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Anchor points and reference points both have an effect on counteroffers in a simulated price negotiations. The modifications from an anchor points are greater in terms of monetary units and rated satisfaction. Initial offers and reservation prices that are less than the proposed selling prices affected the ratings of satisfaction with the proposed selling prices. The outcome and the negotiation process, which involves bidding more than the initial offer and counter offer, is influenced by anchor and reference points.

Global business-to-business relationship development in service industries is analyzed by using the key mediating variable model. This model focuses on commitment and trust in relationship development.

Problem statement: Two experiments were conducted to test the hypothesis that the loss-sensitivity principle extends to integration of the outcomes of two concurrent risky decisions. Purpose of Study: According to this principle, only expected loss outcomes of concurrent decisions would be integrated. Method: A total of 96 undergraduates participated in two experiments. Findings and Results: The results of Experiment 1 showed consistent with the loss sensitivity principle that a prior outcome was integrated with the expected loss outcome of a current decision. However, there was no evidence for integration of the expected loss outcomes of two concurrent decisions. A possible explanation implying that outcomes are ignored if they have not yet occurred was followed up in Experiment 2 where participants were offered bonuses to increase their sensitivity either to gains or losses. An effect of bonus was observed but again there was no evidence for integration of the outcomes of concurrent decisions. Conclusion: Although confirmed in several previous experiments when choices were made between mixed bets with both gain and loss outcomes, whether the loss-sensitivity principle extends to integration of prior outcomes when choices are made between losses or between gains was also questioned by the results.

Problem statement: Sometimes concurrent decisions are not integrated. Purpose of study: An experiment was conducted to investigate whether causally related options of concurrent decisions are not evaluated and therefore not chosen although their combinations are more attractive than single options. In two concurrent decisions participants chose between buying means-end related and unrelated pairs of everyday consumer products. Method: Sixteen undergraduates in one group were sometimes forced to choose the end (or the means), whereas 16 undergraduates in another group were always free to choose the end and means. Findings and results: In the forced choices, participants chose the means or ends presumably because they attended to the additional benefits. Conclusions: However, when free to make both choices participants only chose the ends and means 22% of the time. 28% of the choices were made of only an end or a means, and 50% of the choices were made of two unrelated options.

Purpose of Study: An experiment was conducted to investigate whether causally related outcomes of concurrent decisions are more frequently integrated than unrelated outcomes, and whether certain outcomes are more frequently integrated than uncertain outcomes. Method: Sixteen undergraduates in one group chose between buying means-end related and unrelated pairs of everyday consumer products, whereas 16 undergraduates in another group chose between lottery tickets with the consumer products as prizes. Findings and Results: The results indicated that both causal relatedness and uncertainty of outcomes of concurrent decisions affect integration. Conclusions: Means and ends were more often chosen when they were presented in the same sets of two concurrent decisions than when they were presented together with unrelated options or singly. The observed differences were smaller when choices were made between uncertain outcomes.

People frequently continue an investment despite a negative outcome or sunk cost. Such irrational persistence in a losing course of action has been termed escalation of commitment. Although several explanations of escalation of commitment have been proposed, none of them accounts for all determinants that have been empirically demonstrated. Based on a review of previous research, a conceptualisation is introduced of how escalation of commitment is affected by 4 task dimensions: type and nontransparency of decision goal, nontransparency of sunk costs, time course of sunk costs, and accountability. A more inclusive theory that subsumes escalation of commitment is offered as an alternative that may be developed to account for the effects of the task dimensions.

Prior irreversible investments of money, time, or effort referred to as sunk costs frequently lead to decisions to continue a chosen course of action despite that this is irrational. With the aim of demonstrating that such escalation of commitment is a special case of a more general phenomenon, two experiments were carried out employing undergraduates as participants. Experiment 1 showed for fictitious personal and business investment scenarios that both prior losses and gains (sunk outcomes) affected choices to continue or discontinue the investment. In Experiment 2 the effect of sunk outcomes was reduced although not eliminated by a monetary bonus that in one condition depended on the future outcomes of the second gamble in two-stage gambles, in another condition on the future returns in personal investment scenarios. In support of a more inclusive theory subsuming escalation of commitment, the decisions were affected by both past and future outcomes and both gains and losses.

A violation of procedure invariance in preference measurement is that the predominant or prominent attribute looms larger in choice than in a matching task. In Experiment 1, this so-called prominence effect was demonstrated for choices between pairs of options, choices to accept single options, and preference ratings of single options. That is, in all these response modes the prominent attribute loomed larger than in matching. The results were replicated in Experiment 2, in which subjects chose between or rated their preference for pairs of options which were matched to be equally attractive either in the same session or 1 week earlier. On the basis of these and previous results, it is argued that the prominence effect is a reliable phenomenon. However, none of several cognitive explanations which have been offered appears to be completely viable.

This study investigated how people process time constraints on sequence decisions entailed by an everyday type of errand-planning task. In this task, subjects chose when and where to perform a number of errands in a fictitious environment. Four experiments were conducted in which time constraints were varied. Undergraduate students served as subjects. A main finding was that subjects who were not required to minimise time traded off travel distance (effort) against wait time. Since this trade-off was stronger at early stages in the sequence of errands, it may not simply reflect inconvenience of waiting but an attempt to increase the realism of the plan by reducing the likelihood of obstacles to performing the errands. In addition to providing insights into the role of time constraints, the research demonstrated that, within a decision-making theoretical framework, planning may be conceived of as choices between sequences of actions.

An experiment was conducted to contrast cognitive and motivational explanations of why a decision maker integrates a prior outcome with the expected outcomes of a current choice. Undergraduate students imagined that, on a fictitious day at a racetrack, they did not gamble in the prior race, that they gambled and won, or that they gambled and lost. Subjects rated in one session the likelihood of choosing to gamble in the current race. In another session, they rated how satisfied they would be with not gambling, with gambling and winning, and with gambling and losing, respectively. In support of a concreteness principle based on the assumption that cognitive effort is minimised, the results showed more integration of the prior outcome for descriptions of the bets which concretely integrated the prior outcomes with all the outcomes of the current choice than for descriptions which did not do that. A motivational explanation labelled the “loss-sensitivity principle” was also empirically supported in that, irrespective of concreteness of the descriptions, the prior outcome was always integrated with the expected loss of the current choice.

The study examined relationships between physical features of neighbourhoods and social interaction among the residents. Two independent data collections were administered. First, experts registered properties of the objective physical environment. Principal component analysis (PCA) showed that these measures tapped eight neighbourhood physical dimensions: semiprivate space, visual appearance (surveillance), seating environment, dwelling density, spaciousness, street/entrance level, and size of private open space. Second, questionnaire data were obtained from respondents concerning their perceived environment. In addition, their perceptions of neighbouring were measured with the Multidimensional Measure of Neighbouring (MMN), which taps supportive acts of neighbouring, neighbour annoyance, neighbourhood attachment, and weak social ties. In addition, a general loneliness dimension was measured. All the objective and perceived physical dimensions except size of open private space explained variance of at least one of the neighbouring dimensions. Objective and in particular perceived spaciousness correlated highest with neighbouring. Visual appearance also explained relatively high portions of neighbouring, but only on the annoyance dimension.