Superiors’ Conflict Management Behaviors and Its Relationship to Their Level of Communicative Competence

The purpose of the proposed study was to examine the relationship between superiors and subordinates with respect to communicative behaviors. This study focused on subordinates’ perceptions of their superiors’ levels of communication competence; communication competence was studied as a function of the use of the five conflict management styles. In addition, this study addressed the following question: Is there a significant relationship in terms of superiors’ styles of conflict management and their respective subordinates’ perceptions of their ability to effectively communicate? The study was based on the communicative behaviors that leaders of an organization display and their potential to influence the manner in which they are perceived by those they lead. The underlying theories that framed this study are those of conflict management and communicative competence. The results of the study showed a significant relationship between the conflict management styles displayed by a supervisor and how he or she was perceived as a competent communicator by his or her subordinates. The post hoc analyses also demonstrated that there was a significant difference in the subordinates’ perceived communicative competence level of the supervisor between the conflict management styles of competing and accommodating and between the conflict management styles of avoiding and accommodating. Finally, the analysis revealed that supervisors who used an accommodating style of conflict management had significantly better communicative competence levels than the supervisors that used either competing or avoiding styles of conflict management. Discussion of these findings and recommendations for future research are provided. ¿¿¿

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Arts

Level thesis:degree_level

masters

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Communication

Grantor dc:publisher

University of Akron

Year dc:date

2013

Author dc:creator

• Corn, Shekinah

Contributors dc:contributor

• Walter, Heather

• Communication
• conflict
• conflict management styles
• communicative competence
• superior&rsquo
• s style
• conflict management

Statement dc:rights

• unrestricted
• This thesis or dissertation is protected by copyright: all rights reserved. It may not be copied or redistributed beyond the terms of applicable copyright laws.

Language dc:language

English

Repository record dc:identifier

http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=akron1357603526

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:etd.ohiolink.edu:akron1357603526