Rather than abandon the basic principle of maximizing rewards and minimizing costs, Thibaut and Kelley speculate that people caught up in conflict reconceptualize the situation to relieve tension. Anxious participants mentally alter the numbers so that they are in effect responding to a matrix different from the one they were given. The transformation process Thibaut and Kelley describe is similar to the reframing that Watzlawick considers the only hope for dysfunctional family systems.