the relationship between conflict and emotions on ...

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CONFLICT AND EMOTIONS ON WORKGROUPS/TEAMS

ANA PAULA GIORDANO * ISABEL DÓRDIO DIMAS ** PAULO RENATO LOURENÇO *

Resumo With the present article we intend to clarify if the type of conflict present in work teams has significant impact on teams’ affective outcomes (positive and negative emotions). Moreover, we aim to test the hypothesis that the link between task conflict and team emotions is mediated by socio-affective conflict. Data was collected from 60 teams/groups of several different functions and organizational contexts, from industry, services and sports. The Intragroup Conflict Assessment Scale (EACI; Dimas, Lourenço & Miguez, 2005) was used to evaluate the kind of conflict emerging in the team/group; emotions were assessed using the Portuguese Job Related affective well-Being Scale (PJAWS; Ramalho, Monteiro, Lourenço & Figueiredo, 2008).We found that socio-affective conflict has a significantly higher connection with negative emotions than task conflict and that socio-affective conflict mediates the positive relationship between task and negative emotions as well as the negative relationship between task conflict and positive emotions.

Palavras-chave: Group/team, task conflict, socio-affective conflict, group emotions.

Index

1. Introduction............................................................................................................................... 2 2. Conflict types and emotional outcomes ................................................................................... 3 2.1 Defining conflict .................................................................................................................. 3 2.2. Emotions and group emotional contagion......................................................................... 4 2.3. Group’s emotion as a consequence of conflict. ................................................................. 7 3. Method .................................................................................................................................... 10

* Faculdade de Psicologia e de Ciências da Educação da Universidade de Coimbra ** Escola Superior de Tecnologia e de Gestão de Águeda, Universidade de Aveiro A correspondência relativa a este capítulo deve ser endereçada para o correio electrónico: O SEU EMAIL

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3.1. Sample .............................................................................................................................. 10 3.2. Measures .......................................................................................................................... 10 3.2.1. Intragroup Conflict Assessment Scale (EACI; Dimas, Lourenço, & Miguez, 2005) ........ 10 3.2.2. Portuguese Job Related Affective Well-Being Scale (PJAWSN; Ramalho, Monteiro, Lourenço, & Figueiredo, 20087) .............................................................................................. 11 4. Results ..................................................................................................................................... 12 3. Discussion and conclusions ..................................................................................................... 16 4. References ............................................................................................................................... 20

1. Introduction Today workgroups1 are becoming the rule posing new challenges to the organizational life. In fact, teams put together individuals with distinct characteristics, backgrounds and motivations, with different ways of thinking and acting, becoming, as a consequence, a privileged space of conflict. Hence, understanding intragroup conflict is mandatory for promoting a healthy and effective workplace. Conflicts in teams are stated to be socio-affective and task issues related (e.g., Guetzkow & Gyr, 1954; Jehn, 1997). In academic research and in management literature it is widespread the notion that task conflict may be productive whereas affective conflict is dysfunctional. However, a meta-analysis examining task and relationship conflict effects suggested that each kind of conflict may be negatively linked with both group performance and satisfaction outcomes albeit the correlation between task conflict and performance was significantly less negative when task and relationship conflict were weakly correlated (De Dreu & Weingart, 2003). Nevertheless,

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In the present article, and following other authors (e.g., Dimas, 2007; Lourenço, 2002), we make no distinction between groups and teams, using the two terms interchangeably.

The relationship between conflict and emotions on workgroup/teams Ana Paula Giordano; Isabel Dórdio Dimas; Paulo Renato Lourenço.

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the idea of task and socio-affective conflict being interdependent has only been present in some studies (e.g., Simons & Peterson, 2000) although strong evidence has shown the transformation of task into socio-affective conflict (e.g., Lovelace, Shapiro & Weingart, 2001). In the present study we intend to deepen our knowledge about the affective outcomes of intragroup conflict, analyzing its effects on negative and positive emotions. Moreover, we propose to analyze potential mechanisms through which these two types of conflict are linked.

