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The Science of Negotiation Propensity: Why Not Asking Is Costing You More Than You Think

3 the researchers behind it — Most people assume the gender pay gap is purely a story about employers paying women less for the same work. The science says it's also — in measurabl

Carnegie Mellon University

Linda Babcock

Known for:Pioneering research on gender differences in negotiation initiation, showing men negotiate first salaries four times more often than women and that this compounds into six-figure lifetime earnings gaps

Key findings

  1. 2003

    With Sara Laschever, Babcock synthesized survey and experimental data showing men are four times more likely to negotiate a first salary than women, and that a single un-negotiated starting salary compounds into a lifetime earnings loss exceeding $500,000. ↗

  2. 2007

    With Bowles and McGinn, Babcock demonstrated that gender differences in negotiation outcomes narrow substantially when women are given clear information about what is negotiable — confirming structural ambiguity as a key barrier, not just internal psychology. ↗

Harvard Kennedy School

Hannah Riley Bowles

Known for:Experimental research on the backlash effect in salary negotiation — documenting that female negotiators are penalized in likeability and hirability when they initiate salary talks, while equivalent male negotiators face no comparable penalty

Key findings

  1. 2007

    With Babcock and Lei, Bowles used controlled experiments to show that both male and female evaluators rated female salary negotiators as less likeable and less hirable after they initiated negotiation, while male negotiators performing the same actions faced no equivalent social penalty — the first rigorous documentation of asymmetric backlash. ↗

  2. 2005

    With Babcock and McGinn, Bowles showed that gender gaps in negotiation outcomes narrow significantly when women receive clear information about the negotiability of an offer, pointing to structural ambiguity — not just internal psychology — as a key suppressor of women's negotiation propensity. ↗

Monash University

Andreas Leibbrandt

Known for:Large-scale field experiments on gender differences in negotiation propensity, including the finding that explicit signals about salary negotiability substantially close the initiation gap between men and women

Key findings

  1. 2015

    With John List, Leibbrandt ran a large-scale field experiment across real job postings and found that when ads explicitly stated wages were negotiable, women's initiation rates rose sharply and closed most of the gap — confirming that structural ambiguity about whether asking is allowed is itself a key mechanism suppressing women's negotiation propensity. ↗

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