The Polarizing Effect of Arousal on Negotiation
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Curhan_The polarizing.pdf
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137.33 KB
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Author(s)
Brown, Ashley D.
Curhan, Jared R.
Date Issued
August 2013
Journal
Psychological Science
Publisher
Sage Publications
Citation
Brown, A. D., and J. R. Curhan. “The Polarizing Effect of Arousal on Negotiation.” Psychological Science 24, no. 10 (October 1, 2013): 1928–1935.
Version
Original manuscript
Abstract
In this research, we examined the impact of physiological arousal on negotiation outcomes. Conventional wisdom and the prescriptive literature suggest that arousal should be minimized given its negative effect on negotiations, whereas prior research on misattribution of arousal suggests that arousal might polarize outcomes, either negatively or positively. In two experiments, we manipulated arousal and measured its effect on subjective and objective negotiation outcomes. Our results support the polarization effect. When participants had negative prior attitudes toward negotiation, arousal had a detrimental effect on outcomes, whereas when participants had positive prior attitudes toward negotiation, arousal had a beneficial effect on outcomes. These effects occurred because of the construal of arousal as negative or positive affect, respectively. Our findings have important implications not only for negotiation, but also for research on misattribution of arousal, which previously has focused on the target of evaluation, in contrast to the current research, which focused on the critical role of the perceiver.
MIT Department
Sloan School of Management
Terms of Use
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797613480796
