Simulated Interactions

There has been surprisingly little research on how best to predict decisions in conflicts. Managers commonly use their unaided judgement for the task. Game theory and a disciplined use of analogies have been recommended. When tested, experts using their unaided judgement and game theorists performed no better than chance. Experts using structured analogies performed better than chance, but the most accurate forecasts were provided by simulated interaction using student role players. Twenty-one game theorists made 98 forecasts for eight diverse conflicts. Forty-one experts in conflicts made 60 solo forecasts using structured analogies and 96 solo forecasts using unaided judgement (a further seven provided collaborative forecasts only) while 492 participants made 105 forecasts in simulated interactions. Overall, one-in-three forecasts by game theorists and by experts who did not use a formal method were correct. Forecasters who used structured analogies were correct for 45 percent and forecasts from simulated interactions were correct for 62 percent of forecasts. Analysis using alternative measures of accuracy does not affect the findings. Neither expertise nor collaboration appear to affect accuracy. The findings are at odds with the opinions of experts, who expected experts to be more accurate than students regardless of the method used.

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When people in conflicts can accurately forecast how others will respond, they should be able to make better decisions. Contrary to expectations, earlier research found game theorists' forecasts were less accurate than forecasts from student role players. To assess whether game theorists had been disadvantaged by the selection of conflicts, I obtained forecasts for three new conflicts of types preferred by game theory experts. As before, role-players in simulated interactions were students, and other students forecast using their judgement. Game theorists did better than previously. However, when the three new and five earlier conflicts are combined, 101 forecasts by 23 game theorists were no more accurate (31%) than 354 forecasts by students who used unaided judgement (31%). Experienced game theorists were not more accurate. Neither were those who spent more time on the task. Of 105 simulated-interaction forecasts, 62% were accurate: an average error reduction of 47% over game-theorist forecasts and a halving of error relative to the current method. Forecasts can sometimes have value without being strictly accurate. Assessing the usefulness of forecasts led to the same conclusions about the relative merits of the methods. Finally, by combining simulated interaction forecasts, accurate forecasts were obtained for seven of the eight situations.

I address commentators' concerns about the research reported in my paper. These concerns do not threaten the conclusion that role-playing should be preferred ahead of game theory and unaided judgement for forecasting decisions in conflicts. I provide additional evidence and argument that the relative forecasting accuracy of game theory is a legitimate subject for research. I discuss non-forecasting uses for game theory and suggest that, without forecasting validity, such applications may be ill-founded. Replication of the Green research (Green, K. C. (2002) International Journal of Forecasting 18, 321-344) by game-theory advocates would be valuable. Extending the research with forecasts for more conflicts would allow greater confidence in recommendations to managers. Extensions should aim to increase the variety of conflicts so that managers can match research findings with their own forecasting problems. More data may allow researchers to identify conditions that favour particular forecasting methods and to estimate the effects of variations in conflict descriptions and decision options.

To forecast decisions in conflict situations, experts are often advised to figuratively stand in the other person's shoes. We refer to this as "role thinking" because, in practice, the advice is to think about how other protagonists will view the situation in order to predict their decisions. We tested the effect of role thinking on forecast accuracy. We obtained 101 role-thinking forecasts of the decisions that would be made in nine diverse conflicts from 27 Naval postgraduate students (experts) and 107 rolethinking forecasts from 103 second-year organizational behavior students (novices). The accuracy of the novices' forecasts was 33% and the experts' 31%; both were little different from chance (guessing), which was 28%. The lack of improvement in accuracy from role thinking strengthens the finding from earlier research that it is not sufficient to think hard about a situation in order to predict the decisions groups of people will make when they are in conflict. It is useful instead to ask groups of role players to simulate the situation. When groups of novice participants adopted the roles of protagonists in the aforementioned nine conflicts and interacted with each other, their group decisions predicted the actual decisions with an accuracy of 60%.

