Do we agree on Agreeableness and
Extraversion?
Personality Characteristics in Group Indecision
by
JUDITH EKAMPER
Rijksuniversiteit Groningen
Faculty of Economics and Business
Msc Human Resource Management
ABSTRACT
Sometimes group decision making results in refusing or referring a decision. This group indecision can be caused by task conflict. If group members have differences in opinions and ideas (preference diversity) task conflict will be high. Based on the Big Five Personality Characteristics, it was expected when group members score high on Agreeableness and Extraversion, they would have several characteristics (e.g. cooperative behavior) which could contribute to the agreement into a decision. In a group experiment, this study has analyzed the relationship between task conflict and group indecision, and the moderating effects of Agreeableness and Extraversion. However no significant effects were found. Furthermore, in the explorative part, there was found a relationship between ‘importance of the decision’ and group indecision and between Agreeableness and the Conflict Style ‘forcing’.
INTRODUCTION
“Nothing is so exhausting as indecision, and nothing is so futile” is a famous quote of Bertrand Russell (1930). Despite the age of this quote, it is still relevant. Nowadays, even more complex decisions need to be made. Not only individually, but also in groups and increasingly, more work is done in groups in organizations.
Organizations make use of this group decision making process because it has two important advantages over individual decision making: more people means more knowledge and abilities than an individual and joint decisions may create greater acceptance (Nijstad & Oltmanns, 2012). But why is indecision in groups so exhausting and futile? Although indecision may lead to new and sometimes maybe even better alternatives and information. The costs of decision refusal may exceed the benefits (Nijstad & Oltmanns, 2012). Therefore costs and benefits should be both taken into account in group decision making processes.
Disagreement about a decision in a group could be a reason for not making a decision. Disagreement can be defined as the awareness of employees involved in the conflict that discrepancies, or incompatible wisher or desires exist among them (Boulding, 1963). Conflict in groups can be categorized in three types: relationship, task and process conflict (Jehn & Mannix, 2001). In this paper the focus will be on task conflict. Task conflict is an awareness
makers refuse even good options in situations in which there is a decisional conflict. This implies that even though good decisions are available, people cannot agree into the same decision. It will be interesting to find out why people cannot agree into a decision, or maybe even more interesting, why they can. Because decisions makes it possible for teams to accomplish their tasks.
Dealing with task conflict can be different between individuals. Because individuals have different personality traits, which encounters differently with task conflicts. These personality traits are relatively long-lasting characteristics, which are not easily changed by interventions such as training (Helmreich, 1984). As these characteristics are quite static (e.g. they are not easy to be altered). It would be useful for group members if they would know these characteristics and be aware of the differences. Because awareness can create anticipation to these differences, thereby reaching easier agreement into a decision.
need to discuss as a group, which may lead to agreement. An agreeable group can strengthen the group spirit and cohesion and cooperation between the diversity in preferences.
In this paper it is stated that task conflict (independent variable) will lead to group indecision (dependent variable). This paper proposes that if the groups scores on average high on Agreeableness and Extraversion, task conflict will have a weaker effect on group indecision. This is shown in the conceptual model below.
Figure 1: Conceptual Model
To test this conceptual model, a group experiment will be conducted. Groups will be manipulated in terms of task conflict (high versus low) to see whether task conflict indeed has a relationship with group indecision. Next it will be tested to what degree a group scores on Agreeableness or Extraversion. And if this group score is high, it will indeed lead to less group indecision.
Agreeableness
Task Conflict Group indecision
THEORY
Decision Making and Task Conflict
Groups are units of two or more individuals who interact interdependently to achieve a common objective (Baker & Salas, 1997). Whereby group performance is defined as the extent to which a group accomplishes its goals or mission (Devine & Philips, 2001).
Decisions need to bed made in order to achieve this common objective. In order to reach a decision, groups need agreement into the decision. However, agreement is not always possible because of the existence of task conflict. Still, task-conflict does not always have to be a bad thing. Evidence has demonstrated that task conflict within groups improves decision quality and strategic planning, financial performance, and organizational growth (Bourgeois, 1985; Schweiger, Sandberg & Rechner, 1989; Eisenhardt & Schoonhoven, 1990). Without the benefits of critical discussion, groups may not be able to effectively share and critique information and ideas (e.g., Hall & Williams, 1970; Maier & Hoffman, 1964) and therefore undermining the ability of the group to learn.
