Journal Articles

Managing expectations

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Followers of law, politics and business commonly relate stories of individuals who appear to predict an expected performance level below what they believe themselves to be capable of. The standard explanation for such rhetoric is that it hedges against the negative consequences of unanticipated failures and takes advantage of unexpected successes. Although the strategy appears highly attractive, some individuals do provide honest evaluations of their abilities, and some overpromise. We develop a model of strategic communication designed to explain this variation. Underpromising is especially attractive when observers have strong incentives to watch a preliminary performance; however, when high-quality individuals are in large supply and when the costs of performing badly are neither too high nor too low, underpromising can result in individuals being ignored. To ensure that they are not, individuals must give up the opportunity to outperform a promise and risk an underperformance.

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Detail Information

Series Title

Journal of Theoretical Politics

Call Number

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Publisher

Thousand Oak : sage publisher., 2012

Collation

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Language

English

ISBN/ISSN

09516298

Classification

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Content Type

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Media Type

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Carrier Type

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Edition

Vol. 24 no. 2, April 2012,pp. 274-302

Subject(s)

Psychology
Strategic Communication
Political communication
Campaigns
Managing expectations

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