To forecast decisions in conflict situations, experts are often advised to figuratively stand in the other person’s shoes. We refer to this as “role thinking” because, in practice, the advice is to think about how other protagonists will view the situation in order to predict their decisions. We tested the effect of role thinking on forecast accuracy. We obtained 101 role-thinking forecasts of the decisions that would be made in nine diverse conflicts from 27 Naval postgraduate students (experts) and 107 rolethinking forecasts from 103 second-year organizational behavior students (novices). The accuracy of the novices’ forecasts was 33% and the experts’ 31%; both were little different from chance (guessing), which was 28%. The lack of improvement in accuracy from role thinking strengthens the finding from earlier research that it is not sufficient to think hard about a situation in order to predict the decisions groups of people will make when they are in conflict. It is useful inst...

In this study, we employ judgmental forecasting techniques, Structured Analogies and Interaction groups for long-term forecasting. The aim of the paper is not to evaluate forecasting accuracy per se but to highlight the potential of such techniques in this so complex and challenging task. The case study is about Saudi Arabia and its aim to adopt a diversification strategy to reduce its dependency on the oil sector, where oil revenue consists 90% of its budget currently. The study has four phases: Unaided Judgment, Structured Analogies, and Interaction Groups with Structured Analogies - all three using disguised data – before finally working on the undisguised case study under review over a significant amount of time. Adopting judgmental methods are attributed to three main reasons: in an attempt to derive long-term economic forecasts about Saudi Arabia’s ability to diversify its investments, to discover the impact of different factors on financial and economic outlooks, and to explo...

If people in conflicts can more accurately forecast how others will respond, that should help them to make better decisions. Contrary to expert expectations, earlier research found game theorists' forecasts were less accurate than forecasts from simulated interactions using student role players. To assess whether the game theorists had been disadvantaged by the selection of conflicts, I obtained forecasts for

Can game theory aid in forecasting the decision making of parties in a conflict? A review of the literature revealed diverse opinions but no empirical evidence on this question. When put to the test, game theorists' predictions were more accurate than those from unaided judgement but not as accurate as role-play forecasts. Twenty-one game theorists made 99 forecasts of decisions for six conflict situations. The same situations were described to 290 research participants, who made 207 forecasts using unaided judgement, and to 933 participants, who made 158 forecasts in active role-playing. Averaged across the six situations, 37 percent of the game theorists' forecasts, 28 percent of the unaided-judgement forecasts, and 64 percent of the role-play forecasts were correct. 

If people in conflicts can more accurately forecast how others will respond, that should help them make better decisions. Contrary to expectations, earlier research found game theorists' forecasts less accurate than forecasts from student role players. To assess whether game theorists had been disadvantaged by the selection of conflicts, I obtained forecasts for three new conflicts of types preferred by game theory experts. As before, role-players in simulated interactions were students and other students provided forecasts using their judgement. For eight conflicts, including five from earlier research, 102 forecasts by 23 game theorists were no more accurate (31%) than 357 forecasts by students who used unaided judgement (32%). Of 105 simulatedinteraction forecasts, 62% were accurate: an average error reduction of 47% over game-theorist forecasts. Forecasts can sometimes have value without being strictly accurate. Assessing the usefulness of forecasts led to the same conclusions about the relative merits of the methods.

In important conflicts such as wars and labor-management disputes, people typically rely on the judgment of experts to predict the decisions that will be made. We compared the accuracy of 106 forecasts by experts and 169 forecasts by novices about eight real conflicts. The forecasts of experts who used their unaided judgment were little better than those of novices. Moreover, neither group's forecasts were much more accurate than simply guessing. The forecasts of experienced experts were no more accurate than the forecasts of those with less experience. The experts were nevertheless confident in the accuracy of their forecasts. Speculating that consideration of the relative frequency of decisions across similar conflicts might improve accuracy, we obtained 89 sets of frequencies from novices instructed to assume there were 100 similar situations. Forecasts based on the frequencies were no more accurate than 96 forecasts from novices asked to pick the single most likely decision. We conclude that expert judgment should not be used for predicting decisions that people will make in conflicts. When decision makers ask experts for their opinions, they are likely to overlook other, more useful, approaches.

