Christopher Schalge recently completed a dissertation at Sofia University entitled, “Aikido as a Somato-Spiritual Based Praxis for the Constructive Handling of Social Conflict”

Using a battery of survey measures, including the Body Insight Scale (BIS) and the Spiritualty in the Workplace Scale, findings indicate that (1) increases in spirituality and body insight were positively correlated with constructive conflict-management styles and (2) the use of dominating and avoiding conflict styles in the workplace decreased as aikido training advanced. Committee members were David Lukoff (Chair), Dough Oman, and Paul Linden.