The psychology of conflict is its structure, in other words, it is the way in which it occurs. Conflict psychology examines the relationship between various elements of personality. And she defines conflict itself as the lack of unanimity between two individuals (parties) or groups of subjects. Confrontation is one of the variations in the relationships between subjects. If it is constructive, it acts as a development of the relationship between the participants.
In psychology, the term conflict contains contradictions associated with incredibly strong emotions. Any conflict is a social phenomenon and is characterized by the presence of specific functions that act as unique indicators showing how conflict situations affect society or the individual.
The concept of conflict in psychology
Any individual in the process of existence and activity has repeatedly encountered various conflict situations. A conflict is a divergence in goals and ideological positions of the subjects of interaction. To understand the meaning of confrontations in the life of society and individuals, it is necessary to briefly delve into the essence of the psychology of conflict, and in order to find out its essence, it is important to highlight the core features and conditions for the emergence of confrontation.
So, the foundation of any clash or contradiction is always a situation that may contain one of the following conditions:
— conflicting views of subjects regarding a certain subject or object;
- dissimilar goals or means used in certain circumstances to achieve them;
- opposing interests, desires of opponents.
A conflict situation always includes the presence of subjects of a probable conflict and its object. However, for confrontation to develop, there must also be action, that is, one participant in the confrontation must begin to act, affecting the interests of the other participant. If the second participant in the process responds with similar actions, then the clash will develop from a potential confrontation into an actual one.
The essence of the psychology of conflict is briefly the presence of an initial discrepancy in views, lack of agreement, and divergence of goals. At the same time, the confrontation itself can occur both openly and veiledly.
Conducted studies show that in eighty percent of cases, confrontations arise regardless of the wishes of the subjects of confrontation.
The leading role in the formation of conflict situations is played by “conflictogens”, that is, words, actions or lack of actions that give rise to and provoke the flare-up of confrontation. Every confrontation is characterized by the presence of a clear structure. Its main elements are considered to be: the parties to the confrontation, the subject and motives of the conflict, the image of the conflict situation, the positions of the participants in the confrontation. The participants in the confrontation are individuals who are in interaction. In this case, their interests must be directly violated. Also participants are subjects who support, either explicitly or implicitly, the conflictors.
The subject of the conflict is considered to be an objectively existing or fictitious problem that serves as the cause of confrontation between the participants.
The motives of confrontation as internal motivators push individuals to confrontation. They manifest themselves in the form of individual needs, goals and beliefs.
The image of a conflict situation is a reflection of the subject of confrontation in the minds of individuals participating in conflict interaction.
The positions of the participants in the confrontation represent what the parties say during the confrontation process or during negotiations.
The conflict process, like any other social phenomenon, has its own functions.
Introduction
Conflict, being one of the types of social interaction, which is characterized by the opposition of values, interests and goals of social subjects, is present in any society.
The scientific literature covers the problems of conflict management in organizations, provides a large number of classifications, sections, descriptions of types and types of conflicts with certain economic, psychological, social and other characteristics. When studying conflicts, the main problem is the use of information about their types for the purpose of managing them, and also the fact that the main contribution to the study of conflicts in organizations was made not by management science, but by psychology and sociology. This accounts for the dominant psychological and social views of conflict and conflict management found in the management research literature.
In accordance with this, the functional features of conflicts become extremely important, without having information, regarding which it is extremely difficult to resolve the conflict. However, the specificity of this issue is also due to the fact that in the scientific literature today there is still no unified list of the functions of conflicts, which makes this topic very relevant for research.
The purpose of the work is to theoretically study various approaches to determining the functions of conflicts.
To achieve this goal, during the work it is necessary to perform the following tasks:
— consider the concept and essence of the categories of personnel management “function” and “conflict”;
— explore the functions of conflicts determined by modern researchers of personnel management theory.
Functions of conflict in psychology
Any confrontation can have a positive aspect, that is, be constructive, or have negative consequences, that is, be destructive.
The civilized conflict process is based on maintaining interaction within the framework of competition and cooperation. The struggle marks the exit of confrontation beyond the boundaries of civilization. Therefore, the functions of conflicts are divided into destructive and constructive.
