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Affiliation, Attraction and Close Relationships

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Affiliation, Attraction and Close Relationships 9781405124003_4_010.qxd 10/31/07 3:07 PM Page 196 Affiliation, Attraction and Close 10 Relationships Abraham P. Buunk and Pieternel Dijkstra KEY CONCEPTS affiliation attachment theory attraction buffer effect of social support commitment emotional contagion epidemiological studies equity theory evolutionary theory intimacy investment model loneliness passionate love propinquity reciprocity social comparison theory social exchange theory social support 9781405124003_4_010.qxd 10/31/07 3:07 PM Page 197 CHAPTER OUTLINE Humans are a very social breed. They seek each other’s company in a variety of situations, they make friendships with other people, and they seem to find their ultimate happiness and despair in their intimate relationships. But what is it that drives us to interact socially with others? What determines the fact that we often quite rapidly find ourselves liking some people more than others? Such issues are dealt with in the present chapter. We begin with a discussion of affiliation, followed by a section on attraction and friendships, focusing on the factors that make individuals like other people and become friends with them. Next, we deal with the nature of romantic attraction and, finally, we deal with the development and dissolution of close relationships. Introduction Carl is in general a happy man. He enjoys having fun and spending time with his friends. Recently, he fell in love with Carin, a beautiful woman whom he had known for some time; however, Carin does not reciprocate his feelings. Since then, Carl has felt quite unhappy and at times lonely. Although he needs company because of his unhappiness, even being with his friends hardly improves his mood. Carin likes Carl, but just does not have romantic feelings for him. She feels that Carl lacks ambition, and is not the type of man she is looking for. Her closest girlfriend, with whom she discusses everything, agrees that Carl is not right for her. Why does Carl feel so lonely? Why does being with his friends not improve his mood? And why does Carin find ambition such an important attribute in a mate? The social psychology of personal relationships helps us to answer all these questions, and explains why our close relationships with others can be such sources of personal happiness and fulfilment, but also of great sadness, even despair. This chapter will provide you with the tools to answer these questions, beginning with a consideration of why people need others in the first place. 9781405124003_4_010.qxd 10/31/07 3:07 PM Page 198 198 CHAPTER 10 AFFILIATION, ATTRACTION AND CLOSE RELATIONSHIPS same experiment, rather than someone who was in a quite differ- AFFILIATION: THE NEED ent situation, such as waiting for a professor. As Schachter con- cluded: ‘Misery doesn’t love just any kind of company, it loves only FOR SOCIAL CONTACT miserable company’ (p. 24). Knowledge about social comparison and affiliation has proven very useful in the area of psychology and health. Gump and Kulik When do we like to be in the company of others? (1997) found that participants who were faced with the prospect Does social support for other people help to reduce stress? of undergoing experimentally induced pain spent more time What are the health consequences of a lack of affiliation? looking at how other individuals responded who were to undergo the same threat than at individuals who were to participate in a very different experiment – their responses would not be relevant Situations fostering affiliation: to compare with one’s own responses. Social comparison with others may also provide individuals with valuable information, When do people affiliate? for example about how to deal with their own situation. As a result of this motive, individuals faced with a threat may prefer Humans have a general need to affiliate with others, and they contact with someone knowledgeable, who may provide infor- spend a considerable part of their life in the company of other mation about the potential threat. In their study Stanton, Danoff- people. By affiliation we mean Burg, Cameron, Snider and Kirk (1999) assigned breast cancer affiliation the tendency to seek out the the tendency to seek out the patients randomly to listen to an audiotaped interview in which company of others, irrespective of the company of others, even if we another breast cancer patient’s psychological adjustment and feelings towards such others do not feel particularly close disease prognosis were manipulated to reflect good, poor or un- to them. According to the specified psychological and physical health status. Participants homeostatic model (O’Connor & Rosenblood, 1996), affiliation demonstrated a greater desire for information and emotional can be seen as a drive, in that people look for an optimal range of support from the patient with good rather than poor health social contact. This model states that, when individuals experi- status, but not more than from the patient with unspecified ence too much solitude, they seek out social contact until their health