PSYC 362 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Sarcasm
9 Mar 2020
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PSYC 362 Lecture 7 - Conflict Communication
March 9, 2020
What is conflict?
● Recall interdependence, which was about how motives, goals, beliefs, opinions, or behaviour
interfere with those of another
○ These don’t always align because people are different → leads to relationship
conflicts
● Is conflict bad for relationships? No!
○ Working through adversity as a couple may mean that the two people come out
stronger on the other side of it
○ Not having conflict often means that problems aren’t being dealt with
Frequency of Conflict
● Conflict is inescapable
● A study by Lloyd found that between dating couples, there were 2.3 conflicts per week
● Gable et al. found that married couples were having minor disagreements almost as often as
they were doing fun things
What do couples fight about?
● The top topics that couples fight about include children, chores, communication, and leisure
● Interestingly, personality is one of the things that couples fight about the least
○ This might be because we self-select our partner’s traits when we choose to enter into
the relationship
● Of course, these topics may change over time within a relationship
Causes of Conflict
● Autonomy v. Connection: being your own person but also being close and connected with
your partner
○ E.g. “Saturday nights are for the boys”
● Openness vs. Closedness: matters of privacy, vulnerability, etc.
● Stability vs. Change: we want stability in a relationship, but we don’t want to be bored
● Integration vs. separation: how much overlap do you want there to be with your partner and
people outside of your relationship?
Causes
● Other triggers of conflict include:
○ Criticism
○ Perceived illegitimate demands
○ Rebuffs - i.e. rejected appeals for support
○ Cumulative annoyances - i.e. the quirky things that were cute at the beginning but
soon become annoying
Attributional Conflict
● We often make different attributions for the same situations
● Unhappy couples attribute partners’ behaviours to selfish motives
Conflict is a Process
1. Instigation
2. Conflict communication
3. Responses to conflict
4. Conflict resolution
5. Conflict patterns
Destructive conflict communication
● Going nowhere in a discussion - i.e. not offering solutions, just always accusing
● Defensive speech and actions, reversing the situation on one’s partner
○ “You’re overreacting” and “You’re being so dramatic”
● Body language - oriented away from your partner, rolling eyes
● Prioritizing other things over one’s relationship
● Deterministic language
○ E.g. “You’re always on your phone” or “You never put away your dishes”
Constructive conflict communication
● Body language: oriented towards the partner
● Acknowledging one’s faults and shortcomings
● Offering solutions to the problem
● Agreeing to action
● Collaborative engagement
○ E.g. using “we” phrases instead of “you”
Instigating Conflict
● Harsh startup - beginning a conversation in a negative way or with an accusation impacts the
tone of the conversation
○ 96% of the time, the tone of the first three minutes of the conflict predicts the
outcome
● Flooding: physiological response to sudden or overwhelming negativity from partner - akin to
shell-shock
Document Summary
Recall interdependence, which was about how motives, goals, beliefs, opinions, or behaviour interfere with those of another. These don"t always align because people are different leads to relationship conflicts. Working through adversity as a couple may mean that the two people come out stronger on the other side of it. Not having conflict often means that problems aren"t being dealt with. A study by lloyd found that between dating couples, there were 2. 3 conflicts per week. Gable et al. found that married couples were having minor disagreements almost as often as they were doing fun things. The top topics that couples fight about include children, chores, communication, and leisure. Interestingly, personality is one of the things that couples fight about the least. This might be because we self-select our partner"s traits when we choose to enter into the relationship. Of course, these topics may change over time within a relationship.
