What Makes a Dove Being Heard? How and When Representative Negotiators are Influenced By Cooperative Minorities in Their Constituency

Negotiators in intergroup conflict often represent a constituency that does not agree on the strategy their representative should follow — some constituents may favor a competitive, rigid stance, while other may favor a cooperative, conciliatory stance. Prior research has repeatedly shown that cooperative minorities within a competitive constituency are ignored by their representative (Aaldering & De Dreu, 2010; Bonner, Okhuysen, & Sondak, 2011; Steinel, De Dreu, Ouwehand, & Ramirez-Marin, 2009). In two experiments, we investigate factors that increase the influence of cooperative minorities: Conflict issue (i.e., negotiations about either interest or value conflicts) and references to power. Results showed that cooperative minorities are influential in negotiations about value conflicts, and that referring to a moral mandate also helps cooperative minorities being heard. References to power do also increase the influence of cooperative minorities, but only in negotiations about interest