Psychosocial Predictors of Relationship Conflict Styles as Mediated by Emotional Intelligence

Abstract

This study investigated the influence of age, gender, and emotional intelligence (EI) on conflict management styles among dating age adults in Botswana. A mixed survey and quasi-experimental design was used to assess the relationship between age and gender and the mediating influence of EI on participants' preferred conflict management strategies (avoidance, competition, compromise, accommodation, and collaboration) in response to violent and nonviolent relationship conflict. One hundred fifty-two participants were surveyed before (with the Wong and Law Emotional Intelligence Scale) and after (with the Conflict Style Questionnaire) watching video clips of nonviolent and violent relationship conflict. Correlations, t tests, and regression analyses were conducted. Findings revealed that women were more likely than men to report use of collaboration conflict strategies in response to the nonviolent video, and men were more likely than women to report accommodation strategies in response to the violent video. In the regression analysis, gender was a significant predictor of accommodation conflict style in response to the violent video, and EI had a significant independent and partial mediating relationship with compromise in response to the violent situation and collaboration in response to both violent and nonviolent conflict situations. Findings highlight the important role of EI in the use of higher-level relationship conflict strategies. Implications in the way of communication and conflict management for dating age adults and couples are discussed.

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“…The results of this study suggest a significant relationship between emotional intelligence and conflict management styles, as high EI was associated with the use of integrating style, compromising style and obliging style, while low EI was associated with the use of dominating style and avoiding style. This matches the results of various studies (Başoğul & Özgür, 2016;Chan et al, 2014;Hopkins & Yonker, 2015;Monteiro & Balogun, 2015;Schlaerth et al, 2013;Sehrawat & Sharma, 2014). The study of the Pandey et al (2015) contradicted the result of this present study, as it revealed that high EI was associated with the use of avoiding style.…”

“…The study also revealed that age was not significantly correlated with emotional intelligence (Schlaerth, Ensari, & Christian, ). These results were not congruent with the results of Pandey, Sajjanapu, and Sangwan () and Monteiro and Balogun ().…”

Associations between emotional intelligence and adolescent risky sexual behavior

“…It turns out that people with high emotional intelligence are more positively perceived by others, more popular, and their relationships with other people are more intense and characterized by greater durability and higher quality (Alonso-Ferres, Valor-Segura, Expósito, 2019; Antonysamy, Asgarali Patel, Velayudhan, 2020; Gündüz, 2019;Negi, Balda, 2019;O'Connor, Izadikhah, Abedini, Jackson, 2018;Szczygieł, Weber, 2017;Wollny, Jacobs, Pabel, 2020). They also cope better with conflict and interpersonal problems (Alonso-Ferres, Valor-Segura, Expósito, 2019; Monteiro, Balogun, 2015;Vashisht, Singh, Sharma, 2018). Emotionally intelligent people are more likely to engage in altruistic and cooperative behaviors (Barragan Martin et al, 2021;Enwereuzor, Ugwu, 2021;Huang, Shi, Liu, 2018;Mandal, Mehera, 2017).…”

Couple Conflict-facing Responses from a Gender Perspective: Emotional Intelligence as a Differential Pattern

“…Moreover, Lopes et al (2004) noted that people with greater EI ability tend to inhibit behaviours that are negative or destructive. Likewise, the role of EI in the positive conflict resolution as a form of marital quality among married couples was found based on EI self-report mixed model (Batool & Khalid, 2012;Monteiro & Balogun, 2015;O'Connor et al, 2018).…”