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IJCMA
19,3

Ten years of conflict management

studies: themes, concepts and
relationships

234

Zhenzhong Ma
University of Windsor, Windsor, Canada, and

Received 15 August 2007

Accepted 5 December 2007

Yender Lee and Kuo-Hsun Yu

Chang Jung Christian University, Tainan, Taiwan, China
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to map the intellectual structure of conflict management
studies and to investigate the key themes, concepts, and their relationships of conflict management
literature in the past decade.
Design/methodology/approach Citation and co-citation analysis and social network analysis
were used to trace the development path of conflict management research. The data were collected by
searching the SSCI databases, based on 556 journal articles which were published between 1997 and
2006, and their cited references were analyzed and profiled.
Findings The paper shows that conflict management literature focuses on three key themes:
workplace conflict and conflict management styles, cultural differences in conflict management, and
conflict management in practice. In addition, research on group conflict and work performance has
gained momentum in recent years.
Originality/value The intellectual structure of conflict management literature has received little
attention in spite that a large number of studies have been done on conflict management. This paper
will expose researchers to a new way of profiling key themes and their relationships in conflict
management area, which will help academia and practitioners understand better contemporary
conflict management studies.
Keywords Conflict management, Research, Curriculum development, Knowledge sharing
Paper type Research paper

International Journal of Conflict

Management
Vol. 19 No. 3, 2008
pp. 234-248
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited
1044-4068
DOI 10.1108/10444060810875796

The past decades have seen extensive research on conflict management. Scholars have
examined different types of conflict management styles and tactics and used a variety of
different conceptualizations to explore preferred conflict management style and their
impacts on integrative or distributive outcomes. A large number of conflict management
publications have sprung up in various journals across different disciplines and research
findings have been disseminated to academia and practitioners in the form of journal
articles, conferences papers, books, and other documents. Great efforts have been made
to explore these publications and to evaluate their contributions to the development of
conflict management field in order to further help conflict management area grow. It is
time to take a step back to think critically about these decades of research on where we
have been, where we are now, and possibly where we should go in future.
Even though conflict management research has gained itself a status of a
well-established academic discipline over the past decades, this establishment process
has been slow and encountered many difficulties because quite a few conflict
management researchers prefer to publish their best work in more prestigious journals,

such as Journal of Applied Psychology, Academy of Management Journal, Journal of

Personality and Social Psychology, among others. Another major obstacle to the
development of conflict management research lies in the subjects high degree of
interdependence on other disciplines. While it is true that conflict management
research should not lose this interdependence as an integral part of management
research in general, the overlapping blurs the boundaries of conflict management
research and, as a result, its distinct models and analytical tools are unjustly attributed
to other competing fields. With limited resources and talents contributing to this field,
the cross-fertilization of research ideas among scholars of conflict management will be
much more difficult to obtain.
The objective of this study is to provide conflict management researchers with a
unique map of conflict management related publications and to describe a systematic
and objective mapping of different research themes and concepts in the development of
conflict management area. This study also attempts to help researchers identify the
linkage among different publications and confirm their positions in their contributions
to the development of conflict management area. The principal methods of this study
are citation and co-citation analysis, social network analysis, and a factor analysis,
which is performed to identify the invisible network of knowledge production
underlying the conflict management literature. The results will be a profile of scholars
and publications that make the most contribution to the conflict management area, as
well as key themes in conflict management area and their relationships.
Studies of academic literature: citation and co-citation analysis
There are a large number of techniques that can be used to study a body of literature.
Most frequent is the simple literature review where a highly subjective approach is
used to structure the earlier work. More objective and quantitative techniques becomes
available for use to analyze author citations, co-citations, and systematic review
(Rogers, 1995) in order to examine the knowledge network embodied in the academic
communication process by means of written and published work of a given field. These
techniques are attractive because they are more objective and unobtrusive (Holsapple
et al., 1993).
Among various methods developed in the last three decades, citation analysis is the
earliest and the most widely used method that can be used to quantify this process.
Merton (1979) claimed:
Citation indexing has been a standard of scientific bibliography for more than a decade but its
sociological and historical research potentials have not yet been fully realized.

