Culture, Affect, and Social Influence in Decision-Making Groups

Although social influence plays an important role in organizational groups, past findings regarding culture's impact on social influence have been scarce and inconsistent. Past research has found that people from collectivist cultures are more susceptible to social influence, while other studies have found the opposite or no effect. One major weakness of prior research on social influence is the predominantly cognitive orientation that has underemphasized the role of affect in culture's impact on social influence. We address this weakness by outlining an affective model of social influence, thereby expanding our understanding of social influence in multicultural decision-making groups.