©2023 Bill Eddy, LCSW, Esq. High conflict cases usually involve allegations of very bad behavior, debates over who is acting badly, and what should be done about it. They become high conflict because: facts are few, emotions run high, more and more people become involved (who are often emotionally hooked but uninformed), and two opposing sides emerge. The dispute escalates and prolongs without resolution. This can occur in families, in divorce cases, in the workplace, in communities, online, in the political world, and certainly in legal disputes. High conflict seems to be increasing. These cases usually include at least one high conflict person (HCP) who tends to distort information, sees things in all-or-nothing terms, may have difficulty managing their emotions, and tends toward extreme behavior that most people would never engage in. These cases also tend to involve at least one professional who becomes a negative advocate for an HCP. This article addresses questions that all professionals should ask so that they don’t become negative advocates and so that they can calm down and ethically resolve high conflict disputes with knowledge and compassion. Professionals as Negative Advocates Negative advocates get emotionally hooked by the extreme fear, anger, or blame expressed by HCPs and they believe the HCPs’ distortions of information. They are often persuaded to see the HCP as a victim of someone else’s bad behavior, when in fact the HCP is often the primary perpetrator of such behavior. HCPs get it backwards, then they may persuade others to get it backwards. Their negative advocates may have high conflict personalities themselves or may be relatively new professionals or susceptible to the emotions of high conflict people who can be very persuasive blamers. Therapists, mediators, lawyers, judges, human resource professionals, and others are often exposed to such high conflict people and need to be aware of this risk. Negative advocates tend to jump to conclusions and pursue their solutions with an intense passion because they are emotionally hooked rather than fully and accurately informed. Yet professionals are (or should be!) trained to seek full and accurate information before reaching conclusions about what is going on and what should be done, while always keeping an open mind. Unfortunately, most professional training does not include watching out for the pitfalls presented by clients with high conflict personalities. Starting with an Open Mind Professionals (or any people) who get involved in a high conflict dispute should keep their mind open to at least three possible explanations or theories of the high conflict case, which look the same on the surface: 1. That one person or “side” in the dispute is in fact engaging in very bad behavior (Person A).2. That Person A is not in fact acting badly at all, and the other person or “side” is (Person B).3. That both people are acting very badly. Such an open mind will prevent what scientific researchers call confirmation bias (see my article in our February 2023 High Conflict Institute newsletter). Confirmation bias tends to prevent people from asking open-ended questions and checking alternate theories of what is happening. This “confirmation bias” is a well-known phenomenon in which more attention is paid to and there is better recall of information that is consistent with pre-existing beliefs. More weight is also given to evidence that confirms existing beliefs. Evidence and information that does not support pre-existing beliefs is discounted, forgotten, and taken less seriously. Nickerson has referred to confirmation bias as possibly the single most problematic aspect of human thinking because it is so powerful in preventing people from revising incorrect beliefs and assumptions. (Lorandos and Bernet, 217) This is just as important for mental health and legal professionals as it is for scientific researchers. Failure to remain open to alternative hypotheses that are believable (on the basis of prior knowledge) can pose serious risks to obtaining a scientifically adequate answer. This point is just as true for forensic investigators and therapists as it is for scientists. Failure to test an alternative to a pet hunch can lead interviewers to ignore inconsistent evidence and to shape the contents of the interview to be consistent with their own beliefs. (Ceci and Bruck, 80) Young Children: Did That Really Happen? Take, for example, cases involving children. Experts in interviewing children say that several questions should be asked, otherwise the results are unreliable. This was found in a major study of child sexual abuse allegations that sent day care center workers to prison for forty years in the 1990’s. Faulty interviewing techniques were determined to be the cause of their statements and not abuse (and the workers were released). The interviewer does not challenge the child who provides abuse-consistent evidence by saying things like, ‘You’re kidding me, aren’t you?’ or ‘Did that really happen?’ The interviewer does not ask questions that might provide alternate explanations for the allegations…. When children provide inconsistent or bizarre evidence, it is either ignored or interpreted within the framework of the interviewer’s initial hypothesis. In short, interviewer bias can be found wherever an interviewer thinks he knows the answers before the child divulges them. Ceci and Bruck, 79-80. Since that quote was published in 1995, interviewers have refined their questions to be less overtly challenging, focusing on offering alternative explanations. Resistant Children: Alienation vs. Estrangement A growing problem today is when a child resists or refuses contact with one of their parents during or after a separation or divorce. Is it because the child was abused by one parent or alienated by the other parent? This typically begins between about 8 and 12 years of age, as the child’s brain is going through dramatic changes and subject to intense emotional influences, such as an angry parent—which can push a child to resist that parent (realistic estrangement) or push a child to agree with the angry parent to calm them down (alienation) by joining them in disparaging the other parent. In such situations, it is essential that the person evaluating these claims and interviewing the

