Communication
Permanent URI for this communityhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2223
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Item Attributional processes in accounting for conflict behaviors(2009) Yao, Shuo; Cai, Deborah A.; Fink, Edward L.; Communication; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)One simple way to handle interpersonal conflict is to use accounts to explain one's behaviors. Although accounts play a significant role in managing conflict, relatively little research has explored the processes offenders use to determine the accounts selected in conflict situations. The goal of this dissertation is to investigate the attributional processes offenders use that determine their accounts in conflict. Ten hypotheses were proposed about how the severity of the conflict outcome and the closeness between the parties involved in the conflict influence offenders' choice of accounts. A structural equation model was developed and tested based on the proposed hypotheses. An experiment was conducted, with two levels of outcome severity and three levels of relational closeness. Offenders' attributions (i.e., the degree of internal attribution, the degree of external attribution, controllability, and uncontrollability), anticipated consequences (i.e., expected responsibility and expected anger), and offenders' expected choice of accounts (i.e., the likelihood of selecting concessions, justifications, excuses, and refusals) were measured. Two hundred thirty-eight participants were recruited and randomly assigned to one of the six experimental conditions. Participants read a hypothetical conflict scenario, imagined that they were the offender in the scenario, and completed a questionnaire that had the dependent measures. Results indicated that outcome severity influenced offenders' choice of accounts directly and indirectly. Offenders tended to choose a more defensive account when they perceived the outcome to be severe than when the outcome was not severe. The influence of outcome severity on offenders' choice of accounts was also mediated by the attributions offenders made, the responsibility expected to be assigned to offenders, and anger expected to be felt by victims. When offenders perceived the outcome to be severe, offenders made more attributions, expected more responsibility to be assigned to them, and expected that victims felt angrier about offenders' behavior than when the outcome was not severe. Consequently, when offenders expected more anger from victims, they tended to be less defensive. Interpretations and implications of results, the limitations of the study, and future directions were discussed.Item A Roles Approach to Conflict Strategies: Modeling the Effects of Self- and Other-Role Enactment on Conflict Strategies Through Goals and Emotion(2008) Xie, Xiaoying; Cai, Deborah A.; Communication; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This dissertation addresses how, in a conflict situation, individuals enact different roles and how their responses to the other party's role enactment affect the strategies they choose to handle the conflict. A model is proposed to delineate the cognitive and emotional process through which the focal individual and the other party's role enactment affect the focal individual's conflict strategies. The model was first examined using the data based on participants' recall of a past conflict and their answers to questions that assessed behaviors (N = 265). Next, a laboratory experiment was used to test a model in which a conflict was induced and each participant interacted with a confederate to complete a decision making task (N = 261). The focal person's obligation to his or her general role and the other party's expectation violations were manipulated. Participants' embracement of their situated roles, perceived goal importance, emotion, and the use of four types of conflict strategies were measured. Results indicated that obligation predicted the use of relational-protective strategies through the mediating effect of relational goal importance. Embracement of the situated role was found to directly predict the use of a relational-protective confronting strategy but indirectly predict the use of a relational-disruptive confronting strategy through situated goal importance. The other's expectation violation changed the perceived goal importance and the emotion of the focal individual, which predicted the use of relational-disruptive strategies. However, the main reason for the effect of expectation violation on relational-disruptive strategies was individuals' direct reaction to the other's behavior rather than anger. Interpretations and implications of the results, the limitations of the study, theoretical and methodological contributions of the study, and future directions were discussed.