CONFLICT MANAGEMENT The Psychology of conflict and conflict ...

40 DE DREU AND GELFAND
examine how community demographic composition and fault-lines filter
down to affect the types of conflicts that occur in organizations (Brief et al.,
2005). As another example, higher-level factors are also likely to affect the
co-occurrence of different types of conflict at lower levels. For example, in
organizational contexts where there is a lack of trust, task and relationship
conflict are more highly related than in contexts where there is trust
among employees (Simons & Peterson, 2000).
While the previous discussion focused on how factors at higher levels
that are relatively stable (e.g., structure and conjuncture) affect conflict
and lower levels, top-down effects on conflict types at lower levels
may also occur due to highly dynamic events that occur at higher levels
of analysis. For example, events such as organizational downsizing and
restructuring, organizational changes in leadership, and/or changes in
composition of workgroup can also affect conflict at lower levels of analysis.
Terry and Amiot (chapter 13, this volume), for example, discuss how
organizational merger and acquisitions can affect social identity conflicts
at lower levels in organizations. Organizational changes, such as new
leadership, might also facilitate resource-based conflicts in organizations
because they result in increased ambiguity regarding resource allocations
and increased competition. More generally, research needs to examine
how both stable structures and dynamic events at higher organizational
levels affect the incidence and type of conflict that occurs at lower levels
of analysis.
Previously, we discussed how phenomena at higher levels of analysis
can trigger and shape conflict at lower levels. Another important area
for cross-level research on conflict is the examination of how factors at
higher levels moderate the effects that different types of conflict have
on outcomes. De Dreu and Weingart’s (2003b) contingency approach to
task conflict and outcomes suggested the need to examine moderators
of the conflict-outcome relationship. Likewise, in their conflict-outcome
moderated model (COM), Jehn and Bendersky (2003) similarly suggested
that features of the group context (e.g., task interdependence, routineness
of the task, group diversity, openness norms) as well as features of
the organizational context (e.g., use of rights- versus interest-based third
parties and dispute systems) can moderate the impact of task, relationship,
and process-related conflict on outcomes. Chapters in this volume
also attest to the importance of context as a moderator of the conflictto-outcome
relationship. For example, Jehn and colleagues (chapter 6)
discuss the importance of context as a moderator of diversity effects on
conflict in organizations.
Emergent, Bottom-Up Cross-Level Influences. Previously, we discussed
top-down processes related to conflict in organizations, yet
from a level of analysis perspective, it is equally important to examine
bottom-up influences of conflict at lower levels on higher levels of
analysis. Several chapters in this volume point to the importance of