Naïveté and Cynicism in Negotiations and Other Competitive Contexts

A wealth of literature documents how the common failure to think about the self-interests of others contributes to suboptimal outcomes. Yet sometimes, an excess of cynicism appears to lead us to over-think the actions of others and make negative attributions about their motivations without sufficient cause. In the process, we may miss opportunities that greater trust might capture. We review the research on when people expect too little or too much self-interest in the intentions of others, as contrasted with rational behavior. We also discuss the antecedents and consequences of these naïve and cynical errors, as well as some potential strategies to buffer against their effects and achieve better outcomes in competitive contexts.     

The economic evaluation of time: Organizational causes and individual consequences

People acquire ways of thinking about time partly in and from work organizations, where the control and measurement of time use is a prominent feature of modern management—an inevitable consequence of employees selling their time for money. In this paper, we theorize about the role organizational practices play in promoting an economic evaluation of time and time use—where time is thought of primarily in monetary terms and viewed as a scarce resource that should be used as efficiently as possible. While people usually make decisions about time and money differently, we argue that management practices that make the connection between time and money salient can heighten the economic evaluation of time. We consider both the organizational causes of economic evaluation as well as its personal and societal consequences.     

FAIR MARKET IDEOLOGY: ITS COGNITIVE-MOTIVATIONAL UNDERPINNINGS

Public opinion research indicates that most people espouse egalitarian ideals and acknowledge substantial income inequality in society, but they consistently perceive the economic system to be highly fair and legitimate. In an attempt to better understand this paradox by considering the cognitive and motivational bases of ideological support for the free market system, we draw on and integrate a number of social psychological theories suggesting that people want to believe that the systems and institutions that affect them are fair, legitimate, and justified. We have developed an instrument for measuring fair market ideology, and we have found in several samples that its endorsement is associated with self-deception, economic system justification, opposition to equality, power distance orientation, belief in a just world, political conservatism, right-wing authoritarianism, and scandal minimization. We also present evidence that people evince a system-justifying tendency to judge profitable companies to be more ethical than unprofitable companies. In addition, results from an experimental study we conducted in Hungary indicate that support for the free market system is strongest among people who score high in self-deception under conditions of system threat, suggesting the presence of a (non-rational) defensive motivation. Finally, we discuss several organizational and societal implications of the tendency to idealize market mechanisms and to view market-generated outcomes as inherently fair.     

Beyond Corporate Responsibility: Implications for Management Development

Since the mid‐1990s we have witnessed the rise of numerous constructive and positive activities aimed at developing or enhancing corporate responsibility and corporate citizenship as well as anti‐globalization and anticorporate activism. And, of course, in 2008, we witnessed the meltdown of financial markets and numerous financial institutions as well as some major companies teetering on the brink of collapse. What is actually needed to create the world that many people want to live in may in fact be a new relationship between business and society, that is, new ways of looking at the corporation and its role in society, both in practice and in management education? We will argue that some initiatives, such as Corporation 2020, have already begun to explore these issues by taking a more holistic perspective on different purposes and roles of the corporation in the future. Management education, which has been severely criticized in the aftermath of the economic crisis, has an important role to play, but in a changed form. Implications for leadership and management education include the need to shift cognitive, moral, and emotional levels of development, renewed emphasis on balance both individually and socially, a less is more sensibility, a holistic systems perspective, and shifting the purpose of the firm to encompass not just shareholder needs, but also societal, stakeholder, and ecological needs and interests. In this article we explore some of the ways in which these attributes might be engendered in future leaders, at least in those management development and education programs interested in fostering a new wave of progressive leadership in management for the future.     

STICKY PRICES: A NEW MONETARIST APPROACH

Why do some sellers set nominal prices that apparently do not respond to changes in the aggregate price level? In many models, prices are sticky by assumption; here it is a result. We use search theory, with two consequences: prices are set in dollars, since money is the medium of exchange; and equilibrium implies a nondegenerate price distribution. When the money supply increases, some sellers may keep prices constant, earning less per unit but making it up on volume so profit stays constant. The calibrated model matches price‐change data well. But, in contrast to typical sticky‐price models, money is neutral.     

ARTIFICIAL STATES

We define artificial states as those in which political borders do not coincide with a division of nationalities desired by the people on the ground. We propose and compute for most countries in the world two measures of the degree to which borders may be artificial. One measures how borders split ethnic groups into two separate adjacent countries. The other measures the straightness of land borders, under the assumption the straight land borders are more likely to be artificial. We then show that these two measures are correlated with several measures of political and economic success.     

