The Role of Empathy and Compassion in Conflict Resolution

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 310-325 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olga M. Klimecki

Empathy and empathy-related processes, such as compassion and personal distress, are recognized to play a key role in social relations. This review examines the role of empathy in interpersonal and intergroup relations, including intractable conflicts. Despite the limitations of empathy, there is growing evidence that empathy and compassion are associated with more prosocial behavior in interpersonal relations. Furthermore, empathy and compassion have been associated with more favorable attitudes and higher readiness for reconciliation across a range of intergroup settings. This review ends by summarizing recent evidence for the beneficial effects of compassion training on interpersonal and intergroup relations and by outlining new avenues for future research on how compassion training could reduce intergroup conflicts.

Author(s):  
Suzanne C. Thompson

A sense of personal control is an important resource that helps people maintain emotional stability and successfully negotiate their way through life. People foster their perceived control by focusing on reachable goals, creating new avenues for control, and accepting difficult-to-change circumstances. In general, perceived control need not be realistic in order to have beneficial effects, although in the area of health promotion, overestimating one's control can reduce the motivation to engage in protection. Research on ethnic differences in the benefits of a sense of personal control suggests that those from more collectivistic cultures or subcultures may be less benefited by a sense of personal control, relying instead on a socially derived sense of control. Successful interventions to enhance personal control include programs that bolster coping skills, give options and decisions to participants, and provide training that encourages attributions to controllable factors. Future research should further explore ethnic differences in the effects of personal control, the consequences of unrealistic control perceptions, and interventions to enhance the sense of control.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew G Livingstone ◽  
Lucía Fernández ◽  
Adrian Rothers

We report five studies examining the unique role of felt understanding in intergroup relations. In intergroup terms, felt understanding is the belief that members of an outgroup understand and accept the perspectives of ingroup members, including ingroup members’ beliefs, values, experiences, and self-definition/identity. In Studies 1 (Scotland-UK relations; N = 5033) and 2 (UK-EU relations; N = 861) felt understanding consistently and strongly predicted outcomes such as trust, action intentions, and political separatism, including participants’ actual ‘Brexit’ referendum vote in Study 2. These effects were apparent even when controlling for outgroup stereotypes and meta-stereotypes. Felt understanding was a unique predictor of outgroup trust and forgiveness in Study 3 (Catholic-Protestant relations in Northern Ireland; N = 1162), and was a powerful predictor of political separatism even when controlling for specific, relational appraisals including negative interdependence and identity threat in Study 4 (Basque-Spanish relations; N = 205). Study 5 (N = 190) included a direct manipulation of felt understanding, which had predicted effects on evaluation of the outgroup and of ingroup-outgroup relations. Overall, the findings provide converging evidence for the critical role of felt understanding in intergroup relations. We discuss future research possibilities, including the emotional correlates of felt understanding, and its role in intergroup interactions.


2015 ◽  
Vol 40 (3) ◽  
pp. 262-270 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tina Malti ◽  
Margit Averdijk ◽  
Antonio Zuffianò ◽  
Denis Ribeaud ◽  
Lucy R. Betts ◽  
...  

This study examined the role of children’s trust beliefs and trustworthiness in the development of prosocial behavior using data from four waves of a longitudinal study in a large, ethnically-diverse sample of children in Switzerland (mean age = 8.11 years at Time 1, N = 1,028). Prosocial behavior directed towards peers was measured at all assessment points by teacher reports. Children’s trust beliefs and their trustworthiness with peers were assessed and calculated by a social relations analysis at the first assessment point using children’s reports of the extent to which classmates kept promises. In addition, teacher reports of children’s trustworthiness were assessed at all four assessment points. Latent growth curve modeling yielded a decrease in prosocial behavior over time. Peer- and teacher-reported trustworthiness predicted higher initial levels of prosocial behavior, and peer-reported trustworthiness predicted less steep decreases in prosocial behavior over time. Autoregressive cross-lagged analysis also revealed bidirectional longitudinal associations between teacher-reported trustworthiness and prosocial behavior. We discuss the implications of the findings for research on the role of trust in the development of children’s prosocial behavior.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sonsoles Valdivia-Salas ◽  
José Martín-Albo ◽  
Araceli Cruz ◽  
Víctor J. Villanueva-Blasco ◽  
Teresa I. Jiménez

