Recognizing the challenges that conflict poses, organizational researchers have invested considerable energy toward investigating the processes by which conflict occurs and spreads within a team. However, current theoretical frameworks of conflict contagion posit a static growth trajectory in which members become engaged in conflict and stay in conflict. While this trajectory is certainly possible, the broader conflict literature outside of the organizational sciences has shown evidence for a more varied set of potential trajectories of conflict contagion. To advance theory on team conflict, we integrate conflict research from micro-level (interpersonal) to macro-level (interstate) perspectives into a formal theory of intrateam conflict contagion. Drawing from conflict stage and social contagion theory, we theorize that team members move through three stages of conflict (disengaged, at-risk, engaged) at rates determined by four process mechanisms (faultlines, forgiveness, frustration, integration) such that disengaged individuals become at-risk of engaging in conflict, engage in conflict, then disengage, only to potentially become at risk of reengaging at a later point in time. Using computational modeling, we demonstrate the generative sufficiency of our theory to account for conflict trajectories observed in the broader conflict literature. To facilitate the interpretation of such trajectories, we present a typology of contagion trajectories, discuss the dynamic properties of these trajectories (e.g., stability, bifurcations), and provide implications for future theory building and practice. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

中文翻译：

---

团队内部冲突蔓延的动态系统理论。


认识到冲突带来的挑战，组织研究人员投入了大量精力来研究冲突在团队内发生和蔓延的过程。然而，当前的冲突蔓延理论框架假定了一个静态的增长轨迹，其中成员陷入冲突并保持在冲突中。虽然这种轨迹当然是可能的，但组织科学之外更广泛的冲突文献已经证明了冲突蔓延的更多样化的潜在轨迹。为了推进团队冲突理论，我们将从微观层面（人际）到宏观层面（州际）视角的冲突研究整合到团队内冲突蔓延的正式理论中。根据冲突阶段和社会传染理论，我们推测团队成员会按照四种流程机制（断层线、宽恕、挫折、整合）确定的速率经历冲突的三个阶段（脱离、有风险、参与），从而使脱离的个人变得面临卷入冲突的风险，卷入冲突，然后脱离接触，只是有可能在以后的某个时间点重新卷入冲突。使用计算模型，我们证明了我们的理论的生成充分性，可以解释更广泛的冲突文献中观察到的冲突轨迹。为了促进对此类轨迹的解释，我们提出了传染轨迹的类型学，讨论了这些轨迹的动态特性（例如稳定性、分叉），并为未来的理论构建和实践提供了启示。 （PsycInfo 数据库记录 (c) 2024 APA，保留所有权利）。