Constructive functions of conflicts in psychology:
— relieving tension between subjects of social interaction;
— connecting and communicative-informational;
— motivation for social change;
— promoting the formation of socially necessary harmony;
— reassessment of accepted norms and previous values;
— assistance in strengthening the loyalty of members of a specific structural unit.
Negative functions of conflict in psychology:
— dissatisfaction, decreased labor productivity, increased staff turnover;
— disruption of the communication system, reduction in the level of cooperation in the future;
— unbreakable devotion to one’s own community and unproductive competition with other groups;
- presenting the opposing side as an enemy, understanding one’s goals as positive, and the intentions of the other side as negative;
— elimination of interaction between the parties in confrontation;
— an increase in hostility between the parties to the conflict process as communicative interaction decreases, an increase in mutual hostility;
— shift in emphasis: winning the confrontation is given more importance than solving the problem;
— in the social experience of a community or an individual, violent methods of solving problems are consolidated.
The boundary between constructive and negative functions often loses its uniqueness when it is necessary to assess the consequences of a particular collision. In addition, the vast majority of confrontations are characterized by the simultaneous presence of positive and destructive functions.
Conflict processes are divided according to areas of occurrence into: economic, ideological, social and family conflicts.
Family psychology considers conflicts as a relationship between the confrontation itself and the personality of the opposing party. The peculiarities of family contradictions lie in the danger of transforming the normal mental state of partners into a stressful one, that is, into a state that distorts the individual’s psyche, the consequence of which is often a state of emptiness and complete indifference.
Family psychology understands conflicts as a directed negative state of mind of one or both partners, characterized by aggressiveness and negativism in relationships. This condition is provoked by the incompatibility of the views of the spouses, their interests, beliefs or needs.
Family confrontations vary depending on the stages of development of the social unit. The conflict process plays the most significant role during the period of family formation, when husband and wife are just beginning to find a common language, adapting to each other.
Conflict in social psychology
Communicative interaction as a communication process begins with a positive decision jointly made by individuals regarding the exchange of information. An unlimited number of subjects can participate in the communication process. Each of the interacting subjects is obliged to make their own contribution to the creation of full and effective communication. If a large number of individuals participate in the exchange of information, then the consequence of this process should be the planning of further joint activities. Only in this case should communication be considered successful.
An interaction consisting of two participants is considered simple communication. If more than two individuals are involved in communication, then such communication is called complex. Participation in the communicative process of several communities can be based on mutual understanding or on their confrontation, which is expressed in the form of struggle based on competition. The conflict process is the most striking expression of competition.
Sociologists identify the following components of confrontation: the origin of a conflict situation, the presence of participants, the cause of the conflict process (that is, the object of confrontation), the trigger mechanism, the maturation and resolution of confrontation.
Psychology of conflict development
All individuals find themselves in situations of confrontation. Often people may not realize that they are involved in a confrontation. This often happens at the stage of the emergence of a contradiction, due to the fact that individuals do not have basic knowledge about the stages of formation and escalation of conflicts, which are studied by the psychology of conflict development.
The process of the emergence of a situation of confrontation is called dynamics and consists of several successive stages of development of confrontation, namely the emergence of confrontation between subjects, identification of the desire of the subjects to develop a situation of confrontation, awareness by the parties of the essence and root cause of confrontation, detection of conflict relations, establishment of participants, fading of confrontation.
There are many variations in the definition of conflict in social psychology, but the following formulation is considered more correct: the conflict process arises against the background of a contradiction that arises between individuals or communities due to the need to make decisions on various issues of personal life and social existence. However, not every contradiction will develop into a conflict. Confrontation will arise if contradictions affect the social status of a group or an individual, material values or spiritual guidelines of people, or the moral dignity of an individual.
The psychology of behavior in conflict depends on the learning process. A protracted confrontation helps opponents to study each other well, which allows them to take various actions based on the characteristics of the opponent’s temperament, specific character traits, and inherent emotional reactions. In other words, competitors can predict the actions of the opposing party with almost 100% certainty, which allows them to significantly increase the arsenal of means used and expand the scope of behavioral strategies used, adjusting them to the characteristics of the opposing party. Thus, the problem of conflict in psychology lies in the interdependence of the actions of opponents, which leads to mutually directed influence of the parties.