2. Conflict types and emotional outcomes 2.1 Defining conflict We will adopt the definition of intragroup conflict as it was conceptualized by De Dreu and Weingart (2003) and also, Dimas, Lourenço and Miguez (2005), that is, a discordance of perspectives that causes tension in, at least, one of the parts of the interaction. Historically, there have been three approaches to conflict. Classical organizational theorists stressed the negative nature of conflict and postulated their avoidance as to ensure stability and harmony, essential to the achievement of group objectives (Rahim, 2001). In the late 40’s, instigated by the School of Human Relations movement, authors like Elton Mayo postulated the complexity of organizations and, in consequence, the existence of conflict as the natural result of its diversity. Since conflicts were inevitable, authors prescribed their acceptance albeit still postulating their resolution (Robbins, 1978). More recently, an interactionist approach proposes that conflicts are positive and should be encouraged because they contribute to the organizational effectiveness.


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Guetzkow and Gyr (1954, cit. in Nair, 2008) were the first to distinguish between conflict based on task and those based on interpersonal relations. Following the trend, Jehn (1995) distinguished between two kinds of intragroup conflict: task conflict and socio-affective conflict. Task conflict is a tension perception caused by the disagreement among group members or individuals about the content of their decisions and the resolution of them, and involves differences in points of view, ideas and opinions. On the other hand, socio-affective conflict is a tension perception to the presence of differences between team member’s values, personalities, attitudes. Conflicts are strongly associated with people’s affective experiences (Gayle & Preiss, 1998; Pondy, 1967) as to be in a conflict is to be emotionally charged (Bodtker & Jameson, 2001), since people are not aware of being in a conflict unless they recognize that they are emotional about something. Therefore, analyzing the impact of conflicts in teams’ emotionality is essential to better understand intragroup conflict phenomenon itself.

2.2. Emotions and group emotional contagion Emotions are defined by authors as complex reactions to situations, which include cognitive, motivationa1, and behaviora1 components (e.g., Frijda, 1986). Since they are not only internal states of mind but also processes that occur between individuals, emotions have a social function as they enable relationship changes, being a part of group processes (De Dreu, West, Fischer & MacCurtain, 2001). Barsade and Keli (2001) suggest that individual-level affective experiences combine to form the affective composition of the group. This occurs as individual-level


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affective experiences are shared, and spread all over the group members through emotional contagion processes2. Barsade and Gibson (1998) have suggested a definition for group emotion that considers the combination of two components: “bottom-up” components (affective compositional effects) and its “top-down” components (affective context) which means that group emotion results from the combination of individual-level affective factors that group members possess as well as from group or contextual level factors that define or shape the affective experience of the group. Thus, when individuals are together in a group, they share not only cognitions but also emotions. The process of emotional contagion is a primary mechanism through which emotions are shared and become social, creating collective emotion (Barsade & Gibson, 2007). In this line of thought, Bartel and Saavedra (2000) also found evidence for the construct of group mood, and George (1990, cit. in Bartel & Saavedra, 2000) showed that workgroups can develop affective tones, that is, when the personal disposition of most group members is to experience positive (or negative) mood states, then the affective tone of the group as a whole becomes positive (or negative) as well. Teams’ emotions in this study are framed in Russell’s Circumplex Model of Emotions (1980), in which emotions are defined as having a positive or a negative valence and being associated with a high or a low arousal. As can be seen graphically in figure 1, one dimension of the Circumplex detains the emotional valence (positive / negative); the other dimension reflects the level of arousal or activation (high / low). 2

In accordance with Hatfield, Cacioppo, and Rapson (1992) the degree to which emotional contagion occurs is mediated by attentional processes, with greater contagion occurring when more attention is given out. The next step in the emotional contagion process involves the actual mechanisms by which emotions are transferred: subconscious, automatic, "primitive emotional contagion" which happens by a very fast process of automatic, continuous, synchronous nonverbal mimicry and feedback (Hatfield, Cacioppo & Rapson, 1992, op. cit), and more conscious emotional comparison processes (e.g., Gump & Kulik, 1997; Sullins, 1991, op. cit) such as empathy and perspective taking. The relationship between conflict and emotions on workgroup/teams Ana Paula Giordano; Isabel Dórdio Dimas; Paulo Renato Lourenço.

