The phrase "contrary tendencies" is correct and commonly used in written English.
It refers to opposing or conflicting actions, beliefs, or behaviors. Example: "The company's success was hindered by the contrary tendencies of its two co-founders, who could never agree on a vision for the future."
Late 18th-century Ulster exhibited diverse, contrary tendencies.
There'd be all those alternative pathways to the official ones and to those that made Londoners proud: there'd be quite contrary tendencies….
This interest in the unification of contrary tendencies found expression in two characteristically 19th-century forms: the suite of short pieces (as Robert Schumann's Carnaval) and the symphonic poem, starting with expanded overtures such as Beethoven's Leonore No. 3 and Felix Mendelssohn's The Hebrides.
Processes at different levels of organization, especially, may foster contrary tendencies.
Emerson really means to "accept," as he puts it, "the clangor and jangle of contrary tendencies" (CW3: 36).
Cassirer examines an astonishing variety of textual sources (including both major and minor figures) carefully and in detail, and, without at all neglecting contrary tendencies within the skeptical and empiricist traditions, he develops a compelling portrayal of the evolution of "modern philosophical idealism" through Kant which, even today, reads as extremely compelling and acute.
"If your swaggering about with hairy caps on your heads could possibly tend to put out the fires, even then I should despise you; but … it has the directly contrary tendency … the very existence of a corps of yeomanry in a neighbourhood, in time of peace, has a direct and natural tendency to produce these fires".
In addition, the observed air temperature increased as the sky view factor (SVF) increased during daytime, while a contrary tendency was observed during nighttime.
When Re < 500, the overall thermal performance of case3 is better than case1 but when Re > 500, it displays a contrary tendency.
The crystallinity of as-deposited coatings increased with the increase of substrate surface temperature, whereas the porosity showed a contrary tendency.
The steady-state infiltration rate (SIR) of the control treatment decreased with increasing intensity of rainfall while those of the natural restoration treatments showed a contrary tendency.