However, findings have shown as well that task conflict is associated with reduced productivity and satisfaction in groups (Gladstein, 1984; Wall & Nolan, 1986) and the absence of disagreement within top management teams and decision-making groups is related to increased performance at the group and organizational levels (Bourgeois, 1980; Schwenk & Cosier, 1993). Overall, an absence of conflict will be detrimental to performance in groups performing routine tasks. A small amount of conflict will be beneficial, but increasingly higher levels of conflict will be increasingly detrimental (Ka, 1995).
White, Hafenbrädl, Hoffrage, Reisen & Woike (2011), the group would defer choice whenever at least one member initially preferred to do so, and sometimes even when nobody initially preferred the choice deferral option, but no two people preferred the same option. Groups may therefore defer choice due to disagreement about preferences, which is something that cannot occur when individuals make decisions alone.
Thus, when task conflict exists in which differences of preferences were likely, and when members were less likely to abandon their initial opinion, indecision occurred more often (De Dreu et al., 2008). Concluding, task conflict is a variable that can cause group indecision, which leads to the following hypothesis.
Hypothesis 1: There is a positive relationship between task conflict and group indecision.
Group composition
and outcomes (Kozlowski & Bell, 2003). As this paper is focused on task conflict and group indecision, it will be important to know how group composition can help to overcome disagreement.
Agreeableness
the suffering of others (Batson, 1991; Graziano, Habashi, Sheese, & Tobin, 2007). Therefore I argue if a group scores high on Agreeableness, the group is more likely to overcome their preference diversities. Because they are more considered with the outcome of the group instead of their own outcome. Agreeable persons are trying to find the best solution in which everybody agrees.
In this line of reasoning, the following hypothesis is stated.
Hypothesis 2: The higher the group scores on Agreeableness, the effect of task conflict on group indecision will be weakened.
Extraversion
frequent interactions are highly common in group discussion and could therefore enhance group decision making.
In this line of reasoning, the following hypothesis is stated.
METHODOLOGY
Participants
To test hypotheses, an experiment was conducted at the Research Lab of the Faculty Economics and Business, University of Groningen. The experiment used a 2 x 2 factorial between-groups design in which task conflict (low versus high) and importance of the decision (important versus not important) were manipulated. The manipulation of importance was included for another research project.
Data were obtained from 84 students (42 males, 41 females, one unknown; Age: M= 21.61, SD = 2.53) of the University of Groningen. They were randomly assigned to 28 3-persons groups (7 groups per condition, 14 groups per conflict condition). They either received course credits or were paid 8 € for their participation.
Decision task, materials and conflict manipulation
The group members were instructed to decide among 3 male job candidates that had applied for a teaching position at the Faculty of Economics and Business of the University of Groningen. The given decision options were: Choose candidate A, B, C, or choose none of them (which represented group indecision). For each candidate, information was available on 6 attributes (e.g. Clarity when explaining). These attributes were taken and pretested from Nijstad and Kaps (2008).
I performed a pre-test to examine whether the candidates were perceived to be sufficiently attractive for the job at six different attributes. These six attributes were also measured in the pre-test on a 7-point scale (1 = completely disagree to 7 = completely agree) to check whether these attributes were really perceived as important attributes for a teacher. These six attributes were 1. I think it is important to have an enthusiastic teacher (M= 5.28,
think it is important to have a patient teacher (M= 5.31, SD = 1.10), 4. I think it is important that the teacher can explain clearly (M= 6.46, SD = 0.68), 5. I think it is important that the teacher can maintain order (M= 5.34, SD = 1.12) and 6. I think it is important to have a teacher who is concerned with their students (M= 5.05, SD = 1.309).
With the pre-test thirty-nine participants received information about the 3 candidates. This was the same information which group member 1 received in the conflict situation. They were asked to make the same decision as in the pre-discussion questionnaire. Namely, which candidate they would hire or chose to hire none of the candidates. Of these participants, 27 chose candidate A (69%), 3 candidate B (8%), none of them chose candidate C and 9 chose to refuse all the candidates (23%). Which indicates that candidate A indeed, as expected, was more attractive than candidate B and C for group member 1 in the conflict situation.
candidate A, but they did not get the same negative attributes. This was also the case with candidate B and C. Each group member received the same negative attributes about candidate B and C, but the spread of the negative attributes was varied. This is shown in table 1. This table shows the distribution of candidate profiles and the differences per group member, per condition.