Empathy is an emotional response that may facilitate prosocial behavior and inhibit aggression by increasing empathic concern for others. But the vicarious experience of other’s feelings may also turn into personal distress when the person has poor regulation skills and holds stigmatizing beliefs. In thinking about the processes that may trigger the experience of personal distress or empathic concern, research on the influence of psychological flexibility and inflexibility on stigma is showing promising results. Both processes are assessed with the Acceptance and Action Questionnaire–Stigma (AAQ-S). The current study sought to carry out a validity study of a Spanish version of the AAQ-S with a sample of adolescents aged 11–17 years. The study included an expanded test of its predictive validity with measures at three times to evaluate the role of psychological flexibility and inflexibility as risk or protective variables for the development of personal distress and/or empathic concern in the stigmatizer. Statistical analyses confirmed a two-correlated-factor solution, the adequate reliability of both factors, and their construct and predictive validity in the expected direction. The stigmatizer’s inflexible reaction to their stigmatizing thoughts predicted the occurrence of personal distress, whereas the stigmatizer’s flexible reaction to their stigmatizing thoughts predicted the occurrence of empathic concern for others. These findings confirm the importance of considering the role of regulatory skills in the experience of empathic concern or personal distress in the presence of stigmatizing thoughts, with possible implications for the promotion of prosocial behavior and the reduction of aggressive behavior among adolescents.


2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (38) ◽  
Author(s):  
Karinne Emanoela Goettems dos Santos

Os Centros Judiciários de Solução de Conflitos e Cidadania (CEJUSCS): a autocomposição em perspectiva The Judicial Centers for Conflict Resolution and Citizenship (CEJUSCS): self-composition in perspectiveKarinne Emanoela Goettems dos Santos* REFERÊNCIA SANTOS, Karinne Emanoela Goettems dos. Os Centros Judiciários de Solução de Conflitos e Cidadania (CEJUSCS): a autocomposição em perspectiva. Revista da Faculdade de Direito da UFRGS, Porto Alegre, n. 38, p. 257-276, ago. 2018. RESUMOABSTRACTA alta litigiosidade registrada pelo Poder Judiciário nos últimos anos revela o uso demasiado de um modelo adversarial de solução de conflitos incapaz de assegurar a pacificação social e de garantir a efetividade do acesso à justiça como direito fundamental. É neste cenário que ressurge a autocomposição, através de rituais de solução de conflitos pautados no diálogo, como instrumento capaz de reeducar e transformar as relações sociais. É neste contexto, também, que é editada a Resolução nº 125/2010 do CNJ, que estimula a autocomposição como política pública de resolução de conflitos e determina a criação dos Centros Judiciários de Solução de Conflitos e Cidadania – CEJUSCs, em todo o Poder Judiciário, órgão este que passa a ser responsável pela realização de audiências de mediação e conciliação no tratamento dos conflitos. No âmbito desta temática, o presente trabalho pretende valorizar a autocomposição como caminho de remodelação do acesso à justiça e destaca o papel dos CEJUSCs como seu protagonista. Além disso, vale-se da análise quantitativa acerca do avanço dos CEJUSCs no âmbito da justiça estadual de primeiro grau, no período de 2014 a 2016, destacando, ainda, o trabalho realizado pelo CEJUSC da Comarca de Pelotas/RS. Ao final, espera-se demonstrar que, ainda que o consenso não se mostre perfeitamente internalizado em nossa cultura jurídica, é possível construir um modelo de justiça adequado à realidade contemporânea e que tenha a autocomposição em perspectiva, fazendo do CEJUSC o principal protagonista de um novo olhar sobre o acesso à justiça. The high litigation registered by the Judiciary in recent years reveals the excessive use of an adversarial model of conflict resolution incapable of ensuring social pacification and guaranteeing the effectiveness of access to justice as a fundamental right. It is in this scenario that self-composition resurfaces, through rituals of conflict resolution guided by dialogue, as an instrument capable of re-educating and transforming social relations. It is in this context, too, that Resolution No. 125/2010 of the CNJ, which encourages self-determination as a public policy for conflict resolution, is issued and determines the creation of the Judicial Centers for Conflict Resolution and Citizenship - CEJUSCs, throughout the Judiciary, which is responsible for conducting mediation and conciliation hearings in the treatment of conflicts. In the scope of this theme, the present work intends to value self-composition as a way of remodeling access to justice and highlights the role of CEJUSCs as its protagonist. In addition, it draws on the quantitative analysis of the progress of the CEJUSCs in the scope of the first level state justice, in the period from 2014 to 2016, also highlighting the work carried out by CEJUSC of the Pelotas/RS Region. In the end, it is expected to demonstrate that, even though the consensus is not perfectly internalized in our legal culture, it is possible to construct a model of justice that is appropriate to contemporary reality and that has self-composition in perspective, making CEJUSC the main protagonist of a new look at access to justice. PALAVRAS-CHAVEKEYWORDSCEJUSCs. Autocomposição. Realidade social. Acesso à Justiça.CEJUSCs. Autocomposition. Social reality. Access to justice. * Professora Adjunta do Curso de Direito da Universidade Federal de Pelotas (UFPEL). Doutora em Direito pela UNISINOS (2015), graduação em Direito pela FURG/Rio Grande (1999), Especialização em Direito Processual Civil pela PUCRS (2001) e Mestrado em Direito pela UNISINOS (2006).