Within all academic disciplines, researchers typically cluster into informal networks
that focus on common questions in common ways (Price, 1963), and within these
networks, one scholars concepts and results may be picked up by another, to be
extended, tested, and refined. Therefore, the history of the exchanges between
members of these networks, revealed in patterns of citations, describes the intellectual
structure of a field. When one scholar cites prior work of another, citation analysis
provides a means of documenting this process. Citation analysis is based on the
premise that authors cite papers they consider to be important to the development of
their research. Consequently, heavily cited articles are likely to have exerted a greater
influence on the subject than those less frequently cited.

Conflict
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IJCMA
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236

Mapping conflict management studies between 1997 and 2006

The data used in this study included the articles, authors, publication journals, dates,
and citations. Based on the objective of this study, the authors explored the intellectual
structure of conflict management studies between 1997 and 2006. This study chose this
time period because the conflict management studies of the last decade represent the
most important and the most updated research in conflict management area. Citation
and co-citation analysis is the main method for this study. With citation and co-citation
analysis, this research assumed three phases, each of which required different methods
to examine the evolution of the conflict management studies. First, the databases were
identified as the sources of conflict management publications. Then data collection and
analysis techniques were designed to collect the desired information about the topics,
authors, and journals on conflict management research.
In the second phase, the collected data were analyzed and systematized by sorting,
summing, sub-totaling, ranking, and screening. After a series of operations, key nodes
in the invisible network of knowledge in conflict management studies were identified
and the structures developed. In the final phase, the knowledge network of conflict
management was mapped to describe the knowledge distribution process in conflict
management area. The objective of the third phase research was to explore the pattern
of change in star scholars or publications that have the most influence and, hopefully,
to project future research directions.
For the data presented here, the Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI) was used as
parts of the databases. The SSCI was widely used database, which included citations
published in over 2000 refereed journals. Using SSCI provided the most comprehensive
and widely accepted database of conflict management publications.
Unlike other prior studies, data used in this study were not drawn from journals
chosen by the peer researchers (Holsapple et al., 1993; Walstrom and Leonard, 2000).
Instead, the entire database of SSCI from 1997 to 2006 served as the universe for
conducting the analysis. In order to choose sample articles, this study uses key word
method which utilizes the SSCI database key word search in articles title and abstract.
Using conflict management, conflict resolution, conflict style, and conflict
handling as key words, this study collected 556 journal articles which cited 15,752
published documents as references. The cited publications in these papers include both
published books and journal articles.
Citation analysis
To identify the key publications and scholars who have laid down the groundwork of
conflict management, citation data were tabulated for each of the 556 source
documents using the Excel package. The citation analysis produced interesting
background statistics, as shown in the following tables. Table I lists the most
frequently cited journals of the past decade in the conflict management literature,
among which Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Academy of Management
Journal, International Journal of Conflict Management are the most cited conflict
management journals. It is interesting to notice that the International Journal of
Conflict Management, the journal specified in conflict management, is ranked Number
3, only behind Journal of Personality and Social Psychology and Academy of
Management Journal, and it is even ranked higher than some prestigious journals like
Journal of Applied Psychology and Psychological Bulletin. This confirms the status of
conflict management as a well-established field that already has its own

Journals

Number of citations

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Academy of Management Journal
International Journal of Conflict Management
Child Development
Psychological Bulletin
Journal of Conflict Resolution
Journal of Applied Psychology
Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology
Journal of Marriage and the Family
Journal of Peace Research
Human Relations
Negotiation Journal
Administrative Science Quarterly
Developmental Psychology
Journal of Social Psychology

335
188
160
154
141
140
134
123
88
86
79
79
77
73
71

Conflict
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Table I.
The most frequently cited
journals in conflict
management literature

communication medium, which supports its own knowledge generation and

dissemination process. The general pattern of the most cited journals shows that
conflict management research features general management and psychology specific
journals prominently, alongside conflict management and negotiation specific journals,
with a cluster of peace and conflict resolution as well as family and marriage
counseling focused titles also evident.
The most influential documents with the highest citation and the most influential
scholars were then identified by their total count of citations within the selected journal
articles. As shown in Table II, the most cited conflict management publication between
1997 and 2001 (the first five years) was Deutschs book (1973) The Resolution of
Conflict: Constructive and Destructive Process, followed by Rahims AMJ paper (1983)
A measure of styles of handling interpersonal conflict, and Blake and Moutons book
(1964) The Managerial Grid (see Table II).
Frequency

