Influence of emotion on conflict resolution

What is it about?

The article examines how emotions felt towards a rival group in an intergroup conflict setting affect responses to conflict resolution proposals. The importance of emotions such as hatred, anger, compassion, empathy, guilt and shame are examined and the results indicate that such emotions are powerful predictors of reactions to conflict resolution proposals, even after taking into account other strong influences, such as political preferences. The article further establishes that the perceived source of a conflict resolution proposal matters to a large extent determines responses to the proposal, even when the proposal does not involve significant risks.

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Why is it important?

Emotions can potentially freeze or unfreeze conflicts and an increased understanding of the emotional dynamic of conflicts is important in order to device new ways to resolve political and international conflicts. Emotions felt toward rival groups in conflict are often linked with political preferences. This article disentangles this relationship and studies the relative contribution of emotion and political preferences in predicting responses to conflict resolution proposals.