…New research suggests that one key strategy for winning a negotiation involves bringing some emotion to the table. Specifically, disclosing some personal information can elicit sympathy from the other party and help persuade them to see things from your perspective.
...Half the candidates were told that gaining the other person's sympathy is a good way to succeed in a negotiation; the other half were told that it's wise to remain professional and make rational arguments.
Results showed that candidates told to elicit the recruiter's sympathy scored...
"Feeling the emotion of sympathy also helped information and communication between the parties so that they could come up with really out-of-the-box, creative solutions that they wouldn't have otherwise. So sympathy was sort of a social lubricant."