Exploration Of Gender Role In Conflict Management

With the increasing concern for women's ability in effective communication strategies and conflict management, the question of whether and how gender influences conflict management behavior has received a fair amount of academic attention. Nevertheless, the scholars never reach consensus on this question. This paper attempts to explore the impact of gender on conflict management behavior by examining the conflict management styles of Chinese organization members and the association among gender, organization position and each of the five conflict management style. The investigation is targeted at the employees working at companies in Shanghai. The revised Rahim Organizational Conflict Inventory is used as the instrument. The results of the study show Chinese men and women differ in their likely selection of some conflict style. Moreover, the discrepancies in style preference also differ between people of the same gender but on different organizational level. These findings reinforce the argument that gender differences in conflict management style do exist and produce real effects on conflict management behavior, but often tend to be complicated by other factors, such as the relative position in the organization, or in other words, power. Meanwhile, the study also reveals the conflict management pattern of Chinese organization members. The results support the hypothesis that Chinese organization members prefer non-confrontational strategies such as integrating and compromising, whereas avoiding style, which according to traditional cultural stereotype might be a preferable style of Chinese people, turned out to be the least favorable style.