THE IMPACT OF A BIASED STARTING POSITION IN A SINGLE NEGOTIATION TEXTTYPE MEDIATION

This article examines whether a biased starting position impacts the o utcome of negotiations using a Single Negotiating Text (SNT) (Raiffa 1 982) type, two-party mediation. Two separate experiments were conducte d, one in Helsinki and one in New Mexico, that systematically tested t his issue and related questions. The article argues that, if a biased starting point is not compensated for by the path taken in subsequent steps, the bias will have considerable impact on the final outcome of the negotiations. In both experiments, the mediator played a very insi gnificant role, since the bias was incorporated into the text prior to the initiation of the exercise. In actuality, the experimenter played the role of the mediator, but only facilitated an exchange of informa tion between the parties. The results of our experiments strongly supp ort the hypothesis that such bias has a significant impact on the outc ome of the negotiations. The article concludes by presenting suggestio ns for developing starting SNTs.