Transcript Social Psychology

1
Social Psychology
Attraction and Intimacy
December 2, 2008
Prof. Weiser
Curry College
2
Abraham Maslow
(1908-1970)
“I may say that (being in) love, in a
profound but testable sense, creates
the partner. It gives him a self-image, it
gives him self-acceptance, a feeling of
love-worthiness, all of which permit
him to grow. It is a real question
whether the full development of the
human being is possible without it.”
3
What we will discuss…
• Close Relationships and Health
• Rejection and the Non-development of Relationships
• Important Factors in Attraction
–
–
–
–
–
–
Balance Theory
Proximity
Attitude Similarity
Reward Theory of Attraction
Physical Attractiveness
Evolutionary Theory
• Romantic Love
– Measuring Love
– Passionate Love and Companionate Love
– Attachment and Relationships
• Relationship Dissolution
– Boston Couple’s Study
– The Virginia Study
4
Close Relationships and Health
• Numerous studies over the years have shown
that close relationships predict health
– Health risks are greater among lonely people
– Those with strong social support networks tend to be
healthier and are less likely to die prematurely,
compared to those with few social ties
– Loss of social ties, especially if it occurs suddenly,
heightens risk of disease and illness
5
Cohen et al.
(2003)
After receiving a cold
virus injection, highly
sociable people were
less vulnerable to
catching a cold
6
Close Relationships and Longevity
• Berkman & Syme (1979) The Bay Area Study
– Sample of Oakland men (n = 2,229) and women (n = 2,496)
between ages 30-69, interviewed in 1969 and asked about
their social networks and health habits
– Researchers contacted this sample in 1974
– By that time, 682 of the sample had died
– Males with weak social ties were 2.3 times more likely to have
died by 1974 than those with substantial social ties; for women
lacking social ties, the number was 2.8
– Researchers controlled for SES, obesity, exercise, smoking,
drinking, etc.
7
Broken Heart Effect
• The Broken Heart Effect
– Numerous studies have shown that likelihood of
death increases following the death of a spouse or
long-term companion
8
Broken Heart Effect
• Rees & Lutkins (1967)
– 12.2% of sample of bereaved spouses died within
one year of the death of their spouse, compared to
only 1.2% death rate of nonbereaved spouses
• Kaprio, Koskenvuo, & Rita (1987)
– In a study of 96,000 newly widowed Finnish people,
they found that risk of death doubled in the week
following their partner’s death
Rejection and the Non-development
of Relationships
•
Unfortunately, relationships sometimes fail to
develop because people are rejected by
others. We humans can be so cruel.
– Two kinds of rejection we will discuss:
1. Unrequited love
2. Ostracism
9
10
Unrequited Love
The “Let’s Just Be Friends” Phenomenon
• Unrequited love occurs when one’s love for another
person is not reciprocated (spurned)
– Baumeister, Wotman, & Stillwell (1993)
• 92.8% of subjects (college students) reported at least one
instance of unrequited love during last 5 years
– Men fell in love faster
– Women were more likely to be “rejectors”
– Both “suitors” and “rejectors” felt bad about the spurning
– Thus, even though unrequited love does hurt, the one who
does the rejecting doesn’t necessarily gloat nor feel good
about it either
11
Ostracism
• Ostracism is ignoring or excluding somebody. It
can be either:
– Deliberate
• e.g., your boyfriend won’t talk to you or return your phone
calls after an argument
– Role-prescribed
• Having a job (e.g., janitor, busboy) or some other “social
role” in which it is unexpected or inappropriate that other
people acknowledge your existence
12
Reactions to Ostracism
1. Increased stress
•
Subjects ignored in a laboratory task (e.g., ignored
by two confederates while playing a ball tossing
game ) show heightened levels of physiological
reactivity and negative affect
2. Attempts to improve inclusionary status
•
Williams, Cheung, & Choi (2000)
– Subjects deliberately excluded in a “cyberball” game
later showed more conformity on an Asch-like conformity
task, compared to non-excluded subjects
13
Reactions to Ostracism
3. Heightened aggression
•
Twenge, Baumeister, Tice, & Stucke (2001)
– The Lonely Future Study (text, p. 383)
•
Leary, Kowalski, et al. (2003)
– In 13 of 15 school shootings since 1995, shooters had
either been ostracized by others or romantically rejected
•
Point: Being rejected hurts. And it hurts like hell.
