The bargaining behavior of children and adolescents from thrcc cultures on a competitive resource distribution task was examined. Subjects played a game in which they alternated sugestions until they agreed on a distribution. The strongest effects a c r e those obtained for culture. Indian bargainers negotiated longer, were more competitive, ivere more symmetrical in their competitiveness, and had larger discrepancies in their settlenicnts than did eithcr the Argentineans or the Americans.Americlns were most mmpromising in their tri31-by-trial offers and in thcu final outcome, suggesting a convergent bargaining style. Additional data suggest that the bargaining differences may reflect differenccs among the cultures in their general orientations, ti-itli Indians emphasizing both competitiveness and need derived from a "view of the world" that is based on scarcity or limited resources. Other findings indicate that the effects of age, sex, and experimental condition vary among cultures. An age effect was obtained only in India, where older bargainers negotiated longer and rejected a higher proportion of their opponent's offers than did younger bargainers. hlale bargainers were more competitive than females in India and the United States, but a trend in the opposite direction \vas obtained for Argentinean bargainers. And a different pattern of condition effects for Icngth of negotiations \vas obtained for the three cultures.AUTHORS' NOTE: An earlier version of this paper was presented at the annual meetings of the International Studies Association held in Dallas, 1972. Our thanks go to the staffs of the various scl~ools in each culture that provided us with the facilities and cooperation needed t o carry out this research. Special gratitude is estended to Daniel Solomon, whose contributions to a rehted project were very helpful in the design of tllis study, and to Bruce Korth for his sutistical assishnce. Downloaded from C u l t u r a l differences in bargaining behavior have been a subject of speculation for sonie time. Writing in 1939, IIarold Nicolson reiii3rked, tlicre exist ccrtain s t a n h r d s of ncgotiations which might b c rgarded as pcrnianent and univcrsal. Apart from these standards, whicli should bc common to a11 diploniacy, there arc niarkcd dirt'crcnces in the tlicory and practicc of tlic sevcral Great Powcrs. These diffcrcnccs are causcd by variations in national cliuactcr, tradition, and requircrncnts. Onc can thus distinguish types or species of diplomacy and it is important that tlicsc distinctions should be rccognizcd.

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Data collected from India, Argentina and the U.S. served to arbitrate between competing predictions concerning the amount of agreement between nationals in depicting other nations. Amount of agreement was hypothesized to vary with friendliness, familiarity and type of adjective used to depict the " target " nation. Several findings were obtained in each of the three cultures, including: (a) a higher level of agreement for friendly (or familiar) than for unfriendly (unfamiliar) nations on evaluative traits; (b) considerably more agreement for friendly (or familiar) nations on evaluative than on descriptive traits, and (c) somewhat more agreement for unfriendly (or unfamiliar) than for friendly (familiar) nations on descriptive traits. These results reaffirm and extend previous findings. Other findings were culture-specific, including: (a) the relative salience of familiarity (more important in Argentina and the US.) and friendliness (more important in India) and (b) the higher levcl of agreement for unfriendly than for fricndly nations in Argentina. The first result clarifies interpretations of findings obtained in previous studies wbcre these dimensions were confounded while the second suggests that the ethnocentrism theory prediction for friendliness may be culturespecific.This study was designed to provide additional clarification for competing predictions concerning the amount of agreement among nationals in characterizing other nations. Most treatments of intergroup stereotyping would agree that in order for a perceived characteristic of a group to qualify as a stereotype, a certain level of agreement between individuals should be observed. The level of agreement has been referred to as the amount of stereotypy " l(e.g., Freund, 7 950; Lambert and Klineberg, 1967) or " stereotypical uniformity " (e.g., Katz and Braly, 1933;Berry, 1969). Three factors, in particular, hypothesized to affect the level of agreement are familiarity, friendliness and the type of trait used to depict the other nation.

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