مقاله انگلیسی رایگان در مورد اثر استفاده از زبان دو زبانه اسپانیایی و نتیجه مذاکرات

مقاله سال ۲۰۱۶

More than 60 million Americans over the age of 5 (or 21% of the population) speak a language other than English at home, with the majority of those speaking Spanish (Ryan, 2013). In many U.S. cities, being bilingual, or fluent in more than one language, gives people an edge in the job market (Parker, 2013), and even political candidates are taking notice and producing websites and campaign literature, and giving speeches, in both English and Spanish (Associated Press, 2015). But as Grosjean (2013, p. 12) put it, “bilinguals acquire and use their languages for different purposes, in different domains of life, with different people.” Speakers of multiple languages might find themselves more successful in a given situation using one language or another based upon a number of factors, such as: which is the dominant language of the workplace, which is the primary language spoken by the consumer or members of the household, and even which language seems to better fit the situation. In a service setting, one might be interested in knowing which language would lead to a more successful service encounter for all parties. Service encounters quite often involve various forms of negotiation, particularly when interacting with an agent or customer service representative or when attempting to resolve a complaint. Indeed, in today’s global service environment, customers commonly deal with a representative who is in another country or belongs to a different ethnic group. In these negotiations, service providers and consumers usually seek to maximize their own outcome while still ensuring they achieve an agreement. When both the customer and the service provider are bilingual (proficient in two languages), the language in which the negotiation takes place might become an advantage or a disadvantage in attaining the desired outcomes for both counterparts. The question then becomes, what will be the impact of language on the outcome of the service negotiation. Once the impact of language is clear, such knowledge will allow bilingual customers and service providers to maximize their outcomes in different negotiation situations.

While much of the existing service literature merely calls for more service providers, such as doctors, nurses, or social workers, to be bilingual in order to more effectively meet the needs of their clients or patients (e.g., Chen, 2006; Engstrom, Piedra, & Min, 2009), some more recent literature has begun to investigate the impact of the language (native or second language) on consumers of services (Holmqvist & Van Vaerenbergh, 2013; Van Vaerenbergh & Holmqvist, 2014). On the other hand, despite the enormous literature on cultural differences in negotiations (e.g., Adair, Okumura, & Brett, 2001; Graham, Mintu, & Rodgers, 1994; Salacuse, 1998), only limited research examines the role of language in negotiations (e.g., Ulijn & Verweij, 2000).

This research extends these prior efforts by investigating the role that language, as a component of the person’s social identity, has on negotiation outcomes. Social identity is defined in terms of individuals’ knowledge of their membership in a group, and the value and emotions attached to that membership (Tajfel, 1981). Language is not only an important component of the individuals’ social identity (Grosjean, 1982), but also has the potential to signal membership in an ethnic group (Giles & Johnson, 1987). Thus, this paper will build on the previous work by employing an ethno-linguistic perspective to examine the impact that language (English and Spanish) can have on negotiation outcomes within an ethnic group (U.S. Hispanic). To investigate these effects, the proposed research relies on the threat that being judged unfavorably poses for individuals, affecting their performance and consequently their negotiation outcomes (Steele, 1997; Steele & Aronson, 1995). The language-related stereotypes associated with the ethnic group with lower economic, political, and numeric status (Spanish) would then activate the stereotype threat (Grosjean, 1982; Lambert & Lambert, 1973; Montes-Alcala, 2000; Peñaloza, 1980).