14
Important Factors in Attraction
15
Balance Theory
(Heider, 1958)
• Balance theory is concerned with the relations between
two people, and each of their sentiments toward a third
party.
– Specifically,
• P = person
• O = other person
• X = third party or thing
– Relations (sentiments) among these three things that result in
a positive emotional state is balanced. However, sentiments
among these three elements resulting in a negative emotional
state is said to be imbalanced.
16
Balance Theory
Relations (sentiments) between P-O-X can be either balanced
or imbalanced. If they are imbalanced, it tends to motivate P
to make efforts to make the relations balanced.
17
Balance Theory
Balanced States
Imbalanced States
18
Proximity
• Proximity (geographical nearness) is of paramount
importance in interpersonal attraction.
– Your closest friends here at Curry are probably people who
live on your dorm floor, or who sit close to you in class.
– Your friends from childhood probably lived close to where you
lived.
– Your high school sweetheart likely resided within a few blocks
of where you resided.
19
Proximity
• Festinger, Schachter, & Back (1950)
– Studied patterns of friendships among residents in a married
student housing complex
20
Proximity
• Festinger, Schachter, & Back (1950)
21
Proximity
• Segal (1974)
– Maryland police cadets asked to name their three closest
friends they had made while at the training academy
– Amazingly, 45% of those surveyed indicated that one of their
friends was a person whose sir name was next to their sir
name on the alphabetical list!
• Rose (1984)
– College girls indicate that the biggest reason for their past
friendships ending was lack of physical proximity (e.g.,
moving away to college)
• Weiser (2004)
– Email helpful for college women to maintain long-distance
friendships, but not helpful for men
22
Proximity
• Why does proximity lead to liking?
– One reason, obviously, it that it gives us more
opportunities to interact with someone
– Also, if we have a new neighbor or coworker, we
usually anticipate some kind of interaction with that
person at some point
• Anticipated interaction leads to liking
– And, as we talked about earlier this semester, we
tend to like things the more we are exposed to them
• Mere exposure effect
23
Anticipation of Interaction
• Research shows that merely anticipating
interaction with somebody boosts liking for that
person
– Darley & Berscheid (1967)
• Gave university women ambiguous information about two
other women, one of who they expected to meet for a later
discussion
• Asked how much they liked each one, the women
preferred the person who they expected to meet
24
Mere Exposure Effect
(Zajonc, 1968)
• The tendency to gradually come to like something the more we are
exposed to it. “See it, like it.”
25
Mere Exposure Effect
• Numerous studies have shown that people like better
letters that appear in their own name
• The mere exposure effect occurs even when we are
unaware of what we’ve been exposed to
– Kunst-Wilson & Zajonc (1980)
• Polygon study
– Wilson (1979)
• Novel melody study
• We even like ourselves better when we are the way we
are used to seeing ourselves
– Mita, Dermer, & Knight (1977)
• Photographed students liked their mirror images better than their
actual image (i.e., how we actually look to people, as on a photograph)
26
Attitude Similarity
• Although many people think that “opposites attract,”
this is simply not so
– We are attracted to others whose attitudes are similar to our
own, and we are repulsed by those whose attitudes are
dissimilar to our own
– Attitude similarity = attraction
– In other words, birds of the same attitudinal feather flock
together
27
Attitude Similarity
• The Bogus Stranger Paradigm
– Subject fills out a survey about likes and dislikes.
– Later, subject reads another survey that he thinks was filled
out by another person. Actually, it was surreptitiously filled out
by the experimenter.
– This other survey is filled out in a way such that the “bogus
stranger” appears to be either very similar (or dissimilar) to
the subject regarding likes and dislikes.
– Subject then indicates how much he likes this bogus stranger.
