The Face of Bargaining

The nature of a bargaining situation is discussed. Two general propositions about the conditions affecting the likelihood of a bargaining agreement are presented. The effects of the availability of threat and of permissive and compulsory communication upon interpersonal bargaining are investigated experimentally in a two-person bargaining game. The major findings are (1) Under conditions of bilateral (i.e., available to both players) threat, players have most difficulty in reaching agreements, unilateral (available to one player) threat produces somewhat less difficulty, however, only under conditions of no threat are subjects able to maximize their payoffs. (2) Under conditions of permissive communication, subjects' performance does not differ from that found when the opportunity to communicate is not present. (3) Under conditions of compulsory communication, an improvement in performance is noted in the unilateral threat condition only. These findings are discussed with respect to the balance of cooperative and competitive motivational forces present and the player's need to maintain “face” in interpersonal encounters.