Social value orientation and impression formation: a test of two competing hypotheses about information search in negotiation

Two experiments investigated negotiators' information search strategies as a function of other's personality (cooperative vs. competitive vs. unknown) and own social value orientation (pro-social vs. selfish). In Experiment 1, participants selected questions about other's intention to cooperate or to compete. In Experiment 2, participants generated questions themselves, which were coded as asking about cooperation or competition. Consistent with the false-consensus hypothesis (Ross, Greene, & House, 1977) and inconsistent with the triangle hypothesis (Kelley & Stahelski, 1970), selfish negotiators who had no information about the other's personality asked more questions about other's intention to compete, and pro-social negotiators asked more questions about other's intention to cooperate. Furthermore, both selfish and pro-social negotiators engaged in confirmatory information search. Implications in terms of a self-fulfilling prophecy are discussed.