from the American Psychological Association

as seen in the MHIR DEI weekly update

When and how to engage constructively in family arguments during the holidays

Here are some things to keep in mind before you decide to dive into a brewing conflict and take sides.

By TaNoah MorganLast updated: November 21, 2023

During the holidays, when some of us are spending time with family members with whom we may have sharply conflicting views—whether related to politics or the pandemic—it’s easy for conflict to come to the table.

Some of this may be because stress is at an all-time high throughout the country: Nearly 7 in 10 adults (68%) said that the future of our nation is a significant source of stress in their lives, according to APA's 2023 APA Stress in America survey. Other big sources of stress included violence and crime, the U.S. debt, mass shootings, social divisiveness and health care.

“The hyperpartisanship in our politics has led to a divisiveness in the country that hasn’t been seen since the Civil War and Jim Crow years,” said Carolyn J. Lukensmeyer, PhD, executive director of the National Institute for Civil Discourse (NICD). “It’s like a virus. It’s in our places of worship, where we work, in our families.”

What’s more, the holidays are often stressful anyway, as people feel burdened amid limited time and resources. Family gatherings are supposed to bring comfort.

With that in mind, APA offers a few things to keep in mind as you decide whether you want to approach touchy subjects—be they politics or personal—at all.

• Examine your motives and goals. If conflict arises, one way to set the tone for positive discourse is to check one’s motives. Norman Epstein, PhD, a professor in the department of family science at the University of Maryland College Park who specializes in family relationships, said the motivation behind such conversations is often just as important as the conversation itself. If your goal is winning an argument or proving yourself right and another wrong, for example, you’ve already lost, he said. “What do you want to remember—that it was nice to be with family, or that you had a knock-down drag-out fight with someone?” he said. “You want the engagement to be something that contributes to your relationship in a positive way.”
• Focus on understanding how or why that person came to have their point of view. “The point is to leave that conversation with more understanding of them as a person and human being,” Lukensmeyer said. “When that happens, more conversation does occur."
• Fight fair. These “fair fighting” tips from the University of Texas at Austin Counseling and Mental Health Center are important to keep in mind when approaching the conversation: stick to one issue at a time; state the issue clearly and stick to facts; use “I” statements to express your own feelings and avoid “you” statements that assign blame; invite the other person to share his or her point of view; listen and be careful not to interrupt; and try to see things from the other person’s perspective.
• Avoid directly attacking others. “Fighting fair is being respectful,” Epstein said. “Unfortunately in the national news, we see this model of having conflict in a disrespectful way. One of the most important things kids can learn is you can have conflict where you disagree but don’t put the other person down. Disagreeing about a topic, but not disrespecting the person: That’s one of the things kids and adults need to learn.”
• Take a different approach. Sometimes it’s clear that a topic is too touchy, and that even the best intentions of managing difficult family conversations won’t help. That doesn’t mean we can’t still engage at some level. NICD offers a series of videos, key principles, and best practices for having conversations with those who have a different perspective, through its Engaging Differences program.
• Agree to disagree. Conflict is an essential part of life. It happens in every relationship, and is so much a part of our democratic process that it’s literally written into the U.S. Constitution. That means we can’t solve all the country’s problems—or our family’s—over dinner. But that doesn’t mean, on an individual level, that we can’t or shouldn’t attempt to work through our disagreements, walk away with greater understanding, and build a stronger relationship in the process. “We want people to be able to have quality conversation that eventually finds some area of agreement, and can agree to disagree without being disagreeable,” Lukensmeyer said. “In order for our democracy to thrive and evolve, we have to be able to be in conflict and still find compromise to move us forward.”