Complex negotiations occur within a broader stream of ongoing social exchange, but negotiation research focuses on narrowly circumscribed encounters. Building on Trivers’ model of reciprocal altruism and Thaler’s theory of mental accounting, we propose a model of a negotiator who opens and...

Walton and McKersie's Behavioral Theory of Labor Negotiation sought to provide a descriptive theory of the process by which union and management negotiators reached settlements. Their paper drew on existing psychology, behavioral decision theory, and game theory. The basic psychological model of...