Social Motive Expectations and the Concession Timing Effect

It has been shown that concession timing can influence a negotiator's satisfaction with and judgment of the negotiation partner, the quality of the object, and the agreed upon price (Kwon & Weingart, 2004). Study 1 tested whether the concession timing effect holds when a negotiator believes the other party is cooperatively oriented. The results suggest that a negotiator's belief about the other party's cooperative social motive overrides the concession timing effect. Specifically, if the other party was believed to be cooperative, negotiators did not feel dissatisfied with the outcome or the negotiating partner and did not evaluate the value of the object as being low, even when the other party made early concessions. Study 2 examined the interaction effects of concession timing and cooperative expectations in a more general setting (i.e., a negotiation between friends or between strangers) and investigated the mechanisms through which cooperative expectations override the concession timing effect. Results showed that trust between negotiators and negotiation scripts both played a role.