Conflicts are considered a very important, but insufficiently studied socio-psychological problem. Most scientists view conflicts as a natural and inevitable phenomenon. Therefore, the psychology of behavior in conflict is considered one of the leading topics in social psychology and conflictology. Because acquiring skills to smooth out and resolve all kinds of conflict situations in the process of professional activity or family life will help an individual become more successful and happier.
Chapter 1. The formation of conflictology
Conflictology is a relatively young science. It appeared in its completed form only by the middle of the 20th century. But conflicts have always existed, and the first attempts to understand them date back to ancient times.
The problem of the relationship between contradiction, struggle and conflict in the works of ancient thinkers
Ancient philosophers believed that conflict in itself is neither good nor bad; it exists everywhere, regardless of people's opinions about it. The whole world is full of contradictions; the life of nature, people and even Gods is inevitably connected with them. True, they had not yet used the term “conflict” itself, but they had already seen that conflict does not exhaust the whole of life, but represents only a part of it.
Causes of conflicts psychology
In the history of the study of conflict as a psychological phenomenon, two stages are conventionally distinguished. The first dates back to the twentieth century and continues until the fifties of the last century, and the second - from the late fifties of the last century and continues to this day. The second stage is the psychology of modern conflicts, based on the assertion that any actions of individuals are social, since they are characterized by a close relationship with the social environment.
Conflicts, their provoking factors, forms of manifestation and means of their resolution are understandable solely on the basis of a deep understanding of the nature of society and the individual, the patterns of social interaction and the relationships of individuals.
At the beginning of the last century, the conflict was not singled out as a separate subject of study. The collision was then considered as an integral part of more global concepts (psychoanalytic theory or sociometry). In those days, psychologists were exclusively interested in the consequences of conflicts or a number of reasons that provoke their occurrence. They were not interested in conflict itself as a key element of the study.
At the end of the fifties, the first studies appeared in which the main subject of research became the problem of conflict in psychology.
At the beginning of the twentieth century, among the key areas of psychological research into the conflict process, the following can be distinguished:
— psychoanalytic theory (Z. Freud, E. Fromm, K. Horney);
- ethological (N. Tinbergen, K. Lorenz);
— the concept of group dynamics (K. Levin);
— behavioral (A. Bandura);
- sociometric (D. Moreno).
The psychoanalytic direction is primarily associated with Freud, who created the conceptual theory of human conflict. Freud drew attention to the need to search for factors causing interpersonal conflicts in the unconscious.
K. Horney tried to introduce a social context into the nature of conflicts. She considered the main reason for the confrontations observed between the subject and the environment to be a lack of friendly attitude on the part of relatives, and, first of all, parents. Fromm believed that conflicts arise as a result of the inability to realize personal needs and aspirations in society.
K. Lorenz is considered the founder of the ethological approach to explaining the causes of confrontations. He considered the main reason for the confrontation to be the aggressiveness of the crowd and the individual. In his opinion, the mechanisms for the emergence of aggression in animals and in humans are the same, because aggression is an unchangeable state of a living organism.
K. Levin, in the course of studying the problems of group dynamics, developed the theory of a dynamic behavioral system in which tension increases when the balance between the environment and the individual is disturbed. This tension is expressed in the form of confrontation. For example, the source of confrontation may be the unfavorable management style of the boss.
Followers of the behavioral approach looked for the causes of clashes not only exclusively in innate human qualities, but also in the social environment of individuals, which transforms these qualities.
The founder of the theory of sociometry, J. Moreno, believed that interpersonal conflicts are caused by the state of emotional relationships between subjects, their likes and dislikes towards each other.
The psychology of modern conflicts is based on research conducted in the second half of the last century in the following areas:
— game-theoretic (M. Deutsch);
— concepts of organizational systems (R. Blake);
— theory and practice of the process of introducing negotiations (R. Fischer).
M. Deutsch considered the basis of the conflict to be the incompatibility of the aspirations of the participants in interpersonal relationships.
In the sixties and seventies of the last century, a separate direction began to form in the study of the negotiation process as an integral part of conflict interaction.