Money and Credit Redux

We analyze money and credit as competing payment instruments in decentralized exchange. In natural environments, we show the economy does not need both: if credit is easy, money is irrelevant; if credit is tight, money is essential, but credit becomes irrelevant. Changes in credit conditions are neutral because real balances respond endogenously to keep total liquidity constant. This is true for both exogenous and endogenous debt limits and policy limits, secured and unsecured lending, and general pricing mechanisms. While we show how to overturn some of these results, the benchmark model suggests credit might matter less than people think.     

金钱概念对自我提升产品偏好的影响研究

随着社会物质水平的提高,很多人未必真正拥有财富,但经常暴露于金钱的刺激之下,容易形成金钱概念,会产生拥有金钱财富的效果,根据成就动机理论和市场定价模式,启动金钱概念的消费者倾向选择有利于自我发展的消费选项。 以中国高校学生作为研究样本,采用实验方法,设计3个实验,借助SPSS软件对实验数据进行方差分析,探讨金钱概念对消费者自我提升偏好的积极影响,并进一步探讨成就动机的中介作用和购买目标的调节作用。 实验1选择一种有助睡眠的口服溶片作为实验材料,采用提升类型(自我提升vs.非自我提升)×金钱概念的2×1组间实验,结果变量为支付水平,验证金钱概念对消费者自我提升偏好的积极影响。结果表明,相对于非自我提升类型,金钱概念的消费者对自我提升类型的支付水平更高。 实验2选择维他命水饮料作为实验材料,采用单因素组间实验设计(金钱概念组vs.控制组),结果变量为自我提升类型和非自我提升类型的对比选择,验证金钱概念通过成就动机影响自我提升偏好。结果表明,金钱概念诱发成就动机,进而积极影响消费者对自我提升类型的偏好。 实验3选择棋牌游戏作为实验材料,采用金钱概念(有vs.无)×购买目标(他人vs.自己)×提升类型(自我提升vs.非自我提升)的2×2×2组间组内设计,金钱概念和购买目标为组间设计,提升类型为组内设计,结果变量为支付意愿,检验在不同购买目标情况下,金钱概念对消费者自我提升偏好的影响。结果表明,金钱概念对自我提升偏好的影响只局限在购买目标为自己的情况下,在为他人购买时,金钱概念对自我提升偏好的影响不显著。 研究结论有利于丰富金钱概念研究,拓展金钱概念在消费领域的研究内容;有利于营销者掌握金钱概念对消费者购买决策的影响机理,深入了解消费者的购买心理,制定相应的品牌和产品管理措施,提升自我发展相关产品的销售;有利于人们树立正确的金钱观和消费观,管理好金钱财富,理性地对待金钱。     

On greedy and strategic evaders in sequential interdiction settings with incomplete information

We consider a class of sequential network interdiction problem settings where the interdictor has incomplete initial information about the network while the evader has complete knowledge of the network including its structure and arc costs. In each decision epoch, the interdictor can block (for the duration of the epoch) at most k arcs known to him/her. By observing the evader’s actions, the interdictor learns about the network structure and costs and thus, can adjust his/her actions in subsequent decision epochs. It is known from the literature that if the evader is greedy (i.e., the shortest available path is used in each decision epochs), then under some assumptions the greedy interdiction policies that block k-most vital arcs in each epoch are efficient and have a finite regret. In this paper, we consider the evader’s perspective and explore deterministic “strategic” evasion policies under the assumption that the interdictor is greedy. We first study the theoretical computational complexity of the evader’s problem. Then we derive basic constructive properties of optimal evasion policies for two decision epochs when the interdictor has no initial information about the network structure. These properties are then exploited for the design of a heuristic algorithm for a strategic evader in a general setting with an arbitrary time horizon and any initial information available to the interdictor. Our computational experiments demonstrate that the proposed heuristic outperforms the greedy evasion policy on several classes of synthetic network instances under either perfect or noisy information feedback. Finally, some interesting insights from our theoretical and computational results conclude the paper.     