– Dozens of studies in the 1960s and early 1970s using this
technique found greater similarity produced greater attraction
to the bogus stranger.
28
Attitude Similarity
• As the proportion of similar attitudes (x) between you and another
person increases, liking (y) increases in a linear fashion
Liking (y)
From Byrne (1971)
Proportion of Similar Attitudes (x)
29
Attitude Similarity
• Byrne, Ervin, & Lamberth (1970)
– A real-life version of the bogus stranger technique
– College men matched with either similar or dissimilar coed
(based on survey of likes and dislikes) for a brief blind date.
– These matched students go on a 30-minute “Coke date.”
– Similar pairs (compared to dissimilar pairs) sat and walked
closer to each other while on the date.
30
The Repulsion Hypothesis
• Although attitude similarity does increase liking, attitude
dissimilarity leads strongly to disliking
• This is called the repulsion hypothesis (Rosenbaum, 1986)
– When we meet someone for the first time, we seem to expect
that his or her attitudes will be similar to ours (false consensus
bias). Thus, discovering that the person does, in fact, have
similar attitudes does not really do that much for us.
– But, finding that the person has dissimilar attitudes is much
more “potent” and thus carries more weight in our perception of
the person
– Rokeach (1968)
• Whites showed more liking for, and more of a willingness to work with, a
like-minded Black person than an attitudinally-dissimilar White person
31
Reward Theory of Attraction
• We tend to like those who in some way reward us or
whom we associate with rewards (pleasant experiences
or feelings )
– Berscheid, Walster, & Hatfield (1969)
• Students reported greater liking for another student who claimed to like
them
– Aronson & Linder (1965)
• College women overhear an evaluation of themselves by another student
(target)
• The target was most well-liked when her evaluation gradually went from
negative to positive (vs. consistently positive or consistently negative)
– Lewicki (1985) Big Glasses Study
• Liking by association (see figure 11.6)
32
Physical Attractiveness
If they are pretty are they better?
33
Physical Attractiveness
• Hatfield (Walster), Aronson, Abrams, & Rottman (1966)
– The Computer Dance Study (text, p. 391)
• Landy & Sigall (1974)
– College men read poorly written essay with a photo of either attractive or
unattractive girl attached
– Men gave higher grades to essay if attached photo was of attractive (vs.
unattractive) girl
• Clifford & Walster (1973)
– Gave 5th grade teachers identical information about a student, but with the
photo of an attractive or unattractive child attached
– Teachers rated the attractive children more favorable than the unattractive
children
34
Physical Attractiveness
• Roszell, Kennedy, & Grabb (1990)
– Looked at the incomes of a sample of people previously rated on a 1 to 5
scale of looks
– Each additional scale unit of rated attractiveness equated to an additional
$1,998 annually
• Frieze, Olson, & Russell (1991)
– Rated the looks of 737 MBA graduates on 1 to 5 scale, then determined
their incomes
– Each additional scale unit of rated attractiveness equated to an added
$2,600/year for men and $2,150/year for women
•
Sigall & Landy (1973)
– Men accompanied by physically attractive females were rated more
favorably than if accompanied by females “made to look unattractive”
– Beauty apparently has a “radiating effect”
35
Physical Attractiveness
• Why do we like physically attractive people so
much?
– Dion, Berscheid, & Hatfield (1972)
• Most people possess a physical attractiveness stereotype
• The physical attractiveness stereotype can be summarized as
follows: What is beautiful is good
• Bottom line: Looks matter. And they matter a lot.