B. Hassan, in his work “Constructive Psychology of Conflict,” took a new look at negotiations as a way out of confrontation. He believed that any effective negotiation process is the product of joint research work by all its participants. In his manual “Constructive Psychology of Conflict,” he presented the basic concepts of a constructive approach to conflicts and proposed ways to analyze situations of confrontation. In addition, he outlined various approaches to the negotiation process, to understanding the ways of organizing and conducting negotiations as the main way for opponents to interact to effectively resolve confrontations.
Types of obedience
(
In business communication, in principle, there is no concept of “types of obedience,” so I wrote about “types of listening.” Like this. Further, under the asterisk, there is only one mention of the concept “types of obedience” in d.o)
American communication researcher Kelly identifies four types of listening
.
Directed, critical listening.
The participant in communication first carries out a critical analysis of the message (often doing this preventively, that is, coming with an attitude towards critical perception of information), and then makes an attempt to understand it. Such listening is appropriate where decisions, projects, ideas, points of view, etc. are discussed. Where new information is discussed and new knowledge is communicated, critical listening has little prospect. The attitude of rejecting information does not allow one to listen to it; it requires focusing attention only on what confirms the undesirability of listening. As a result, everything valuable seems to pass by, there is no interest in information, a person simply wastes time and remains dissatisfied.
Empathic listening.
With empathic listening, the participant in a business interaction pays more attention to “reading” feelings rather than words. Such listening can be effective if the speaker evokes positive emotions in the listener, and ineffective if the speaker evokes negative emotions with his words.
Non-reflective listening.
This type of listening involves minimal interference in the interlocutor’s speech with maximum concentration on it. Such a hearing is appropriate in the following situations:
· the partner is eager to express his point of view, his attitude towards something;
· the partner wants to discuss pressing issues, he experiences negative emotions;
· it is difficult for a partner to express in words what worries him;
· partner is shy, unsure of himself.
Active reflective listening.
In this type of listening, feedback is established with the speaker. Feedback from the listening process can be provided in various ways:
· questioning (direct appeal to the speaker, which is carried out using a variety of questions);
· paraphrasing, or verbalization (to paraphrase means to express the same thought, but in different words. The listener paraphrases the speaker’s thought, that is, returns to him the essence of the message so that he can assess whether it was understood correctly);
· reflection of feelings (when reflecting feelings, the main attention is paid not to the content of the message, but to the feelings that the speaker expresses, the emotional component of his statements);
· summarizing (thereby the partner makes it clear to the speaker that his main thoughts are understood and perceived).
(This is all I found where the word “obedience” is mentioned in business communication)
In domestic social psychology, says R.M. Bityanov, it is customary to distinguish three different types of interpersonal communication in their orientation: imperative, manipulation, dialogue.
Imperative communication is an authoritarian, directive form of influencing a communication partner in order to achieve control over his behavior, forcing him to take certain actions. The peculiarity of the imperative is that the ultimate goal of communication - coercion of a partner - is not veiled. Orders, instructions, instructions and demands are used as means of exerting influence.
We can name a group of social activities in which the use of an imperative type of communication is completely justified from both the target and ethical points of view. These include military statutory relations, “superior-subordinate” relations, in difficult and extreme conditions.
At the same time, it is possible to identify those areas of interpersonal relationships where the use of the imperative is inappropriate and even unethical. First of all, we are talking about intimate-personal relationships, marital and child-parent relationships. It is known that with the help of commands, orders and unconditional prohibitions one can achieve external obedience
and fulfillment of any requirements. However, they do not become part of a person’s internal personal beliefs, his introverted motivation.
Manipulation is a common form of interpersonal communication that involves influencing a partner in order to achieve one’s hidden intentions. Like the imperative, manipulative communication involves influencing a partner in order to achieve one’s goals. The fundamental difference is that the partner is not informed about the true goals of communication. They either hide from him or are replaced by others.
With regard to manipulation, we can also say that there are areas of human interaction where it is quite appropriate and where it is practically unacceptable. The area of “permitted manipulation” is undoubtedly business and business relationships in general. The concept of communication between D. Carnegie and his many followers has long been a symbol of this type of relationship. At the same time, there is a danger of transferring such skills of mastering the means of manipulative influence to other people in the business sphere and to other areas of human relationships, control over oneself and one’s life.
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