石油价格冲击与经济波动风险最小化的货币供应机制分析

本文通过构建一个包含石油价格冲击的DSGE模型,基于经济波动风险的最小化,研究了石油价格冲击对中国货币供应机制的影响。在模型结构参数贝叶斯估计的基础上,通过货币政策前沿的比较分析,回答了中国货币供应机制是否应该对石油价格冲击做出反应以及应该如何反应的政策问题。研究结果表明,中国当前的货币供应机制并没有对石油价格冲击做出显著的反应,但为了减小经济波动的风险,中国的货币供应机制在对产出增长和通货膨胀反应的同时,对石油价格冲击做出反应具有必要性。     

Behavior in a Dynamic Decision Problem: An Analysis of Experimental Evidence Using a Bayesian Type Classification Algorithm

Different people may use different strategies, or decision rules, when solving complex decision problems. We provide a new Bayesian procedure for drawing inferences about the nature and number of decision rules present in a population, and use it to analyze the behaviors of laboratory subjects confronted with a difficult dynamic stochastic decision problem. Subjects practiced before playing for money. Based on money round decisions, our procedure classifies subjects into three types, which we label “Near Rational,”“Fatalist,” and “Confused.” There is clear evidence of continuity in subjects' behaviors between the practice and money rounds: types who performed best in practice also tended to perform best when playing for money. However, the agreement between practice and money play is far from perfect. The divergences appear to be well explained by a combination of type switching (due to learning and/or increased effort in money play) and errors in our probabilistic type assignments.     

The many (distinctive) faces of leadership: Inferring leadership domain from facial appearance

Previous research has shown that people form impressions of potential leaders from their faces and that certain facial features predict success in reaching prestigious leadership positions. However, much less is known about the accuracy or meta-accuracy of face-based leadership inferences. Here we examine a simple, but important, question: Can leadership domain be inferred from faces? We find that human judges can identify business, military, and sports leaders (but not political leaders) from their faces with above-chance accuracy. However, people are surprisingly bad at evaluating their own performance on this judgment task: We find no relationship between how well judges think they performed and their actual accuracy levels. In a follow-up study, we identify several basic dimensions of evaluation that correlate with face-based judgments of leadership domain, as well as those that predict actual leadership domain. We discuss the implications of our results for leadership perception and selection.     

激励合约线性结构的行为合约理论解释

合约理论继承了经济学传统自利偏好假设,却忽略了公平偏好等行为心理因素。为此,在借鉴行为经济学描述公平偏好的FS模型基础上,把公平偏好引入最优激励合约设计的标准框架,以行为合约理论为工具,通过建立离散产出和离散努力模型,研究设计公平偏好下的最优激励合约。分析结果发现,引入公平偏好之后的一级最优和二级最优激励合约都是线性结构的,并且其斜率会随着公平偏好增强而增大,但不会超过0.5。这不但得到了线性结构的激励合约,而且得到了与实证研究结论相一致的关于激励合约斜率性质的理论分析结果,从而为激励合约线性结构提供了一种较合理的理论解释。     

Daily work pressure and exposure to bullying-related negative acts: The role of daily transformational and laissez-faire leadership

The present study integrates the work environment hypothesis and the effort-reward imbalance model to argue that work-related antecedents of workplace bullying are moderated by the day-to-day leadership practices of one’s immediate leader. Specifically, we propose that individuals’ daily experiences of work pressure are positively related to their daily experiences of bullying-related negative acts. Moreover, we claim that this relationship is weaker on days when those individuals report high (vs. low) levels of transformational leadership behaviour, and stronger on days when they report high (vs. low) levels of laissez-faire leadership behaviour. To test these three hypotheses, we asked 61 naval cadets on a tall ship sailing from Northern Europe to North America to fill out a diary questionnaire for 36 days yielding 1509 observations. The results of multilevel analyses supported our hypothesis of a positive relationship of cadets’ daily reports of work pressure with their daily reports of bullying-related negative acts. In addition, laissez-faire leadership behaviour (but not transformational leadership behaviour) moderated the work pressure–bullying-related negative acts relationship. Our findings support the assumption that laissez-faire leadership is an important component in the development of conflict escalation and workplace bullying, while transformational leadership is not. We discuss theoretical as well as practical implications of these findings.     

