Conflict avoidance

Conflict avoidance is a person's method of reacting to conflict, which attempts to avoid directly confronting the issue. Methods of doing this can include changing the subject, putting off a discussion until later, or simply not bringing up the subject of contention. Conflict prevention can be used as a temporary measure to buy time or as a permanent means of disposing of a matter. The latter may be indistinguishable from simple concession to the other party to the extent that those avoiding the conflict subordinate their own wishes to the party with whom they have the conflict. However, conflict prevention can also take the form of withdrawing from the relationship. Thus, avoidance scenarios can be either win-lose, lose-lose or possibly even win-win if terminating the relationship is the best solution.

Turner and Weed classify concealment as one of the three main types of responses to conflict, describing concealers as those who take no risk and so say nothing, concealing their views and feelings. Concealers are further divided into three types; namely:

• Feeling-swallowers who swallow their feelings. They smile even if the situation is causing them pain and distress. They behave thus because they consider other people's approval important and feel that it would be dangerous to affront them by revealing their true feelings.
• Subject-changers who find the real issue too complex to handle. They change the topic by finding something on which there can be some agreement with the conflicting party. According to Turner and Weed, this response style usually does not solve the problem; instead, it can create problems for the people who use this and for the organization in which such people are working.
• Avoiders who go out of their way to avoid conflicts.

Impact on intangibles

Research within conflict avoidance psychology has identified three areas that are significantly impacted by an individual's choices surrounding conflict: stress, loneliness, and relationship satisfaction. Interventions to reduce conflict avoidance would lead to reduced stress and the use of avoidance in a conflict situation can lead to anxiety as well as allow for a gradual recognition of threats. Specifically, low-conflict avoidance groups had lower levels of distress compared to high-avoidance groups. However, a major cost of avoidance is emotional numbness, which results in times when an individual does not want to uncover something like traumatic memories. Regarding loneliness, increased levels of peer conflict avoidance are significantly correlated to higher loneliness. This leads experts to argue that conflict avoidance is detrimental as it may decrease the ability to learn the skills required for dealing with future conflicts, leading to a negative feedback loop that may compound and negatively impact the development of interpersonal relations. Experts have found that the more dissatisfied one is entering a conversation, the more they avoid it. Additionally, emotional distance is created the more dissatisfaction there is. The ability to control unpleasant emotions has been proven to be essential for successful long-term relationships and research has found that avoidance increases hope, courage and contributes to an ability to control unpleasant emotions. However, as a result of many uncontrollable situations, avoidance does not always solve the issue at hand and is likely to interfere with any appropriate action.

Measuring conflict avoidance

The Thomas-Kilmann model assesses one’s behavior in times of conflict and contains two basic dimensions: assertiveness and cooperativeness. Within these dimensions are five methods for dealing with conflict: competing, collaborating, compromising, avoiding, and accommodating. The model suggests that avoiding should be used in various situations, such as when an issue is of low importance, when the individual has little to no power, when the potential costs of confrontation heavily outweigh any benefits of resolution, when gathering further information would be advantageous, or when others can solve the issue more effectively. Any of the dimensions listed above can be overused or underused in the workplace. To identify underuse, the model suggests looking at whether an individual seems to engage in frequent hostilities or is often overwhelmed. To combat this, one should attempt to frame issues less threateningly and spend time setting priorities. Recognizing overuse can be equally important and can be identified via several signs such as a suffering of coordination due to a suppression of other inputs, a dysfunctional amount of energy spent on avoiding issues rather than solving them, and important decisions being preemptively made.

Cultural differences surrounding avoidance

There are significant differences in conflict avoidance across cultures, with the starkest contrast being between collectivist and Western cultures. For example, individuals from collectivist societies are more likely to avoid conflict within an ingroup member than Western societies. In collective societies, there are also greater relationship-oriented values and a belief that a direct approach will harm a relationship, causing a greater prevalence of conflict avoidance. These societies may even use conflict avoidance to protect the protagonist, something that would not be fathomed in Western societies. In collective societies, there is more of a sensitivity to hierarchy compared to the West, leading to greater avoidance when there is significant separation between the parties involved. This sensitivity stems from the perceived risks of a lower-tiered individual speaking out.

Conflict avoidance in the workplace

In the workplace, managers sometimes avoid directly dealing with conflict among co-workers by simply separating them. In workplaces and other situations where continued contact with a person cannot be severed, workers may eschew confrontation as being too risky or uncomfortable, opting instead to avoid directly dealing with the situation by venting to others or engaging in passive aggressive methods of attack such as gossip. Unresolved conflict in the workplace has been linked to miscommunication resulting from confusion or refusal to cooperate, increased stress, reduced creative collaboration and team problem-solving, and distrust. According to an East Bay Business Times article, some possible results of conflict-averse senior executives may include

poor-performing executives can survive because the president doesn't investigate or act on employee complaints; conflict can become malignant between departments, because there is no tie breaker to force resolution; and ineffective managers are passed from one department to the next, because the senior executive would rather play 'pass the turkey' than cook the goose.

Further research surrounding conflict avoidance in the workplace has revealed that there are significant negative effects of its use and that if acknowledged, managers can create effective plans to mitigate the negative impacts. It has been shown that employees spend large amounts of time avoiding conflict, disproving the idea that conflict avoidance is an efficient method of conflict management. Avoidance can even lead to less psychological forgiveness and greater emotional exhaustion. Incivility is not formally registered in a majority of instances which is likely a reason why incivility has widespread negative effects. Avoidance is difficult for the employee because it makes them aware of the perpetrator’s activities, therefore making it difficult to forget. As a result, avoidance is unlikely to decrease the stress of a disjointed relationship in the long term and when the employee does not act on the incivility the perpetrator is much more likely to continue the behavior whether they are aware of it or not. Therefore, experts suggest that management should not wait for formal complaints to take action and should establish unrelated complaint networks such as counselors to provide a more effective outlet for avoiding employee distress. Managers should also develop strong cooperative goals and proactively train employees in conflict management which promotes more constructive conflict management.

See also

• Learned helplessness