Full citation index for document

16
16
15
14
14
10
10
9
9
9
8
8
8
8

Deutsch, M. (1973), Resolution Conflict

Rahim, M.A. (1983), Acad. Manage. J., Vol. 26, p. 368
Blake, R.R. (1964), Managerial Grid
Pruitt, D.G. (1986), Social Conflict Esca.
Thomas, K.W. (1976), Hdb Ind. Org. Psychol., p. 889
Hofstede, G. (1980), Cultures Consequence
Rahim, M.A. (1995), J. Appl. Psychol., Vol. 80, p. 122
Leung, K. (1987), J. Pers Soc. Psychol., Vol. 53, p. 898
Pruitt, D.G. (1993), Negotiation Social C.
Van De Vliert, E. (1990), Acad. Manage J., Vol. 33, p. 199
Rahim, A. (1979), Psychol. Rep., Vol. 44, p. 1323
Rubin, J.Z. (1994), Social Conflict Esca
Thomas, K.W. (1992), Hdb. Ind. Org. Psychol., Vol. 3, p. 651
Tingtoomey, S. (1991), Int. J. Confl. Manage., Vol. 2, p. 275

Table II.
Highly cited documents
(Frequency $ 8):
1997-2001

IJCMA
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238

Table III.
Highly cited documents
(Frequency $ 7):
2002-2006

For the second five years, the first two most cited documents were the same as those in
the first five years. The third most cited document was Jehns paper (1995) A
Multi-method examination of the benefits and detriments of intra-group conflict (see
Table III). Journal articles and books combined, the top five most cited scholars
between 1997 and 2001 (the first five years) were Johnson, Rahim, Pruitt, Leung, and
Thomas (see Table IV). For the second five years between 2002 and 2006, the status of
important scholars changed. The most cited scholar was Rahim, followed by Jehn,
Deutsch, Tjosvold, and Johnson (see Table V). These scholars have the most influence
in the development of conflict management area and thus collectively define this field.
Frequency

Full citation index for document

20
18
13
12
11
11
10
9
8
8
7
7
7
7
7
7
7
7

Deutsch, M. (1973), Resolution Conflict

Rahim, M.A. (1983), Acad. Manage. J., Vol. 26, P368
Jehn, K.A. (1995), Admin. Sci. Quart., Vol. 40, P256
Rubin, J.Z. (1994), Social Conflict Esca.
Blake, R.R. (1964), Managerial Grid
Hofstede, G. (1980), Cultures Consequence
Jehn, K.A. (1997), Admin. Sci. Quart., Vol. 42, p. 530
Van De Vliert, E. (1990), Acad. Manage. J., Vol. 33, p. 199
Alper, S. (2000), Pers. Psychol., Vol. 53, p. 625
Amason, A.C. (1996), Acad. Manage. J., Vol. 39, p. 123
Baron, R.M. (1986), J. Pers. Soc. Psychol., Vol. 51, p. 1173
Fraser, N.M. (1984), Conflict Anal Models
Friedman, R.A. (2000), Int. J. Confl. Manage., Vol. 11, p. 32
Hofstede, G. (1993), Academy Management E., Vol. 7, p. 81
Pelled, L.H. (1999), Admin. Sci. Quart., Vol. 44, p. 1
Putnam, L.L. (1982), Communication YB, Vol. 6, p. 629
Shantz, C.U. (1987), Child Dev., Vol. 58, p. 283
Thomas, K.W. (1976), Hdb. Ind. Org. Psychol., p. 889

Author

Table IV.
Author citation frequency
(Frequency $ 14):
1997-2001

Johnson, D.W.
Rahim, M.A.
Pruitt, D.G.
Leung, K.
Thomas, K.W.
Fisher, R.J.
Van de Vliert, E.
Bercovitch, J.
Deutsch, M.
Rubin, J.
Blake, R.R
Triandis, H.C.
Dewaal, F.B.M.
Wall, J.A.
Aureli, F.
Burton, J.
Hofstede, G.

Frequency
56
48
37
34
30
29
22
21
19
19
18
18
17
17
14
14
14

Author
Rahim, M.A.
Jehn, K.A.
Deutsch, M.
Tjosvold, D.
Johnson, D.W.
Hofstede, G.
Van de Vliert, E.
Amason, A.C.
Dedreu, C.K.W.
Fang, L.P.
Pruitt, D.G.
Rubin, J.Z.
Blake, R.R.
Leung, K.

