The roles of emotion management and perspective taking in individuals’ conflict management styles and disposition to forgive Laura Rizkalla, Eleanor H. Wertheim * , Lisa K. Hodgson School of Psychological Science, La Trobe University, Kingsbury Drive, Bundoora Campus, Vic. 3086, Australia article info Article history: Available online 3 August 2008 Keywords: Forgiveness Conflict resolution Empathy Emotional intelligence Emotions Problem solving Relationships Interpersonal communication Communication Conflicts abstract This study aimed to link two fields of research: conflict management and forgiveness. Adult participants (n = 122) and a validating sample of significant others (n = 122) completed measures of disposition to forgive, conflict style, emotion management, and perspective taking; and multi-dimensional models of their relationships were tested. Disposition to forgive was most consistently associated with problem solving and yielding conflict styles. Greater perspective taking was associated with greater forgiveness, and greater problem solving and yielding conflict styles, as well as with lesser fighting style; and perspective taking fully or partially mediated the relationship between ability to repair emotions and dispositions to forgive and problem solve during conflict. Significant other reports con- firmed most of the findings based on self-report. Ó 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Conflict is a normal part of human interactions; however, depending on how it is managed it can have constructive or destructive outcomes (Deutsch, 2006). Furthermore, individuals appear to have conflict management styles or dispositions that are relatively stable over time and across situations (Blake & Mouton, 1964; Sternberg & Soriano, 1984). Five conflict styles are usually discussed: fighting, yielding, avoiding, compromising and problem solving. These styles vary along dimen- sions of the individual’s motives (concern for self versus others; Carnevale & Pruitt, 1992), approach (competitive or cooper- ative; Deutsch, 2006), and outcome (who ‘wins’; Blake & Mouton, 1964; Wertheim, Love, Peck, & Littlefield, 2006). Fighting (or forcing) involves endeavoring to meet one’s own interests, even at the expense of another party, generally with a win-lose (or lose-lose) result (Spangle & Isenbart, 2003; Wertheim et al., 2006). A yielding style involves managing conflict by fulfilling the other party’s needs at the expense of self-interests. Avoiding involves withdrawing from disputes; which generally fails to resolve the dispute. However researchers disagree about whether avoidance reflects lack of concern for others or a concern for others with the aim of preventing open conflict (Gabrielidis, Stephan, Ybarra, Dos Santos Pearson, & Villareal, 1997). While compromising involves seeking a common solution in which both parties give up something to reach a mutual middle ground, a problem solving style aims to find solutions acceptable to all parties, through addressing every- one’s interests creatively (Weitzman & Weitzman, 2006; Wertheim et al., 2006). As these styles show, conflict can be resolved with varying degrees of satisfaction for each party. When conflict remains unresolved, a party ‘loses’, or a hurtful transgression takes place, grievances and resentment can form against the other party 0092-6566/$ - see front matter Ó 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jrp.2008.07.014 * Corresponding author. Fax: +61 3 9479 1956. E-mail address: e.wertheim@latrobe.edu.au (E.H. Wertheim). Journal of Research in Personality 42 (2008) 1594–1601 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Research in Personality journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jrp