Cooling Off in Negotiations: Does it Work?

Negotiations frequently end in conflict after one party rejects a final offer. In a large-scale Internet experiment, we investigate whether a 24-hour cooling-off period leads to fewer rejections in ultimatum bargaining. We conduct a standard cash treatment and a lottery treatment, where subjects receive lottery tickets for several large prizes. In the lottery treatment, unfair offers are less frequently rejected, and cooling off reduces the rejection rate further. In the cash treatment, rejections are more frequent and remain so after cooling off. We also study the effect of subjects' degree of »cognitive reflection« on their behavior.