Table 1 Distribution of candidate profiles
Candidate A Candidate B Candidate C Complete Profiles 1 2 3 4 5 6 1 2 3 4 5 6 1 2 3 4 5 6 Conflict condition Group member 1 1 3 5 6 1 2 5 6 2 4 5 6 Group member 2 1 2 4 6 1 2 3 4 1 2 3 5 Group member 3 2 3 4 5 3 4 5 6 1 3 4 6 No conflict condition Group member 1 1 3 5 6 1 2 5 6 1 2 4 5 Group member 2 1 2 5 6 1 4 5 6 1 2 3 5 Group member 3 1 4 5 6 1 3 5 6 1 2 5 6
Procedure
When the participants came to the Research Lab, they were randomly subdivided in groups and were guided into a room with 3 small tables in the corners and 1 big table in the center. First they were seated individually at the corner tables to fill in a part of a personality test (Big-Five). After this test they read a general instruction. The instruction stated that they were a member of a selection committee that had to fill a vacancy for a teaching position at the Faculty of Economics and Business. They were instructed to decide together, which of the 3 applicants they would hire. However, they had also the opportunity to hire none of the candidates and look for further candidates. With the latter it was also stated that this option had several consequences comparable to the real world, namely time-consuming and additional costs. This general instruction also mentioned the complete procedure of the experiment. After this instruction, candidate profiles were handed out. Each participant was advised to study them carefully and it was pointed out that the participants could not read these profiles during the discussing. After these 8 minutes I collected the profiles and handed the first questionnaire about the candidates. In this pre-discussion questionnaire the participants indicated which candidate (or none of them) they would hire. Furthermore they had to rate each candidate on job suitability (e.g. ‘Candidate A is well suited for the function of teacher).
the discussion were measured. These were measured by 30 statements, each statement had two possible options which the participants could choose which conflict style reflect them best during discussion. Demographic questions were also asked during this post discussion questionnaire. Afterwards they were debriefed, paid and dismissed.
During this experiment, not only task conflict, but also importance of the decision was manipulated. This was done by two different instructions. At the first general instruction it was clearly stated that this decision was important or not by making the words bold. Furthermore it was explained what the function entailed. In the high importance condition it was stated that the teacher should be in function for a longer period of time and had to teach several important courses. According to the faculty the new teacher was badly needed. In the low importance condition it was stated that the new temporary teacher was not necessary, but it was mandatory according to the faculty. The teacher had to teach one less important course for several weeks. At the follow up instruction, before the group discussion, it was again mentioned by giving a reminder if the decision was important or not and by making the words bold.
Measurement
Agreeableness and Extraversion
Pre-discussion questionnaire
Before the discussion, each group member was asked to name his or her favorite decision option (hire A, B, C, or none of them) and rated the job suitability for each candidate on 3 7-point scales (1 = completely disagree to 7 = completely agree). These items (e.g. “Candidate A would be a good teacher”) were averaged per candidate to create an index of job suitability (Cronbach’s α = .94, .95 and .95 for candidate A, B, and C, respectively).
Post-discussion questionnaire
RESULTS
Manipulation checks.
First, I checked whether I successfully induced pre-discussion Conflict. A 2 (condition) x 3 (group member) x 3 (job candidate) mixed model ANOVA, with condition (conflict vs. no conflict and high importance vs. low importance), and group member as between subject variables, and candidate as a within subject variable, was conducted on the candidate’s pre-discussion job suitability. A significant three-way interaction among condition, candidate, and group member was found, F(4,156) = 16,11, p < .001, confirming that group members generally liked the candidates that they should have liked (see Table 2).
