Premium
Gender Differences in Initiation of Negotiation: Does the Gender of the Negotiation Counterpart Matter?
Author(s) -
Eriksson Karin Hederos,
Sandberg Anna
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
negotiation journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.238
H-Index - 32
eISSN - 1571-9979
pISSN - 0748-4526
DOI - 10.1111/j.1571-9979.2012.00349.x
Subject(s) - negotiation , psychology , significant difference , social psychology , compensation (psychology) , political science , medicine , law
In this study, we investigated if and how gender differences in the propensity to initiate a negotiation are affected by the gender of the counterpart in the negotiation. We enlisted 204 S wedish students to take part in an experiment in which they had to decide whether to initiate a negotiation for higher compensation. In line with previous research, we found that men were more likely than women to initiate a negotiation: 42 percent of the male and 28 percent of the female participants initiated a negotiation. The gender difference, however, was only large and statistically significant when the negotiation counterpart was a woman. With a female negotiation counterpart, women were less likely than men to initiate a negotiation by 24 percentage points, while with a male negotiation counterpart, the gender difference was only 5 percentage points and not statistically significant. This result suggests that the gender of the negotiation counterpart should be taken into consideration when analyzing gender differences in initiation of negotiation.