This study aims to derive the major causes of two types of conflicts(relationship conflict and task conflict) in hospital organizations, and to verify empirically whether each cause and some paths of causes has an effect on task conflict and relations...
This study aims to derive the major causes of two types of conflicts(relationship conflict and task conflict) in hospital organizations, and to verify empirically whether each cause and some paths of causes has an effect on task conflict and relationship conflict. Major causes of relationship conflict and task conflict are 5 variables; doctor's authoritarianism, selfishness of occupation group, role ambiguity, work interdependence between occupations, and distorted communication. This thesis attempted to set up hypothetical path, leading to task conflict, and to verify hypotheses targeting hospital workers through two or three theoretical discussions among five causes, mentioned above. In addition, it intended to set up comparative hypotheses related to several paths, and to verify hypotheses through the samples of clinic-class workers and the samples of the general hospital-class workers.
The hospital organizations of research subjects include one public health center, five clinics (over 30 in sickbed), three general hospitals(over 100 in sickbed), one upper-scale general hospital (over 700 in sickbed), and one university hospital, located in Gyeongsangnam-do. This study distributed questionnaire survey papers to 310 nurses, medical technicians, and administrative staffs, working in these 11 hospitals, and collected them. Main questionnaires that are included in task conflict and relationship conflict, and questionnaires that are included in the path were composed of Likert 5-point scale. To collect data through questionnaire surveys, the self-administered method of respondents were used.
To measure the validity of questions, factor analysis was conducted, and reliability of questions, loaded in each factor was calculated. Meanwhile, the analysis of variance was conducted to identify the difference between task conflict and relationship conflict according to demographic and socioeconomic backgrounds. To analyze correlations of cause variables, and relationship conflict and task conflict, the Pearson correlation analysis was conducted, and path analysis was conducted by using AMOS analysis techniques.
The findings of setting up and verifying each hypothetical path model to achieve the research purposes are as follows:
First, as a result of verifying direct effects of factors on relationship conflict and task conflict, hypothesis 2-1(as the selfishness of occupation increases, relationship conflict will increases), hypothesis 3-1(as role ambiguity increases, relationship conflict will increase), hypothesis 4-2(as work interdependence between occupations increases, task conflict will increase), hypothesis 5-1(as distorted communication increases, relationship conflict will increase), and hypothesis 5-2(as distorted communication increases, task conflict will increase) were adopted.
Second, as a result of verifying paths in the hypothetical model of this study, statistically significant and verified hypotheses are suggested as follows: doctor's authoritarianism had an indirect effect on relationship conflict, and accordingly, hypothesis 1-5(as doctor's authoritarianism and the selfishness of occupation interacts with each other, relationship conflict will increase) was verified. The selfishness of occupation had a direct and indirect effect on relationship conflict and interacted with role ambiguity, so that hypothesis 2-4 (as the selfishness of occupation and role ambiguity interacts with each other, relationship conflict will increase) was verified. The selfishness of occupation did not have a direct effect on task conflict but it interacted with relationship conflict, so that it had an indirect effect on task conflict). Therefore, hypothesis 2-5(as the selfishness of occupation and role ambiguity interact with each other, task conflict will increase) was verified. Subsequently, role ambiguity had a direct and indirect effect on relationship conflict. In particular, it had an effect on relationship conflict by interacting with distorted communication, so that hypothesis 3-6(as role ambiguity and distorted communication interacts with each other, relationship conflict will increase) was verified.
Meanwhile, hypothesis 3-7(as role ambiguity and distorted communication interacts with each other, task conflict will increase) and hypothesis 3-3(as role ambiguity and relationship conflict interacts with each other, task conflict will increase) was verified. Work interdependence between occupations had a direct and indirect effect on task conflict. It interacted with distorted communication and relationship conflict, so that hypothesis 4-6(as work interdependence between occupations and distorted communication interact with each other, task conflict will increase) was verified. Distorted communication had a direct and indirect effect on task conflict. It interacted with relationship conflict, so that hypothesis 5-3(as distorted communication interacts with relationship conflict, task conflict will increase) was verified.