Frequency
50
40
39
30
29
18
18
17
16
16
15
15
14
14

Although citation analysis does not eliminate the bias against younger authors, a
paper-based ranking (Tables II and III) places more emphasis on the quality (as
opposed to the quantity) of the documents produced by a given author than an
author-based ranking (Tables IV and V). In addition, Tables II and III represent
research focuses of the main authors in a field and they indicate the popularity of
certain conflict management topics. Examining this list, the readers notice the high
number of citations of what can be termed field-defining titles, which lay the ground
work for the understanding of conflict management as a distinct field. This list also
shows a close relationship between conflict management and applied psychology,
general management, personality studies, and cross-cultural research.
A comparison between Table II and Table III reveals some important changes in
conflict management research from the first five years (1997-2001) to the second five
years (2002-2006). First, the most influential publications in the first five years have a
relatively evenly distributed citation data, comparing with those in the second five years.
In other words, the citations are more concentrated on a few important publications in
the second five years and their status in conflict management research has been
consolidated. Second, the ranking of the most frequently cited publications has also
changed. Among the top five most cited publications in the first five years, the top two
publications, i.e. the book by Deutsch (1973) and the paper by Rahim (1983), remain the
same ranking in the second five years, yet the other two publications (Pruitt and Rubins
book (1986) and Thomas paper (1976), ranked 4 and 5 respectively in the first five years)
have been replaced in the second five years by Jehns ASQ paper (1995) and the book by
Rubin et al. (1994). This change indicates research interests have shifted to focus more on
group conflict and work performance (Jehn, 1995). Third, Hofstedes work on culture and
cultural differences (1980) has remained one of the most influential publications (ranked
6 in both periods), which suggests that cultural difference in conflict management has
been a popular topic among conflict management studies.
Co-citation analysis
In this stage, data mapping was conducted and the intellectual structure of the conflict
management studies was revealed. Co-citation analysis is a bibliometric technique that
information scientists use to map the intellectual structure of a research field. It

Conflict
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Table V.
Author citation frequency
(Frequency $ 14):
2002-2006

IJCMA
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240

Figure 1.
Core themes in conflict
management research:
1997-2001

involves counting documents from a chosen field paired or co-cited documents.

Co-citation studies compile co-citation counts in matrix form and statistically scale
them to capture a snapshot at a distinct point in time of what is actually a changing
and evolving structure of knowledge (Small, 1993).
Co-citations were tabulated for each 556 source documents using the Excel package.
Many of the authors had very few co-citations and were either unlikely to have had a
significant impact on the development of conflict management area or were too recent
to have time to impact on the literature. To facilitate the running of our analysis and
improve the probability of its success, the authors made sure that all authors in the
final set had at least eight citations in the first five years and seven in the second five
years. Based on the total number of citations in the selected journals, the top 30
scholars were identified, and then a co-citation matrix was built before a pictorial map
was drawn to describe the correlations among different scholars. In doing so, we were
following the procedures recommended by White and Griffith (1981).
Social network analysis technique was used to graph the relationships in the
co-citation matrix and identify the strongest links and the core areas of interest in conflict
management (Pilkington and Teichert, 2006). Figures 1 and 2 show the core research
themes of conflict management studies, based on sampled articles with of the co-citation
in this study sample articles with links of greater than or equal to five co-citations shown
in the network. This was produced using UCINET software (Borgatti et al., 2002) and
shows graphically the core areas of interest. The different shapes of the nodes result from
performing a faction study of these authors. This method seeks to group elements in a
network based on the sharing of common links to each other. The diagram shows that
research interests in conflict management are concentrated on the interactions between
conflict management styles, cultural differences, conflict resolution, child and adolescent
development, and group conflict and performance.
While the diagrams in Figures 1 and 2 are very informative and provide a clear
picture, their focuses are only on the very core areas and a limited amount of data. By
taking the co-citation matrix and grouping the authors using factor analysis of the
correlations between the entries, we can determine which authors are grouped together
and therefore share common elements. The closeness of author points on such maps is

