Maurice Schweitzer

Adam D. Galinsky

What does it take to succeed? This question has fueled a long-running debate. Some have argued that humans are fundamentally competitive, and that pursuing self-interest is the best way to get ahead. Others claim that humans are born to cooperate and that we are most successful when we collaborate with others. Here, researchers Galinsky and Schweitzer explain why this debate misses the mark. Rather than being hardwired to compete or cooperate, we have evolved to do both. In every relationship, from co-workers to friends to spouses to siblings, we are both friends and foes. Only by learning how to strike the right balance between these two forces can we improve our long-term relationships and get more of what we want. Galinsky and Schweitzer draw on original research from their own labs and from across the social sciences to show how to maximize success in work and in life by deftly navigating the tension between cooperation and competition. They offer insights and advice ranging from gaining power and keeping it, building trust and repairing trust once it's broken, and diffusing workplace conflict and bias, to finding the right comparisons that motivate us and make us happier, and succeeding in negotiations--ensuring that we achieve our own goals and satisfy those of our counterparts.--Adapted from book jacket.

When to Cooperate, when to Compete, and how to Succeed at Both

Friend and Foe

Jiyin Cao

The current research explored the influence of regulatory focus on the accuracy of lie detection. We propose that a prevention focus leads to greater performance in detecting lies than those under a promotion focus, because a prevention focus engenders a vigilant state and enhances people's sensitivity to negative information. Four studies supported this hypothesis using different lie detection materials. The first two studies considered regulatory focus as a chronic individual difference and found that prevention focus was positively related to accuracy in detecting lies. Studies 3 and 4 manipulated regulatory focus by a) framing the task as truth detection vs. lie detection and b) asking participants to write essays about their aspirations and hopes vs. their duties and obligations. Results consistently found that individuals under a prevention focus had higher accuracy in detecting lies than promotion focused individuals. Importantly, a prevention focus did not produce a mere response bias and increase people's tendency to judgment truth as lies. Implications for motivation and conflict resolution are discussed.

Adam D. Galinsky

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