PERSONALITY IN SOCIAL-INFLUENCE ACROSS TASKS AND GROUPS

In a study on the person-by-situation interaction on leadership, 9 una cquainted female and male students completed a personality-adjective l ist before they cooperated in 3 triads on 4 different assessment-cente r tasks, each time with 2 new partners. The rotation design war run wi th 4 samples of 9 subjects each, half of them men, half women. Each su bject's contribution to the group process war ranked by the team membe rs and by 2 observers. In each of the 4 9-person samples the main effe ct of persons war much larger than the person-by-task (and group-compo sition) interaction effect The personality pattern Low Emotional Stabi lity/Low Independence was clearly a hindrance to influence for men, bu t not far women. Social roles modify the influence of personality char acteristics on leadership behavior attenuating the personality influen ce more with women than with men. Finally, some practical conclusions are drawn.