Mara’s expertise is within the fields of negotiation and conflict resolution. Her research focuses on communication processes in negotiation. She is interested in how the timing and sequencing of negotiation strategies affects negotiators’ outcomes, particularly their ability to create value in the negotiation; and als in identifying the contextual, cognitive and dispositional factors that shape strategy choice and sequencing. Currently she is researching how trust and first impressions shape negotiators' strategic decisions, including the use of deception. In a related project, she is investigating how social stereotypes, especially gender, affect the perception of and reaction to a range of negotiation strategies. In addition to her role at MBS, Mara has held lecturing positions at the University of Melbourne and University of Otago, as well as a range of management positions in the Australian Public Service. She also has considerable experience as a presenter on executive development programs. Mara has published in leading international management, psychology and communication journals, and has presented her work extensively at international conferences. She served on the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Conflict Management for 2003-2005 . She co-edited the International Association of Conflict Management's journal, Negotiation and Conflict Management Research, from 2009 - 2012 (http://www.iacm-conflict.org/ncmr/). She currently serves on the editorial boards of Human Communication Research, and Group Decision and Negotiation. From 2001 -2003, she was a board member of the International Association of Conflict Management and is a Past President of the Association (2008 - 2009). She is a member of the Academy of Management's Conflict Management Division Executive. In 2010, she became a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia (ASSA).
Communication Sequences in Negotiation
Power Profiles: The Power-Action Link in Negotiation (with Philip L. Smith) (2010)
Characterizing negotiations as a series of micro-exchanges directs attention to the conditional relationships between negotiators’...
Emergent Negotiations: Stability and Shifts in Process Dynamics (with Laurie Weingart), Negotiation and Conflict Management Research (2008)
Negotiation is a dynamic process in which negotiators change their strategies in response to each...
Communication and conflict (with Linda Putnam and Laurie Weingart), Conflict in Organizations (2007)
Communication is central to the experience and management of conflict. It is through communication that...
Conflicting Social Motives in Negotiating Groups (with Laurie Weingart, Jeanne M. Brett, and Philip L. Smith), Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (2007)
Negotiators’ social motives (cooperative versus individualistic) influence their strategic behaviors. This study used multi-level modeling...
Trust in Negotiation
Maybe It’s Right, Maybe It’s Wrong: Structural and Social Determinants of Deception in Negotiation (with Chris J. Horan and Philip L. Smith), Journal of Business Ethics (2013)
Context shapes negotiators’ actions, including their willingness to act unethically. Focusing on negotiators use of...
Maybe It’s Right, Maybe It’s Wrong: Structural and Social Determinants of Deception in Negotiation, Journal of Business Ethics (2013)
Context shapes negotiators’ actions, including their willingness to act unethically. Focusing on negotiators use of...
Negotiations and Trust (with Philip L. Smith), Encyclopedia of Peace Psychology (2012)
This forthcoming entry in the Encyclopaedia of Peace Psychology provides an overview of trust in...
But Can I Trust Her? Gender and Expectancy Violations in Negotiation (with Carol Kulik, Dasha Simonov, and Carolyn Bradshaw) (2011)
Women who negotiate incur social backlash, being perceived as more pushy and demanding than women...
MindSets: Sensemaking and Transition in Negotiation (with Philip L. Smith), Framing Conflicts: Theory and Applications (2010)
A negotiation’s opening moments are characterized by high levels of uncertainty. During this phase, individuals...
Deception
Maybe It’s Right, Maybe It’s Wrong: Structural and Social Determinants of Deception in Negotiation (with Chris J. Horan and Philip L. Smith), Journal of Business Ethics (2013)
Context shapes negotiators’ actions, including their willingness to act unethically. Focusing on negotiators use of...
Maybe It’s Right, Maybe It’s Wrong: Structural and Social Determinants of Deception in Negotiation, Journal of Business Ethics (2013)
Context shapes negotiators’ actions, including their willingness to act unethically. Focusing on negotiators use of...
Sweet Little Lies: Social Context and the Use of Deception in Negotiation (with Carol T. Kulik) (2012)
Social context shapes negotiators’ actions, including their willingness to act unethically. In this research, we...
