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Abstract:
The present study was designed to bridge previous research on cooperative decision making and on mixed-motive interactions. The structure of the group tasks studied in the mixed-motive literature is such that all group members simultaneously experience motives to compete and to cooperate and that all members accurately recognize that the mixed-motive reward structure is the same for everyone. In contrast, the present study considers that members' motives can also vary on a task that on the surface appears purely cooperative. We conducted a laboratory experiment using a cooperative group decision-making task and we varied the number of members who were also given competitive incentives (0, 1, 2, or all 3 members). We found that the preferences of competitive members were often adopted by the group. Competitive members reported engaging in more strategic information sharing and presenting their preferred alternative in a more favorable way; they also trusted other group members less than did cooperative members. The results of this study are consistent with studies of mixed-motive interaction that showed that in the absence of information about members' motives, group members often assume that other members have similar motives and engage in similar behaviors.

Group decision making, competition, cooperation, computer-mediated