Getting stuck or stepping back: effects of obstacles and construal level in the negotiation of creative solutions

Difficult issues in negotiation act as interfering forces but their effects on negotiation processes and outcomes are unclear. Perhaps facing such obstacles leads individuals to take a step back, attend to the big picture and, therefore, to be able to craft creative, mutually beneficial solutions. Alternatively, facing obstacles may lead negotiators to focus narrowly on the obstacle issue, so that they no longer consider issues simultaneously, and forego the possibility to reach high quality, integrative agreements. Three experiments involving face-to-face negotiation support the "getting stuck" hypothesis, but only when negotiators are in a local processing mode and not when they are in a global processing mode. Implications for the art and science of negotiation, and for construal level theory, are discussed.

[1]  Fieke Harinck,et al.  Negotiating interests or values and reaching integrative agreements: the importance of time pressure and temporary impasses , 2004 .

[2]  J. Brockner,et al.  Value from hedonic experience and engagement. , 2006, Psychological review.

[3]  Francesca Flamini,et al.  First things first? The agenda formation problem for multi-issue committees , 2007 .

[4]  T. Schelling.  The Strategy of Conflict , 1963 .

[5]  Lutz-Alexander Busch,et al.  The game of negotiations: ordering issues and implementing agreements , 2002, Games Econ. Behav..

[6]  M. Bilewicz.  History as an Obstacle: Impact of Temporal-Based Social Categorizations on Polish-Jewish Intergroup Contact , 2007 .

[7]  Sean M. McCrea,et al.  I want to be creative: exploring the role of hedonic contingency theory in the positive mood-cognitive flexibility link. , 2008, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[8]  A. Knippenberg,et al.  Shielding intentions from distraction: Forming an intention induces inhibition of distracting stimuli , 2006 .

[9]  Pruitt,et al.  A Brief History of the Oslo Talks , 1997 .

[10]  Gerardo A. Okhuysen,et al.  Saving the worst for last: The effect of time horizon on the efficiency of negotiating benefits and burdens☆ , 2003 .

[11]  Anja Achtziger,et al.  Implementation Intentions and Shielding Goal Striving From Unwanted Thoughts and Feelings , 2008, Personality & social psychology bulletin.

[12]  Janice R. Kelly,et al.  Effects of time limits and task types on task performance and interaction of four-person groups. , 1985 .

[13]  Yaacov Trope,et al.  Negotiation from a near and distant time perspective. , 2006, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[14]  Peter J. Carnevale,et al.  Negotiation in Social Conflict , 1993 .

[15]  Christian Dobel,et al.  How Writing System and Age Influence Spatial Representations of Actions , 2007, Psychological science.

[16]  K. Lewin,et al.  A Dynamic Theory of Personality - Selected Papers , 2008 .

[17]  Blythe Duell,et al.  Good citizens to the end? It depends: empathy and concern with future consequences moderate the impact of a short-term time horizon on organizational citizenship behaviors. , 2006, The Journal of applied psychology.

[18]  Phillip A. Lewis,et al.  Toward a Theory of Agenda Setting in Negotiations , 1993 .

[19]  Arie W Kruglanski,et al.  Forgetting all else: on the antecedents and consequences of goal shielding. , 2002, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[20]  Daniel Druckman,et al.  Determinants of Compromising Behavior in Negotiation , 1994 .

[21]  Matthijs Baas,et al.  Hedonic tone and activation level in the mood-creativity link: toward a dual pathway to creativity model. , 2008, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[22]  N. Bolger,et al.  A framework for studying personality in the stress process. , 1995, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[23]  C. D. De Dreu,et al.  Motivated information processing, strategic choice, and the quality of negotiated agreement. , 2006, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[24]  Nira Liberman,et al.  Temporal construal effects on abstract and concrete thinking: consequences for insight and creative cognition. , 2004, Journal of personality and social psychology.

[25]  D. Druckman.  Social psychological approaches to the study of negotiation , 1977 .

[26]  Thomas M. Spalek,et al.  The Left-to-Right Bias in Inhibition of Return Is Due to the Direction of Reading , 2005, Psychological science.

[27]  P. Carnevale,et al.  Effects of gain-loss frames in negotiation: Loss aversion, mismatching, and frame adoption , 1994 .

[28]  Anne Maass,et al.  Directional Bias in the Mental Representation of Spatial Events , 2003, Psychological science.

[29]  R. Walton,et al.  A Behavioral Theory of Labor Negotiations: an Analysis of a Social Interaction System , 1965 .

[30]  Herb Cohen,et al.  You Can Negotiate Anything , 1982 .

[31]  A. Ledgerwood,et al.  Group-Identity Completion and the Symbolic Value of Property , 2007, Psychological science.

[32]  B. Nijstad,et al.  Taking the easy way out: preference diversity, decision strategies, and decision refusal in groups. , 2008, Journal of personality and social psychology.