RELATIONSHIPS

Sexual selection  is an evolutionary explanation of partner preference. Attrivutes or behaviours that increase reproductive success are passed on.

Anisogamy - Is the difference between male and female sex cells (gametes). Male gametes (sperm) are extremely small, highly mobile and created continously in vast numbers from puberty to old age and dont require much energy to produce. However female gametes (eggs/ova) are large and are produced at intervals for a limited number of fertile years. So no shortage of fertile males but shortage of fertile females. Anisgomay gives 2 different mating stratergies called sexual  selection. A males reproductive stratergy is to mate with as many fertile females as possible

Inter-sexual selection (between the sexes) - Quality over quantity. Trivers said females make a greater investment of time, commitment before, during and after the birth of her offspring. The consequence of making the wrong choice in partners in greater for women, so they select a  genetically fit partner who can provide. So males compete for the oppurtunity to mate with fertile females.

Intra-sexual selection (Within each sex) - Quantity over quality. The competiton between males to be able to mate with a female.

Research for anisgomy - Buss surveyed over 10000 adults in 33 countries and asked them question about age and attributes they look for.  Females placed greater value on resource-related  charcteristics such as financially stable, abmbiton. Males valued reproductive capactiy such as good looks, young, chastity. These finding relflect differences in sexes for mating stratergies due to anisogamy. Also sexual selection theory. This can be applied to many different cultures. 

Research for inter-sexual - Clark and Hatfield, male and female psychology student were sent out across a campus and approached rhe oppopsite sex and said "i have been noticing you recently. I find you to be very attractive. Would you go to bed with me tonight ?". 75% of males agreed but no females agreed. This supports the theory because women are choosier when selecting mating partners.

Singh studied waist-hip ratio and found the size of the female doesnt matter but ratio of her waist and hips do, ratio of 0.7 is found to be attractive by males. The combination of wider hips and narrow waist is attractive because you see the women is fertile but not pregnant.

Waynforth and Robin studied lonely hearts advertisements in American newspapers. Found that women offered physical attractiveness and indicators of youth (flirty, **** , curvy) whereas men offered resources (successful, fit, mature) and sought after youth and attractiveness.

Ignores social and cultural influences - Women have greater roles in the workplace so it means they are no longer dependent on men to provide for them. Bereczkei said this social changes has consequences for womens mating preference which  is not resource oreintated.

Self-disclosure - When you reveal personal info about yourself. You reveal more usually as the relationship develops because this cn stregthen a bond when used appropriately.

Altman and Taylors social penetration theory includes self-disclosure as a major concept as to how a relationship develops. It is the gradual process of revealing our inner self to someone else. It involves the reciprical exchange of info between he 2 partners. When 1 partner reveals personal info they display trust so to go further the other partner must also reveal sensitive info. So they penetrate more deeply into eachothers lives and gain a greate undertsanding of on another. 

Altman and Taylor said self-disclosue has 2 elements, breadth and depth.As both these increase, partners become more commited to eachother. The onion metaphor is uded to explain this, we disclose alot of info at the start of the relationship but most of it is superficial, like the outer layer of an onion - this is low risk info. Breadth of diclosure is narrow because many topics are off limits in the early stage. As he relationship develops, self disclosure becomes deeper, removing more and more layers to reveal our true selves - High risk info. Breadth is the number of topics but depth is how much you go into them.

Reis and Shaver said for a relationship to develop as well as increase in breadth and deth there needs to be a reciprocity. So there is a feeling of balance. 

Research studies - Sprecher and Hendrick studied hetrosexual couples and found strong correlations between several measures of satisfaction and self-disclosure. Men and women who used self disclosure and believed their partners did also were more satisfied with and commited to their relationship. Laurenceau used a method that involved writing dialy diary entries. Found that disclosure and perception of disclosure in your partner was linked to higher intamacy levels. Increases our confidence in validity of this theory. 

Real-life - Hass and Stafford found 57% of gay men and women in their study said that open and honest self-disclosure was the main way they deepened their relationships. If less skilled partners (those who limit communication) can learn to use self disclosure  then this could bring several beenfits to the relaionship. Help peopel improve their relationships. However this study was only done on gay mena nd women so cannot be genrealised to hetrosexual couples. Also self-reporting may be unreliable because of social desirability biases.

