The Impact of Context Dependence on Relationship Repair in Negotiation

Negotiation is an emotionally charged process, in which relationship rupture can occur. While past research has focused on predictors of relationship rupture in negotiation, there has been a dearth of research focusing on effective relationship restoration behaviour following a rupture to the relationship. When relationship rupture occurs, relationship restoration is imperative for successful negotiation outcomes, however, cultural variations in communication norms can create barriers for effective restoration. This research aims to determine how context dependence, a communication norm which guides the degree to which individuals attend to or rely on contextual cues in communication, influences the effectiveness of different restoration strategies. We propose that relationship restoration will be most effective when the type of relationship repair mechanism is congruent with an individual’s level of context dependence. Preliminary results from our research support our predictions. In one study, low context Caucasian North American participants perceived a culturally congruent direct apology as more effective for restoring damaged negotiator relationships compared to a culturally incongruent third-party apology. In another study, low context Caucasian North Americans preferred a direct apology over a third-party apology and believed their negotiation counterpart would perceive the direct apology as being more effective for relationship restoration. Our high context sample (Chinese dataset) is currently being collected for comparison and this sample will be used to investigate context dependence as a moderator of relationship restoration effectiveness. Results from this sample will be available by the IACCP conference date.