Mutually Dependent: Power, Trust, Affect And The Use Of Deception In Negotiation (with Philip L. Smith), Journal of Business Ethics (2009)
Using a simulated two-party negotiation, we examined how trustworthiness and power balance affected deception. To...
Loose With The Truth: Predicting Deception In Negotiation (with Philip L. Smith), Journal of Business Ethics (2007)
Using a simulated, two-party negotiation, we examined how characteristics of the actor, target, and situation...
Turning Points in Negotiation
Punctuated Negotiations: Transitions, Interruptions, and Turning Points (with Daniel Druckman), Handbook of Research on Negotiation (2013)
Negotiation is a dynamic process. Outcomes develop from patterned exchanges between negotiating parties and their...
Contextual Primes, Trust and Negotiators’ Reactions to a Crisis (with Daniel Druckman) (2011)
Using a simulated bilateral negotiation over several security issues, we test the relationship between crises...
Turning Points in Negotiation (with Daniel Druckman), Negotiation and Conflict Management Research (2011)
This manuscript will appear as a "State of the Art" Commentary about turning points in...
Interpretive filters: Social cognition and the impact of turning points in negotiation (with Dan Druckman and Philip L. Smith), Negotiation Journal (2009)
A number of studies have shown that certain events that occur during a negotiation can...
Moments in Time: Metacognition, Trust and Outcomes in Negotiation (with Philip L. Smith), Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin (2005)
This research tested the relationships between turning points, cognitive and affective trust, and negotiation outcomes....
Gender Stereotypes and Negotiation Strategies
Natural Born Peacemakers? Gender And The Resolution Of Conflict, The Handbook of Conflict Resolution: Theory and Practice (2013)
Two males sit apart, staring at each other from the corners of their eyes. A...
Negotiating The Gender Divide: Lessons From The Negotiation And Organizational Behavior Literatures (with Carol T. Kulik), Journal of Management (2012)
Employment relationships are increasingly personalized, with more employment conditions open to negotiation. Although the intended...
Sweet Little Lies: Social Context and the Use of Deception in Negotiation (with Carol T. Kulik) (2012)
Social context shapes negotiators’ actions, including their willingness to act unethically. In this research, we...
But Can I Trust Her? Gender and Expectancy Violations in Negotiation (with Carol Kulik, Dasha Simonov, and Carolyn Bradshaw) (2011)
Women who negotiate incur social backlash, being perceived as more pushy and demanding than women...
Sugar ‘n’ Spice and All Things Nice: Gender and Strategy Choices in Negotiation (with Carol Kulik) (2009)
In this chapter we examine how social stereotypes affect the perception of women who strive...
Emotion in Negotiation
With Feeling: How Emotions Shape Negotiation (with Daniel Druckman), Emotion in Group Decision and Negotiation (2012)
An increasingly popular topic in current research is how emotional expressions influence the course of...
Emotion in Negotiation: Introduction to Special Issue (with Dan Druckman), Group Decision & Negotiation (2008)
This paper is the introduction to a Special Issue of Group Decision and Negotiation, focusing...
Tools for Analysing Negotiators' Communication
Markov Chain Models of Negotiators’ Communication (with Philip L. Smith and Laurie R. Weingart), Encyclopedia of Peace Psychology (2012)
This entry into the Encyclopedia of Peace Psychology provides an overview of the application of...
Markov chain analyses of communication processes in negotiation (with Philip L. Smith and Laurie Weingart), Methods of Negotiation Research (2006)
Markov chain analysis provides a way to investigate how the communication processes in dyadic negotiations...
Markov chain analyses of communication processes in negotiation (with Philip L. Smith and Laurie Weingart), International Negotiation (2005)
Markov chain analysis provides a way to investigate how the communication processes in dyadic negotiations...
Quantitative coding negotiation processes (with Laurie Weingart and Philip Smith), International Negotiation (2005)
The examination of negotiation processes is seen by many researchers as an insurmountable task largely...
Negotiators' Cognition
Psychological Aspects of Negotiating Strategies and Processes (with Philip L. Smith), Encyclopedia of Peace Psychology (2012)
This entry into the Encyclopedia of Peace Psychology proveis an overview of cognitive factors that...
Cognitive representations of negotiation (with Philip L. Smith), Australian Journal of Management (2005)
Using a bilateral negotiation, we examined the relationship between motivational orientation, cognitive maps and negotiators’...