Social Conflict Situations Research Articles

Cognitive and emotional determinants for destructive coping strategies by junior high school students in a social conflict situation

Abstract My research purpose was to evaluate the contribution of self-evaluation, the locus of control and emotions in generating destructive coping strategies by junior high school students in a social conflict situation. I used the proprietary questionnaire to test adolescents’ coping strategies (KSMK), Self-evaluation Scale (SES) by M. Rosenberg, the Locus of Control Questionnaire (KBPK) by G. Krasowicz and A. Kurzyp-Wojnarska, and the Three-Factor Inventory of Personality States and Traits (TISCO) by C. Spielberger and K. Wrześniewski. Empirical studies were carried out in junior high schools in Wroclaw and the surrounding area. They involved 893 adolescents (468 girls and 425 boys) aged 13‒15. I stated in my research that low self-evaluation of a young man’s abilities, a strong conviction about the impact others have on positive or negative consequences of events and reacting with fear and anger co-exists with destructive adolescent coping strategies.

Conflict, coordination, compromise? The potential of game theory to explain the choice of viewing in shared domestic television use

AbstractA large proportion of television consumption takes place in groups, usually in households shared by partners or families. However, theories of media use tend to neglect this: Although they explain how individual orders of preference come about, they hardly address the fact that different orders of preference within a small group may conflict with one another. We propose using game theory to illustrate how to find a solution when conflicts in orders of preference arise. Game theory is suited to explaining decisions in social conflict situations in which those involved have an influence over one another. We use different (fictional) examples to demonstrate the potential of game theory here and provide a theoretical framework for future empirical studies.

The Role of Anger, Fear and Curiosity in Various Conflict Resolution Strategies

The aim of this research is to evaluate the emotions that generate constructive and destructive strategies for coping in social conflict situations by adolescents. Studies based on C. Spielberger’s ThreeFactor Personality States and Traits Inventory (TISCO), adapted by K. Wrześniewski, and K. Thomas’ and R. Kilmann’s Conflict Resolution Style Questionnaire (CRSQ), adapted by T. Wach (Dąbrowski 1991), were used for the empirical study done in 2014 on students from Polish gymnasium schools in Vilnius. Adolescent students (131 girls and 126 boys) ranging from age 1315 years were chosen. Base on the analysis of the study material collected, one can say that adolescents applying destructive strategies in social conflict situations, demonstrate high level of negative emotions. Adolescents who constructively steer their behaviour in a social conflict situation are characterized with a higher level of positive emotions. The data from current studies suggests that youths using cooperation strategies in social conflict situations, exhibit higher emotional tension of curiosity, as a trait. Studies conducted show that during the age of adolescence, boys deal with emotionsactivating social conflict situations better than girls, as more often they seek mutual understanding with partners rather than resolving disputable issues.

Amnesty: a ‘conversation’ within the medium of culture. A dialogue approach to the strategy of amnesty in protracted social conflict situations

In contemporary conflict resolution there are various strategies in place to assist the liberal peace-building project. This article investigates the controversial strategy of amnesty within protracted social conflict situations. It challenges the juridical approach towards the strategy by exploring amnesty as a ‘dialogue’ or ‘conversation’ within the medium of cultures. The author will utilise Feller and Ryan's eight multidisciplinary characteristics of ‘dialogue’ to explore amnesty as a conversation among its participants and wider society. This is supplemented by a case study examining the amnesty process under the Amnesty Act 2000 in the East-Central African nation of Uganda. It concludes with theoretical and policy implications for both scholars and practitioners of conflict resolution.

Discourses of conflict and collaboration and institutional context in the implementation of forest conservation policies in Soria, Spain

This article examines the emergence of conflict and collaboration in the implementation of forest conservation policies in Soria, Spain. We draw insights from discursive institutionalism and use a comparative case study approach to analyse and compare a situation of social conflict over the Natural Park declaration in the Sierra de Urbión, and a civil society led collaborative process to develop management plans for the “Sierra de Cabrejas” in Soria. The implementation of the EU Habitats Directive generated different outcomes in these two cases, which unfolded in the context of the same nature conservation legislation and national and provincial administrative structures but differed in terms of types of forests involved, property rights arrangements and forest use histories. We critically examine the influence of the institutional context and dominant discourses on the emergence of outcomes: conflict emerged where local institutions and discourses were threatened by the EU directive, while collaboration was possible where local institutions and counter-discourses were weak. We find that the institutional context plays an important part in determining local discourses in the implementation of forest conservation policies. Yet local counter-discourses have limited influence in the implementation and policy processes in the face of contestation by the discourses of regional civil servants conservation activists.