Cultural differences - Tang reviewed research regarding sexual self-disclosure. Concluded that people in USA (indiviualist) self-disclose significantly more sexual thoughts and feelings than those in China (collectivists). Botht these levels of self-disclosure are linked to relationship satisfcation in those cultures. So self-disclosure theory is limited so low ecological validity,

Relationship breakdown is accompanied by a reduction in self disclosure, as partners wrap themselves up again in layers of concealment. However theories of relationship breakdown (Ducks theory) show how couples deeply discuss their broken relationship to save it, the deep feelings discussed may not be enough to rescue the relationship. This challenges the social penetration theory because it doesnt always lead to a happier relationship. 

Alot of self-disclosure reserach is correlational because you cant directly establish a cause and effect.

Shackelford and Larsen found that people with symmetrical faces are rates more attractive(honest signal of genetic fitness) and also baby face (small chin, large eyes) - protective and caring instinct which is a valuable resource for females wanting to reproduce. McNully found evidence that the initial attractiveness that brought that partners together continued to be an important feature of the relationship after marriage.

The halo effect - We have preconceived ideas about personality traots attractive people must have which are almost always positive. Dion found that physically attractive poeple are rated kind,strong,sociable and successful compared to unattractive people. This belief makes good looking people more attractive to us so we behave positively toawrds them (self-fulfilling prophecy).

The matching hypothesis - Common sense tells us that we cant all form relationships with the most attractive people. Walsters hypothesis states that people choose romantic partners who are roughly of similar physicl attractiveness to eachother. To do this we must make a realistic judgment about our own value to a potential partner. Our choice of partner is a comprimise because we dont want to be rejected.

Support for the halo effect - Palmer and Peterson found tat attractive people were rated as more politically knowledgable and competent than unattractive people. This halo effect is powerful because particpants still chose the attractive people even when they knew they ha no particular expertise. This has implications for the political process. 

Individual differences - Some people dont attach much importance to attractiveness. Towhey asked ppts to rate an individual based on their photograph and soem biographical info. They also completed a questionnaire (MACHO scale) - designed to measure sexist attitudes. Those who scored highly on the scale were more influenced by the physical attractiveness. Low scores were less sensitive to the attractiveness. 

Support for the matching hypothesis - Feingold carried out a meta-analysis of 17 studies and found a significant correlation in ratings of attractiveness between romantic partners. High validity because they looked at actual partners which is realistic. 

Role of cultural influences - Reserach shows attractiveness is consistent across cultures. Cunningham found that female features of large eyes, small nose, cheekbones, high eyerbrows were related as high attrcative by asian, white and hispanic males. Wheeler and Kim found that Korean and American students judged attractive people to be more trustworthy, mature and friendly.

Contradiction - Taylor stuied the activity logs of a popular dating site. He measured actual date choices and not merely preferences. Online daters sought meetings wih people who were more physically attractive than them, it seems they did not consider their own levels of attractiveness when deciding who to date.

Kerckhoff and Davis devised a filter theory to explain how romantic relationships form and develop (compared attitudes and personalities ofstudent couple in short and long term relationships). 

Social demography - These factors influence the chnaces of potential partners of actually meeting eachother. Includes location, religion, age, ethnicity, level of education, social class etc. You are more likely to meet people who are physically close, the key beneift of this is accessibility  (doesnt require much effort to meet people who live nearby. Anyone who is 'too different' is discounted as a potential partner. 

Similarity in attitudes - Partners will often share similar beliefs because of the 1st level of filter which has been narrowed down to social and cultural similarities. K and D found similarity was only important for couplewho had been together less than 18 month, there is a need for partners to agree over basic values - this encourages deeper communcation. If similarity didnt exist therlationship will fizzle out.

Complementarity - Ability for partners to meet eachothers needs - one has a trait the other lacks. K and D found this was more important for long term couples  so at the later stage opposite attracts. This is attractive because it gives partners the feeling they form a whole - adds depth to relationship.

Research evidence  - Filter theory assumes that key factors in a relationship change over time, this agrees with most peoples experiences so it has face validity. Winch found evidence that similarities of attitudes and interests are typical in the earliest stages of the relationship. He also found between partners married forseveral years comlimentarity is more important. 