港口主导下煤炭供应链的下游经销商融资决策研究

作为资金密集型与大资本运营行业,煤炭贸易企业要在激烈的市场竞争中求得生存和发展就需要大量的资金准时投入,而随着国家对煤炭行业的新一轮宏观政策,煤炭贸易企业靠传统的银行融资就显得比较困难,这在近年来导致了较多的下游煤炭经销商不得不改行甚至破产。基于此,我国迫切需要提供下游煤炭经销商的融资决策理论与方法。本文表明当下游煤炭经销商面临资金不足并需要借贷时,它们可以利用基于供应链金融的应收账款质押和民间借贷两种不同方式进行融资。在这两种融资模式下,本文以煤炭经销商的收益为目标函数,以贷款方的审核时间、放贷率、贷款利率等为决策变量,提供了下游煤炭经销商的融资模式选择以及相关的最优融资额,从而能够确定它们的煤炭最优订货量。本文的研究结果为下游煤炭经销商的融资决策提供了有用的理论方法,对开拓煤炭港口企业的融资理念与推动煤炭港口整体的经济发展有着重要的应用价值。     

Analysis of Job Satisfaction: The Case of Japanese Private Companies

The scope of economic theory expands if we consider that working provides people with both pecuniary compensation for its disutility and job satisfaction. This study empirically analyzes the job satisfaction of employees in Japanese private companies using a multivariate ordered probit model. In particular, we examine the effects of a big economic shock, such as the Lehman shock, on job satisfaction, as well as the effects of differences in gender and employment status. We estimate the model using a Bayesian analysis and a multivariate ordered probit model using the Markov chain Monte Carlo method. We show that non‐pecuniary aspects of jobs play an important role in job satisfaction.     

DOES THE BETTER‐THAN‐AVERAGE EFFECT SHOW THAT PEOPLE ARE OVERCONFIDENT?: TWO EXPERIMENTS

We conduct two experimental tests of the claim that people are overconfident, using new tests of overplacement that are based on a formal Bayesian model. Our two experiments, on easy quizzes, find that people overplace themselves. More precisely, we find apparently overconfident data that cannot be accounted for by a rational population of expected utility maximizers who care only about money. The finding represents new evidence of overconfidence that is robust to the Bayesian critique offered by Benoît and Dubra (Jean‐Pierre Benoît and Juan Dubra (2011). “Apparent Overconfidence.” Econometrica, 79, 1591–1625). We discuss possible limitations of our results.     

What to do next

Why do we work? While there may be some obvious, practical answers to this question, like needing to make money to survive, there are other reasons that people work. These include working: to have stimulation and excitement--to meet new challenges and have variety in your life; for love and affection--to be with colleagues, clients, customers and to provide security and protection for family and friends; and to leave a thumbprint on the world and change individuals, systems, and institutions. For quality life, it is necessary not only to work but to enjoy your work. For physicians considering careers in medical management, the key to success is being truly excited about management activities. If you are heading towards management, you need to view some of the tasks as fun or you probably won't stay with it very long.     

TRUST,SOCIAL CAPITAL,AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

Many argue that elements of a society's norms, culture, or social capital are central to understanding its development. However, these notions have been difficult to capture in economic models. Here we explore a possible role for “trustworthiness” as corresponding to social capital. Individuals are trustworthy when they perform in accordance with promises, even if this does not maximise their payoffs. The usual focus on incentive structures in motivating behaviour plays no role here. Instead, we emphasise more deep‐seated modes of behaviour and consider trustworthy agents being socialised to act as they do. To model this socialisation, we borrow from a process of preference evolution pioneered by Bisin and Verdier (2001). The model developed endogenously accounts for social capital and explores its role in the process of economic development. It captures in a simple, formal way the interaction between social capital and the economy's productive processes. The results obtained caution against rapid reform and provide an explanation for why late‐developing countries may not easily be able to transplant the modes of production that have proved useful in the West. (JEL: O1, O3, O4, Z1)     

Relationships among the academic business disciplines: a multi-method citation analysis

A great number of papers have been published that compare the quality or impact of academic journals. This article seeks to broaden the debate on journal evaluation by showing how top journals in various academic business disciplines, as defined by the Financial Times list of top research outlets, relate to one other. Using large-scale sociometric analyses on about 140,000 citations we found that the integration of the citation network has increased over time. Moreover, the information flow from Finance and Economics to Management has become stronger and, within Management, a polarization between information generators and users has taken place. We also found that most business academics published in distinct and mostly non-overlapping disciplines. The only exceptions were Finance and Economics as well as Strategic Management and OB/HR. Surprisingly, we also found that the general business journals, which could be assumed to be cited by most other journals across the management disciplines, are not central to the entire field. For instance, they are not complementary at all to Finance and Economics. Instead, Operations Research (OR) and Management Information Systems journals occupy the central space on the perceptual map. This indicates that these disciplines (and OR in particular) are complementary with Management and with Finance and Economics.