Me or you? Neural correlates of moral reasoning in everyday conflict situations in adolescents and adults

Throughout adolescence, progress in the understanding of the moral domain as well as changes in moral behavior is observable. We tested 16 adolescents (14–16 years of age) and 16 healthy adults (22–31 years of age) on the developmental changes in everyday moral decision making using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Using verbal stories describing everyday moral conflict situations, subjects had to decide between a moral standard or a personal desire. In the moral conflict situations, adolescents not only chose significantly more often the hedonistic alternative than adults, but they also reported higher certainty ratings. Contrasted with everyday social conflict situations that required a decision between a social-oriented behavior and a personal need, moral conflict situations induced an activity increase in frontal areas, the middle temporal gyrus, the thalamus, and the parahippocampal gyrus in adolescents compared to adults. Moreover, a closer look at the moral conflict situations revealed that adolescents showed more activity than adults in brain areas that are also centrally involved in theory of mind (ToM) during morally oriented decisions in contrast to personal-oriented decisions. This indicated that the development of moral reasoning may be strongly correlated with the development of ToM reasoning.

The role of self-assessment and emotions in designation of an aggressive strategy of coping with a social conflict situation by gymnasium school students

<b>Background, participants and procedure </b><br /> This research is aimed at evaluation of the role of self-assessment and emotions in designation of an aggressive strategy of coping with a social conflict situation by gymnasium school students. It uses a questionnaire to study strategies adopted by youth to cope with a social conflict situation (KSMK), Self-Esteem Scale (SES) and a Three-Factor Personality States and Traits Inventory (TISCO) questionnaire. The empirical study was conducted in gymnasium schools in Wrocław and neighbouring localities. It included 811 adolescents (414 girls and 397 boys) aged 13-15. <br /> <b>Results and conclusions</b><br /> Based on the analysis of the collected research material, it is concluded that low assessment of teenagers’ own capacity plays a role in choosing an aggressive strategy to cope with a social conflict situation. Participation of adolescents in a situation of a threat to accomplishment of their own objectives intensifies negative emotions. Research results confirm that aggression is a form of dealing with anger and fear felt in a social conflict situation.

FRENCH PRISONERS OF WAR, CONFLICTS OF HONOUR, AND SOCIAL INVERSIONS IN ENGLAND, 1744–1783

ABSTRACTDuring the wars of the eighteenth century, French prisoners on parole in Britain were placed in a paradoxical situation of captives with privileges. Instead of studying these men as if they dwelt in a world apart, this article focuses on captivity zones as a social laboratory, where people of different status would socialize. These spaces accordingly provide a lens through which to glimpse the repercussions of international conflicts at the level of local communities. The disputes which opposed these captives to the English population, which were the object of letters of complaints sent by the French prisoners to the authorities, shed light on the normative and moral resources which were used by eighteenth-century Englishmen and Frenchmen to legitimize themselves in situations of social conflict. As a configuration characterized by shifting social relations, the parole zone brought together local, national, and international issues, intertwined primarily in the rhetoric of honour. In these incidents, there was no systematic alignment of class and national discourses and actions, while the precise standing of these Frenchmen on the social ladder was constantly challenged and debated. The resulting quarrels therefore reveal a series of social inversions: dominant groups in France were in many respects dominated in England. Rather than being a mere reflection of pre-existing social hierarchies, such micro-incidents reinvented them.

Perceptions of forgiveness among Palestinian teachers in Israel

This article presents the results of a study conducted among Palestinian teachers in Israel to address their contextual understanding and perceptions of forgiveness. It sheds light on K–12 teachers’ responses to daily cultural and social conflict situations in a Middle Eastern context. This research aims to contribute to our understanding of forgiveness on conceptual as well as perceptual levels, hoping to enhance the knowledge-base needed to educate for forgiveness and reconciliation in Arab society. The present study is the first of several examining forgiveness among teachers in four Middle Eastern countries (Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt). Sixty-two classroom teachers in Arabic-speaking schools among Palestinians in Israel participated in the study. The teachers filled out a survey that included 10 hypothetical scenarios requiring forgiveness. The results from the survey and qualitative written responses suggest a high level of forgiveness when the situation involves parents, children, and social commitments, such as in giving wedding gifts. When the wrongdoing was intentional, there was less willingness to forgive in all cases, except in the case of parents of a child misbehaving. In addition to the present study’s contribution to the research on forgiveness and reconciliation, it also adds to the knowledge-base on constructing curricula for peace education in the Middle Eastern context.