Failure to replicate - Levinger said many studies failed to replicate the orgincal findings that formed the basis of the filter theory, this could be because of social chnages over time and also because of defining a relationship according to its length. K and D said short term is less than 18 months, those who were longer had a deeper connection. You cant apply it to all hetrosexual couples, or any homosexual, or people ffrom other cultures.

Cause and effect - Filter theory says people are initally attracted to eachother because of similarities, Anderson found in a longitudinal study that cohabiting partners became more similar in their emotional responses over time. Davis and Rusbult found romantic partners over time bring thier attitudes in line with each others, so similairty is an effect of inital attraction, not the cause.

Lack of temporal validity - Online dating has reduced the importance of some social demographic variables because apps like tinder have made meeting potenital partners very easy, to tge extent that we might aswell pursure a date with someone outside our usual social demographic (culture,class) than we would say 30 years ago.

Anderson found that similairty increased over time suggesting that complemntarity isnt really a coomon feature in long temr relationships. Gruber-Baldini carried out a longitudinal study of married couples and found the similairtes in terms of intellectual abilities and attitudinal felxibility increased over time over a 14 year period.

Thibault and Kelley said we try to minimise losses and maximise gains, we judge our satisfaction with a relationship in terms of the profit it yields. Such rewards and costs are subjective (what one person considers a reawrd might be less valuable to someone else), also the value of rewards may change along the course of a relationship. Rewards include companionship, sex and emotional support. Blau said relationships can be expensive so costs include time, stress, energy.

Comparison level - this is a way to measure profit in relationship. This is essentially rhe amount of reward you believe you deserve to get. It develops out of our experiences of previous relationships and also from social norms which is reflected in media, books, films. Overtime our CL changes because we have experienced more relationships and more experience of social norms. CL links with self-esteem, low self-esteem will have low CL, someone with higher self esteem will believe they are worth alot more.

Comparison level for alternatives (CLalt) - The SET predicts that we will stay in our relationships as long as we believe it is more rewarding than the alternatives. According to Duck, the CLalt we adopt is dependent on the state of our current relationship. If the costs of our current relationship outweigh the rewards, then altrenatives become mor eattractive.

T and K 4 stages of relationship development - Sampling stage, bargaining stage, commitment stage and instituionalisation stage.

Direction of cause and effect - Agyle said we dont measure costs and rewards in a relationship, nor we condier the attractiveness of alternatives, not until we are dissatisfied with the relationship. Miller found that people who rated themselves as being in highly commited relatonships spent less time looking at images of attractive people, also less time looking was a good predictor of the relationship continuing 2 months later.

Measuring SET concepts - Rewards and costs have been defined suerficially (Money) in order to measure them. But psychological rewards and costs are more difficult to define, especially because they are subjective. It is unclear what the values of CL and CLalt must be before dissatisfcation threatens a relationship, how attractive do alternatives need to be? or by how much should costs outweigh the rewards?

Artificial research - Majority of studies use artificial tasks in artificial condtions e.g. one procudure involves 2 strangers working together on a game laying scenario in which rewards and costs are distributed, the 2 'partners'know nothing about eachother. More realistic studies are less upporitve of SET, ecspecially because snapshot studies cannot account for the properties of a relatonship that emerge overtime e.g. trust.

Clark and Mills said the theory fails to account for different types of relationships , they suggest that exchnage relationships (work colleagues) do involve social exchange but communal relations (romantic) doesnt because they dont keep score of who is ahead.

SET ignores equity/fairness - There is alot of reserach support for role of equity in relationships, so SET is a limited explanation.

Equity means fairness. Walster said that with equity what matters most is both partners levels of profit are roughly the same. This isnt the same as equality where levels of costs and rewards need to be the same. 

According to the equity theory it isnt the size or amount of rewards and costs that matters but its the ratio of the 2 to eachother. (if one partner puts alot into a relationship and gets alot out then it will seem fair). Satisfying relationships are marked by negotiations to ensure equity, the rewards are distributed fairly between the partners.

A partner who is the subject of inequity will become distressed and disstaisfied if this happens for long enough. The greater the percieved inequity, the greater the dissatisfcation. 