36
Physical Attractiveness
• Not everybody ends up paired with somebody
attractive
– Instead, we usually pair off with people who are
about as attractive as we are; this is called the
matching hypothesis
– Presumably, people who are similar in terms of looks
are more likely have successful, satisfying, and
lasting relationships
• White (1980)
– In a study of UCLA dating couples, those who were most similar in
physical attractiveness were most likely, 9 months later, to have
fallen deeply in love
37
Lovers come to resemble each other…
• Zajonc, Adelmann, Niedenthal, & Murphy (1987)
– Subjects were presented with a random array of facial photos
and then asked to match the men with the women who most
closely resembled them
• 24 of the photos were of couples when first married
• 24 were of the same couples after 25 years of marriage
– Couples who originally bore no resemblance to each other
when first married were found, after 25 years of marriage, to
resemble each other facially
• That is, actual couples were more likely to be correctly matched on
facial similarity after 25 years of marriage than right after marriage
38
Evolution and Attraction
• In the 1990s, researchers began to theorize that
attraction is in some ways driven by evolutionary
factors.
• That is, natural selection has predisposed men
and women to pursue certain strategies when
seeking a potential mate, and to prefer certain
characteristics in a potential mate.
39
Evolution and Attraction
• Evolutionary psychologists are interested in the evolution
of certain behaviors and psychological processes.
– Why do infants start to fear strangers about the time they become
mobile?
– Why are most parents so passionately devoted to their children?
– Why do so many people fear snakes and spiders versus more
dangerous things like guns and explosives?
– Why are men more likely than women to initiate sexual relations,
and why are they less choosy than women in this capacity?
– Why are there differences in the qualities men and women prefer
in potential mating partners?
40
Evolution and Attraction
• David Buss and David Schmidt, two of the world’s
leading evolutionary psychologists, believe that the
central driving force in mate selection is the amount of
parental investment each sex devotes to the offspring
– Hence, the sex that has the biggest parental investment
should be more discriminating in choosing potential mating
(sexual) partners, and more readily engage in indiscriminant
sexual activity
• This, of course, would be women
– And, the sex that has the least parental investment should be
less discriminating in choosing potential mating (sexual)
partners, and more readily engage in sexual activity
• This would be men
41
Evolution and Sexuality
• Gender Differences in Sexuality
– Males and females, to a large extent, think and act the same.
However, clear differences arise regarding sexual attitudes
and behaviors when you look at survey results.
Question (summarized)
Male
Female
Casual sex with different partners ok
48%
12%
Affection necessary for sex
25%
48%
Think about sex everyday
54%
19%
42
Evolution and Sexuality
• Clark & Hatfield (1989)
– Student researcher assistants (men and women) approached
opposite-sex strangers on campus and complimented them on
their attractiveness. Then, they asked the strangers one of
three questions: (numbers on right are the percents of men
and women strangers who said “yes” to each question).
Question (summarized)
Male
Female
Go on a date sometime?
50%
50%
Come to my apartment tonight?
66%
6%
Go to bed with me tonight?
75%
0%
43
Evolution and Sexuality
• Why do such gender differences occur?
– Evolution has predisposed males with the inclination
to send their genes into the future by mating with
multiple females because males have lower costs
involved.
– However, females are evolutionarily predisposed to
be more selective (and more reluctant to engage in
sex) because of the higher costs involved with
pregnancy and nursing.
44
Evolution and Mating Preferences
• Question: What qualities do you look for in a
potential dating partner?
– Women:
• Smart, honest, trustworthy, educated, good job, tall,
strong, warm, kind, has a good job, makes good money
– Men
• Pretty, has a nice body
• Dozens of studies since the 1990s show that men and
women do indeed prefer different qualities in potential
mates.
45
Fox News Poll
(1999)
46
Evolution and Mating Preferences
• Men tend to prefer women who have a youthful and
fertile appearance.
• Smooth skin and fertile shape
• Waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) of around .7; that is,
proportionally wider hips than waistline, even for heavier
women
• Women also prefer healthy-looking men, but especially
those who seem bold, dominant, mature and appear
able to secure resources and protect.
• Lots of money, good-paying job
• Lots of nice possessions
• Tall
47
• Singh (1993)
When men around the
world ranked figures with
various weights and waistto-hip ratios (.7 to 1.0),
they favored a pronounced
hourglass shape.
The highest ranked figures
are N7, N8, and U7 (in that
order). The lowest ranked
is O10.
48
Evolution and Mating Preferences
All over the world, males look for youthful appearing
females to mate with. Females, on the other, hand look for
maturity, dominance, affluence and boldness in males.