Violate my beliefs? Then you're to blame! Belief content as an explanation for causal attribution biases.

We examined the extent to which the content of beliefs about appropriate behavior in social situations influences blame attributions for negative outcomes in relationship situations. Young, middle-aged, and older adults indicated their level of agreement to a set of traditional and nontraditional beliefs. Five months later, we assessed the degree to which these same individuals blamed traditional and nontraditional characters who violated their beliefs in 12 social conflict situations. Older adults held more traditional beliefs regarding appropriate relationship behaviors (e.g., the acceptability of premarital sex). Individual differences in the content of one's beliefs were needed to understand age-related patterns in blame attributions; for example, adherence to traditional beliefs about appropriate relationship behaviors led to higher responsibility and blame attributions toward characters behaving in ways that were inconsistent with these beliefs. Structural regression models showed that beliefs fully mediated the effects of working memory and need for closure on causal attributions and partially mediated the effects of age and religiosity on attributions. Personal identification with the characters had additional, independent effects on attributions. Findings are discussed from the theoretical perspective of a belief-based explanation of social judgment biases.

Perceptions of social conflicts among incarcerated adolescents with callous-unemotional traits: ‘You’re going to pay. It’s going to hurt, but I don’t care.’

Delinquent youth with callous-unemotional (CU) traits may have a unique social-cognitive processing pattern that perpetuates their violent behavior. The current study examined the association between CU traits and the endorsement of deviant social goals during peer conflicts as well as expectancies and values regarding victim suffering following aggression. Participants included 156 (84 males, 72 females) adjudicated juveniles residing at two gender-specific residential facilities in an urban city within the southeastern United States. The association between CU traits and participants' ratings of their social goals in hypothetic conflict situations and outcome expectancies/values regarding victim suffering were examined after controlling for prior violence, intelligence, and demographic covariates. CU traits were associated with an increased endorsement of social goals associated with revenge, dominance, and forced respect in social conflict situations. Adjudicated youth with CU traits were also less likely to endorse conflict avoidance and friendship building as important social goals when provoked by peers. There was no association between CU traits and expectations for victim suffering following aggression, but CU traits were significantly associated with lower levels of concern about victim suffering. These findings were significant after controlling for participants' prior history of violence, intelligence, and demographic covariates. Adjudicated youth with CU traits tend to emphasize power-oriented goals when provoked by peers and have little interest in rectifying social conflicts to build potential friendships with others. Juveniles with CU traits seem to be aware that their aggressive behavior will cause others to suffer, but they do not care when it does.

The Semiotic Therapy of Religious Law

Religion can bring about social harmony as well as social conflict. Religious law is a key element in both cases. Scholars can explain how religious law changes according to historical and socio-cultural context. They can also help reengineering prescriptions that cause social conflict. Changes in religious law can be explained according to a chronological rhetoric (certain agents cause certain changes) or according to a logical rhetoric (a change acquires its meaning in opposition to other possible changes). The two approaches are complementary, but the semiotics of religious law predominantly adopts the second one. In both cases, the explanation of how a religious law changes and the reengineering of a religious prescription are related activities. The semiotics of religious law is particularly equipped to propose alternatives for conflicting prescriptions. However, there is a difference between showing that some alternatives exist and advocating which alternatives should be taken. Whilst the latter position is similar to that of semiotic guerrilla warfare, the former rather configures the semiotics of religious law as a therapy. Semiotic guerrilla warfare stresses the need to demystify the discourse of power that subjugates individuals or groups to a certain religious law. Semiotic therapy does not focus on demystification but on reconciliation. The task of the semiotic therapy of religious law is to show that situations of social conflict generated by certain prescriptions can be decreased or eliminated by adopting alternative paths of meaning. The semiotic therapist of religious law can be effective in showing these alternatives only if some pragmatic and semantic preconditions are met: a correct involvement with the sets of religious core values at stake and an articulated analysis of the paths of meaning to which these values give rise.

