Psychology- Relationships

We form relationships with people who reinforce our postive self view by making us feel good about ourselves (operant conditioning) with things like compliments. We may also associate people with positive experiences (classical conditioning).

-Giffit and Guay- warm greeting on creative task

-Cunningham- happy film

-Reductionist- simple reinforcement

-Deterministic- underestimates how much control an individual has over who they are attracted to

-Lott- only relevnat to certain kinds of relationships eg family ones are rarely based on rewards.

-Cannot explain why some women choose to remain in abusive relationships.

This suggests that we view our relationships a bit like a business, we consider profit and loss before we embark on them. Thaibaut and Kelly say we make constant cost benefit analysis whilst in the relationship, if past or possible relationships look more profitable we we leave the one we are in.

-Rusbult and Martz- when investment high but alternatives are few we will remain

-Simpson- how people deal with possible alternatives, one way to deal with threat is to reduce them as a means of protecting the relationship. Rating opposite sex, rate lower in relationship.

-Relevant to many kinds of relationships, considers individual differences

-Simplistic- some people leave with no alternatives

-Selfish- focuses on selfish nature, some people like looking after others

-Individualistic- many relationships are arranged in collectivist cultures

-Simplistic- relationships break down for all sorts of reasons

-Deterministic- over estimates the amount of control a person has over the breakdown

-Indivdualistic- china divorce rate is rare

-Stephens- in poland found economic dependence on each other

-Duck and Lee- there is a process of breakdown, not just lack of reinforcement

-Bias- based on white, middle class, heterosexual male

-It is economic- can apply to all sorts of relationships

-Stephens- in Poland found that people rely on their partner

-Individual differences- people see profit and loss differently

-Individualistic- low divorce rate in China

-Some people leave despite no alternative

-Selfish- many people gain pleasure from taking care of loved ones

Our evolutionary instinct is to pass our genes on to ensure our genetic code isn't lost. Females will select men who are wealthy and ready to commit, males will impregnate as many females as possible as they can never be sure that a child is theirs.

-Clark and Hartfield- students approached strangers ans asked them three things, 50% said yes to going out, 75% men agreed to sex, no women did , only 69% agreed to go back

-Buss and Schmitt- how many partners over next year/lifetime, 8:1, 4:18

-Dunbar and Waynforth- 900 USA ads, 42:25% youthful mate, 44:22% attractive, 34:50% used attractive terms about self

-Gender stereotypes- stating it is natural for men to be prominscuous

-Homosexuals- cannot apply to these relationships as they cannot have children

-Females- some women like to have casual sexual relationships, not just men

Trivers- Women will naturally invest more than men as they can be sure that the child is theirs, men can never be sure so it would be a waste of resources to invest all into a child that may not even carry their genes

-Women are far less likely to have one night stands as they know they will have to invest

-Daly and Wilson- children under two are 60X more likely to be killed by a stepparent, mainly stepfather than by a biological parent, genetically unrelated.

-Animals- there has been support in animals that females invest more

-Sometimes women leave their children, which contradicts the theory

-Sometimes women abuse and neglect their children, little investment

-Gender stereotypes- offensive to men

Bowlby suggested that attachment could have lifelong implications, suggesting we use our mother as a model for all future relationships. Ainsworth's strange situation allowed us to put children into classes.Hazan and Shaver said type A would have the least need for intimacy, type B would have the most fulfilling and type C would be jealous and clingy.

-Hazan and Shaver- love quiz, type B, long lasting (2X) , C and A were vulnerable to lonliness

-Feeney and Noller- B had most enduring, A had short lived and least intense

-McCarthy- A had greatest difficulty, C had poorest friendships, B were most successful at both

-Retrospective- this can make results unreliable

-Kagan- temperament hypothesis, we are naturally either easy or difficult which affects relationships

-Reductionist- many factors can influence how we experience relationships

Moghaddam found that relationships differ between individualistic and collectivist cultures. Individualistic relationships tend to be voluntary, where as collectivist culutres tend to be arranged by family, divorce also carries stigma.

-Simpson- would you marry a person with desired qualitites, 80% men and women said no.

-Goodwin- found 88% support for bride price system in SA

-China- low divorce rates (4%)

-Western parents can still influence children but in more subtle ways

-Goodwin- looked at 70 hindu couples in Leicester and found on 8% had arranged marriages

-Ethnocentricism- assumption that western relationships are better forn being voluntary, when actually non-western marriages seem to be more successful