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Emotions result from a combination of these two dimensions, standing somewhere in the continuum (Russell, 1980, 1997). Hence, in group contexts, it is also necessary to consider both positive and negative emotions (valence dimension) and the different types of activation (arousal scale) to better understand the emotional phenomenon (Ramalho, Monteiro, Lourenço & Figueiredo, 2008). Therefore, in this perspective, the studies of emotion should move away from a strictly basic emotion model of affective states, where each emotion is thought to emerge from independent neural systems, to a more dimensional approach of emotions (Posner, Russell & Petterson, 2005).

Figure 1 - Russel’s emotions Circumplex (adapted from Barret & Russell, 1998)

The group’s emotion, positioned somewhere in the circumplex, is also characterized by states ranging from the excited to the relaxed, going through states of sadness and tension. The model has been tested in several studies (e.g., Feldman, Barrett & Russell, 1999; Russell, 1980), which permitted to confirm the hypothesis that


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the structure underlying the affective experience can be characterized as having a bidimensional structure.

2.3. Group’s emotion as a consequence of conflict Emotions play an important role in conflict phenomena. Pondy (1967) noted there is an important distinction between perceiving conflict (cognition) and feeling conflict (affect), and that conflict does not get manifest until it is felt. About this, Jehn (1997) stated that emotions define individuals’ subjective interpretations of the reality and the reactions to current situations, reinforcing that all types of conflict are emotionally charged. Scholars have studied the connection between both types of conflict – task conflict and socio-affective conflict – and the affective and emotional outcomes. Several researches show us that socio-affective conflict is more highly connected with negative emotions, since the core of this kind of disagreement is centered on personal motives stating that task conflict is less threatening to our personal identity (De Dreu & Van Vianen, 2001). Nonetheless, some researches’ conclusions can be considered somewhat paradoxical, particularly with respect to the effects of task conflict on affective reactions. In fact, almost all studies point out that socio-affective conflicts interfere negatively in the quality of the relationships between team members (Amason & Sapienza, 1997), lessening the desire to stay in the team (Medina, Munduate, Dorado, Martínez & Guerra, 2005). Thompson, Hochwarter and Harrison (1995) found that disagreements over personalized, regarding individually oriented topics (i.e., socioafective conflict) cause hostility, distrust, cynicism, and apathy among team members. However, studies regarding the effects of task conflict on emotions are not as The relationship between conflict and emotions on workgroup/teams Ana Paula Giordano; Isabel Dórdio Dimas; Paulo Renato Lourenço.

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conclusive. There is some evidence showing that high levels of task conflict lead to the decrease of satisfaction (Jehn, 1997) and the desire to abandon the team (Jehn, 1995). Despite that, other studies have not found any effect of task conflict on affective variables (Medina et al., 2005). De Dreu and Weingart (2003) shed a light on these contradictory results regarding conflict’s outcomes. On a meta-analysis that studied the associations between socioaffective conflict, task conflict, team performance, and team member satisfaction, evidence was found that the two conflict types are highly correlated. Additionally, they pointed out for the fact that the correlation between task conflict and the team outcomes was significantly less negative when task and relationship conflict were weakly correlated. Yet, the idea of task and socio-affective conflict being interdependent has only been present in few studies. Researchers had tried to find support for the mediational role of socio-affective conflict on the relationship between task conflict and team results, namely with respect to team affective reactions. Friedman et al. (2000) showed that task conflict did not have a direct effect on stress felt by department employees; instead, task conflict’s influence was indirect through its effect on socio-affective conflict. Gamero, Gonzalez-Romá and Peiró (2008) studied the mediation role of socio-affective conflict on the relation between task conflict and shared affect. The results showed that socio-affective conflict fully mediated the relationship between task conflict and team affect. Lovelace, Shapiro, and Weingart (2001) suggested that, during conflict, the personalization of contentious communications may contribute to the escalation of emotions, therefore conflicts that may begin as being task-related may develop into a more personal conflict. In line with these findings, a large number of researchers argue


