CONFLICT MANAGEMENT The Psychology of conflict and conflict ...

268 SPECTOR AND BRUK-LEE
dynamic process that occurs between parties as they experience negative
emotional reactions to perceived disagreements and interference with the
attainment of their goals” (adapted from Hartwick & Barki, in press).
the Current state of ConfliCt, health, anD Well-BeinG researCh
One of the most basic limitations to this topic is that there is no consensus
on the definition of conflict, and often researchers fail to be precise
in what they mean by conflict in their studies. In fact, researchers often
omit a definition of conflict as measured in their studies or provide definitions
that are unique to their own work. For example, conflict has been
described as a “relationship in which a sequence of conditions and events
moves toward aggressive behavior and disorder” (Ware & Barnes, 1992,
p. 213) or as a “situation in which two individuals disagree about issues,
actions, or goals and joint outcomes become important” (Gordon, 1999,
p. 275) among many other definitions. Without a concise, widely agreed
upon definition, research progress is slowed because results cannot always
be generalized from one study to another.
What is needed is more conceptual and empirical work to clearly explicate
what is meant by conflict. For example, researchers are not always
clear whether conflict is an exchange in which two parties engage in
behaviors directed toward one another or a unidirectional phenomenon
in which one person does something to another passive recipient. The latter
approach fails to distinguish conflict from other forms of interpersonal
behavior at work such as bullying (Rayner & Keashly, 2005) or incivility
(Pearson, Andersson, & Porath, 2004). Certainly, one can define conflict as
a general phenomenon that subsumes others that are more specialized.
However, there might well be differences between a case in which a person
is the passive recipient and a case in which a person is an active participant
in an equal exchange, even though the specific behaviors the person
experiences, such as critical and insulting remarks, may be the same.
Empirical work is needed to explore both types of phenomena in parallel
to see if one is more damaging than the other is. Some researchers have
argued that conflict is a bidirectional phenomenon (Fink, 1968; Hartwick
& Barki, in press), and other terms might better refer to the unidirectional.
The term social stressor is a more general concept that can subsume both.
There is also a need to break conflict into its component parts. Some of
that work has been done; for example, Barki and Hartwick (2001) distinguished
various components of the conflict process, including disagreement,
interference, and emotional response. They also divided conflict
into types, according to its focus on personal issues versus work tasks.
Work is needed to further explore these and possibly other components/
types of conflict.
Given the lack of a consensus definition, it is not surprising that wellestablished,
psychometrically sound measures are in short supply. Often,