Jolie M. Martin
ABSTRACT
We examine the impact of individuals' religious and political affiliations on the conflict resolution strategies they employ. Participants in the U.S., Israel, and Qatar played the interactive computer game, PeaceMaker [15], with the objective of satisfying constituents on both sides of the Israel-Palestine conflict. In the role of the Palestinian President, we find that participants tended to take actions favoring those constituents with whom they shared cultural affiliation. Oppositely, when playing the role of the Israeli Prime Minister, participants exhibited comparatively greater bias toward constituents with whom they did not share cultural affiliation. We interpret this difference in light of minority-majority group membership, and the assertion of in-group interests versus perspective-taking of out-group interests. Finally, we discuss the potential of interactive computer games to study cross-cultural interaction in other dynamic environments characterized by uncertainty and complex interdependencies.
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Index Terms
- The cultural determinants of strategic bias: a study of conflict resolution in an interactive computer game
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