status. Thus they did not profit from the opportunity affiliative drive is satiated; and when they experience excess social to learn more about the patient with poor health status, which contact, they seek out solitude to restore the optimum level of might in fact have been useful in putting their own situation affiliation. It is generally assumed that the human desire for affili- into perspective and, indeed, making them feel comparatively ation stems in large part from our evolutionary past, when joining better off. others in the face of threat, such as predators and aggressors, enhanced our chances of survival. It has indeed been found that Anxiety reduction A host of evidence indicates that indi- individuals are particularly likely to affiliate under conditions viduals in threatening and stressful circumstances do often turn of stress, in which survival issues may become salient (e.g., to sympathetic others who may offer them reassurance, comfort Baumeister & Leary, 1995; Buunk & Schaufeli, 1993). Why would individuals affiliate when confronted with a stressful situation? Two theoretical answers to this question are particularly relevant, one stemming from social comparison theory and the other from attachment theory. Social comparison According to social comparison theory, par- ticularly in novel and stressful situations, individuals tend to seek out others to compare them- social comparison theory assumes that selves with, to learn more individuals seek out others to compare about their own feelings and themselves with, to assess the to obtain information about appropriateness of their feelings and to the most effective way of be- obtain information about the most effective having. They may not know way of behaving how to feel and respond: ‘Am I too worried?’, ‘Should I be really concerned’, ‘Am I the only one who is so upset?’ Affiliation with others facing the same situation gives individuals the oppor- tunity to compare their responses with those of others, and thus to assess the appropriateness of their feelings (Festinger, 1954). In line with this theory, Schachter (1959) found that research participants Plate 10.1 Social comparison with others may provide individuals under threat of receiving an electric shock preferred to be in the with valuable information, for example about how to deal with company of someone else who was also waiting to take part in the their own illness. 9781405124003_4_010.qxd 10/31/07 3:07 PM Page 199 AFFILIATION: THE NEED FOR SOCIAL CONTACT 199 present is nervous rather than emotional contagion the unconscious PIONEER calm. In such cases emotional mimicking of the facial expressions and contagion may occur: indi- feelings of another person viduals unconsciously mimic John Bowlby (1907–1990) started his intellectual career others’ facial expressions and at the University of Cambridge where he studied develop- feelings (e.g., Gump & Kulik, 1997, Study 2). mental psychology and, later, child psychiatry and psycho- analysis. Upon returning from army service in 1945, Bowlby Social support and stress reduction Whereas seeking out became head of the Children’s Department at the Tavistock the company of others is an active strategy for reducing anxiety, Clinic in London. Studying maladapted children, Bowlby felt that psychoanalysis was putting far too much emphasis on having a supportive network of friends or relatives is something the child’s fantasy world and far too little on actual events. that is reliably associated with As a result, Bowlby developed attachment theory, which stress reduction. Social sup- social support the feeling of being states that a child’s actual experiences within the family have port refers to the feeling of supported by others, usually divided into far-reaching effects on his or her personality development. being supported by others, four components: emotional support, and is usually divided into appraisal support, informational support According to Bowlby, starting during the first and instrumental support months in their relationships with both par- four components (House, ents, children build up so-called ‘working 1981), i.e., emotional support models’ of how attachment figures are likely (feeling cared for, loved and appreciated); appraisal support to behave, and for the rest of their lives (feedback and social comparison on how to evaluate things); children’s expectations are based on these informational support (such as information about how to handle models. situations); and instrumental support (receiving concrete aid and help). The first three of these components correspond to the two functions of affiliation under stress that were mentioned above. In addition, social support often takes place ‘invisibly’, without indi- viduals noticing that others are supporting them. A person may, for instance, not explicitly notice that his or her partner had done and emotional support chores around the house, but nevertheless feel happy as a result attachment theory proposes that the development of secure infant–caregiver (e.g., Stroebe & Stroebe, that things at home seem to be going so well (Bolger, Zuckerman attachment in childhood is the basis for the 1996; Wills, 1991).
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