Glossary

Affect labeling:	Describing feelings with words.
Amygdala:	Our threat detector, and it calculates whether a stimulus is to be feared and avoided, or whether something is a reward and can be approached.
Approach-reward reflex:	Humans are hardwired to minimize or avoid pain and maximize reward. If people sense that there is a reward, they will unconsciously and automatically experience an approach-reward reflex.
Attitude:	The way a person expresses or applies their beliefs and values.
Avoid-threat reflex:	Humans are hard-wired to minimize or avoid pain and maximize reward. If people sense a threat, they will unconsciously and automatically experience an avoid-threat reflex. If a threat is perceived, the sympathetic nervous system is stimulated and prepares to meet that stressful situation, including triggering a fight or flight response, as necessary.
Belief:	An internal feeling that something is true, even though it may be unproven or irrational.
Caucus:	A separate private meeting that is held with a party during a joint meeting.
Clean Language:	The Clean Language questioning technique is a method used for seeking information while ensuring that a mediator’s own perceptions, assumptions or bias do not taint the questions posed. It consists of a set of simple questions, asked in a specific way, using the client’s own words and symbols.
Cognition:	Any knowledge, opinion or belief that is held by a person regarding their sense of self or identity, or their behavior or environment.
Cognitive elements:	The six cognitive elements are: knowledge; opinions and thinking; beliefs, values and attitudes; behavior; sense of self or identity; and environment (the physical, social or psychological world in which a person lives).
Cognitive dissonance:	The psychological conflict that results when one cognitive element is incongruent with another cognitive element, simultaneously.
Cognitive consonance:	When cognitive elements are congruent with each other.
Conflict trigger:	An event that results in a sudden and disproportionate emotional reaction in a person. This emotional reaction indicates that something that is of fundamental value to the person is perceived to be, or is, under threat.
Future Focus question:	A question used to generate connections with a possible future perspective. These questions paint a hypothetical, conditional or consequential picture on which parties in conflict can reflect. Future-focus questions change the parties’ states of mind and bring them to a place where they can look at their conflict differently, from outside their current paradigm.
Journey of Inference:	The inner journey a person makes from the time they experience something to the decisions they make based on that experience. This journey encompasses the information they selected during the experience; the interpretations they made about that information; the assumptions they made; and the conclusions they then reached, which, in turn, informed any decisions or actions they took.
Metaphor:	A figure of speech in which a word or phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable, for example, “It is raining cats and dogs.”
Neuro-linguistic Programming (NLP):	NLP encompasses the three most influential components involved in producing human experience: neurology, language and programming. The neurological system regulates how bodies function, language determines how people interact and communicate with other people, and programming determines what kinds of models of the world they create. NLP describes the fundamental dynamics between mind (neuro) and language (linguistic), and how their interplay affects body and behavior (programming).
Paradigm:	A person’s model for interpreting and understanding their world, their role in it and how they understand the roles of others. In NLP terms this is called their world map.
Paradigm shift:	When a person changes their thinking, perspective and understanding about something.
PEP interaction:	The interaction between the people involved in a conflict, the environment or context in which the conflict takes place and the problem presenting.
Position:	The stance a party takes in a conflict. This is the place from where they rationalize their situation, and then act and react. When a party is feeling threatened, the “position” they take will be their way of protecting their vulnerability.
Unconscious:	Any thought or emotion that happens outside everyday awareness.
Underlying interest:	The deep-down need or fear that informs and drives the stance or “position” a party adopts in a conflict.
Values:	A measure of the worth or importance people attach to something.