Changes in adolescents' conflict responses associated with consecutive presentation of hypothetical conflict situations

The advantages of using hypothetical situations are one reason they have be en widely used to examine adolescents' responses to conflict situations. On e frequently used research protocol involves presenting several conflict sc enarios to participants during a single session. However, in real-life situ ations multiple conflicts rarely occur within short periods of time, and th e nature of this presentation may be associated with changes in adolescents ' reports of conflict behavior. Trend analyses of emotional, conflict goal, and conflict tactic responses from grade 8, 10, 12, and college students t o consecutively presented conflict situations showed that responses were as sociated with presentation of the hypothetical situations. Findings reveale d an increase in reports of assertive conflict behaviors and a decrease in reports of constructive conflict behaviors with successive situation presen tation. Results from the current study suggest that researchers must consid er trends in responses when examining findings from successive situation pr esentation methodologies because adolescent reports of conflict behavior ma y change as situation presentation proceeds. (C) 2001 The Association for P rofessionals in Services for Adolescents.