2020 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hossein Nassaji

AbstractHow to correct learner errors has long been of interest to both language teachers and second language acquisition (SLA) researchers. One way of doing so is through interactional feedback, which refers to feedback provided on learners' erroneous utterances during conversational interaction. Various theoretical claims have been made regarding the beneficial effects of interactional feedback, and over the years a considerable body of research has examined its effectiveness. In this context, a central and challenging question has always been how to determine whether such feedback is effective for language learning. Studies investigating the role of feedback have used various measures to assess its usefulness. In this paper, I will begin with a brief overview of the recent studies examining interactional feedback, with a focus on how its effectiveness has been assessed. I will then examine the various measures used in both descriptive and experimental research and discuss the issues associated with such measures. I will conclude with what continues to pose us a challenge in assessing the role of feedback and offer some recommendations to inform future research in this area.


2019 ◽  
Vol 50 (4) ◽  
pp. 483-507 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donna J. Yao ◽  
Melody M. Chao ◽  
Angela K.-y. Leung

Essentialism, a fundamental belief of the fixedness of social group essences, is often associated with negative intergroup outcomes. However, research is yet to explore the role of essentialism in intergroup conflicts, despite their prevalence. To address this gap, we conducted the first direct examination on how essentialism influences conflict management toward out-group members. Moreover, we examined perspective-taking as a positive factor in improving conflict management among essentialist individuals relative to their non-essentialist counterparts in intergroup contexts. Results across three experiments provided little support to the negative effect of essentialism on intergroup (vs. intragroup) conflict management. Yet, we found that perspective-taking promoted the use of problem solving and improved one’s own gain and the dyad’s joint gain among essentialist individuals, but not non-essentialist individuals, in intergroup (vs. intragroup) conflict situations. This research suggests that when coupled with perspective-taking, essentialism can promote constructive conflict resolution in intergroup contexts.


2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (6) ◽  
pp. 256-262
Author(s):  
Niels Peeters ◽  
Inger Grethe Løyning ◽  
Sofie Ferdinand ◽  
Daphne Kos

Abstract The purpose of this narrative review is to define the theoretical constructs of engagement, participation, and balance. The implementation of these constructs in multiple sclerosis (MS) rehabilitation are described because MS symptoms such as fatigue and cognitive decline may affect engagement in daily life. The constructs of engagement and participation can be considered to be different when they are studied. The constructs related to balance are of interest when targeting engagement. Multidisciplinary rehabilitation programs may have beneficial effects in optimizing engagement. Therefore, the measurement of these constructs is primordial because they give us a deeper understanding of the meaning of activity performance that reflects engagement in daily life. Future research may focus on describing engagement in both men and women at all stages of MS and may explore variables that influence engagement in daily life to integrate engagement optimization in MS rehabilitation. Engagement may have beneficial effects as part of multidisciplinary rehabilitation in MS.


Author(s):  
Alexandra Gerbasi ◽  
Karen S. Cook

This article examines the role of trust as a determinant of cooperative behavior in social relations and social organizations. It begins with an overview of some issues of definition, scope, and measurement of trust, followed by discussion of the dimensions of trust and trustworthiness. It then reviews some evidence on the role of trust in social relations and social organizations before analyzing the main and moderating effects of trust in the context of organizations. It also explores the macro-level consequences of trust for society as well as the negative impact of trust networks. Finally, it looks at a number of alternatives to trust and suggests directions for future research. The article argues that trust is only one mechanism by which we motivate cooperation and manage social order and that the role of trust in society has been radically oversold as a necessary and wholly positive force.


Author(s):  
Suzanne C. Thompson

A sense of personal control helps people maintain emotional stability and negotiate their way through life. People foster this by focusing on reachable goals, creating new avenues for control, and accepting difficult-to-change circumstances. Perceived control need not be realistic in order to have beneficial effects. Research suggests that those from more collectivist cultures may derive less benefit from a sense of personal control, relying instead on a socially derived sense of control. Interventions to enhance personal control include programs that bolster coping skills, give options to participants, encourage attributions to controllable factors, and focus on empowerment. Future research should include longitudinal studies that examine disconfirmations of control and the value of maintaining vs. relinquishing control following a traumatic event. More attention is also needed on cultural differences in perceived control, the effects of illusory control on health-promotion behaviors, and interventions to increase perceived control in everyday life.


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