D. van Knippenberg

The possessive self as a barrier to constructive conflict management: Effects of mere ownership, process accountability, and self-concept clarity on competitive cognitions and behavior

The authors propose that people have difficulty managing conflict because they quickly develop ownership of arguments and positions they use in the dispute, that these arguments and positions become part of their (extended) self-concept, and that any opposition or counterargumentation therefore becomes an ego-threat. Four studies reveal that individuals value arguments and beliefs more when these are associated with the self and that anticipated or real opposition triggers ego-defensive cognition and behavior, including competitive communication, retaliatory responses, negative perceptions of the partner, and attitude polarization. These effects were weaker when epistemic needs were raised through process accountability or when individuals had high rather than low self-concept clarity. The authors conclude that because people develop ownership of arguments and make these part of their self-concept, conflict is difficult to manage and bound to escalate. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2007 APA, all rights reserved).

License to Fail? How Leader Group Prototypicality Moderates the Effects of Leader Performance on Perceptions of Leadership Effectiveness

Leadership often serves as an explanatory category for performance outcomes (i.e., failure and success). This process can strengthen or weaken leadership effectiveness, because contingent on their performance leaders may gain or lose follower endorsement – the basis of leadership. Drawing on the social identity analysis of leadership, we hypothesized that leader group prototypicality and performance information interact to predict followers’ perceptions of leadership effectiveness. Because group prototypical leaders are more trusted by their followers, we hypothesized that group prototypical leaders are evaluated as more effective after failure information than non-prototypical leaders. In contrast, we predicted that both prototypical and non-prototypical leaders should receive similar evaluations of leadership effectiveness after success. We found support for our predictions in a scenario experiment, a cross-sectional field study, and a laboratory experiment.

The Influence of Group Norms on Representatives' Behavior in Intergroup Negotiations: The Role of Standing and Need to Belong

In a computer-mediated negotiation experiment (N = 107), it is investigated how and why intragroup characteristics, such as a competitive or cooperative group norm and a negotiators standing within the own constituent group, interplay with personality to influence the behavior of a group representative in intergroup negotiations. Applying insights from the social identity approach (specifically self-categorization theory), we argue and show that for negotiators with a low standing in their group (but not for those with a high standing), their dispositional need to belong (Baumeister & Leary, 1995) is related to their motivation to be accepted by their group, which in turn influences the degree to which they act upon group norms when negotiating on behalf of their group.