Understanding Conflict in Human Interaction

Understanding Conflict

• Conflict is a fact of life and a key ingredient in human interaction.
• Interpersonal relationships are affected by conflict.
• Conflict is a perceived incompatibility of actions or goals between people or nations.
• Conflict occurs when there is an imbalance between concern for oneself and those of others.
• A triggering event occurs when one party perceives the actions of another as a threat.
• The triggering event often results in a strong negative emotion such as anger or contempt.

Conflict Stages

• Intrapersonal conflict: conflict with oneself
• Interpersonal conflict: conflict amongst individuals
• Intragroup conflict: conflict within a group
• Intergroup conflict: conflict between groups

Responses to Conflict

• Flight Response: Avoidance, ignoring, denial
• Confrontation: Emotions running high, leading to violent behavior, foul language, physical harm, verbal threats, public humiliation, rumor spreading, lawsuits or strikes.

Strategies When in Conflict

• Fight (Competing): Actively pursuing one's own needs and goals at the expense of others.
• Submit (Accommodating): Yielding to the wishes of others to preserve the relationship.
• Flee (Avoiding): Disengaging or withdrawing from the conflict.
• Freeze (Compromising): Finding a mutually acceptable solution that involves partial satisfaction for all parties.

Causes of Conflict

• Relationship: Imbalance in recognizing and providing for the needs of others. Perceived imbalance in distribution of power and resources.
  • Miscommunication
  • Strong emotions
  • Stereotyping
  • Repetitive negative behavior
• Data: Lack of or misinterpretation of data
• Interest: Driven by unmet needs.
  • Causes of data conflicts: lack of information, misinformation, differing views on data's relevance & differing interpretations of data
  • Causes of interest conflicts: perceived or actual competition over interests, procedural interests, psychological interests
• Structural: Involving human organizations, social structures, or processes and procedures (e.g., labor and management).
  • Causes of structural conflicts: unequal authority, unequal control of resources & time constraints
• Values: When prioritization of values differs between parties (e.g., parent-safety/security, teenager-friendship).
  • Causes of values conflict: different ways of life/ideology and worldview, different criteria for evaluating ideas.

Costs of Conflict

• Personal costs: stress affecting health and well-being, self-confidence, self-worth, and self-values.
• Societal costs: disrupted lives, destruction of life and property, human misery, displacement, hunger, disease, and death.
• Organizational costs: expensive litigations, decreased productivity, poor working relationships, resulting in organizational breakdown.

Positive Effects of Conflict

• When viewed positively, conflict can lead to more growth and deeper relationships.
• Issues surface
• Awareness of both parties’ needs
• Emotions can be expressed
• Uniqueness and differences are accepted
• Resolve to pursue common goals
• Dialogue and empowerment encouraged

Conflict Management Styles (Thomas-Kilmann Model)

• Assertiveness: The extent to which a person will try to satisfy his or her won needs or interests
• Cooperativeness: The extent to which a person will attempt to satisfy the other person's needs or interests.
• The model categorizes 5 styles of conflict handling: competing, collaborating, compromising, accommodating, avoiding

Negotiating a Conflict Situation

• Understand the nature of conflict.
• Acknowledge your feelings and emotions.
• Examine your relationship.
• Clarify intentions.
• If possible, talk openly.
• Request or grant forgiveness/apology, and move forward.
• Identify approaches to conflict-handling.