Perceived disagreement and goal interference are central characteristics of interpersonal conflict (Barki & Hartwick, 2004).
Consequently, conflict is influenced by how people construe it and conflict has an inherent cognitive component. Appropriately, scholars have investigated the social cognitive aspects of interpersonal conflict.
The chapter in the first volume of The Sage Handbook of Conflict Communication focused on social cognition, and interpersonal conflict remains an excellent starting point for understanding research in the area (Roloff & Miller, 2006). We update that chapter and to establish continuity, we follow the same general outline. We first focus on research that examines the relationship between social knowledge and conflict and then move to an analysis of scholarship that informs as to the relationship between cognitive processes and conflict. The reader will note that new perspectives have emerged and some older perspectives not included in the earlier edition are now relevant. Finally, as in the earlier edition, we focus on recent research and evaluate strengths and weaknesses.Social Knowledge and Interpersonal Conflict
Social cognition research is focused on how people make sense of themselves, others, and their social activities. Such sense making is guided by and influences knowledge structures that are defined as organized sets of interrelated information about a person’s experience (Fletcher & Fitness, 1996). Six types of social knowledge have been studied by conflict researchers: (1) beliefs, (2) scripts, (3) partner memory, (4) rules, (5) frames, and (6) problem appraisals ( Roloff & Miller, 2006). To some degree, knowledge structures vary in the extent to which they reflect a person’s general conception of a conflict or individual aspects. Frames and problem appraisal often focus on how individuals generally understand their current conflict, whereas beliefs, scripts, rules, and memory structures are focused on specific features of conflict. We begin by examining the specific structures and then move to the more general ones.
Beliefs
Beliefs constitute descriptions of phenomena that individuals perceive to be accurate. Beliefs can influence perceptions and actions by making people sensitive to certain features of a focal object or action. Conflict researchers have focused on four sets of beliefs: other- related, self-related, relationship-related, and conflict-related.