Artifacts as Social Conflict Resolution Mechanism in Traditional Urhobo Society of Nigeria's Niger Delta

Traditional Urhobo society attempts to achieve stability by resolving personal and public social conflicts. The mechanisms employed for this include using art objects in rituals. No detailed scholarly attention, however, seems to have been given to identifying and classifying these conflict-resolution devices in previous studies of the art and culture histories of the Urhobo. In this paper, the social conflict situations prevalent in Urhobo traditional society and their resolution mechanisms are examined. Three categories of social conflicts and two resolution mechanisms are identified and classified.

Maternal separation enhances offensive play-fighting, basal corticosterone and hypothalamic vasopressin mRNA expression in juvenile male rats

Early life stress is a risk factor for altered adult emotionality including impaired social behavior, enhanced aggression and violence. These behavioral deficits most likely have an earlier onset in life. We recently demonstrated that maternal separation (MS, 3h daily on postnatal day 1-14) increased intermale aggression in adult Wistar rats. Here, we investigated whether MS induced alterations in juvenile play-fighting, which is a precursor of aggression. MS increased offensive play-fighting behaviors in juvenile male rats, as indicated by a twofold increase in the number of nape attacks, a higher frequency of offensive pulling and biting, and a lower frequency of submissive play behaviors. Furthermore, MS rats showed higher plasma corticosterone levels and higher vasopressin mRNA expression in the paraventricular nucleus and the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis compared with control rats during the early dark phase. Thus, MS enhanced aggressive play-fighting accompanied by changes in several relevant neuroendocrine parameters. Taken together with previous findings, the increase in aggressive behaviors both at juvenile and adult age illustrates that exposure to MS alters the way rats cope with social conflict situations throughout life.

Social Coping in Everyday Life and in Crisis Situations: An Evolutionary Psychology Perspective

An online questionnaire-based survey investigated which action heuristics are activated for social coping in everyday life and in biologically relevant crisis situations. A total of 187 participants (86% women, mean age 35) from all parts of German-speaking Europe provided information about how they would cope in social conflict situations. In everyday life situations, participants reported more functional coping when dealing with youths than when dealing with adults. Coping strategies were most dysfunctional when dealing with one’s partner. Conversely, social coping strategies in biologically significant crisis situations were more functional within the nuclear family than with outsiders. The results are discussed against the background of display rules for social coping and the theory of inclusive fitness.

Jumping off and being careful: children's strategies of risk management in everyday life

This article addresses the complexity of children's risk landscapes through an ethnography of 10- to 12-year-old Danish children. The data revealed how children individually and collectively engaged with risk in their everyday activities. The children assessed risks in relation to their perceptions of their health as strength and control, negotiated the conditions of playing, and attuned their responses to situations of potential social and physical conflict. In the paper this risk engagement is illustrated in a variety of contexts: children's decisions to wear or not to wear a bicycle helmet; playing and games and routine pushing and shoving at school. In looking after themselves, children negotiate rules of participation and they safeguard personal and collective interests. Gender differences in these processes are addressed and discussed. The article argues that risk engagement is an important resource through which children also learn from their own mistakes. This is a necessary learning process when children engage with their personal health and safety. The article critically discusses different sociological frameworks and shows the significance of the study for the growing literature on understanding the meaning of risk in childhood.

Paciente en programa de mantenimiento con metadona

Objective The case of a patient addicted to heroine, receiving maintenance treatment with methadone and diagnosed as HIV positive since 1991, is presented. Material and methods The toxicological history of a 43 year old male is revised, as is his organic and psychiatric pathology and the social problem that his dependency has produced. Results After describing the patient's toxicological history in detail, the principal diagnosis is carried out along with that of other concomitant psychiatric disorders following the DSM-IV criteria. The possibilities for treatment of the opiate dependency disorder are mentioned, and the substitution treatment with agonists (methadone) is analysed in detail. Conclusions For the patient addicted to heroine, the priority is to maintain adherence to the treatment, as this will achieve a reduction or suppression of the consumption, health control of accompanying pathologies and an improvement in the social conflict situation, all of which will result in an improvement in the quality of life. The substitution treatment with agonists (methadone, buprenorphine, etc.) has shown itself to be useful in this sense since, on alleviating the symptoms of abstinence and blocking the desire to consume opiates, it has been well accepted among these patients.

