Neuroscience
Past research has shown it’s disadvantageous to feel down or angry when you’re negotiating. But now Marwan Sinaceur and Larissa Tiedens argue that pretending you’re angry can be beneficial, especially when dealing with someone who has few options, because it gives the impression you are “dominant, strong and tough”.
First they asked 157 students to imagine they were a salesman for a technology company, and to read a fictional account of a negotiation between themselves and a buyer. Afterwards, the students who read a version in which the buyer got angry agreed to more concessions than the students who read a version in which he stayed calm, but only if they were told beforehand that their business was struggling at the moment.
In a second experiment, 142 students role-played in pairs, with half of them acting as a an employer and half as a job candidate. The students playing the role of ‘employer’ were given negotiation advice beforehand. Compared with the ‘employers’ advised to hide their emotions, the ‘employers’ who were told it was good to look angry (plus tips on feigning anger by frowning or banging the table) managed to negotiate better terms on salary, holiday, work location and equipment, but only if they were negotiating with a ‘candidate’ who thought there were no other jobs available.
“Whereas feeling angry has been shown to lead to bad negotiation outcomes, we showed that expressing anger can lead to good negotiation outcomes”, the researchers concluded. However, they advised that the strategy be treated with caution in light of earlier work showing that expressing an emotion can cause you to feel that emotion, and because you could put people off negotiating with you in the future. “As such, the expression of anger may be a strategy best suited for relatively short single-shot negotiations”, they said.
__________________________________
Sinaceur, M. & Tiedens, L.Z. (2006). Get mad and get more than even: When and why anger expression is effective in negotiations. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 42, 314-322.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
- Using Psychological Negotiating Tricks Can Blowback On You
For some time now negotiation researchers have been telling us we can get ahead by using tactical emotional expressions to manipulate the other party. Show anger to make them worry about threats, or disappointment to nudge them into feeling guilty, and...
- How Anger Can Make Us More Rational
Anger can de-bias our thinkingImagine you're in a room with four people, one is lip-snarling angry, the others are calm. Who among them would you consider the most likely to think rationally? A surprising new study suggests that in at least one important...
- Physical Distance Boosts The Success Of Computer-based Negotiation
A sense of physical distance encourages more abstract thought Negotiations that take place over computer, without face-to-face contact, have more chance of success when those negotiating think there is greater physical distance between each other....
- Why It's Time For The Media To Help Our Politicians Believe They Can Succeed
A psychology study fresh off the presses shows the importance of positive expectations for the successful resolution of awkward negotiations. The results couldn't be more timely as our senior politicians negotiate over terms for a new coalition British...
- Jokes Are A Serious Part Of Business
Most textbooks fail to discuss the role of humour in business negotiations but from her analysis of two real-life meetings concerning a multi-million pound transaction, Taina Vuorela at the Helsinki School of Economics reports that humour can be an important...
Neuroscience
Why you should add a bit of Grrrrr to your negotiations…
Past research has shown it’s disadvantageous to feel down or angry when you’re negotiating. But now Marwan Sinaceur and Larissa Tiedens argue that pretending you’re angry can be beneficial, especially when dealing with someone who has few options, because it gives the impression you are “dominant, strong and tough”.First they asked 157 students to imagine they were a salesman for a technology company, and to read a fictional account of a negotiation between themselves and a buyer. Afterwards, the students who read a version in which the buyer got angry agreed to more concessions than the students who read a version in which he stayed calm, but only if they were told beforehand that their business was struggling at the moment.
In a second experiment, 142 students role-played in pairs, with half of them acting as a an employer and half as a job candidate. The students playing the role of ‘employer’ were given negotiation advice beforehand. Compared with the ‘employers’ advised to hide their emotions, the ‘employers’ who were told it was good to look angry (plus tips on feigning anger by frowning or banging the table) managed to negotiate better terms on salary, holiday, work location and equipment, but only if they were negotiating with a ‘candidate’ who thought there were no other jobs available.
“Whereas feeling angry has been shown to lead to bad negotiation outcomes, we showed that expressing anger can lead to good negotiation outcomes”, the researchers concluded. However, they advised that the strategy be treated with caution in light of earlier work showing that expressing an emotion can cause you to feel that emotion, and because you could put people off negotiating with you in the future. “As such, the expression of anger may be a strategy best suited for relatively short single-shot negotiations”, they said.
__________________________________
Sinaceur, M. & Tiedens, L.Z. (2006). Get mad and get more than even: When and why anger expression is effective in negotiations. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 42, 314-322.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
- Using Psychological Negotiating Tricks Can Blowback On You
For some time now negotiation researchers have been telling us we can get ahead by using tactical emotional expressions to manipulate the other party. Show anger to make them worry about threats, or disappointment to nudge them into feeling guilty, and...
- How Anger Can Make Us More Rational
Anger can de-bias our thinkingImagine you're in a room with four people, one is lip-snarling angry, the others are calm. Who among them would you consider the most likely to think rationally? A surprising new study suggests that in at least one important...
- Physical Distance Boosts The Success Of Computer-based Negotiation
A sense of physical distance encourages more abstract thought Negotiations that take place over computer, without face-to-face contact, have more chance of success when those negotiating think there is greater physical distance between each other....
- Why It's Time For The Media To Help Our Politicians Believe They Can Succeed
A psychology study fresh off the presses shows the importance of positive expectations for the successful resolution of awkward negotiations. The results couldn't be more timely as our senior politicians negotiate over terms for a new coalition British...
- Jokes Are A Serious Part Of Business
Most textbooks fail to discuss the role of humour in business negotiations but from her analysis of two real-life meetings concerning a multi-million pound transaction, Taina Vuorela at the Helsinki School of Economics reports that humour can be an important...