Abstract

The article examines entire dispute courses in family interaction with regard to argumentation. The approach is an interdisciplinary one integrating both linguistic conversation analysis and empirical psychology, and leads to a typology of dispute courses. Research is guided by the presupposition that the presentation of an argument depends on two systems, a cognitive one and a motivational one, and that both systems are reflected in the realization of the interaction.Six types of dispute courses were detected and grouped in the dichotomy of more constructive and more destructive courses where the latter were divided again into courses disturbed in topical progress or disturbed in interpersonal relationships. The types were evaluated through quantitative methods referring to an exhausting coding of the utterances in the material used. Quantitative evaluations yield a synopsis of the different dispute courses concerning the kind of mutual interaction control, the argumentation itself, and the argumentation levels of the participants