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that task conflict may turn into socio-affective conflict through a misinterpretation of task conflict behavior over time, attributable to the dynamic nature of conflict (Amason, 1996; Friedman, Tidd, Currall & Tsai, 2000; Janssen, Van de Vliert & Veenstra, 1999; Jehn, 1997). Yang and Mossholder (2004) postulated that, task conflict and socio-affective conflict should be decoupled to get closer the good consequences of conflicts. Simon and Peterson (2000) found that an environment of trust influences positively the disconnection between task and socio-affective conflict. In the present study we intent to shed light to the consequences of the two types of conflict on team emotions. Indeed, emotions are an essential part of intragroup conflict and knowledge about this relationship is still lacking (Jehn, 1997). Moreover, we analyze the mediator role of socio-affective conflict in the relationship between task conflict and team emotions. This idea goes along with anterior evidences that supported the mediator role of socio-affective conflict in the relationship between task conflict and stress (Friedman et al., 2000) employee satisfaction, psychological well-being and job tension (Medina et al., 2005). Hence, considering the previous literature, we have formulated the following hypotheses: H1: Socio-affective conflict will have higher positive correlation levels with negative emotions, than task conflict. H2: Socio-affective conflict will have higher negative correlation levels with positive emotions, than task conflict. H3: Socio-affective conflict mediates the positive relationship between task conflict and negative emotions.


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H4: Socio-affective conflict mediates the negative relationship between task conflict and positive emotions.

3. Method 3.1. Sample In this research a sample of 582 persons distributed in 60 work teams was studied. These teams were selected by convenience sampling method or accessibility. The downside of this method is that the studies and conclusions can be applied only to the sample and can not be extrapolated with confidence to its universe, because there is no guarantee that the sample is representative (Trochim, 2006). Participants come from different organizational contexts: sports, services and industry. The sample is composed majorly by males (75.3%) and the group members are part of the team/group from 1 to 5 years (48.1%). The average size of the samples’ teams is of 9.7 subjects (SD = 4.3). The larger team had 17 elements and the smaller team was composed by two people. 3.2. Measures 3.2.1. Intragroup Conflict Assessment Scale (EACI; Dimas, Lourenço, & Miguez, 2005) This measure aims to assess the frequency of the two types of conflict (task and socio-affective) in workgroups. These two dimensions are measured through nine items: five assess task-related conflict and four measures socio-affective conflict. Individuals classify the frequency that tension happens in their team, caused by the situations that are described (e.g., Different opinions about how the work is done; Disagreements between team members related to personality differences.). Responses


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of each item are framed on a Likert scale of seven points that ranges from 1- Never happens to 7- Happens all the time. This scale was constructed after an extensive revision of the literature about intragroup conflict and was based on Jehn’s Intragroup Conflict Scale (1994), and on De Dreu and Van Vianen’s socio-affective conflict assessment scale (2001) (cf. Dimas, 2007). This scale has been used in many studies with different working groups, always confirming its psychometric properties [e.g., Bastos, 2008 (α =. 87 for the task conflict α =. 84 for the socio-affective conflict); Cadima, 2009 (α =. 86 for the task conflict, α =. 83 for the socio-affective conflict)].

