Your gain, my loss? Zero-sum thinking in negotiation

Negotiation research was among the first to document zero-sum thinking, in the form of the fixed-pie bias: treating negotiations as win-lose interactions and thus missing win-win opportunities. Recently, research on zero-sum thinking has reemerged, largely outside negotiation, documenting zero-sum perceptions of status, social relations, and even everyday exchange. We offer a three-part framework that brings these advances back to negotiation. First, we review evidence linking zero-sum thinking to negotiation avoidance, in part through the fear of conflict. Second, we propose that the desire to "win" may lead negotiators to accept deals that are worse than their outside options and to reject deals that are better. Third, we propose that zero-sum thinking may lead negotiators to undervalue the relationships on which a deal's value depends. These arguments suggest that zero-sum thinking in negotiation extends well beyond its best-known form, the fixed-pie bias.