Data based on 37 cultures
49
Evolution and Mating Preferences
• Why do these gender differences occur?
– Evolution has predisposed males to prefer young,
healthy, and fertile looking women because women
with these traits are more likely to be successful at
reproduction.
– However, females are evolutionary predisposed to
prefer male traits that signify the ability to provide
and protect resources.
50
Romantic Love
51
The Essence of Romantic Love
52
Measuring Love
• Zick Rubin (1970)
– Gave a large number of romantically involved students a
number of statements that expressed feelings one might have
toward a friend or a lover. Examples:
• “I think that _____ is unusually well-adjusted.”
• “If I could never be with _____, I would be miserable.”
– There were 13 statements for liking and loving; students
completed them in relation to how they felt about their lover
– By and large, the liking and loving scores did not relate to each
other as strongly as you might think, especially for women
– Suggests, among other things, that liking and loving are
different things (e.g., that loving is not merely an extension of
liking).
53
Theories of Love
• Sternberg (1998)
54
Theories of Love
• Clyde and Susan Hendrick (1984)
– Six “love styles”
Eros
Passionate love, which occurs because one has a mental picture of his or
her "ideal qualities" in another person; like Cupid’s arrow
Ludus
Game-playing love, without any real serious emotional investment
Storge
Unexciting love conceptualized sort of like the feelings you would have
toward a best friend, brother, or sister
Pragma
Love based on specific material qualities a mate can provide; hard-headed
Mania
This type of lover years for love, but when he/she finds it, finds it painful;
physical symptoms to different circumstances of the relationship
Agape
Selfless giving love; emphasis is on caring about every step the partner
takes; could be considered "altruistic" love
55
The Love Attitudes Scale
(Hendrick & Hendrick, 1986)
56
The Love Attitudes Scale
(Continued)
57
Two Types of Love
• Social psychologists generally distinguish
between two types of romantic love
– Passionate love
• A state of intense and emotional longing for togetherness
with another
– Companionate love
• Affection we feel for those with whom are lives are
intertwined
• It is the warm afterglow after the energy of passionate love
has worn off
58
Gupta & Singh
(1982)
59
A Theory of Passionate Love
• A major component of passionate love is physiological
arousal
– In this view, passionate love is the psychological experience
(cognitive awareness) of being aroused by someone we find
really attractive
• According to this view, heightened arousal should
intensify feelings of love
– It also suggests that arousal from an unrelated source should
increase passionate feelings to a romantic stimulus, even if
the stimulus did not cause the arousal
60
Capilano Bridge Experiment
 Dutton & Aron (1974)
 Capilano Bridge is about 230 ft.
above a rocky river
 Unsuspecting men were
approached by pretty female
confederate after crossing this
scary bridge
 These men more likely to later
call her (compared to men who
were approached by same
woman after crossing safe
bridge 10 ft. above river)
61
Attachment and Relationships
• Attachment is a strong emotional bond we have
with another person
– Attachment styles in infancy form “internal working
models,” or blueprints, of intimacy
– That is, they lead to the development of images of
the self (positive or negative) and others (positive or
negative) that serve to influence the nature of later
adult relationships
62
Attachment Styles
• How can you measure attachment in infancy?
• Observe separation anxiety (distress that occurs when
mother leaves; begins around 8 months)
Best methodology to study separation anxiety:
Strange Situation Paradigm
(Ainsworth, 1979)
63
Attachment Styles and Relationships
• Secure attachment
– Such infants play comfortably in their mother’s presence, happily
exploring the environment
– When mother leaves, they show distress; when she returns, they run and
cling to her and are relaxed.
– Tend to have warm and trusting relationships as adults
• Preoccupied attachment
– Fearful, tend to cling to mother
– When mother leaves, they show distress. When she returns, they may be
indifferent or hostile
– As adults, are possessive, clingy, and jealous
• Avoidant attachment (a.k.a. dismissing or fearful attachment)
– Show little distress during separation, and little clinging during reunion
– As adults, less invested in relationships and avoid getting close to others
64
Relationship Dissolution
65
The Boston Couples Study
(Rubin, Hill, & Peplau, 1976)
• Two-year study of 231 Boston dating couples
(college students). At the beginning, couples
filled out surveys about themselves and their
perceptions of the relationship with current
boyfriend or girlfriend.