People often use analogies when forecasting, but in an unstructured manner. We propose a structured judgmental procedure whereby experts list analogies, rate their similarity to the target, and match outcomes with possible target outcomes. An administrator would then derive a forecast from the information. When predicting decisions made in eight conflict situations, unaided experts' forecasts were little better than chance, at 32% accurate. In contrast, 46% of structured-analogies forecasts were accurate. Among experts who were able to think of two or more analogies and who had direct experience with their closest analogy, 60% of forecasts were accurate. Collaboration did not help.

Better forecasts of decisions in conflict situations, such as occur in business, politics, and war, can help protagonists achieve better outcomes. It is common advice to "stand in the other person's shoes" when involved in a conflict, a procedure we refer to as "role thinking." We tested this advice in order to assess the extent to which it can improve accuracy. Improvement in accuracy is important because prior research found that unaided judgment produced forecasts that were little better than guessing. We obtained 101 role-thinking forecasts from 27 Naval postgraduate students (experts) and 107 role-thinking forecasts from 103 second-year organizational behavior students (novices) of the decisions that would be made in nine diverse conflicts. The accuracy of the forecasts from the novices was 33% and of those from the experts 31%. The accuracy of the role-thinking forecasts was little different from chance, which was 28%. In contrast, when we asked groups of participants to each act as if they were in the shoes one of the protagonists, accuracy was 60%.

In important conflicts such as wars and labor-management disputes, people typically rely on the judgment of experts to predict the decisions that will be made. We compared the accuracy of 106 forecasts by experts and 169 forecasts by novices about eight real conflicts. The forecasts of experts who used their unaided judgment were little better than those of novices. Moreover, neither group's forecasts were much more accurate than simply guessing. The forecasts of experienced experts were no more accurate than the forecasts of those with less experience. The experts were nevertheless confident in the accuracy of their forecasts. Speculating that consideration of the relative frequency of decisions across similar conflicts might improve accuracy, we obtained 89 sets of frequencies from novices instructed to assume there were 100 similar situations. Forecasts based on the frequencies were no more accurate than 96 forecasts from novices asked to pick the single most likely decision. We conclude that expert judgment should not be used for predicting decisions that people will make in conflicts. When decision makers ask experts for their opinions, they are likely to overlook other, more useful, approaches.

The article extends the application of the mechanisms of conversational humour from everyday conversations to written mass media texts. It argues that such an approach is made possible by the dialogic structure of some texts, despite the lack of spontaneity and authenticity that is found in casual conversations and that appears implicit in many definitions of conversational humour. Identifying instances of quasi-conversational verbal exchange in the novel journalistic genre of live text commentary, the article points out that humour in such written texts is achieved cooperatively between different voices present in the text, i.e. the journalist’s voice and the authentic voices of selected readers whose emails are cited in the text of the commentary. A close analysis reveals that within the commentary, quasi-conversational segments constitute a special narrative layer that is characterised by its orientation to gossip and which includes frequent elements of humour. After defining the concept of a quasi-conversation and distinguishing between two sets of mechanisms of conversational humour, the article focuses on the interactive mechanisms (retorts, teasing, and banter) that occur in second turns in conversations, i.e. as reactions to previous speakers’ turns.

Role -playing and unaided opinions were used to forecast the outcome of three negotiations. Consistent with prior re search, role-playing yielded more accurate predictions. In two studies on marketing negotiations, the predictions based on role-playing were correct for 53% of the predictions while unaided opinions were correct for only 7% (p < 0.001).