Changes in percieved equity - what makes us most dissatisfied is a change in the level of equity as time goes on. In the beginning its natural to contribute more than you recieve but if this carries on as the relationship develops then it will not feel as satisfying as it did in the early days.

Dealing with inequity - The more unfair a relationship feels, the harder they will work to restore equity (strong correlation). The possible outcome is a cognitve one becasue they will revise their perceptions of rewards and costs so that the relationship feels more quitable to them, even if nothing actually changes. What was once seen as the cost earlier is now seen as the norm (untidiness).

Research evidence - Utne carried out a survey of 118 recently married couples, measuring equity with 2 self report scales. The husband and wives were aged between 16 and 45 years and had been togetehr more htan 2 years before marrying. Found that couples who considered there relationship equitable were more satisfied than those who saw themsleevs over our under benifitting. This increases it validity and also it studied real life relationships.

Cultural influences -  Aumer-Ryan found that there are cultural differences in the link between equity and satisfaction. The researcher compared collectivists couples and individualist couples. Couples from an individualist culture considered their relationship to be most satisfying when the relationship was equitable, whereas in collectivists they were most satisfied if they we overbenifitiing. So this is a limited theory.

Individual differences - Huseman said some people are less sensitive to equity than others. Some partners are benevolents (are prepared to contribute more to the relationship than they get out of it) and some are entitleds (who believe they desrve to be over benefitted and accept it without guilt). 

Types of relationships - Clark and Mills concluded that we should distinguish between different types of relationships. Research shows that equity plays a central role in casual relationships, work relations and acquaintanceships. But the evidence of equity in romantic relations is mixed.

Contradictory reserach evidence - The theory claims that satisfying relationships should become more equitable overtime, but Berg and McQuinn found that equity did not increase in their longitudinal study of dating couples. 

According to Rusbult commitment depends on satisfaction, inestment and coparison with alternatives. A satisfying relationship is seen to be profitable if it has many rewards and few costs.  Each partner is generally satisfied if they getmore out of the relationshi than they expect based on previous relationships and social norms. Comparison with alterantives result in people asking themselevs could my needs be better met outside my relationship?, alternatives also include having no romantic relationship. 

Investment is what we would lose if the relationship were to end. 2 types are Instrinsic investments - Things we put directly into the relationship such as money and possessions and also energy, emotion and self-disclosure. Extrinsic investments - Things that did not previously feature in the relationship but are now closely associated with it such as things bought togethe like a house, car, children. Intangible things is shared memories.

Rusbult said the main thing that causes people to stay in relationships is not satisfaction but it is commitment and the reason they are commited is because they have made an investment which they do to want to see go to waste.

Relationship maintenance mechanisms are you would accomodate minor mistreatment by biting not tongue, enduring partners do not engage in minor ***- tat. They will also put thier partners interests and feelings first and will also be much more forgiving. Cognitive elements include people thining unrealistically positively about their parters (positive illusion), they also ridicule alternatives.

Research evidence - A meta analysis by Le and Agnew reviewed 52 studies from late 1970s-1999 which included 11,000 ppts from 5 countries. They found satisfaction, CLalt anf investment size all predicted relationship commitment. Relationships with high commitment was the most stable and long lastig. These fidnings were true for both men and women, across all cuktures in the analysis and for homosexuals aswell - some valdity.

Explains abusive relationships - Rusbult and Martz studied battered women at a shelter and found those most likely to return to an abusive partner had made the most investments and had the fewest attractive alternatives. Recognises that a victim of IPC does not have to e satisfied with the relationship to stay in it.

Oversimplified - Goodfriend and Agnew said there is much more to investment than what you just put into the relationship, because in the early stages partners will have made few investments. G and A extended Rusbults model byincluding investments partners make in their future plans so they commit because they want to see their plans work out. So the original model is limited explanation.

Methodological strengths - Alot of evidnece supporting the model relies on self-report, interviews. However these are appropriate because what matters is te persons own perception of these factors, if you belive you have made a big investment, that will influence your commitment.

Strong correlations have been found between all the important factors of the invetsment model. However most studies do not allow us to conclude that any of these factors cause commitment. It coudl actually be that the more commited you feel towards your partner the more investment you are willing to make.