Conflict
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Figure 2.
Core themes in conflict
management research:
2002-2006

algorithmically related to their similarity as perceived by citers. We use r-Pearson as a

measure of similarity between author pairs because it registers the likeness in shape of
their co-citation count profiles over all other authors in the set (White and McCain, 1998).
The co-citation correlation matrix was factor analyzed using varimax rotation, a
commonly used procedure, which attempts to fit (or load) a maximum number of authors
on a minimum number of factors. The diagonals were considered as missing data and
were applied the criterion of omitting two cases (pairwise delete) (McCain, 1990).
Three factors were extracted from the data between 1997 and 2001 and altogether they
explain over 73 per cent of the variance in the correlation matrix. Table VI lists the three
most important factors along with the authors that had a factor loading of at least 0.4. As
is often seen in this type of analysis, authors with less than a 0.4 factor loading were
dropped from the final results (White and Griffith, 1981). We tentatively assigned names
to the factors based on our own interpretation of those authors with high associated
loadings. Our interpretation of the analysis results is that conflict management research is
composed of at least three different sub-fields: workplace conflict and conflict
management styles, cultural differences in conflict management, and conflict resolution
in practice. We did not interpret the remaining factors because of their relative small
eigenvalues, and these factors consequently have been excluded from Table VI.
Figure 1 and Table VI clearly indicated that the most influential scholars in conflict
management studies between 1997 and 2001 clustered together. The first set of major
research topics focused on workplace conflict and conflict management styles.
Workplace conflict occurs when an employee perceives his or her interests as being
obstructed or negatively affected by another party. Putnam and Poole (1987) submitted
that conflict is the interaction of interdependent people who perceive incompatible goals
and interference from one another in achieving those goals. In the workplace, conflicts
center on resource allocations and interpersonal misunderstandings and the desirable
outcome is focused on conflict management rather than on conflict elimination. Van de
Vliert (1997) proposed that conflict management is about what people intend to do and
what they actually do in face of conflict. Although almost an infinite number of conflict
management strategies may be conceived of, conflict management research and theories

Table VI.
Author factor loadings
(varimax rotation):
1997-2001

Van De Vliert, E.
Putnam, L.L.
Blake, R.R.
Bentler
Kilmann
Sternberg, R.J.
Thomas, K.W.
Rahim
Pruitt, D.G.
Lewicki, R.J.
Wall, J.A.
Deutsch, M.
Straus

0.947
0.936
0.924
0.918
0.899
0.850
0.838
0.826
0.790
0.723
0.684
0.677
0.544

43.6 per cent

variance
Hofstede, G.
Leung, K.
Triandis, H.C.
Tingtoomey, S.
Kozan, M.K.
Sheppard, B.H.

Factor 2: Cultural differences in

conflict management
0.954
0.944
0.936
0.917
0.811
0.658

17.6 per cent

variance

Burton, J.
Rothman
Fisher, R.J.
Ross, M.H.
Lederach, J.P.

Factor 3: Conflict
resolution in practice

242

Factor 1: Workplace conflict and

conflict management styles

0.948
0.924
0.832
0.713
0.686

12.4 per cent

variance

IJCMA
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tend to converge on the dual concern model (Pruitt and Rubin, 1986). The dual concern
model is originated from the earlier work by Blake and Mouton (1964) and from
Deutschs theory of cooperation and competition (Deutsch, 1973). According to the dual
concern model, conflict management style is a function of high or low concern for self,
combined with high or low concern for others. Many conflict theorists (e.g. Pruitt and
Rubin, 1986; Rahim, 1983; Thomas, 1992) have used a two-dimensional conflict model to
distinguish among different styles people use to manage conflict. In most schemes, these
dimensions reflect peoples concerns for their interests and their concerns for the other
parties or the relationship. Recent empirical studies (e.g. Rahim and Magner, 1995; Van
de Vliert and Kabanoff, 1990) suggested that a five-style model (Rahim, 1983) appears to
be the most valid. The five conflict management styles identified by this model are often
termed as: integrating, avoiding, obliging, dominating, and compromising.
Based on Figure 1 and Table VI, the topics on cultural differences in conflict
management interest the authors in the second group. Conflict management process is
greatly influenced by societal cultures. Hofstedes (1980) cultural taxonomy has added to
conflict management literature in exploring the way culture affects the conflict
management process. Each of the five dimensions of Hofstedes framework
(individualism-collectivism, power distance, masculinity-femininity, uncertainty
avoidance, and short- vs long-term orientation) has been explored in an effort to relate
them to conflict management behaviors. Triandis (1989) described the concept of
Individualism-Collectivism as the most important dimension that affects social
behaviors across different cultures. Researchers have also explored other aspects of
societal culture and their impacts on the choice of different methods for handling
interpersonal interactions (Ting-Toomey et al., 1991). Leung and colleagues have looked
at the roles of procedural justice, fairness, trait attributions as well as responsibility
attributions in determining choice of conflict management strategy (Leung et al., 2002).
Similarly, Leung (1987) demonstrated a relationship between collectivism and dispute
resolution, claiming that people from collectivistic cultures like China preferred to engage
in conflict management strategies that worked to reduce the animosity between parties
more than people from individualistic cultures like the USA.
Conflict resolution in practice attracts the authors in the third group. Rothman
(1997) distinguished four steps in the conflict resolution process: antagonism,
resonance, invention, and action. Mediation is a common way to conflict resolution.
Perhaps the most studied aspect of mediation is that of impartiality of the mediator. In
essence, impartiality is a matter of the disputants perceptions. Burton and Dukes
(1990) also argued that mediation requires the mediator to be impartial. Also related to
this topic, Fishers study on Interactive Conflict Resolution (ICR) found that few
systematic and comparative analyses exist to evaluate many of the processes that
practitioners claim to have an impact on creating peace in various conflicted societies
around the world (Fisher, 1997).
In the same way, four factors were extracted from the data between 2002 and 2006
and together they explain over 82 per cent of the variance in the correlation matrix.
Table VII lists the four most important factors along with the authors that had a factor
loading of at least 0.4. We also tentatively assigned names to the factors on the basis of
our own interpretation of the authors work and their contributions. The result of our
analysis shows that conflict management field is composed of at least four different
sub-fields between 2002 and 2006: workplace conflict and conflict management styles,
cultural differences in conflict management, conflict in child and adolescent
development, and group conflict and work performance.