©2023 Bill Eddy, LCSW, Esq. Confirmation bias is a scientific and psychological term that needs to be considered when anyone is dealing with a high conflict dispute, including professionals and the individuals involved. It basically means that a person jumps to a conclusion about what is going on and then only looks at and believes information that confirms their original conclusion—even when it’s wrong. They ignore contradictory information and interpret vague or irrelevant information to fit into their theory of what is happening. This is why responsible scientific researchers are required to look for evidence that may disconfirm their theory and prove a different theory, as well as information that supports it. Unfortunately, most conflict resolution professionals (lawyers, mediators, judges, therapists, and others) don’t know the importance of confirmation bias and often get their cases backwards when dealing with high conflict people who are often persuasive blamers. This article addresses what professionals and individuals in high conflict disputes can do to avoid confirmation bias, including four proposals to significantly improve accuracy. To give some context, the following three examples demonstrate the serious consequences of confirmation bias. The “Abusive” Father When I graduated law school in 1992 in San Diego, there was a big case in the news about a father who was charged with sexually abusing his 8-year-old daughter. The father vigorously denied this, and the mother vigorously defended him, so the daughter was placed in foster care. After more than a year in foster care while the father’s trial was pending, the daughter finally told a therapist her father did it. After over two years in foster care and individual therapy, the girl was going to be adopted out. Almost all professionals, on both sides of the case, believed that the father must be guilty and were irritated with his unwillingness to confess. Then, shortly before trial, the deputy District Attorney discovered that DNA evidence ruled out the father as the perpetrator. From the beginning, the daughter had told this “crazy” story of a man coming into her bedroom window, taking her out, sexually abusing her, then putting her back in her room. Of course, everyone thought she was just protecting her father, who was an obvious suspect. Except that the girl’s story turned out to be true! Another man was found guilty of the same behavior in the same neighborhood around the same time period with four other young girls. Guess what! His DNA matched the girl’s clothing. This was a case of confirmation bias, which cost county agencies approximately $3 million in legal settlements for how they mishandled the case. Around that same time, the American Psychological Association published a book titled Jeopardy in the Courtroom. They addressed an insidious form of confirmation bias called interviewer bias which influenced children to make false “disclosures,” such as the girl did in the above case. Interviewer bias characterizes those interviews where interviewers have a priori beliefs about the occurrence of certain events and, as a result, mold the interview to elicit statements from the interviewee that are consistent with these prior beliefs. One of the hallmarks of interviewer bias is the single-minded attempt to gather only confirmatory evidence and to avoid all avenues that may produce negative or inconsistent evidence. Thus, while gathering evidence to support his hypothesis, an interviewer may fail to gather any evidence that could potentially disconfirm his hypothesis. [1] Two “Bad” Employees I am aware of a few cases like the following in the workplace, in which a conflict between two employees is assumed to be contributed to equally, so that they both get fired with little investigation. For example, a few years ago two employees started getting into perpetual conflicts. Each complained to their boss that the other was bothering them and starting fights. The boss didn’t have time to figure this out, he said, so one day there was a physical fight and he assumed that both parties must be at fault—so he fired them both! In a lawsuit, it became clear that one employee had consistently bullied the other employee who was a member of an ethnic minority group. The targeted employee complained to superiors, but all that was done was a lecture to both parties equally to behave better. It was unclear who started the physical altercation, but it was clear to witnesses that the situation leading up to the fight was bullying of the minority group member. He brought the lawsuit based on unlawful discrimination. However, the history and inaction of the company didn’t matter. Physical fighting (which they both admitted to that day) violated the company policy, so that the company was allowed to simply fire them both. Case closed. The lawsuit against the company was dismissed. [2] In many countries, including the United States, hiring and firing is “at will,” meaning that employers can fire both parties even if one is primarily responsible for a problem. Bullying is not illegal in the workplace in the United States. An exception against firing at will is when there is discrimination against a member of a group protected from discrimination, such as ethnic minorities, gender, age, and so forth. However, in this case, even though one was repeatedly bullying a member of a minority group, on that one day they both broke the rule about no physical violence, so the company was free to fire them both. This is a different kind of confirmation bias, in which the presumption is that both parties are equally at fault and should be equally punished, when the full evidence pointed to one person. The “Meddling” Mom In 2010, in a small California city, a mother went to court to get a restraining order against the father of their infant son, about 9 months old. The mother said the father was depressed and angry about her separating from him. He had sent her a story he wrote about killing their son. She sought a temporary restraining order that would require supervised contact for the