• They were contacted again two years later.
• After the two-year period, 103 (45%) of the
couples had broken up.
66
The Boston Couples Study
(Rubin, Hill, & Peplau, 1976)
• Factors that predicted the breakup:
– Low involvement in the relationship
• e.g., not seeing each other every day, dating other people, low self-reported
involvement at Time 1
– Age discrepancies
– Differences in educational aspirations, intelligence, and physical attractiveness
– Women more likely to perceive problems in the relationship
– Women more likely than men to initiate the breakup
– Breakups tended to occur at key times (May, August)
• Suggests that women strategically “choose the moment” for a breakup
– Being sexually active in the relationship (or not) had no predictive effect in
terms of likelihood of breaking up
67
The Psychological Toll
of Relationship Dissolution
• Are there adverse psychological consequences
associated with relationship dissolution (e.g.,
depression)?
The idea that relationship
dissolution can lead to depression
can be traced back to the writings of
Sigmund Freud, who believed that
depression is triggered by a loss.
68
The Psychological Toll
of Relationship Dissolution
A national survey taken during the 1980s found higher
depression rates among divorced adults
69
The Psychological Toll
of Relationship Dissolution
• There are three ways a relationship can be terminated
– You can initiate the breakup yourself
– The other person can break up with you
• This is called an other-initiated separation
– The breakup can be mutual
• Although relationship dissolution is never easy, no
matter who initiates it, a recent study has shown that
other-initiated separations have an especially
deleterious effect on mental health for those who
experience them
70
The Virginia Study
• Kendler et al. (2003)
– A total of 7,322 adult twins were interviewed
– During interview, the interviewers probed for the
presence of either major depression (MD), and
several other mental health disorders
– In another interview, researchers assessed the
monthly occurrence of stressful life events and
determined which of several categories they fall
under
71
The Virginia Study
1. Loss
•
Reduced sense of connectedness due to loss of person,
material possessions, job, health, or respect by others
2. Humiliation
•
Feeling devalued, usually due to rejection or role failure
3. Entrapment
•
Ongoing unpleasant circumstances that are expected to
persist or get worse, and nothing can be done about it
(similar to learned helplessness)
72
The Virginia Study
• Categories and dimensions of stressful life events
– Loss
•
•
•
•
Death
Respondent-initiated separation
Other key loss
Lesser loss
– Humiliation
• Other-initiated separation
• Other’s delinquency
• Put down
– Entrapment
• Long-term sustained entrapment
• Long-term worsened entrapment
• Failed positive event
73
The Virginia Study
Prediction of Onset of Major Depression
74
Risk for Depression in Month of Event Occurrence as a
Combination of the Categories of Loss and Humiliation
Loss Category
Humiliation
Category
Lesser
Loss
Other Key
Loss
Respondent initiated
separation
Death
None
3.3
5.8
10.2
9.9
Put down
5.6
12.8
5.5
Other’s
delinquency
7.1
10.8
Other-initiated
separation
2.6
21.6
75
Making It Easier For Others to Like You
• Take control of proximity factors
– e.g., in a classroom, sit beside others and avoid seats at the end of the
row or away from others
• Emphasize similarities and overlook differences
– Try to find common ground when you meet and talk with others, and avoid
dwelling on areas of disagreement
• Take reasonable steps to make the most of your physical
appearance, but look beyond the appearance of others
– Try to stay fit, dress nice, and use proper hygiene. But, don’t fall victim to
the inaccurate stereotypes about superficial characteristics, for this will
limit your pool of friends and potential lovers
• Be nice to ALL people!
– Friends are hard to find in this world. So is TRUE love. So, be nice to
everyone you meet and you’ll be very happy. You get a lot more bees with
honey than you do with vinegar.