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- Title
Do Participants and Observers Assess Intentions Differently During Bargaining and Conflict?
- Authors
Dickson, Eric S.
- Abstract
Political actors in conflict settings are often uncertain about their counterparts' intentions. This article explores the psychology of how intentions are assessed using a novel experimental design that randomly assigns subjects to one of three roles—“proposer,”“recipient,” or “observer.” Recipients and observers are given identical noisy information about proposers' actions, and make postplay assessments of proposers' intentions that are rewarded based on accuracy. A first experiment explores a context of while a second experiment explores a context of . The results suggest that actors' perceptions can sometimes be directly affected by the set of strategic alternatives they possess. When signals about proposer behavior appear “negative,” recipients' assessments of proposers' intentions are more negative than observers' assessments recipients have the ability to respond to the proposer's action—but not if recipients lack this ability. The ability to respond to proposer behavior appears to cause recipients to make more negative inferences about the proposer than circumstances warrant. Interestingly, recipients' and observers' assessments are indistinguishable when signals about proposer behavior instead appear “positive.”
- Subjects
CONFLICT management; INTERPERSONAL relations; EXPERIMENTAL design; SOCIAL psychology; INTENTION; POLITICIANS -- Psychology; ATTITUDE (Psychology); SOCIAL conflict
- Publication
American Journal of Political Science (Wiley-Blackwell), 2009, Vol 53, Issue 4, p910
- ISSN
0092-5853
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1111/j.1540-5907.2009.00408.x