METHODOLOGICAL CONSIDERATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH

METHODOLOGICAL CONSIDERATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH

Preliminary comparisons of male/male interactions within bachelor and breeding groups of western lowland gorillas ( Gorilla gorilla gorilla)

The establishment of bachelor groups of western lowland gorillas ( Gorilla gorilla gorilla) in captivity was considered to be a necessary husbandry step in response to growing concern within the European and North American co-operative breeding programmes that breeding situations are limited [Harcourt, A.H., 1988. Bachelor groups of gorillas in captivity: the situation in the wild. Dodo 25, 54–61; Johnstone-Scott, R.A., 1988. The potential for establishing bachelor groups of western lowland gorillas ( Gorilla gorilla gorilla). Dodo 25, 61–66]. Comparisons of behaviour between bachelor groups and breeding groups, targeting situations of social conflict, give an insight into the functions of male/male interactions within bachelor groups. Observations were undertaken at two zoos in the United Kingdom, one housing a bachelor group and one housing a breeding group of G. g. gorilla. Data were collected on the frequencies of escalated and non-escalated aggression (aggression), display, play-fighting and displacement (avoidance of aggression), and food-sharing and resource-sharing behaviours (tolerance) between males in three age-classes: silverback, blackback and sub-adult. Significant differences in behaviour were found between the three age-classes. In both the bachelor (Kruskal–Wallis: K [2] = 13.58, p < 0.001, post hoc critical value = 9.43) and breeding group ( K [2] = 14.50, p < 0.001, post hoc critical value = 9.87) the silverback exhibited higher levels of escalated aggression than the sub-adults and higher levels of non-escalated aggression than either the blackbacks or the sub-adults ( K [2] = 14.90, p < 0.001, post hoc critical value = 9.43; K [2] = 21.16, p < 0.001, post hoc critical value = 9.87 for bachelor and breeding groups, respectively). The bachelor group sub-adult initiated significantly lower numbers of displacements (approach–retreat behaviour) than either the silverback or the blackback ( K [2] = 9.72, p < 0.01, post hoc critical value = 9.43), whereas in the breeding group the sub-adult only initiated significantly lower numbers of displacements than the silverback ( K [2] = 11.52, p < 0.01, post hoc critical value = 9.87). Significant differences in play-fighting between the age-classes were only seen in the breeding group, the blackback initiating more play-fights than the silverback ( K [2] = 8.63, p < 0.01, post hoc critical value = 9.87). Significant differences in behaviour were also found between the groups. In all age-classes the breeding group individuals exhibited higher levels of chest beat display than the bachelor group (Mann–Whitney: U [10,10] = 9.00, p < 0.001; U [10,10] = 26.0, p < 0.05; U [10,10] = 10.5, p = 0.001 for silverbacks, blackbacks and sub-adults, respectively). The breeding group silverback also showed higher levels of non-escalated aggression than the bachelor group silverback ( U [10,10] = 20.0, p < 0.05). The blackbacks in the bachelor group exhibited higher levels of displacements than the breeding group blackback ( U [10,10] = 13.00, p < 0.01). These results indicate possible differences between bachelor and breeding groups of captive gorillas in their methods of managing social interaction. However, these results are based on a small sample size and represent the initial findings of a larger study. They should be treated with caution until the full study is completed.

Man, Institutions and Bioeconomics

Because bioeconomics is born of the interaction between the biological activity system and its socio-economic activity system, a holistic methodological approach is essential to study the relations between them. However, it must search for increasing levels of reductionism within each discipline to delve into the ultimate nature of each one of the intervening forces, whether economic or biological. This paper explores the economic forces. Through the biological capacity to comprehend, man and by extension, society, accumulates knowledge, the fulcrum from which he is able to dominate over his natural habitat. From this ‘point d’appui’, man builds two basic tools to assist him in achieving the goal of bettering his social condition. On the one hand, he creates institutions that allow him to “live with others” and, on the other, he develops technology that helps him to “live better with others”. Institutions, also referred to as ‘social technology’, tend toward stability over time while technology or ‘material technology’, tends toward instability, which would suggest that, normally, the mechanics of change will originate in material technology and, from there, progress to social technology by way of the political market. The level of progress and development attained depends on the quantity and rate of growth of knowledge applied by a society. In the process, man and his collectivity are forced to adopt new views of their environment through new shared mental models. The concurrence of equipment and political market will ultimately become the prime mover of institutional and economic change as well as change in mentality. Both technologies must keep on an adaptive course of stable evolution since discrepancies arising between them can cause tension between the various social groups. Adequate management of technological shock is essential to avoid extreme situations of social conflict. Herein lie the most important political decisions that a government must confront over the long term.