Table 2 Pre-discussion candidate ratings
Group decision
Questionnaire items were all aggregated to the group level by taking the group mean. Hypothesis 1 stated that there is a positive relationship between task conflict and group indecision. I did a logistic regression analysis to check whether task conflict in the group leads to indecision (indecision was dummy coded). However, no significant positive relationship between task conflict and group indecision was found, F(4,156) B= 0.05, p>.05. Therefore Hypothesis 1 should be rejected. Of the total of 28 groups (14 groups per condition), 7 groups decided (25%) to hire none of the candidates and 21 groups (75%) decided to hire a candidate. In the high conflict condition 4 groups (28.57%) hired none of the candidates, respectively in the low conflict condition 3 groups (21.43%). It was indeed expected that group indecision occurred more in the high conflict situation. However this was not significant.
To check whether Agreeableness has an moderation effect on the relationship between task conflict and group indecision, as was predicted in Hypothesis 2, I conducted a logistic regression analysis with the Process model number 1 of Hayes (2014). This analysis revealed no significant interaction between task conflict and agreeableness, B=.47, SE=.48, z=.97,
p=.33. This indicates that hypothesis should 2 be rejected. Agreeableness had no significant
effect on the relationship between task conflict and group indecision.
hypothesis 3 should be rejected. Extraversion had no significant effect on the relationship between task conflict and group indecision.
Table 3 shows the interaction of the moderators (Agreeableness & Extraversion) with task conflict and group indecision.
Because the results showed no support for the hypotheses, I used the other variable ‘importance of the decision’ from the other study as well to explore whether this variable has a relationship with group indecision. I did a logistic regression analysis to check whether high importance of the decision in the group leads to indecision (indecision was dummy coded). This analysis revealed a significant relationship between importance of the decision and group indecision, B=-.36, p=<0.05. This means that if the decision was of high importance, the group would more often chose to hire none of the candidates. As mentioned before, 7 groups did not hire a candidate. In the high importance condition 6 groups (44.86%) hired none of the candidates, this was in the low importance condition 1 group (7.14%). It was indeed expected that group indecision occurred more in the high importance situation.
To see whether Agreeableness and Extraversion had a moderation effect on this relationship, I conducted a regression analysis with the Process model number 1 of Hayes (2014) with both Agreeableness and Extraversion. The results of this analyses were B=-5.32,
SE=5.89, z=-.90, p=.37 and B=-1.52, SE=1.55, z=-.98, p=.33, respectively. This analysis
Furthermore I explored with conflict styles on Agreeableness and Extraversion at the individual level. I used a regression analysis, the results are shown in Table 4. A regression analysis only showed a significant negative relationship between Agreeableness and ‘forcing’,
B=-1.23, SE=.44, p=<0.05. Which means that an increase in Agreeableness will lead to a
decrease in the conflict style ‘forcing’.
Table 4
Agreeableness Extraversion
Force B=-1.23, SE=.44, p=.01 B=.33, SE=.36, p=.37
Solve B=.62, SE=.32, p=.06 B=.14, SE=.26, p=.60
Compromise B=-.42, SE=.36, p=.25 B=.27, SE=.29, p=.40
Avoid B=.44, SE=.40, p=.28 B=-.58, SE=.31, p=.07
DISCUSSION
Although much research has been done on group decision making, less research has been done on decisions that do not get made in a group. Furthermore, much research has been done on personality traits (e.g. the BIG-Five). However, these personality traits are not extensively linked to group decision making and especially to group indecision. To see whether task conflict had a relationship with group indecision, and personality traits (Agreeableness & Extraversion) had a moderating effect on this relationship. A group experiment was conducted, in which task conflict was manipulated (low versus high conflict).
First, the relationship between task conflict and group indecision was tested with a logistic regression analysis. It was expected that in the situation of ‘high-conflict’, less decisions were getting made compared to the ‘low-conflict’ situation. However, no significant effects were observed as the small sample size made it difficult to find strong statistical evidence.
Second it was expected that both Agreeableness and Extraversion (e.g. Big Five personality traits) had a moderating effect on this relationship. Because there was no significant relationship between task conflict and group decision making, these moderating effects were also not observed.
Furthermore I experienced with Conflict styles used by the participants at individual level during the discussion to measure whether there was a relationship with the two personality traits. These styles were forcing, solving, compromising, avoiding and adjusting. Each style stands for a different type of conflict management behavior, which can be seen in the figure below.
