Interpersonal Attraction and Close Relationships

1. Interpersonal Attraction and Close Relationships

3. Who do we like? Desirability Contact itself does not produce romantic relationships. Other factors that influence who we would like to date are: Social norms Norm of homogamy: What we are homogamous on changes over time: Religion used to be important, but not anymore. Race is still important, but not as much as it used to be; specific gender-race interactions exist. Social class still a strong predictor; college grads marry college grads, etc.

4. Who do we like? Desirability

5. Who do we like? Desirability Physical Attractiveness Matching hypothesis? (Berscheid et al. 1971) Happens in reality, even though people would actually prefer to date someone more attractive than themselves. Attractiveness stereotype. Social rewards for dating hotties.

6. Who do we like? Desirability Physical attractiveness, cont� What facial features are cross-culturally attractive? Mix of neonate and mature features seems to be the most attactive. Very robust finding across cultures (Langlois & Roggman 1990). For women, large eyes, small nose, small chin, prominent cheekbones and narrow cheeks, high eyebrows, large pupils, and big smile (Cunnigham 1986) For men, large eyes, small nose, prominent cheekbones, large chin, and a big smile (Cunnigham et al. 1990).

7. Who do we like? Desirability Physical attractiveness Why? Neonate features thought to be attractive because they elicit feelings of warmth and nurturance in perceivers Think how you act around a newborn puppy or kitty. Mature features convey power, status, and dominance.

8. Who do we like? Desirability Physical attractiveness, cont� Facial Symmetry Several researchers, most of them evolutionary psychologists, report that people find symmetrical faces and bodies the most attractive (Gangestad et al. 1994). Since parasites and other health conditions can cause dissymmetry, these psychologists hypothesize that evolutionary mechanisms evolved to find symmetry attractive. Recent research suggests a small to moderate relationship between attractiveness and symmetry.

9. Who do we like? Desirability Physical Attractiveness, cont� Attraction over time in close relationships (Yela & Sangrador 2001). As relationship progresses, perceived attractiveness of partner rises, then falls around years 5 through 15, and then starts rising again. Researchers argue that passionate love explains the initial spike, habituation to partner explains the dip, and the later spike due to familiarity and cognitive dissonance. Interesting that the dip happens right around the time that many marriages end.

10. Who do we like? Desirability

11. Who do we like? Desirability Exchange Processes Comparison level: �Am I getting things from this relationship that I got in the past?� Relationships are evaluated as above or below CL; above CL are satisfying, below dissatisfying. Comparison level for alternatives: �Can I do better?� If CLALT low, people usually remain in bad relationships; if high, then people usually leave relatively satisfying relationships.

12. Who Do we like? Similarity Attitudinal Similarity Republicans like Republicans, Bama fans like Bama fans, vegans like vegans, etc�. Why? Shared Activities People who do things together grow to love one another together.

13. Who Do we Like? Reciprocal liking Reciprocal liking: You give love, you get love. Why?

14. Defining Love: Companionate Love vs. Passionate Love Companionate: Passionate:

15. Passionate Love Scale (Hatfield and Sprecher 1986) I would feel deep despair if _____ left me. Sometimes I feel I can�t control my thoughts; they are obsessively on ______. I feel happy when I am doing something to make _____happy. I would rather be with ____ than anyone else. I�d get jealous if I thought ____ were falling in love with someone else. I yearn to know more about _____. I have endless affection for _____. I sense my body responding when ____ touches me.

16. Perspectives on Love: Triangular Theory of Love (Sternberg 1988)

17. Perspectives on Love: Triangular Theory of Love

18. Perspectives on Love: Love Styles (Hendrick and Hendrick (1986) 6 Love Styles Eros: Passionate, physical love Ludus: Love as a game Storge: Slow-growing love Pragma: Pragmatic love Mania: Emotional, rollercoaster love Agape: Selfless, altruistic love

19. Perspectives on Love: Love Styles Questions from Love Style Questionnaire My partner and I were attracted to each other immediately after we first met. (Eros) I try to keep my partner a little uncertain about my commitment to him/her. (Ludus) It is hard for me to say exactly when our friendship turned to love (Storge) A main consideration in choosing my partner was how (s)he would reflect on my family. (Pragma) If my partner and I break up, I would get so depressed that I would even think of suicide. (Mania) I cannot be happy unless I place my partner�s happiness before my own. (Agape)

20. Perspectives on Love: Love Styles Men more ludic, women more storge and pragmatic. Couples show high similarity in love styles. Couples more likely to stay together if high on Eros and low on Ludus.