3.2.2. Portuguese Job Related Affective Well-Being Scale (PJAWSN; Ramalho et al., 2008) PJAWSN resulted of an adaptation made by Ramalho et al. (2008) to the Portuguese idiom and to the context of working groups/teams of the Job Related Affective Well-Being Scale developed by Katwyk et al. (2000). The JAWS, in its original form, sought to measure the emotions felt by individuals caused by work, noting the frequency of 30 emotions (positive and negative) depending on their level of activation (Katwyk et al., 2000; Ramalho et al., 2008). The PJAWSN scale is composed by 28 items (13 regarding the positive emotions and 15 to negative emotions) that measure the emotions experienced at work, through a Likert scale ranging from 1 – Never to 5 - Always. The measure revealed good psychometric properties in this study, with a Cronbach's alpha associated with positive emotions of .87 and .91 for negative emotions (Ramalho et al., 2008), and in subsequent studies[e.g., positive emotions’ α = .91 and negative emotions’ α= .91 (Pinto, 2009); and positive emotions’ α = .91 and negative emotions’ α= .91 (Marques, 2010) ].


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4. Results

In the present study, the unit of analysis was the group rather than the individual and, as a result, individual responses were aggregated to the team level. To justify aggregation we computed the average deviation index (ADM Index) developed by Burke, Finkelstein and Dusing (1999). According to Dimas (2007), the main advantage of using this Index is that it represents a cut-off point from which it is assumed the disagreement between the elements of the team. The cut-off value is calculated by dividing the number of possible responses to an item (i) by 6. If AD> i / 6, we can not assume that the results represent the reality of the group. The application of this criterion resulted in the exclusion of four teams from further analyses related with socio-affective conflict (remaining a total of 56 teams/groups) and three teams from the analyses with task-conflict (n=57) in consequence of having an AD index > 1.17. Regarding positive emotions, seventeen teams were excluded (n=43) and in the case of negative emotions variable, five teams were eliminated as these groups had presented AD indexes > 83. In Table 1 are presented the means, standard deviations, correlations between variables, and the reliability of the measures. As can be seen, all measures present very good levels of internal consistency. Concerning EACI, socio-affective conflict and task conflict present a Cronbach alpha of .85 and .89, respectively, whereas both dimensions of PJAWSN (Positive Emotions and Negative Emotions), present a level of internal consistency of .94.


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Table I. Descriptives, Cronbach’s Alpha and correlations between variables N

M

SD

α

1

1.Task conflict

56

3,0

0,90

.89

--

2. Socio-affective conflict

57

3,1

0,19

.85

.896**

--

3.Negative emotions

43

3,5

0,58

.94

.618**

.721**

--

4.Positive emotions

55

2,7

0,54

.94

-.571**

-.672**

-.891**

2

3

4

--

Note. ** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (1-tailed).

In order to test H1, correlations between variables were analyzed (table 1) and, subsequently, were tested the existence of significant differences between coefficients (Alferes, 2002; Cohen, Cohen, West & Aiken, 2001). We used the procedure proposed by Cohen and Cohen (1983) and, also, by Guilford and Fruchter (1986) to analyze the existence of significant differences between the correlations of the two variables X1 (task conflict) and X2 (socio-affective conflict) with the same third variable X3 (positive/negative emotions). As a result we found evidence of significant differences between the correlations of the conflict types and negative emotions (t(52)= 2.333, p0.05) (Cohen & Cohen, 1983). Regarding these results, we did not find support for H2. The mediator role of socio-affective conflict on the relationship between task conflict and team emotions was tested through hierarchical regression analysis following Baron and Kenny’s procedure (1986). First, the mediator variable (socio-


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affective conflict) was regressed on the predictor variable (task conflict). Second, the dependent variable (negative /positive emotions) was regressed on the predictor variable. Finally, the dependent variable was regressed on the predictor and the mediator variables. Mediation exists when the following requirements are met: 1) the predictor variable is related to the mediator in the first regression equation; 2) the predictor variable is related to the dependent variable on the second regression equation; 3) the mediator is related to the dependent variable in the third regression equation, whereas the effect of the predictor on the dependent variable becomes non-significant – full mediation – or still significant, but significantly lower than the same relationship in the second regression equation – partial mediation (Frazier, Barron & Tix, 2004). Following these procedures a linear regression analysis between socio-affective conflict and task conflict was conducted, which confirmed that these variables are strongly related (β=. 896, p