In Chapter 1 of your text, the authors present a model of effective conflict management (pp. 13-23). They then discuss four properties of conflict interaction. (See the list on p. 23 and the elaboration on pp. 23-36). How, in your judgment, does knowledge of these properties affect the likelihood that one can behave in accordance with those aspects of the model related to effectiveness?
Folger, Poole, and Stutman identify numerous signs that the parties to a conflict are stuck in destructive cycles of either spiraling escalation or avoidance. (See Table 1.1, p. 22.) In your experiences with other people, what signs have you relied on in determining when a conflict appears to be heading in the direction of either escalation or avoidance? In arriving at such recognition, what have you typically attempted to do to move the conflict toward a point of resolution (in other words, to enter the integration stage)? Have your tactics usually worked or failed? In either case, why do you think that they have had the effects they have?
Conflicts, according to the text authors, emerge as the result of actions and others’ reactions to them. Identify an example from your own knowledge or personal experience of an action or set of actions and subsequent reactions that resulted in a conflict that escalated into additional actions/reactions. An example might be when a roommate invited a significant other to stay overnight without informing the other roommate. Identify the triggering actions and reactions and the subsequent ineractions that sustained the conflict.
One of the properties of conflict interaction that Folger, Poole, and Stutman emphasize is that patterns of interaction in conflicts tend to be self-perpetuating. For instance, being insulting leads to further insults, shouting leads to further shouting, being condescending leads to further acts of condescension, and the like. It is almost as if the parties become involved in a game of one-upmanship. Why do you think that we tend to persist in such patterns even when it becomes obvious that they are destructive?
Case 1.1 (pp. 34-35) nicely illustrates how a single remark can radically change the climate of a situation in which conflict occurs. In the example, the emergent conflict did not appear to be one to which the parties responded effectively. If you were in the position of the visiting journalist, how might you have responded to the student in question in order to restore the previously welcoming climate of the brown-bag discussion? Why do you think that your strategy would work in this type of situation? How do you think the professor in the case should have responded to the student? Why?
In light of the authors’ observation that relationships both influence and are influenced by conflict interaction, create a dialogue between two people that you feel illustrates this sort of reciprocity. You might think of incidents in your relationships with others when the characteristics of an instance influenced the responses of the parties involved and, in turn, altered the relationship. For instance, there may be a situation in which a person is upset by a friend's treatment of a mutual third friend.