©2021 Megan Hunter, MBA Workplace conflict is challenging. It requires time, depletes morale, disrupts the workflow, and ultimately sabotages competitive advantage and mission. We typically give up on challenging employees, but what if we knew the strategies that would give them a chance to change? Before I go further, if you’re thinking that not all conflict is bad, I agree. Conflict happens all the time and most of it is managed without negative lasting fallout. High conflict is different because it involves blame, accusations, high emotion, and all-or-nothing solutions, which lead to frequent meetings with human resources, managers, up to the highest levels. People with high conflict personalities (P-HCPs) have lots of dilemmas and complaints that feel life-or-death in that moment. So they react right now because it feels that important right now. Most people stop before they act. P-HCPS don’t. If you’re smacking your forehead yet again wondering why this person keeps doing the same self-defeating and disruptive actions, you may be dealing with someone with a high conflict personality. If you have P-HCPs in your organization, you know how frustrating and time-consuming it can be, and despite your best efforts, you think you’re out of options. That is partially true. The strategies used in ordinary conflict don’t work well in high-conflict situations. New strategies are required but they’re not part of our usual skill set, so we often unintentionally make the situation worse. Instead, try these strategies and see if you can make some headway and gain some peace: Attention and Connection Giving someone a compliment on their shoes or asking how their weekend went can go a long way, especially when combined with a smile, eye contact, and a pleasant tone of voice. Most people are craving connection during the lockdowns and strange times we’ve experienced the past nearly two years, so this strategy works well for almost anyone (we’re all a bit stressed). Note the use of the term “craving” above. If you’re craving connection, multiply that by ten to begin to understand the P-HCP brain’s quest for connection. The HCP brain craves connection and attention, which to you may seem like giving in to them, but it’s not. What you’re giving is a gift that they can’t get on their own. Take the time, make the connection, and be authentic. Do it again the next day and the next. The time it takes has a positive payoff in the moment and in the long run. If they continue to bring complaints and dilemmas, you’ll have a better footing to set some limits and steer them in the right direction. Or make different decisions. Dilemmas and Decisions P-HCPs are stuck in a repeat cycle of dilemmas and crises to which they’re constantly reacting. These aren’t dilemmas about work product. They are dilemmas involving people and relationships — the hardest thing in the world for them. The next time someone brings a complaint or dilemma to you, ask them to take a pen and paper to write a list of options for addressing that dilemma – from the most ridiculous and extreme to the most reasonable and everything in between. This is part 1. The next step, part 2, is vital. Ask them to check each option for these four things and cross out any yes answers. What they’re left with may likely be the least high conflict option. Questions to ask about each option: Does it include blame or defensiveness? Is it all-or-nothing? Is it extreme? Is it coming from emotion? You will have to coach them through this the first few times and remind them to use it every time they have a dilemma. The main issue that you’ll want to help them with is to stop themselves and remember to do this. Their default is to react right away, so you’re teaching a valuable skill by helping them learn to stop themselves, analyze their options, and make decisions about their own dilemmas. P-HCPs want other people to solve their dilemmas, but when you do, it will typically backfire and your best advice won’t be taken. It takes time and practice, and you’ll need to remind each time they come to you with a dilemma to analyze their options. Tell them that any time they have a strong feeling, it’s a sign to pause and analyze their options. This helps them calm their emotions, shift into thinking mode, and gives them control over their decisions. If they ultimately make a not-so-great decision, at least it’s their decision and they’ve had a chance to think about it. Make sure you use EAR (empathy, attention, respect) in all conversations with them. BIFF Response® for Written Communication Again, because it’s hard for P-HCPs to stop themselves before doing something self-sabotaging, giving them a structured method for writing emails, texts, DMs or anything in writing will help. Teach them this simple method for both writing to someone and responding to someone. BRIEF: 2-5 sentences is all that’s needed typically INFORMATIVE: focus on facts and straight information FRIENDLY: use a friendly tone FIRM: close it firmly and if you need a response, offer two or more options for the other person to choose from Everyone in an organization should use BIFF as a matter of course for all email interaction. It calms everyone, whether high conflict or not, but it especially calms and contains the conflict when high conflict personalities are involved, and it saves so much time! EAR Statement™ for Verbal Communication Thinking about craving again, the HCP brain craves three things: 1. empathy 2. attention 3. respect It craves them because it feels lost without them. It craves them because it’s in react mode. It craves them because the feeling is intense and powerful. There’s nothing easier than giving an upset person an EAR Statement. It’s a gift. So, why don’t we do it more often? Because we’re also stuck in our own defaults of explaining, arguing, right-fighting, or we’re simply in problem-solving mode, failing to include