تغییرات میان فرهنگی در برداشت رهبری و اسناد کاریزما به رهبر

Leadership perception is based on (a) a recognition-based process that involves categorization of leaders’ characteristics into relevant stereotypes; and (b) an inference-based process that involves making attributions for leaders’ characteristics based on outcomes of salient events (Lord & Maher, 1993). The present study examined the interactive effects of these two alternative processes of leadership perceptions on attributions of charisma cross-culturally. Groups of participants from either a collectivistic culture (Turkey) or an individualistic culture (United States) read a vignette about a prototypical or antiprototypical leader (manipulation of recognition-based process) whose company produced a slight or significant increase in sales (manipulation of inference-based process). The results showed that the co-occurrence of these two processes produced optimal attribution of charisma to the leader. In addition, the leaders’ prototypical characteristics were more effective in forming a leadership impression in an individualistic culture, whereas collectivistic people made attributions based on the company performance outcome.

The power of leaders is largely dependent on how they are perceived by others (Hollander & Julian, 1969; Maurer & Lord, 1991; Pfeffer, 1977). The extent to which an individual is perceived as a leader can increase employees’ acceptance of organizational decisions and policies, followers’ organizational commitment, and positive affect among employees (Pfeffer, 1977). Positive perceptions help leaders accentuate their important characteristics to manage their public impressions (Foti, Fraser, & Lord, 1982). Perceptual processes are also important influences on the measurement of leader behavior (Hogg, 2001; Maurer & Lord, 1991). For instance, to select leaders, or to provide developmental feedback to managers, most assessment centers use behavioral measures that can be distorted by observers’ perceptual inaccuracies (Maurer & Lord, 1991; Murphy & Jones, 1993). Therefore, research on leadership perceptions expands our views of how leaders gain and maintain power, helps leaders to improve their abilities to execute and manage their roles in organizations, and guides applied psychologists and managers in the use of behavioral measurements. To understand how people perceive leaders, it is essential to understand how they process information and interpret organizational performance in different cultural contexts. The present study investigated leadership perceptions by comparing recognition-based and inference-based information processing, and primarily examined how their co-occurrence increases attributions of charisma to leaders in collectivistic and individualistic cultures. We sought to obtain experimental evidence for the interactive effects of these two alternative forms of information processing on the attributions of charisma to the leader. The other purpose of this study was to investigate both the moderating and mediating processes involved. In particular, we examined culture as the potential moderator, and dispositional attributions as the potential mediator.