Third-Party Intervention in Workplace Conflict: The Impact of Culture and Gender

Abstract

This study examines the impact of culture and gender on perceptions of conflict in general, and third-party intervention in particular. We theorized that third-party help may concern four different types of interventions: procedural interventions, substantive interventions, social-emotional interventions, and relational interventions. Using a scenario study on a group of Chinese and Dutch employees and students (n = 164) exploratory factor analysis on 14 potential third-party interventions confirmed this four-part typology. Further analyses on the Dutch (n = 36) and Chinese (n = 35) sub sample of bank employees showed that, as expected, Hong Kong Chinese rather than Dutch employees and female rather than male employees seem to suffer from conflict stress. Furthermore, while a social-emotional function was most preferred by Dutch respondents and relational third-party intervention by Hong Kong Chinese respondents, these effects were both qualified by the respondents' gender. That is, particularly Hong Kong Chinese men preferred relational third-party help highest and social-emotional help lowest. We found some evidence to support our expectation that this effect might be mediated by the parties' interdependent self construal. When involved in workplace conflict, third parties might incorporate these differential preferences in the strategy they choose.