Roommate Conflicts and Construal Levels

Abstract

Abstract The purpose of this study was to see if priming participants in a low- or high-level construal condition impacted their judgment and likelihood of confronting a roommate on different hypothetical conflict scenarios. Participants were primed using a why/how survey. They viewed eight different hypothetical scenarios, four mild and four severe, and were asked to indicate the likelihood that they would confront someone if those scenarios occurred to them. The hypothesis for this study was that participants in the high-level construal condition would be more likely to confront with the severe conditions, relative to the mild ones, and participants in the low-level construal condition would be more likely to confront with the mild, relative to the severe, conditions. The results for this study did not reveal any statistical significance. Participants in the high-level construal condition had higher ratings of likelihood of confrontation for both the mild and severe conditions which was not predicted. However, with the right amount of time and validation of hypothetical roommate scenarios, this study could take many promising future directions.