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Table VII.
Author factor loadings
(varimax rotation):
2002-2006

Thomas, K.W.
Rahim, M.A.
Van de Vliert, E.
Sternberg, R.J.
Blake, R.R.
Putnam, L.L.
Friedman, R.A.
Pruitt, D.G.
Rubin, J.Z.
Dedreu, C.K.W.
Lewicki, R.J.
Canary, D.J.
Baron, R.M.

0.931
0.893
0.888
0.886
0.874
0.873
0.869
0.844
0.780
0.712
0.657
0.649
0.642

53 per
cent
variance
Triandis, H.C.
Leung, K.
Hofstede, G.
Tingtoomey, S.
Spector, P.E.

Factor 2: Cultural
differences in conflict
management
0.907
0.892
0.886
0.871
0.701

14.6 per
cent
variance
Laursen B.
Aureli, F.
Shantz, C.U.
Gottman, J.M.

Factor 3: Conflict in child

and adolescent
development

0.905
0.843
0.796
0.678

8.6 per
cent
variance

Pelled, L.H.
Tjosvold, D.
Amason, A.C.
Jehn, K.A.
Johnson, D.W.
Deutsch, M.

Factor 4: Group
conflict and
performance

244

Factor 1: Workplace
conflict and conflict
management styles

0.805
0.755
0.734
0.725
0.620
0.552

6.2 per
cent
variance

IJCMA
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Figure 2 and Table VII clearly indicated that the most influential scholars in conflict
management studies between 2002 and 2006 also clustered together. The first two groups
of studies, workplace conflict and conflict management styles and cultural differences in
conflict management, are the same as those in the first five years. Yet in the cluster of
workplace conflict and conflict management, the influences of Thomas, Rahim and
Sternberg are increasing and the influences of Van de Vliert, Putnam and Blake are
falling. In the cluster of cultural differences and conflict management, the position of
Hofstede and that of Triandis switched: Triandis becomes number one and Hofstede is
number three, which is opposite to their positions in the first five years. This may suggest
that scholars become more interested in the concept of subjective cultures and their
impacts on conflict management, as advocated by Triandis, after many years of studies
using Hofstedes framework to explore cultural differences in conflict management.
The topics on conflict in child and adolescent development hold the authors together
in the third group. In the process of child and adolescent development, conflicts are not
necessarily bad. In contrast, conflict is sometimes viewed as prerequisite for close
relationships (Shantz, 1987). The goal of child socialization, for example, is not to
eliminate conflict but to make sure that it serves a functional purpose (Shantz and
Hartup, 1992). In contrast to children who tend to resolve conflicts primarily with
coercion, adolescents favor negotiation, and practice less disengagement and coercion
(Laursen et al., 1996). In addition, even when conflicts occur, they are less emotionally
laden (Laursen et al., 2001), and thus are less contentious.
Figure 2 and Table VII also showed that the relationship between group conflict and
work performance entertains the authors in the fourth group. Jehn (1995) distinguished
two kinds of intra-group conflict: task conflict and relationship conflict. In this
literature, diversity issue receives tremendous attention in the research of group
conflict. Recent studies have examined diversity in both moderated and mediated
models. For example, two studies have found that certain types of diversity are
positively related to task conflict, which in turn affects group performance (Jehn et al.,
1999; Pelled et al., 1999). Pelled et al. (1999) argued that although all types of diversity
may affect both task conflict and relationship conflict, task-related diversity is more
likely to have a greater influence on task conflict than on relationship conflict and that
such diversity is more likely to increase team performance. Similarity, Amason (1996)
argued that cognitive diversity represents the potential for high-quality decision
outcomes. Research has demonstrated that when participants emphasize their
cooperative and interdependent, rather than competitive, goals, they are more able to
discuss diversity in an open and constructive manner (Tjosvold, 1998).
A comparison of Figure 1 and Table VI with Figure 2 and Table VII seems to suggest
that future conflict management research will continue to focus on the topics of conflict
management styles and cultural differences in conflict management, with more attention
shifted to the impact of different group conflicts on work performance and to the
relationship between conflict management and child and adolescent development. In
