Coveting a vintage coffee table listed for $500 on Facebook Marketplace? You may be tempted to make an assertive offer that is direct and confident-sounding: “I’ll pay you $300.” After all, it’s common knowledge that negotiators who project confidence get the best results.
But in a new paper with co-authors Alice Lee and Claire Malcomb, Malia Mason, senior vice dean for faculty and the Courtney C. Brown Professor of Business in the Management Division at Columbia Business School, establishes that stating a proposal directly increases the risk of a negotiation impasse and that negotiators perform better, on average, if they couch an assertive offer with linguistic hedges. In short, hedging language “softens” proposals and requests. For example, “Could you possibly help me move this weekend?” is a softer, hedged version of “Would you help me move this weekend?” In an offer for the vintage coffee table, “I was hoping to pay $300” will likely get better results than “I’ll pay $300.”
How Language Shapes Negotiation Outcomes
The researchers conducted four experiments designed to measure the odds of a party declining to negotiate when an offer is direct versus hedged — and to measure the financial cost of being too direct. In each experiment, the monetary value of the offer was identical in both direct and hedged offers; only the directness of the language used to express the offer varied.
In the first experiment, participants were told to imagine they were selling their baseball card collection, which they knew was worth $400 to $600 and that they had posted an ad online to sell it for $600. The half of participants who were randomly assigned to the hedged condition received an offer that said, “I saw your ad. I was wondering if I could pay $400 for your card set.” The other half received a direct offer that said, “I saw your ad. I’ll pay $400 for your card set.” The participants were asked to rate how offensive they found each offer and whether they would decline it.
Experiment two looked at whether hedging language would be more or less effective in situations where a successful negotiation would lead to a long-term relationship, such as a salary negotiation. The third experiment examined how a direct offer that implies an openness to negotiate (“I saw your ad and want to discuss the price. I will pay $200.”) would fare compared with a simple direct offer and a hedged offer.
Finally, in experiment four, the researchers explored how the benefit of hedging (i.e., reducing the chance that the other side walks away) compares to its risk (i.e., giving the impression of being too willing to negotiate and thus inviting a more aggressive counter) in a live, dyadic negotiation. The researchers invited participants into a lab setting to negotiate. Sellers were presented with two offers, one hedged and one direct. They were also told that if negotiations failed, they had a third fallback option. Sellers selected one deal-making partner and proceeded to negotiate a price. The researchers then collected data from the sales, looking at the value of realized deals in both the direct and hedged groups, as well as the value of all failed and declined negotiations — i.e., the value of the fallback option.
Why Softer Offers Get Better Results
In all experiments, participants found the hedged offer significantly less offensive and were far more likely to want to negotiate with the person making the hedged offer than the person making the direct offer. In experiment one, the odds of declining the hedging offers were 1.88 times lower than the odds of declining the direct ones. These findings held true both in hypothetical and live settings.
The researchers found that, among parties who transacted, the sale price did not vary significantly between hedged and direct negotiators. This finding counters the common concern that hedging language makes the offering party appear too willing to concede ground. Crucially, when they take into consideration the increased rate at which direct negotiators reach an impasse, results reveal that the optimal approach is to make assertive offers with hedged language. As the researchers conclude, “Hedging leads to better overall performance, even when accounting for the potential costs associated with seeming open to negotiation. Hedging enables the introduction of a self-favorable starting point into the conversation while keeping the risk of offense and missed negotiation opportunities at bay.
Real-World Implications for Business Negotiation
While the principles of successful negotiation have always been important, the value of Mason’s findings become clear in the context of online marketplaces where the cost of walking away from an offer and seeking a new partner has decreased. In this setting, the language used in a first offer assumes even more importance.
Interestingly, Mason’s study also seems to call into question the stereotype of a successful business executive — direct, hard-nosed, and usually male. Women are more likely than men to use hedged language, and women are often encouraged, especially in business settings, to behave more assertively –– more like men. This research would suggest that actually, for optimal results in negotiations, men might be better advised to behave more like women.
However, the researchers are careful to point out that we may have gender-specific expectations about hedging — a small amount of hedging for men might be the equivalent of a more substantive amount of hedging for women negotiators. Hedging language may also have a less pronounced effect in certain cultures, such as in Israel, where direct communication is the norm. Mason’s study lays the groundwork for further investigation into how gender and cultural norms help determine the optimal delivery in negotiations.
Adapted from “Hedging First Offers Permits Assertiveness While Lowering Risk a Partner Walks,” by Alice J. Lee, Malia F. Mason, and Claire S. Malcomb.
