Influence: Science and Practice (13 page)

Provided you are so inclined, you might even turn the inspector’s own weapon of influence against him. Recall that the rule for reciprocation entitles a person who has acted in a certain way to a dose of the same thing. If you have determined that the “fire inspector’s” gifts were used, not as genuine gifts, but to make a profit from you, then you might want to use them to make a profit of your own. Simply take whatever the inspector is willing to provide—safety information, home extinguisher—thank him politely, and show him out the door. After all, the reciprocity rule asserts that if justice is to be done, exploitation attempts should be exploited.

READER’S REPORT 2.4
From a Former Television and Stereo Salesperson

For quite a while, I worked for a major retailer in their television and stereo department. Continued employment was based on the ability to sell service contracts which are warranty extensions offered by the retailer. Once this fact was explained to me I devised the following plan that used the rejection-then-retreat technique, although I didn’t know its name at the time.

A customer had the opportunity to buy from one to three years’ worth of service contract coverage at the time of the sale, although the credit I got was the same regardless of the length of coverage. Realizing that most people would not be willing to buy three years’ worth of coverage, initially, I would advocate to the customer the longest and most expensive plan. This gave me an excellent opportunity later, after being rejected in my sincere attempt to sell the three-year plan, to retreat to the one-year extension and its relatively small price, which I was thrilled to get. This technique proved highly effective, as I sold sales contracts to an average of 70 percent of my customers, who seemed very satisfied in the process, while others in my department clustered around 40 percent. I never told anyone how I did it until now.

Author’s note:
Notice how, as is usually the case, use of the rejection-then-retreat tactic also engages the action of the contrast principle. Not only did the initial higher request make the lower one seem like a retreat, it made that second request seem smaller, too.

SUMMARY

According to sociologists and anthropologists, one of the most widespread and basic norms of human culture is embodied in the rule for reciprocation. The rule requires that one person try to repay, in kind, what another person has provided. By obligating the recipient of an act to repayment in the future, the rule for reciprocation allows one individual to give something to another with confidence that it is not being lost. This sense of future obligation within the rule makes possible the development of various kinds of continuing relationships, transactions, and exchanges that are beneficial to the society. Consequently, all members of the society are trained from childhood to abide by the rule or suffer serious social disapproval.

The decision to comply with another’s request is frequently influenced by the reciprocity rule. One favorite and profitable tactic of certain compliance professionals is to give something before asking for a return favor. The exploitability of this tactic is due to three characteristics of the rule for reciprocation. First, the rule is extremely powerful, often overwhelming the influence of other factors that normally determine compliance with a request. Second, the rule applies even to uninvited first favors, thereby reducing our ability to decide whom we wish to owe and putting the choice in the hands of others. Finally, the rule can spur unequal exchanges; to be rid of the uncomfortable feeling of indebtedness, an individual will often agree to a request for a substantially larger favor than the one he or she received.

Another way that the rule for reciprocity can increase compliance involves a simple variation on the basic theme: Instead of providing a first favor that stimulates a return favor, an individual can make an initial concession that stimulates a return concession. One compliance procedure, called the rejection-then-retreat technique, or door-in-the-face technique, relies heavily on the pressure to reciprocate concessions. By starting with an extreme request that is sure to be rejected, a requester can then profitably retreat to a smaller request (the one that was desired all along), which is likely to be accepted because it appears to be a concession. Research indicates that, aside from increasing the likelihood that a person will say yes to a request, the rejection-then-retreat technique also increases the likelihood that the person will carry out the request and will agree to such requests in the future.

Our best defense against the use of reciprocity pressures to gain our compliance is not systematic rejection of the initial offers of others. Rather, we should accept initial favors or concessions in good faith, but be ready to redefine them as tricks should they later be proved as such. Once they are redefined in this way, we will no longer feel a need to respond with a favor or concession of our own.

Study Questions

Content Mastery

1. What is the rule for reciprocity? Why is it so powerful in our society?
   
2. Which are the three features of the reciprocity rule that make it so exploitable by compliance professionals?
   
3. Describe how the Regan study illustrates each of the three exploitable features of the rule.
   
4. How does the rejection-then-retreat technique use the pressure for reciprocation to increase compliance?
   
5. Why should the rejection-then-retreat technique increase a compliant person’s willingness to (a) carry out an agreement and (b) volunteer to do future favors?
   

Critical Thinking

1. Suppose you wanted a professor to spend an hour helping you with a topic for a term paper. Write a script showing how you might use the rejection-then-retreat tactic to increase the chance of compliance to your request. What should you be careful to avoid when making your first request?
   
2. One study (Berry & Kanouse, 1987) found that, by paying physicians first, they were much more likely to complete and return a long questionnaire they had received in the mail. If a $20 check accompanied the questionnaire, 78 percent of the physicians filled out the questionnaire and sent it back as requested. But if they learned that the $20 check was to be sent to them after they completed it, only 66 percent did so.
      Another interesting finding concerned the physicians who got the check up front but didn’t comply with the questionnaire request: only 26 percent cashed the check (as compared to 95 percent of those who had complied). Explain how the rule for reciprocity can explain both findings.
   
3. Explain what is meant by the term
   noblesse oblige
   and how the concept of reciprocity might play a role in it. Hint: John F. Kennedy once said, “For those to whom much is given, much is required.”
   
4. How does the photograph that opens this chapter reflect the topic of the chapter?
   

Chapter 3
Commitment and Consistency
Hobgoblins of the Mind

It is easier to resist at the beginning than at the end.

–Leonardo Da Vinci

A
STUDY DONE BY A PAIR OF CANADIAN PSYCHOLOGISTS (KNOX
& Inkster, 1968) uncovered something fascinating about people at the racetrack: just after placing bets they are much more confident of their horse’s chances of winning than they are immediately before laying down the bets. Of course, nothing about the horse’s chances actually shifts; it’s the same horse, on the same track, in the same field; but in the minds of those bettors, its prospects improve significantly once that ticket is purchased. Although a bit puzzling at first glance, the reason for the dramatic change has to do with a common weapon of social influence. Like the other weapons of influence, this one lies deep within us, directing our actions with quiet power. It is, quite simply, our desire to be (and to appear) consistent with what we have already done.
Once we make a choice or take a stand, we will encounter personal and interpersonal pressures to behave consistently with that commitment.
Those pressures will cause us to respond in ways that justify our earlier decision. We simply convince ourselves that we have made the right choice and, no doubt, feel better about our decision (Fazio, Blascovich, & Driscoll, 1992).

By way of illustration, let’s examine the story of my neighbor Sara and her live-in boyfriend, Tim. After they met, they dated for a while, even after Tim lost his job, and eventually moved in together. Things were never perfect for Sara: She wanted Tim to marry her and to stop his heavy drinking; Tim resisted both ideas. After an especially difficult period of conflict, Sara broke off the relationship and Tim moved out. At the same time, an old boyfriend of Sara’s called her. They started seeing each other socially and quickly became engaged and made wedding plans. They had gone so far as to set a date and issue invitations when Tim called. He had repented and wanted to move back in. When Sara told him her marriage plans, he begged her to change her mind; he wanted to be together with her as before. Sara refused, saying she didn’t want to live like that again. Tim even offered to marry her, but she still said she preferred the other boyfriend. Finally, Tim volunteered to quit drinking if she would only relent. Feeling that under those conditions Tim had the edge, Sara decided to break her engagement, cancel the wedding, retract the invitations, and let Tim move back in with her.