Third, the summarizations of the verified results regarding the direct effect of factors on relationship conflict and task conflict targeting the primary sample or the sample of general hospital-class, are as follows: Hypothesis 6-1(task conflict as well as relationship conflict in general hospital-class will be higher than task conflict as well as relationship conflict in clinic-class) was verified to some degree. That is, task conflict in general hospital-class appeared to be higher than task conflict in clinic-class. Hypothesis 6-2(doctor's authoritarianism in clinic-class will have an effect on relationship conflict and task conflict, but doctor's authoritarianism in a general hospital-class will have no effect on relationship conflict and task conflict) was dismissed. This reveals that doctor's authoritarianism has no significant effect on relationship conflict and task conflict statistically. Only some parts of hypothesis 6-3(doctor's authoritarianism in clinic-class will have an effect on the selfishness of occupation, but doctor's authoritarianism in general hospital-class will have no effect on the selfishness of occupation) were adopted. In addition, only some parts of hypothesis 6-5(the selfishness of occupation in general hospital-class will have an effect on relationship conflict and task conflict but the selfishness of occupation in clinic class will have no effect on relationship conflict and task conflict) were adopted. It was hypothesized that selfishness of occupation would have a significant effect on relationships conflict and task conflict, but it only had an effect on relationship conflict. Subsequently, hypothesis 6-6(work interdependence between occupations in general hospital-class will have an effect on relationship conflict and task conflict, but work interdependence between occupations in clinic class will have no effect on relationship conflict and task conflict) was adopted to some degree. It was hypothesized that work interdependence between occupations in general hospital-class would have a significant effect on relationship conflict and task conflict statistically, but it only had a significant effect on task conflict statistically. On the other hand, it was hypothesized that work interdependence between occupations in clinic-class would have a significant effect on relationship conflict and task conflict statistically, but it only had an effect on task conflict. Hypothesis 6-7 (Distorted communication that occurs in clinic-class will have an effect on relationship conflict and task conflict, but it will not have an effect on relationship conflict and task conflict in general hospital-class) were adopted to some degree. Since distorted communication in clinic-class had a significant effect on task conflict statistically, this hypothesis was verified. Meanwhile, it was hypothesized that distorted communication in general hospital-class would have no significant effect on relationship conflict and task conflict, but it had an effect on task conflict.
Fourth, in comparing the results of the paths of effect factors, leading to relationship conflict and task conflict targeting each clinic-class and general hospital-class, two hypotheses were verified. Hypothesis 6-4 (doctor's authoritarianism in clinic-class will have an effect on relationship conflict by interacting with the selfishness of occupation, but doctor's authoritarianism in general hospital-class will have no effect on relationship conflict by interacting with the selfishness of occupation) was dismissed. In addition, hypothesis 6-8(distorted communication that occurs in clinic-class will have an effect on task conflict by interacting with relationship conflict, but such path will not be existent in general hospital-class) was verified.
The verification of the Hypothetical path model has a policy implications as follows:
First, since selfishness of occupation, role ambiguity, and distorted communication have a direct effect on relationship conflict, the selfishness of occupation should be mitigated and roles of occupations should be clarified to reduce relationship conflict. In addition, the prevention and reduction of distortion in communication are required.
Second, in the light of the fact that doctor's authoritarianism through the selfishness of occupation, the selfishness of occupation through role ambiguity, and role ambiguity through distorted communication, and work interdependence between occupations through distorted communication had an effect on relationship conflict, efforts to reduce relationship conflict by paying attention to the interaction of these variables should be made.
Third, since doctor's authoritarianism, work interdependence between occupations, and distorted communication have an effect on task conflict, the degree of these effect factors should be lowered to reduce task conflict.
Fourth, in the light of the effect of selfishness of occupation through work interdependence between occupations, role ambiguity through distorted communication, and work interdependence through distorted communication on task conflict, the efforts to reduce task conflict should be made by paying attention to the interaction of these variables.
Fifth, since selfishness of occupation, role ambiguity, and distorted communication have an effect on task conflict through relationship conflict, and relationship conflict has an effect on task conflict, the efforts to reduce task conflict in view of these effect factors should be made. In particular, since relationship conflict has a direct effect on task conflict, the efforts to reduce relationship conflict are required to reduce task conflict.