Talk Isn’t Always Cheap: A Theory of Social Influence and Deliberation in Group Decision-Making

Organizations rely on groups to process information and make decisions, yet deliberation's effectiveness remains contested. The authors develop an agent-based model to examine under what conditions deliberation helps or hinders organizational decisions. In the model, group members influence one another through two distinct processes: informational influence, which promotes updating beliefs based on perceived expertise, and normative influence, which drives conformity to gain social approval. While each can improve group outcomes under the right conditions, they can also undermine deliberation; informational influence may spread inaccurate beliefs, while normative influence can suppress dissent and obscure critical information. The model examines how social influence relationships, particularly network density, shape the interplay between these dual processes. Their results identify two key mechanisms: certification, where groups benefit from recognizing expertise without isolating members, and censoring, where conformity cascades suppress diverse viewpoints. They propose a theoretical framework linking network structure to deliberation outcomes, offering propositions on when organizations can reduce censoring, enable certification, or balance both.