Duck proposed a phase model of relationship breakdown, he said the ending of a relationship is a process that takes time and has 4 phases.

Intra-psychic phase - The dissatisfied partner broods on the reason for his/her dissatisfaction, centering mostly on thier partners shortcomings. The partner mulls their thoughts privately and may share them with a trusted friend. Weigh out pros and cons and evaluate these against the alternatives, begin to make plans for the futue.

Dyadic phase - There is a series of confrontations overtime, the relationship is discussed and dissatisfactions are aired. The 2 possible outcomes are a determination to continue breaking up or a renewed desire to repair it.

Social phase - The break up is made public, mutual friends find they are forced to choose sides. Gossip is traded and encouraged.Some friends will provide reinforcement and reassurance, others willbe judgmental and place the blame on one partner or the other, some may hasten the breakup by providing previously secret info. This is usually the point of no reurn.

Grave-dressing phase - This is the aftermath of the breakup. The person may tell a favourable story about the breakdown forpublic consumption, this allows the partners to mantain a positive reputation, usually at the expense of the other partner. La Gaipa said it is crucial eachpartner tries to retain some social credit, by blaming cirumstances or others just not themselves. They also create a rivate story which may be different from the public one. Traits you once found attractive are now reinterpreted in a much negative fashion. On the other hand some exes may admit they werent compatible. 'its time to move on'

Incomplete - Rollie and Duck said the original model described is oversimplified, they added a 5th phase called the resurrection phase, exes turn their attention to future relationships using experience learnt from their previous ones. They also said that progression from one phase to the next in not inevitable, it is possible to return to an earlier point in the process at any phase. The new model also empahsises the processes that occur in the relationship breakdown.

Methodological issues - Most of Ducks research is retrospective, so participants recall may not be accurate or reliable, ecspecially the very early stages of the relationship which tend to be ignored. It is almost impossible to study this phase (when probelms first appear), researchers are reluctant to study this because thier involvement coukd make things worse. So Ducks model is an incomplte description to how relationships end.

Real-life applications - This model also suggest various ways of reversing a breakup. It recognises that different repair stratergies are more effective at particular points  than others. Duck recommends that people in the intra-psychic phase are encouraged to focus on the postive aspects of thier partner. The dyadic phase you should focus on improving your communication skills. Neither of these stratgeries is likely to be much use in the later stages. This could be used in relationship counselling.

Description rather than explanation - Ducks model is less successful as an explanation of why breakdowns occur. Flemlee's fatal attraction hypothesis argues that causes of relationship breakdown can be found in the attractive quaities that bought the partners together. 

Cultural bias - Based on western cultures. Moghaddam said relationships in individulist countries are generally voluntary and frequently come to an end. In collectivist cultures relationships are more likely to be obligatory, less easy to end. So very unlikely that process of relationship breakdown is identical across cutures.

Reduced cues thoery -  Sproull and Kiesler - CMC relationships are less effective thand FTF ones becaome they lack many cues we dpend on in FTF incl non verbalc cues such as phsyical appearance and also our emotionals states such as facial experessions, tone of voice - this reduces de-individuation and this encourages disinhibiton in relating to others. So virtual relations are likely to be more blunt and aggressive this may make people reluctant to self-disclose. 

The hyperperpersonal model - Walther said online relationships can be more personal that FTF ones. Because CMCs develop quickly since self-disclosure happens earlier, they can also end more quickly because excitement level of the interaction insnt matched by the level of trust. Cooper and Sportolari call this the boom and bust phenomenom. A key feature of self-disclosure is that people have more time to manipulate their online image, Walther calls this selective self-presentation, people online have more control over what to disclose and the cues they send, so they can easily manipulate self-disclosure to promote intimacy. Bargh said when your aware other people dont know your identity, you feel less accountable for your behaviour, so anonimity promotes self-disclosure.

Mckenna and Bargh said a advantage of CMC is the absense of gating (obstacle of formation of relationships e.g. social anxiety, physical attractivess), this allows online relationships to get off the ground quicker, so self-disclosure becomes more deeper and frequent. This is because online you are more focused on what the person is saying than what they look like or sound like. Absense of gating means people are free to create online identities that they could never manage FTF. e.g intorverts become extroverts. 

