PSYCHOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF THE CAUSES OF CONFLICT
By AYESHA QADEER

Psychology of a person plays an important role in creating conflicts. Here first we should know what.
PSYCHOLOGY

Psychology is young science with roots in many disciplines, from physiology to philosophy. Psychology can be defined as “the science of behavior and mental processes”.

CONFLICT

In psychology, a conflict is a seeming incompatibility of actions, goals or ideas. The elements of conflicts are much the same at all levels, from nations in an arms race, to cultural disputes within a society, to individuals in marital strife. In each situation, people become enmeshed in a destructive social process that produces results no one wants.
After knowing about psychology and the definition of conflict in psychology now I will analyze how psychology of a person plays an important role in creating conflicts.

AGGRESSION

Aggressive nature of a person is a major cause of creating conflicts, in psychology; aggression has a more precise meaning than it does in everyday usage. Aggression is any physical or verbal behavior intended to hurt or destroy, whether done out of hostility or as a calculated means to an end. Let us examine some psychological factors which are the causes of aggression.

PSYCHOLOGY OF AGGRESSION

Aversive nature Although suffering sometimes builds character, it may also bring out the worst in us. Studies in which human or animals have unpleased experiences reveal that “those made miserable after make miserable”. This phenomenon led to the frustration aggression principle: Frustration creates anger, which may generate aggression. When social psychologist realized that events such as physical pain and personal insults also trigger aggression, they saw that frustrations are instances of aversive nature.

Learning to express and Inhibit Aggression Aggression may be a natural response to aversive events, but learning can alter natural reaction. Aggressive reactions are more likely in situations where experience has taught us that aggression pays. Aggressive behavior can be learned through direct rewards, as when animals that have fought successfully to get food or mates become increasingly ferocious. It can also be learned through observation. Children who grow up observing aggressive models often imitate the behaviors they see. Parents of delinquent youngsters typically rely on spankings and beatings for discipline. This models the use of aggression as a method of dealing with problem. Once established, aggressive behavior pattern are difficult to change.
Aggressive nature of a person prevents him to cooperate or resolve the conflict among each other. Besides aggressive nature of the person there are some other causes of conflicts.

Prejudice

Prejudice means prejudgment. It is an unjustifiable and usually negative attitude towards a group – typically a different culture, ethnic, or gender group. Like attitudes, prejudice is a mixture of beliefs (often over generalized and called stereo-types), emotions (hostility, envy or fear) and predispositions to action (to discriminate).

Social Inequalities

When some people have money, power and prestige and other do not, the “haves” usually develop an attitude that justifies things as they are. In the extreme case, slave owners perceived slaves as lazy and irresponsible – as having the very traits that “justified” enslaving them. More commonly, women may be seen as unassertive but sensitive and therefore fit for the task they often perform. In short, prejudice rationalizes inequalities.
Discrimination also increases prejudices through the reactions it provokes in its victims. Gordon Allport, in his classic book “The Nature of Prejudice” noted that being a victim of discrimination can produce either self blame or anger. Both reactions may create new grounds for prejudice through the classic “blame the victim” dynamic. If circumstances of ghetto life breed a higher crime rate to justify continuing the discrimination that helped to create a ghetto.
It is understandable that the suppressed people should develop an intense hostility towards a culture whose existence they make possible by their work, but in wealth they have too small share.

Personality Disorders

Personality disorders are also one of the important causes of conflicts. Personality disorders – inflexible and enduring patterns of behavior that impair one’s social functioning – sometimes coexists with one of the other psychological disorders, but need not involve anxiety, depression, or loss of contact with reality.
From above all we can easily analyze that how psychology of a person plays an important role in creating conflict. Sometimes these conflicts become so severe that they transformed into war and war might be because of one person and we all know that the motto of UNESCO was “war begins in human minds”. But to avoid conflicts there are some steps which can be taken to prevent psychological disorders in people so that their minds become healthy and their nature will become more cooperative and less aggressive.

PREVENTING PSYCHOLOGICAL DISORDERS

Psychotherapies and biomedical therapies tend to locate the cause of “psychological disorders” within the disordered person. We infer that people who act “cruelly” must be “cruel” and that people who act “crazy” must be sick. We attach labels to such people, there by distinguishing from “normal” folks. It follows them that psychologists try to treat “abnormal” people by giving them insight into their problems, by changing their thinking or by controlling them with drugs.
There is another way to view many psychological disorders: as understandable response to a disturbed and stressful society. According to this view, it is not just the person who needs treatment, but also the person’s social context. Better to prevent a problem by reforming a sick situation than to wait for a problem to arise and then treat it.
George Albee the president of American psychological Association contends that those who care about preventing psychological casualties should therefore support programs that alleviate poverty, discrimination and other demoralizing situations.
Prevention of psychological problems means empowering those who have learned an attitude of helplessness, changing environments that breed of loneliness, and bolstering parent’s and teacher’s skills at nurturing children’s self esteem. Indeed “every thing aimed at improving the human condition, at making life more fulfilling and meaningful, may be considered part of primary prevention of mental or emotional disturbance” (Kessler & Albee). (Myers, 1992)
Albee has reminded us of one of this book theme: A human being is an integrated bio-psycho-social system. For years we have trusted our bodies to physicians and our minds to psychiatrists and psychologists. That neat separation no longer seems valid. Chemical imbalances can produce schizophrenia and depression. And anger, depression and stress can threaten our physical health. There is one quote of Mahabharata about mental disorders that
“Mental disorders arises from physical ones and like wise physical
disorders arise from mental ones”. (Mahabharata, c.200 A.D)
There are some therapies which are useful in preventing psychological disorders which are written below:

Psychological Therapies

Psychoanalysis: psychoanalyst aims to help gain insight into the unconscious origins of their disorders and to work through the accompanying feelings.

Humanistic Therapies

Unlike psychoanalysts, humanistic therapies focus on client’s current conscious feelings, and on their taking responsibility for their own growth.
Behavior Therapies Behavior therapies worry less about promoting self awareness and more about directly modifying problem behaviors.

Cognitive Therapies

The newer cognitive therapies, such as Ellis’s rational – emotive therapy and Beek’s cognitive therapy for depression, aim to change self defeating thinking by training people to look at themselves in new, more positive ways.

Biomedical Therapies

There are some biomedical therapies which include Drug therapies, Electroconvulsive therapies and psychosurgery which help in preventing psychological disorders.
From the above discussion we can easily analyze how psychology plays an important role in creating conflicts and what are the causes of these conflicts and how we can prevent psychological disorders in human beings so that their minds will become healthy and they will make their surroundings peaceful. “Mens sana in corpore sano”, says an ancient Latin adage: “A healthy mind is a healthy body” and here I add that and it creates a healthy society.

M.A (Previous) Department of International Relations, University of Karachi, Second Semester, 2007

All content (C) Department of International Relations, Karachi University

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