Relationship between personality portraits of university students and interpersonal conflict resolution strategies: a latent profile analysis

This study aimed to examine the relationship between personality types and conflict resolution strategies among university students. 'Personality' is a stable individual characteristic that provides a framework for explaining individual behaviors, feelings, and motivations. Moreover, the strategies that individuals choose and use when coping with conflict are also closely related to personality. In this study, a Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) was conducted on 975 university students using the Chinese Congress Five Personality Inventory (CBF-PI-B) measure as an indicator to explore their personality subtypes and the Student Version of the Rahim Organizational Conflict Inventory-II (ROCI-II) was utilized to measure the four types of conflict resolution strategies, namely collaboration, compliance, dominance, and avoidance. The effect of personality subtype on each strategy was examined. The best-fit model revealed three distinct personality types among university students: the dual-concern type (283 individuals), the stable type (654 individuals), and the control type (39 individuals). Dual-concern individuals had a stronger tendency to use all strategies than stable individuals and a stronger tendency to use all strategies except compliance than control individuals; stable individuals were more likely to use collaboration and avoidance strategies than control individuals. In conclusion, this study suggests that university students' propensity to use conflict resolution strategies can be meaningfully grouped based on personality type.