiveness depends on perceived justice of employees from the design of PAS. However, the results of this study are valid in the arrangements of academic jobs in universities and in similar or close context of Estonian culture.

This paper demonstrates the role of PAS design in conditions of intellectual job arrangement in universities with its influence on organizational effectiveness in the context of OL.

This research aimed to find whether information about a product can give rise to negative perceptions even in inert situations (nocebo effects), and to understand how price levels impact such judgments.

In all experiments, participants were exposed to negative product information in the form of potential side-effects. In an initial study, a higher non-discounted versus a discounted price frame was presented for a health drink after customers were exposed to negative aspects. Then, in experiment 1, price (high vs low) and exposure to information (no information vs negative information) was manipulated for skin creams where participants physically evaluated the cream. In experiment 2, price was manipulated at three levels (low, high, discounted) orthogonally with product information (no negative information vs with negative information) to get a more nuanced understanding.

In the initial study, after exposure to negative information, the non-discounted group had more positive ratings for the drink. Study 1 showed that reading about negative information resulted in a nocebo effect on perception of dryness (side-effect). Moreover, when no information was presented, perception of dryness by low and high price groups were similar but in the face of negative information, perception of dryness by low-price group was more pronounced compared to a high-price group. Study 2 conceptually replicated the effect and also confirmed that not only discounts (commonly linked with product quality), but absolute price levels also show a similar effect.

Nocebo effects have been rarely documented in consumer research. This research showed how simply reading generically about potential side effects gives rise to nocebo effects. In addition, even though marketers might find it tempting to lower prices when there is negative information about certain product categories, such an action could backfire.

To the best of our knowledge, the link between observable nocebo effects and its link with pricing actions is a novel research thread. We were able to show a nocebo effect on product perception after reading about negative information and also find that a higher price can mitigate the nocebo effect to some extent.