Figure 2: Conflict styles
Assertive Forcing Solving
Compromising
Unassertive Avoiding Adjusting
Uncooperative Cooperative
Implications
Regarding to the first hypothesis, I expected to find a positive relationship between task conflict and group indecision. This was also in line of reasoning by White et al (2011), when task conflict is high, which in this experiment entails high preference diversity, indecision would occur more often. However, this relationship was not significant. A reason for this outcome might be the fact that I only created preference diversity (task conflict) in order to create conflict. There are more ways in which conflict can be created, namely relationship- and process conflict (Jehn & Mannix, 2001) and thereby more factors which can affect group decision making.
Another reason could be preference diversity in this experiment was not a reason for causing task conflict. The decision in this group experiment was a decision which did not affect the participants themselves. They did have to make a decision about hiring a new candidate but the outcome did not have direct consequences for the participants. It could be argued that for instance if the participants would have made a decision about which participant should fulfill the new job position, task conflict was more focused on the participants themselves.
Therefore in group decision making processes there should be taken more into account than only task conflict (preference diversity). Furthermore, consequences of decisions need to be highlighted.
higher quality interpersonal interactions. People with extravert characteristics show more or less the same behavior as people with agreeable characteristics within social dilemmas (Kichuk & Wiesner, 1997). Based on this theory I expected that these characteristics could contribute to the process of group decision making. Because people who are more cooperative and have strong interaction skills, are putting more effort in group decision making processes to finally make the decision of hiring a candidate. However, as stated by Thorne et al. (2009) the strength of communication and cooperation depends on the disclosure of information. As in this experiment the distribution of information was not completely disclosed, the strength could be weakened and therefore leading to less decisions being made. Beside the lack of a big sample size, it could be argued that Agreeableness and Extraversion do not have the ultimate influence in group decision making processes. These traits maybe have a stronger influence in the group discussion processes itself.
Limitations and future research
This study had to deal with some limitations. The first limitation relates to the small sample size. This group experiment was conducted with 84 participants in total and there were only 14 groups in each of the two conditions. This small sample size makes it harder to find strong statistical evidence for the hypotheses. Therefore it was more difficult to reach conventional levels of significance.
Another limitation could be manipulation of the independent variable task conflict. Task conflict was manipulated with diverging preferences of the participants for a candidate. One explanation might be that the participants of the experiment did not perceive the conflict as real. As the participants of this experiment were students, no real consequences were perceived during the discussion and final decision. Another explanation might be that the manipulation of task conflict was not strong enough. The manipulation of the variable ‘importance of the decision’ did reached a conventional level of significance. The main difference between these manipulations was the emphasis. During the ‘High-importance’ situation it was clearly emphasized that the participants did need to make an important decision, and vice versa. During the ‘High-conflict’ situation the manipulation was not clearly expressed to the participants.
It could be interesting to find out in future research whether the remaining three Big Five personality traits (e.g. Conscientiousness, Neuroticism and Openness to Experience) have a moderation effect on the relationship between task conflict and group indecision. Although the literature did not show many support for these relationships, it might be interesting to explore this so that there will be statistical evidence for these (existing) relationships.
A recommendation for next studies will be, using a larger sample size and using other types of conflict as well (relationship and processes). To cover all possibilities why conflict may occur, so other reasons of group indecision will be excluded.
Conclusion
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APPENDIX
Extraversion 20-item scale (Alpha = .91)
+ keyed Feel comfortable around people. Make friends easily.
Am skilled in handling social situations.
Am the life of the party.
Know how to captivate people.
Start conversations.
Warm up quickly to others.
Talk to a lot of different people at parties.
Don't mind being the center of attention.
Cheer people up.
– keyed Have little to say.
Keep in the background.
Would describe my experiences as somewhat dull.
Don't like to draw attention to myself.
Don't talk a lot.
Avoid contacts with others.
Am hard to get to know.
Retreat from others.
Find it difficult to approach others.
Agreeableness 20-item scale (Alpha= .85)
+ keyed Have a good word for everyone. Believe that others have good
intentions.
Respect others.
Accept people as they are. Make people feel at ease. Am concerned about others. Trust what people say.
Sympathize with others' feelings. Am easy to satisfy.
Treat all people equally.
– keyed Have a sharp tongue. Cut others to pieces.
Suspect hidden motives in others. Get back at others.
Insult people.
Believe that I am better than others.
Contradict others.
Make demands on others.
Hold a grudge.
