He's also looking forward to collaborating with other faculty whose work has a strong grounding in cognitive psychology and decision-making. As for his Negotiation course, he hopes students will learn more than just how to get the best deal for their side. They should also recognize that negotiation doesn't just occur in a conference room. Human beings are always negotiating. To many MBA candidates, the Fall Term II course in Financial Accounting is one of the toughest challenges of the first-year core.
Accounting is based on rules.
For Levine, what makes the subject intriguing is how we interpret those rules and where we find room for negotiation. Levine, who received her doctorate last year from Carnegie Mellon, has a broad range of research interests, including managerial compensation, financial disclosure, the economics of standards and the strategic behavior of securities analysts. One of my current studies is on analysts' forecasts, particularly why they generally seem to be optimistic. One theory is that analysts can expect to get better information from management if their earnings estimates are optimistic. Even analysts who strive to be accurate may introduce a bit of bias or optimism into their forecasts, if their forecasts are based on better information.