The Implications of Value Conflict: How Disagreement on Values Affects Self-Involvement and Perceived Common Ground

This article presents two studies demonstrating the implications of having different values (vs. interests) in a situation where people take opposite positions. study 1 examined how people respond to a range of conflict issues that were framed either as referring to conflicting values or as referring to conflicting interests. study 2 used a more immersive methodology,in which participants were led to consider either their values or interests in taking up a particular position,after which they were presented with a confederate who took up the opposite position. results of both studies converge to demonstrate that framing a particular conflict issue in terms of values causes people to experience more self-involvement and to perceive less common ground. this result can be seen as a potential explanation of why value conflicts tend to escalate more easily than conflicts of interests and also offers scope for interventions directed at value conflict resolution. © 2012 by the society for personality and social psychology,inc.