Not my type: Conflict’s effects on morale are due more to meaning violation than to conflict type

Conflict can be helpful or harmful. Though past research has focused on conflict type (task, process, relationship, status) as a key differentiator of helpful versus harmful conflict, we offer a new perspective. We propose that conflicts become harmful--operationalized here as reducing job satisfaction, satisfaction with co-workers, and organizational commitment, and increasing turnover intentions--when participants take the conflict personally. We further argue that taking conflict personally (TCP) results when one’s personal sense of meaning is violated through the counterpart’s engaging in activity seen as inappropriate or transgressive. Study 1 shows that violations of respect trigger TCP and harm morale, and these effects supersede those of conflict type. Study 2 replicates this finding using violations of social norms. Finally, Study 3 uses experience sampling to validate our arguments in field settings and over time. Meaning violation and TCP appear to be stronger predictors of responses to conflict than is conflict type.