THE VARYING EFFECT OF INDIVIDUALISM-COLLECTIVISM ON PREFERENCE FOR METHODS OF CONFLICT-RESOLUTION

Previous research (e.g., Leung, 1987) established that people from ind ividualistic societies tend to show a high preference for confrontatio nal procedures such as arbitration, while those from collectivist cult ures prefer harmony-enhancing procedures like negotiation and mediatio n, in resolving disputes. Gire & Carment (1993) found results opposite to those of earlier studies when they compared respondents from Canad a (an individualist society) and Nigeria (a collectivist society). One reason given for their failure to replicate earlier results was that the conflict may have covered a domain in which Canadians were more co llectivist than Nigerians. To test this claim, Canadian and Nigerian r espondents were asked to indicate their preferences for methods of res olving a dispute between neighbours. Because Nigerians had been found to be more collectivist on the neighbour subscale, it was hypothesized that, as a method of resolving this dispute they would prefer negotia tion to a greater extent than Canadians. The study also examined the e ffect of type of conflict (whether a conflict was interpersonal or int ergroup) on method preference. The main hypothesis regarding individua lism-collectivism was confirmed. However, there was also a culture by type of conflict interaction. Nigerian participants indicated a differ ent preference pattern for threats, acceptance of the situation, and a rbitration in the interpersonal conflict over the intergroup conflict. Differences in preference according to type of conflict were found on ly on acceptance of the situation in the Canadian sample. The implicat ions of these findings for the theory of procedural preferences and pr actice of conflict processing are discussed.