addition, it is easy to see from the comparison that the key nodes in current conflict
management researchs knowledge network, as shown in Figure 2, are more concentrated
than their counterparts in Figure 1, and closer links have been built among scholars who
are doing research on conflict management. The density of the correlations between
different scholars has greatly increased. With more scholars and more resources added to
conflict management studies, a better academic environment conducive for the
cross-fertilization of research ideas in conflict management field is formed, and conflict
management research will gain more momentum for further development.

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Conclusion
The study of conflict management literature has received little attention in spite that a
great deal of research has been done on conflict management. This study exposes
researchers to a new way of profiling key themes and their relationships in conflict
management area, which will help academia and practitioners understand better
contemporary conflict management studies. Using citation and co-citation data
published in SSCI between 1997 and 2006, this study investigates conflict management
research and describes the invisible network of knowledge production in conflict
management area. The results of this study suggest that contemporary conflict
management research is organized along different concentrations of interests:
workplace conflict and conflict management styles, cultural differences in conflict
management, and group conflict and work performances. Future conflict management
studies will probably continue to center on these topics.
The mapping of the intellectual structure of conflict management literature
suggests that conflict management studies have gained its reputation as a legitimate
academic field, with some conflict management specific journals gaining prominent
status, such as the International Journal of Conflict Management. The emergent
invisible network of knowledge production in conflict management area also suggests
that many of the most cited publications in this area come from non-conflict
management dedicated journals, such as those from psychology and personality
studies, and similarly, some best research on conflict management is published
elsewhere, which may not be very good for the development of conflict management
field. It has to be admitted that academic pressure to publish in established places has
much to do with this phenomenon, but without more and better contribution from this
fields own scholars, it will be very difficult for conflict management field to grow
further in the future. That being said, our analysis has shown that conflict
management area has formed its own knowledge network that supports
cross-fertilization. It is believed that conflict management publication outlets will
gain the popularity and prestige required to establish a better academic discipline
when we learn more about the key themes of conflict management studies, how they
relate, and what they stand for.
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About the authors
Zhenzhong Ma is an assistant professor in management at Odette School of Business, University
of Windsor, Ontario, Canada. He received his PhD in management from McGill University in
2005. Dr Ma has published in Group Decision and Negotiation, International Journal of
Cross-cultural Management, International Journal for Emergent Markets, and Contemporary
Management Research. His research interests include conflict management, negotiation,
cross-cultural management, and organizational behavior and human resource management, with
a focus on how national cultures and individual differences affect the dynamics of group process
and negotiations. Zhenzhong Ma is the corresponding author and can be contacted at
maz@uwindsor.ca
Yender Lee is a professor in management at the Graduate School of Business and Operations
Management, Chang Jung Christian University in Taiwan. His research interests include
technology and innovation management, entrepreneurship, information science, and
international Business.
Kuo-Hsun Yu is a PhD student at the Graduate School of Business and Operations
Management, Chang Jung Christian University in Taiwan. His research interests include
technology management and information science.

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