21. Perspectives on Love: Love as A Story (Sternberg 1998) Love story: Falling in love involves finding someone with whom you can create a relationship that fits your love story. Also, satisfaction in relationships depends on sharing similar love stories. Love stories come from culture and mix with personal experiences and dispositions.

22. Perspectives on Love: Attachment Styles and Love Our attachments that we form in early life can have an effect on our relationships and love styles in adulthood (Hazan and Shaver 1987) Builds on Bowlby�s work on attachment theory. Not deterministic. Attachment styles are cognitive schemes that can be changed, albeit often with difficulty.

23. Perspectives on Love: Attachment Styles and Love Secure: I find it relatively easy to get close to others and am comfortable depending on them and having them depend on me. I don't often worry about being abandoned or about someone getting too close to me. Avoidant: I am somewhat uncomfortable being close to others; I find it difficult to trust them completely, difficult to allow myself to depend on them. I am nervous when anyone gets too close, and often, love partners want me to be more intimate than I feel comfortable being. Anxious/Ambivalent: I find that others are reluctant to get as close as I would like. I often worry that my partner doesn't really love me or won't want to stay with me. I want to merge completely with another person, and this desire sometimes scares people away.

24. Perspectives on Love: Attachment Styles and Love �Secures� characterized as happy and trusting in relationships. �Avoiders� characterized by fear of intimacy, emotional highs and lows, and jealousy. �Anxious� characterized by obsession, desire for union, high sexual attraction, and extreme jealousy. �Secures� tend to stay in relationships longer than �Avoiders� and �Anxious.� Hazan and Shaver argue that romantic love has a basis in biology; romantic love not just a cultural construction.

25. Perspectives on Love: Attachment Styles and Love Recent evidence suggests that attachment styles may be at least partly genetic (Gillath et al. 2008). Individuals with attachment anxiety have a particular genetic pattern related to the neurotransmitter dopamine. Individuals with attachment avoidance have a particular genetic pattern related to the neurotransmitter serotonine. Researchers claim that genes explain about 20% of the variability in attachment style.

26. Perspectives on Love: Romantic Love v. Prosaic Love Ann Swidler (2001): Talk of Love Two conflicting yet commonly held ideals about love among middle-class Americans. Romantic Prosaic-realistic These ideals are a cultural response to institution of marriage. Romantic love - because we need justifications and rationalizations to explain being married to one person. Prosaic love - because marriage (at least ideally) is a life-long commitment; requires rational and realistic approach.

27. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory Evolutionary social psychologists, building on the seminal work of Charles Darwin (1871), have developed a number of theories based on evolutionary theory to predict sexual preferences and behavior. Evolutionary social psychologists begin with Darwin�s idea of sexual selection. Sexual selection based on two interacting factors: Intrasexual competition: Preferential mate choice:

28. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory Evolutionary social psychologists also build on Trivers (1972) idea of differential parental investment. Differential parental investment: Men technically only have to invest a little amount of time (sometimes just a few seconds!) to produce offspring. Women, however, have to at least invest 9 months and then some.

29. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory Based on the ideas of sexual selection and differential parental investment, Buss (1994) develops three premises to develop several hypotheses concerning differences in sexual preferences between men and women. Mating behavior is strategic (but not necessarily conscious). Mating strategies are time context-dependent. �Do I want to get laid right now, or do I want a long-term partner?� Because men and women have faced different mating problems over time, they have evolved different strategies.

30. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory Buss� hypotheses based on these premises focus mostly on What qualities in a partner will each sex desire in their mate. Desires in short-term mating versus long-term mating. Mate-poaching and guarding Buss tested his hypotheses from two main data sources: College students Romantic partner preferences from 37 cultures on six continents and five islands (n = 10,047). Cross-cultural research necessary to truly test evolutionary social psychology claims.

31. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory What qualities in a partner will each sex desire in their mate. Men will be attracted to women who have cues to fertility value (full lips; clear and unwrinkled skin; lustrous and long hair; symmetry; low waist-to-hip ratio; facial femininity, etc.). Men will also seek out younger sex partners, since younger partners have more childbearing years ahead of them. Women will seek out men with a lot of resources and power.

32. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory

33. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory

34. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory What qualities in a partner will each sex desire in their mate. The Gender Inequality Critique (Eagly and Wood 1999) Reanalyzed Buss� data from 37 nations Added United Nations� data about gender equality, income, and empowerment. Found that as gender equality increased, male preference for younger women and female preference for older men decreased. Also, as gender equality increased, female emphasis on male potential earning capacity decreased. All other things being equal, both men and women seem to want a hottie.

35. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory Desires in short-term mating versus long-term mating. Because of differences in parental investment On average, men want 18 sexual partners in their lifetime, while women want about 5 (Buss 2006). Men will seek to have sex sooner than women, since the less time elapses the more women men can have sex with. Supported by Clarke and Hatfield�s (1989) �Would you like to have sex?� study.

36. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory

37. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory Desires in short-term mating versus long-term mating. Because of differences in parental investment, women will avoid short-term mating strategies. However, when they do short-term mate, it will be for resource allocation and mate switching (using a short-term mate as a means to exit a poor relationship). Greling and Buss (2000) found that women thought it would be highly likely to receive resources by engaging in short-term mating. Also found that women thought it would be highly likely that they would have extra-partner affairs when their current partner couldn�t hold down a job or if they wanted to find another partner.

38. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory Mate Poaching and Guarding Mate poaching: 60% of men and 53% of women admit to poaching. 67% of men and 41% of women admit to being successfully poached. Buss (2006) argues that mate poaching evolved because desirable mates attract many suitors, and thus the most desirable mates are already �taken.�

39. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory Mate Poaching and Guarding With mate poaching evolved mate guarding. In particular, the emotion of jealousy has evolved to combat mate poaching (Buss 2001). Jealousy also gendered:

40. Perspectives on Love: Evolutionary Theory

41. Perspectives on Love: Social Exchange and Equity Theory Social exchange theorists argue that people want to be in relationships in which they receive lots of rewards for little costs (Kelley and Thibaut 1950). Equity theorists, on the other hand, argue that couples are the happiest when the costs and rewards that one person gets is roughly equal to the costs and rewards contributed by the other (Walster et al. 1978; Homans 1961). Equity is a powerful social norm. Which one do you think has the most empirical support? Which one do you think people actually prefer?

42. Perspectives on Love: Social Exchange and Equity Theory Social Exchange in Long-Term Relationships Investment Model of Commitment: Model predicts that people will remain in relationships that they are not satisfied with if they have high investment in the relationship and few attractive alternatives to the relationship (Rusbult and Martz 1995).

43. Perspectives on Love: Social Exchange and Equity Theory

44. Perspectives on Love: Social Exchange and Equity Theory Equity in Long-Term Relationships The importance of equity in a relationship changes over time and with commitment (Clark and Mills 1993). New, short-term relationships are mostly exchange relationships. Exchange relationship: Long-term relationships are mostly communal relationships. Communal relationship: People in long-term relationships still care about equity; however, they believe that it will balance out in the end (Lemay et al. 2007).

45. Breaking Up For the majority of us, most of the romantic relationships we have in our lives will end when either we or our partners decide to end the relationship. Around 40% of marriages in the US end in divorce. In the majority of societies, couples tend to separate and divorce around the fourth year of marriage (Fisher 2004). Regarding the dissolution of romantic relationships, social psychologists have focused on The process of breaking up Why break ups occur The experience of breaking up

46. Breaking Up The Process of Breaking Up (Duck 1982) Breaking up isn�t a single event. Rather, breaking up is a process that occurs through 4 stages.

47. Breaking Up The Process of Breaking Up (Duck 1982)

48. Breaking Up Why People Break Up When people aren�t getting the rewards that they think they deserve and think that there are attractive alternatives to the relationship, they are more likely to break up. Even communal relationships will end if one or both partners believe that the relationship has become extremely inequitable.

49. Breaking Up The Experience of Breaking Up The most powerful predictor of how a person will experience a break up is whether he or she is the initiator of the break up (Akert 1998). Breakees report high levels of loneliness, depression, unhappiness, anger, and negative physical symptoms (stomachaches, headaches, etc.) after a break-up. Breakers experience less emotional and physical pain after a break-up. Mutual breakers lead to less emotional and physical pain than single breakees but not single breakers. Women experience more negative reactions to breaking up than men.

50. Breaking Up The Experience of Breaking Up Men and women are equally likely to be the breakers of a relationship (Akert 1998). Remaining friends after a relationship depends on the role one plays in the breakup and one�s gender (Akert 1998). Women are more interested in remaining friends if they are the breakees than men who are breakees. Men who are breakers want to stay friends less than women who are breakers. Men and women want to be friends equally when break-up is mutual.

51. Breaking Up