It is wrong to sugest that non-verbal cues are entirely missing from CMC, Walther and Tidwell said people use other cues such as style and timing of their messages, acorstics (LOL) and emojis are used as effective substitutes of facial epressions and tone of voice. The success of online communications is difficult for reduced cues theory to explain.

The hyperpersonal model says people self-dislcose in ways which are sometimes of hyperhonest or hyperdishonest. Whitty and Joinson summaried evidence to show this is the case e.g. questions asked in online discussions tend to be very direct, initmate whereas FTF convos are small talk. The responses are also direct and to the point. Supports the fact that the way we self-disclose in a relationship is to present ourselves in a postive light.

Support for absense of gating - McKenna and Bargh looked at CMC used by lonely and anxious people and found that they were able to express their true selves more than in FTF situations. 70% of romantic relationships that initially formed online survived more than 2 years, higher than relationships formed in the offline world.

The majority of relationships, especially romantic relationships, do not take place entirely online, but rather are a mixture of FtF and CmC, reducing the deindividuation effect required for the reduced cues and hyper personal theories.

The relevance of research into CmC relationships changes rapidly as more technology is released and the way that we interact with technology changes. Much of the research cited in this article took place before the year 2000. The way we interact with people over facetime, emoticons and tindercould be completely different to the technologies which were the inspiration for the theories outlined here.

McCutcheon developed te celebrity attitude scale which was used in a alrge scale study by Maltby, he identified 3 levels of parasocial relationship: 1) Entertainment-social - The least intense level of celebrity relationship. Celebrities are veiwed as sources of entertainment and fuel for social interaction. Giles found that parasocial relationships were a fruitful source of gossip in offices. 2) Intense-personal - An intermediate level which reflects which reflects a greater personal involvment with a celebrity. Might have obsessive thoughts and intense feelings. 3) Borderline pathological - Strongest level which features unctrollable fantasies and extreme behaviours.

The absorption-addiction model - McCutcheon explains tendency to form parasocial relationsips because of deficiencies people have in their own lives e.g. lack of fulfillmentin thier everyday relationsips. So a PR allows them to escape from reality. The AAM has 2 components: 1) Absorption - Seeking fulfilmentin celebrity worship motivates the individual to focus their attention on the celeb, beocmes pre-occupied in their existence and identify with them. 2) Addiction - The individual needs to sustain their commitment to the relationship by feeling a stronger and closer involvement, leads to extreme behaviours such as stalking or delusional thinking,

The attachment theory  - Bowlbys theory suggets that early childhood difficulties may lead to emotional troubles later on, insecure avoidant and resistant are attachment types associated with unhealthy emotional development. Insecure-resistant are the most likly to form PR because they need to have unfulfiled needs met, but in a relationship that isnt accompanied by the threat of rejevtion, dissappointment that real life ones bring.  

Support of AAM - Maltby investigated link between celebrity worship and body image in males and females between 14 to 16, females reported an intense-personal PR with a female celebrity whose body shape they admired, reserachers found these teens had poor body image, and this may lead to development of eating disorder such as anorexia. He also linked entertainment-social to extraverted traits, intense-personal to with neurotic traits and borderline-pathological with psychotic traits.

McCutcheon measured attachment types and celebrity attitues in 299 ppts, they found ppts with insecure were no more likely to form PR than secure attachments. This raises doubts about the validity of attachment theory.

Methodological issues -  Most studies use self-report to collect data e.g. online questionnaires but this can result in bias becasue people may respond in ways to enhance their social status. Most studies use correlational analysis e.g. an intense-personal PR causes young women to have poor body image is unwarranted, it could be young women who already have ppor body image are drwan to intense perosnal worship of an admired celeb, this issue of cause and effect can be addressed by longitudinal studies but this is lacking in this field.

Problems with AAM - It has been criticed of being a better description and not an explanation e.g it does not explain how charcteristics of those who are absorbed and addicted develop.

Cultural influence - Schmid and Klimmt reported that forming a parasocial relation ship with Harry Potter is not culturally specific, using an online questionnaire they found similar levels of PR in indvidualist and collectivist culture.