In 1975, a consortium sponsored by the Argentine government tried to purchase the stock of the Britishowned Falkland Islands Company, a monopoly that owned 43 percent of the land in the Falklands, employed 51 per cent of the labor force, had a monopoly on all wool exports, and operated the steamship run to South America. The stockholders were willing to sell especially because the Argentine consortium was reportedly willing to pay “almost any price.” But the British government stepped in to prevent the sale, (Murray N. Rothbard, as quoted in The Wall Street Journal, 8 April 1982). In my opinion, the actual solution in the Falklands War left both sides worse off than before. In contrast, a sale of the Falklands would have benefited both sides in the short run, and, as companies seldom wage shooting wars, this would probably have been a good long-range solution. Apparently, Britain did not predict how the Argentine generals would act when it blocked the sale, and the Argentine generals did not predict how Britain would respond when they occupied the islands. Accurate forecasting by each side in this situation might have led to a superior solution.

This study examines the evidence on alternative procedures that can be used to forecast outcomes in conflict situations. I first define what is meant here by conflict situations. Next, I describe alternative forecasting methods. This is followed by a presentation of hypotheses on which method is more appropriate. The evidence is reviewed in two stages: first the prior research, then research that we have done.

Green’s study [Int. J. Forecasting (forthcoming)] on the accuracy of forecasting methods for conflicts does well against traditional scientific criteria. Moreover, it is useful, as it examines actual problems by comparing forecasting methods as they would be used in practice. Some biases exist in the design of the study and they favor game theory. As a result, the accuracy gain of game theory over unaided judgment may be illusory, and the advantage of role playing over game theory is likely to be greater than the 44% error reduction found by Green. The improved accuracy of role playing over game theory was consistent across situations. For those cases that simulated interactions among people with conflicting roles, game theory was no better than chance (28% correct), whereas role-playing was correct in 61% of the predictions.

In important conflicts such as wars and labor-management disputes, people typically rely on the judgment of experts to predict the decisions that will be made. We compared the accuracy of 106 forecasts by experts and 169 forecasts by novices about eight real conflicts. The forecasts of experts who used their unaided judgment were little better than those of novices. Moreover, neither group’s forecasts were much more accurate than simply guessing. The forecasts of experienced experts were no more accurate than the forecasts of those with less experience. The experts were nevertheless confident in the accuracy of their forecasts. Speculating that consideration of the relative frequency of decisions across similar conflicts might improve accuracy, we obtained 89 sets of frequencies from novices instructed to assume there were 100 similar situations. Forecasts based on the frequencies were no more accurate than 96 forecasts from novices asked to pick the single most likely decision. We conclude that expert judgment should not be used for predicting decisions that people will make in conflicts.
When decision makers ask experts for their opinions, they are likely to overlook other, more useful, approaches.

People often use analogies when forecasting, but in an unstructured manner. We propose a structured judgmental procedure whereby experts list analogies, rate their similarity to the target, and match outcomes with possible target outcomes. An administrator would then derive a forecast from the information. When predicting decisions made in eight conflict situations, unaided experts' forecasts were little better than chance, at 32% accurate. In contrast, 46% of structured-analogies forecasts were accurate. Among experts who were able to think of two or more analogies and who had direct experience with their closest analogy, 60% of forecasts were accurate. Collaboration did not help.

To forecast decisions in conflict situations, experts are often advised to figuratively stand in the other person’s shoes. We refer to this as “role thinking” because, in practice, the advice is to think about how other protagonists will view the situation in order to predict their decisions. We tested the effect of role thinking on forecast accuracy. We obtained 101 role-thinking forecasts of the decisions that would be made in nine diverse conflicts from 27 Naval postgraduate students (experts) and 107 role thinking forecasts from 103 second-year organizational behavior students (novices). The accuracy of the novices’ forecasts was 33% and the experts’ 31%; both were little different from chance (guessing), which was 28%. The lack of improvement in accuracy from role thinking strengthens the finding from earlier research that it is not sufficient to think hard about a situation in order to predict the decisions groups of people will make when they are in conflict. It is useful instead to ask groups of role players to simulate the situation. When groups of novice participants adopted the roles of protagonists in the aforementioned nine conflicts and interacted with each other, their group decisions predicted the actual decisions with an accuracy of 60%.