Implementation intentions and the willful pursuit of prosocial goals in negotiations

Three studies examined whether the self-regulation strategy of forming implementation intentions (i.e., if-then plans) facilitates the attainment of prosocial goals when a limited resource is to be distributed between two parties who hold adverse cognitive orientations. In three experiments, pairs of negotiators were assigned prosocial goals that either had to be supplemented with plans (if-then plans, Gollwitzer, 1999) on how to act on these goals or not. Experiment 1 used a mixed-frames negotiation paradigm in which one negotiation partner operated on a gain-frame, the other on a loss-frame. When participants had the prosocial goal to find fair agreements and furnished it with a respective if-then plan, unfair agreements in favor of the loss-frame negotiator no longer occurred. Experiment 2 used a same-frame negotiation paradigm, where both negotiation partners had either a loss or a gain-frame. When loss-frame pairs had furnished their prosocial goals to cooperate with the negotiation partner with a respective if-then plan, reduced profits as compared to gain-frame pairs of negotiators were no longer observed. In addition, negotiators who had formed implementation intentions were more likely to use the integrative negotiation strategy of logrolling (i.e., making greater concessions on low rather than high priority issues). Experiment 3 used a computer-mediated negotiation task in order to analyze the effects of prosocial goals and respective implementation intentions on the course of the negotiation. Again, implementation intentions facilitated the pursuit of prosocial goals in the face of adversity (i.e., loss frames) by use of the integrative negotiation strategy of logrolling. The present research adds a self-regulation perspective to the research on negotiation by pointing out that the effects of negotiation goals can be enhanced by furnishing them with respective plans (i.e., implementation intentions)

Verhandlungsführung - psychologische Grundlagen

Verhandlungsforschung wird heutzutage unter drei verschiedenen: Perspektiven betrieben: In kognitiven Ansätzen wird untersucht, wie unterschiedliche Konzeptualisierungen der Verhandlungssituation und des Verhandlungsgeschehen zu mehr oder weniger günstigen Verhandlungsergebnissen führen. Motivationale Ansätze versuchen dagegen herauszufinden, wie im Zusammenwirken verschiedener Interessensorientierungen oder im Wettstreit widersprechender Motive integrative Lösungen zustande kommen. Selbstregulatorische Ansätze schließlich gehen davon aus, dass Ziele in komplexen Verhandlungssituationen nur schwer zu realisieren sind und dass die Zielverwirklichung auf das Nutzen effektiver, selbstregulatorischer Strategien (z. B. der Vorsatzbildung) angewiesen ist

Trade-offs hurt, compromises as well: How value-driven conflicts impact negotiation behaviors, outcomes, and subjective evaluations

Value conflicts have been shown to impair negotiation behavior and outcomes (Harinck & Ellemers, 2014). Positions on values may be perceived as more incompatible than positions interests in utility-driven conflicts because incompatible values typically induce identity threat and a trade-off aversion. In two preregistered experiments (N=176/310), we test whether value-driven versus utility-driven conflicts impact behaviors, outcomes, and subjective evaluations even in a setting in which the motives behind the positions (values or utility) are structurally similarly compatible. We further tested whether the provision of information (compared to no provision) about the counterpart’s motives would have opposite effects in value-driven and utility-driven conflicts. Our findings corroborate that a value motive leads to an increased aversion against trade-offs, to more compromise offers (Study 1 and 2), and to lower individual and joint outcomes (Study 2). Across multiple dimensions (i.e., instrumental outcome, process, relationship, and in Study 1, self), subjective evaluations were more negative in value-driven conflicts than in utility-driven conflicts. Contrary to our predictions, providing information about the counterpart’s motives did not affect behaviors, outcomes, or subjective evaluations, possibly because it neither improved objective understanding of the other nor increased perceived discrepancy between counterparts. The results are discussed regarding theoretical implications for value-driven conflicts, and practical implications for information exchange as a facilitator in integrative negotiations

Mindset-Oriented Negotiation Training (MONT): Teaching More Than Skills and Knowledge

In this conceptual paper, we propose that both skill set development and mindset development would be desirable dimensions of negotiation training. The second dimension has received little attention thus far, but negotiation mindsets, i.e., the psychological orientations by which people approach negotiations, are likely to have a considerable influence on the outcome of negotiations. Referring to empirical and conceptual mindset studies from outside the negotiation field, we argue that developing mindsets can leverage the effectiveness of skills and knowledge, increase learning transfer, and lead to long-term behavioral changes. We introduce an integrative negotiation mindset that comprises three inclinations which complement each other: a collaborative, a curious, and a creative one. We also discuss activities that help people to develop and enhance this mindset both in and out of the classroom. Our general claim is that by moving beyond the activities of conventional negotiation training, which focuses on skills and knowledge, mindset-oriented negotiation training can increase training effectiveness and enable participants to more often reach what we define as sustainable integrative agreements

Promoting prevention success at the bargaining table: Regulatory focus in distributive negotiations

Article history: Available online xxxx JEL classification: C78 C91 PsycINFO classification: 2360 3020 Keywords: Regulatory focus Promotion Prevention Self-regulation Negotiation Buyer Seller a b s t r a c t While promotion-focused individuals conceptualize goals as ideals and opportunities, prevention-focused individuals conceptualize goals as obligations and necessities. Due to these different goal conceptualizations, prevention-focused parties are expected to set the framework for agreements in distributive business-negotiations among parties with different regulatory foci: Specifically, we predict that prevention-focused negotiators reveal a high resistance to concede until their goals are met, but are willing to concede once their goals are fulfilled. In contrast, promotion-focused parties should adjust their concession making to the best attainable outcomes, irrespective of their negotiation goals. Two studies supported these theoretical assumptions: Prevention-focused parties with goals located in the upper range (i.e., high goals) of the 'zone of possible agreements' (ZOPA; e.g., Sebenius, 1992) revealed a high resistance to concede. Hence, they outperformed promotion-focused counterparts-irrespective of whether the latter held low (Study 1) or equally high (Study 2) goals. Conversely, prevention-focused parties with goals located in the lower range of the ZOPA (i.e., low goals) revealed a lower resistance to concede. Hence, they were outperformed by their promotion-focused counterparts-irrespective of whether the latter held equally low (Study 1) or high (Study 2) goals. The findings are discussed with respect to the role of self-regulation and goal conceptualization in the context of negotiations

The Costs and Benefits of Negotiated Agreements in Social Conflicts

Psychological research on negotiation is shaped by the fundamental belief that social interaction between negotiators is unconditionally beneficial to negotiation outcomes. Over a series of four experiments, we provide the first empirical test of this belief. Drawing on an experimental paradigm established in group performance research, we compare interactive negotiations with non-interactive, nominal negotiation methods, allowing us to identify process gains or losses in different negotiation settings. Our first three experiments show considerable benefits of social interaction in both distributive (Experiments 1 and 2) and integrative (Experiment 3) negotiations, independent of motivational and coordinative challenges. However, our fourth experiment demonstrates that process gains in negotiations are not unconditional. After adding explicit transaction costs to a distributive price negotation, interactive negotiators could no longer surpass their nominal counterparts in terms of negotiation outcomes. On the contrary, by embedding the negotiation in a series of different tasks, we were able to show that longer negotiation durations for interactive negotiators led to a significantly worse overall task performance compared to nominal negotiators