Avoidance and Active Fighting

One nonproductive conflict strategy is avoidance. Avoidance may involve actual physical flight: You may leave the scene (walk out of the apartment or meeting room). Or you may simply psychologically tune out all incoming arguments or problems. In the United States men are more likely to use avoidance than women.

Nonnegotiation is a special type of avoidance. Here you refuse to discuss the conflict or to listen to the other person's argument. At times nonnegotiation takes the form of hammering away at your own point of view until the other person gives in, a method referred to as steamrolling.

Instead of avoiding the issues, take an active role in your conflicts. Don't close your ears (or mind) or walk out during an argument.

To take an active role, involve yourself on both sides of the communication exchange. That is, participate actively as a speaker-listener; voice your own feelings and listen carefully to the voicing of your opponent's feelings. Be willing to communicate as both sender and receiver – to say what is on your mind and to listen to what the other person is saying.

Force and Talk

When confronted with conflict, many people prefer not to deal with the issues but rather to force their position on the other person. Force may be emotional or physical. In either case, it is an unproductive strategy: The issues are avoided and the person who "wins" is merely the combatant who exerts the most force. This is the technique used by warring nations, children, and even some normally sensible and mature adults.

The use of force is surely one of the most serious problems confronting relationships today, although many approach it as if it were a minor – or even humorous – issue. Researchers found that more than 50 percent of both single and married couples reported that they had experienced physical violence in their relationship. If we add symbolic violence (for example, threatening to hit the other person or throwing something), the percentages are above 60 percent for singles and above 70 percent for marrieds. In a study of divorced couples, 70 percent reported at least one episode of violence in their premarital, marital, or postmarital relationship. Violence during marriage was higher than for pre- or postmarital relationships. In another study, 47 percent of a sample of 410 college students reported some experience with violence in a dating relationship. In most cases the violence was reciprocal – each person in the relationship used violence.

The only real alternative to force is talk. Instead of using force, you need to talk and listen. The qualities of empathy, openness, and positiveness, for example, are suitable starting points.

Blame and Empathy

Conflict is rarely caused by a single, clearly identifiable problem or by only one of the parties. Usually conflict occurs because of a wide variety of factors, and all concerned play a role. Any attempt to single out one person for blame is sure to be unproductive. A frequently used fight strategy is to blame another person. Consider, for example, the couple who fight over their child's getting into trouble with the police. Instead of dealing with the conflict itself, the parents may blame each other for the child's troubles. Such blaming, of course, does nothing to resolve the problem or to help the child.

Empathy is an excellent alternative to blame. Try to feel what the other person is feeling and to see the situation as the other person does. Try to see the situation as punctuated by the other person, and think about how this differs from your own punctuation.

Demonstrate empathic understanding. Once you have empathically understood the feelings of the other person or group members, validate those feelings as appropriate. If your partner is hurt or angry and you feel that such feelings are legitimate and justified (from the other person's point of view), say so; say, "You have a right to be angry; I shouldn't have said what I did. I'm sorry But I still don't want to go on vacation with your college roommate." In expressing validation you're not necessarily expressing agreement on the point at issue; you're merely stating that your partner's feelings are legitimate and that you recognize them as such.