Abstract

Two experiments were performed to test the hypotheses that the minority negotiation styles (flexible vs. rigid) would increase the majorities' cognitive conflict as well as affective in interaction with situations(consensus-required vs. consensus-nonrequired) (Hypothesis 1) and that the increased cognitive conflict would be resolved by differentiation between majority and minority viewpoints (hypothesis 2). The extraneous effects of agreement or disagreement between majority and minority in group discussion were controlled: Two situations and two negotiation styles were manipulated without agreement in experiment 1, and the negotiation style only was manipulated in consensus-required situation with agreement in experiment 2. In experiment 1, the interaction effect between situation and negotiation style was significant : majority opinion was more changed by flexible style than rigid in consensus-required situation, but less changed by flexible style than rigid in consensus-nonrequired situation. And in the latter situation minority image was equally favorable in both flexible and rigid styles, but in the farmer situation the image was more favorable in flexible style than rigid. These results provide support for the hypothesis 1. The intrapersonal coexistence of majority and minority viewpoints were observed: The negative correlation between the two viewpoints before the minority influence was changed to positive after the influence. This result supports the hypothesis 2. In experiment 2, it was found that majorities' opinion was more changed by rigid style than flexible, and minority image was not different from one another. Thus, if majorities and minority agree to the issue in consensus-reauired situation, rigid style only increased majorities' cognitive conflict about the issue. These results also support the hypothesis 1. The intrapersonal coexistence of majority and minority viewpoints was also observed in experiment 2. The negative correlation between the two viewpoints before the minority influence was disappeared after the minority influence. This result also provides support for the hypothesis 2. It was unexpectedly found that, although minority viewpoint was not accepted in these conditions, the degree of majorities' opinion change was positively correlated with the degree of concession to agree with minority. These results were interpreted as dissonance reduction process. The findings in these experiments were discussed in light of the relation between affective and cognitive conflict, and of compairing the differntiation to the dissonance reduction as mechanisms of the resolution of the cognitive conflict in minority influence.