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Full-Text Articles in Social Psychology
Perceptions Of Power In Conflict Situations, Samuel B. Bacharach, H. Andrew Michener, Edward J. Lawler
Perceptions Of Power In Conflict Situations, Samuel B. Bacharach, H. Andrew Michener, Edward J. Lawler
Edward J Lawler
Subjects rendered judgments regarding the power of the participants in a series of conflictual circumstances where an adversary threatened a target. These situations manipulated four independent variables: (a) the adversary's capacity to damage the target's interests, (b) the adversary's probability of actually attacking, (c) the target's ability to block the impending attack, and (d) the target's capacity to retaliate. Results showed that all of the independent variables affected the subjects' judgments of the adversary's power, while three of them (damage, blockage, and retaliation) affected judgments of the target's power. Differences in the predictive equations for judgments of adversary power and …
(Mis)Understanding Our Influence Over Others: A Review Of The Underestimation-Of-Compliance Effect, Vanessa K. Bohns
(Mis)Understanding Our Influence Over Others: A Review Of The Underestimation-Of-Compliance Effect, Vanessa K. Bohns
Vanessa K. Bohns
I review a burgeoning program of research examining people’s perceptions of their influence over others. This research demonstrates that people are overly pessimistic about their ability to get others to comply with their requests. Participants in our studies have asked more than 14,000 strangers a variety of requests. We find that participants underestimate the likelihood that the people they approach will comply with their requests. This error is robust (it persists across various samples and requests) and substantial (on average, requesters underestimate compliance by 48%). We find that this error results from requesters’ failure to appreciate the awkwardness of saying …