Conflict Resolution I

            One of the major goals of preschool teachers and parents alike is that children enter Kindergarten with good social skills.  An area of particular concern is conflict and conflict resolution.  Preschool is often the first environment where children learn to get along with others, with the exception of siblings or perhaps a few friends.  For the first time they learn, practice, and invent ways to negotiate disagreements with other children (Lokon, 1995; Sheldon, 1996; O’Brien, Roy, Jacobs, Macaluso, and Peyton, 1999).  Most disputes among children benefit their development, though some parents and educators perceive conflicts as something to be prevented, avoided, or squelched.   Researchers have found that conflicts are essential for the development and socialization of young children (Periolat and Nager, 1988; Rende and Killen, 1992; Wheeler, 1994; Lokon, 1995; Sims, Hutchins and Taylor, 1997).   While not all conflicts are necessarily constructive, they all help foster empathy or a better understanding of others, which is essential to healthy emotional development, not to mention that their resolution is a necessary social skill at school and throughout life.

            Children begin to develop gender identification and separation around the third year of life (Sims, Hutchins, and Taylor, 1998).  Literature on conflict indicates that females are generally found to use more conciliatory verbal strategies such as negotiation and males tend to use more competitive and aggressive resolution strategies such as hitting or verbal insults (Wilson, 1988; Laursen and Hartup, 1989; Sheldon, 1992; Wheeler, 1994; Sims, Hutchins, and Taylor, 1998).  Vespo, Pedersen and Hay (1995) indicate that gender is not a factor.  There is also indication that competitive and aggressive strategies are more prevalent with younger preschoolers, and older preschoolers more often use conciliatory strategies (Laursen and Hartup, 1989; Wilson, 1992).  Rende and Killen (1992) report that events that precede conflict episodes (antecedent events) play a part in the choice of strategies chosen for resolution.

            Young children acquire gender identification and learn about the roles expected of them as representatives of their gender.  Gendered behavior is learned at a young age as children learn about the world around them and how to behave in that world.  Research on the development of gendered behavior indicates that gender segregation begins around the third year of age. While there seems to be no gender difference in the initiation of conflict, conflict management strategies and outcomes appear to be areas in which gendered behavior is apparent (Vespo et al, 1995; Sims et al, 1998).