Had a very busy day a few days ago and in the process something came to me. I was invited to attend a diversity meeting and later in the afternoon had to do a presentation on how behavioral habits cloud communication. What made the two connect for me was how they work together without our realizing it to create conflict.
I say that because there are six universal “fixed action patterns” that govern a good deal of human interaction. We all use them to make quick sense of the things we encounter, meaning they are a mental shorthand we use without thinking when we cross paths with another human being. They are the need for: consistency, reciprocation, social proof, liking, authority, and a response to scarcity, Rather then focus on all six, the first three are of major significance as the latter three are pretty clearly understood.
Consistency: Implies that once we have made a decision there are internal as well as external pressures to think and behave consistent with that decision. In other words, once we have developed a mental image of a person or 
concept we will work to make our behavior conform to that thinking no matter the situation presented to us. A good example would be that two people meet with the best of intentions and expectations regarding the encounter. If those expectations are not met we may regard the other as difficult when it is simply a matter of different ideas of what should be consistent. This need for consistency is so strong that at times it may cause us to act in ways that go against our own best interests in order to make our ideas match our actions. Again, this is done without our conscious awareness in a large number of instances.
Reciprocation: This is the heavyweight of the six categories because it is found to exist in all human societies. By reciprocation I mean a need to respond in kind that creates a sense of obligation. The example that readily 
comes to mind is my giving a friend a tip as to a course of action. It was given without the expectation of any type of repayment. A few days later, she called me offering to return the favor. I was forced to accept despite the fact it was not expected, because to refuse meant that she would have to provide an even bigger favor to repay her sense of obligation. Can you imagine the unexpected confusion that occurs when the receiving party does not experience that sense of obligation? Or, the return of favor is not consistent with return in kind? Breaking the rule of reciprocation is a major interactional taboo, and the person breaking it may not even be aware they have done so, or its significance.
Social Proof: Quite simply, we use what other people think is correct to determine our own behavior. To explain it I refer to a study where a man was asked to collapse on a busy street and another participant would walk by, look 
at him, and walk away. The people watching this occur all followed this behavior of looking at him and walking away. The same process was followed on another busy street only this time the second person stopped to assist the man by asking if he was alright. A crowd quickly formed asking the same thing. A similar concept is encouraged to get at least one child to speak up when they see bullying, because others will mirror this behavior and establish the norm that bullying is unacceptable
Now that I hope you understand how we all are subject to these fixed action responses, I also hope you understand that we are not prisoners to them. If we know that we have our own set of expectations that may not be the expectations of others, we can work to understand how others may see a situation quite differently. This does not mean we have to agree but simply understand, because that understanding may cause us to at the very least adjust our own point of view or the other to do the same. On another front, it also serves to illustrate the power, through social proof, you as an individual actually have to be an agent of change.