Curr Psychol (2010) 29:235–246 237 Similarly, Cialdini et al. (1995) found that individuals scoring high on the Preference for Consistency-scale were more likely to show compliance with an FITD-type of request than individuals low in this preference. The need to behave consistently across conditions, regardless of careful scrutiny of the exact nature of the various requests, thus constitutes an important heuristic principle that people use when presented with influence techniques, but primarily when they are in a state of mindlessness. Indeed, research on the related “That’s-Not-All” technique (Pollock et al. 1998), whereby an initial request is followed by a series of subsequent requests that are gradually made more desirable to the target, has shown that its effectiveness is reduced when the target’s mental alertness increases and he or she becomes “mindful” (Langer 1992). Another powerful heuristic that people draw upon when in a state of mindlessness is the motivation to return a favor, i.e. the principle of reciprocity (Gouldner 1960). A technique that hinges on this principle is the Door-In-The-Face (DITF) technique which is characterized by a sequence of rejection-then-moderation (see O’Keefe and Hale 2001). In the DITF-technique, a large request (which probably will be rejected) is followed by the milder target request. Although not uncontested, it is generally assumed the technique works because the influence agent, by sizing down the request, makes a clear concession. For the target, this would evoke the need to make a concession in return and thus to comply with the milder request. In a classic study, Cialdini et al. (1975) provided a first demonstration of the effectiveness of the DITF technique. They asked Arizona State University students to work as non-paid volunteers for the Juvenile Detention Center. Everyone rejected. Next, however, the request was made milder: they were asked to take a group of juveniles to the zoo for 2 h. Under these conditions, half of the participants complied with the request. In the target request-only control condition, where participants were only asked to take the juveniles to the zoo for 2 h, only 17% complied. A follow-up study more directly tested the reciprocity account. In that study, participants were asked by either one or two influence agents to volunteer to assist low-income children for two years. After rejection, participants were asked to take the group of children to the zoo for 2 h. Compared to control conditions, the DITF condition again proved effective in bringing about compliance, but only when the same individual made both requests. When one person made the large request and the second person the smaller request, the technique ceased to be effective. In the case of a single requester scenario, the agent made a clear concession, which evoked the norm of reciprocity, whereas in the two-requester scenario this norm was not made salient. Importantly, this norm operates under mindless conditions. Hence, the DITF technique, too, is more effective when participants are mindless, rather than mindful. In sum, it is evident that the effectiveness of a broad variety of social influence techniques hinges on the principle of mindlessness. But where does this mindlessness in these and other social influence situations stem from? In other words: what is it that makes people behave ‘automatically’ and fall back on engrained heuristics when presented with an influence technique under these circumstances? Although mindlessness has been proposed as a “conditio sine qua non” for the techniques to work, it is interesting to note that research to date has failed to directly address this key question.