Term
| Four Factors That Underlie Attraction |
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Definition
1. Repeated contact and the mere exposure effect
2. Physical attraction/attractiveness
3. Similarity
4. Reciprocity |
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Term
| Repeated contact and the mere-exposure effect - Factor of Attraction |
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Definition
- Researches have demonstrated that the ‘mere-exposure effect’, in which repeated exposure often leads to a more positive evaluation of someone.
- People who are in close physical proximity to us tend to be people we like because we have repeated exposure with them, become familiar with them, and spend time to them
- Study found that people in the hall of residence are more likely to form a relationship with people on the same floor than ones on other floors |
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Term
| Similarity and homogamy - Factor of Attraction |
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Definition
- The more similar a stranger’s attitudes are to your own, the more likely you are to be attracted.
- Tend to form relationship with people that have the same ethnicity, income, religion, smoking and drinking habit (not personality characteristics, but general social characteristics)
- Again, due to the mere exposure and proximity effect as we are usually around people that are similar to us |
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Term
| Reciprocity - Factor of Attraction |
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Definition
- We like people that like us
- People that are warm and friendly and seem happy to see you
- Relationships are formed due to the opinions of how people act towards us |
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Term
| Four factors that are associated with success and longevity in relationships |
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Definition
1. ‘Similarity breeds content’: you are more likely to stay involved with someone who is similar to you.
2. Successful couples have sex more often than they argue, and people in successful marriages have sex more than those in less successful marriages.
3. Successful couples are intimate: they share their innermost thoughts and feelings
4. People in successful marriages share in decision making and in the daily burdens of maintaining a house and a home |
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Term
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Definition
1. Passion (including sexual desire)
2. Intimacy (emotional closeness and sharing)
3. Commitment (the conscious decision to be in a relationship)
Particular relationships reflect different proportions of each dimension, in amounts that are likely to vary over time. |
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Term
| Romantic or Passionate love description |
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Definition
“a wildly romantic state [in which] tender and sexual feelings, elation and pain, anxiety and relief, altruism and jealousy coexist in a confusion of feelings.” (from Berscheid & Walster, 1978; p.426.)
- Highly agitated and engaged stage that is obsessing your mind and body
- The signs of physiological arousal are general to many emotions: sweaty palms, flushed face, fast heart race |
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Term
| Key elements of Romantic or Passionate Love |
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Definition
| Obsession, constant thinking, wildly fluctuating emotions and physiological arousal in the presence of our love. |
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Term
| Companionate love description |
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Definition
“affection we feel for those with whom our lives are deeply entwined” (from Berscheid & Hatfield, 1978, p. 429).
- A person for whom you feel a strong bond of affection, but without the intense physical arousal component
- People of which you feel a strong
- Someone who you once had a romantic relationship with, but the lives are now so entwined that you are completely committed to
- Might be brothers and sisters, work associates, long term friends |
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Term
| Key elements of Compassionate love |
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Definition
| Companionship, respect, mutual trust and care. |
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Term
| Sternberg’s triangular model |
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Definition
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Term
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Definition
| Sense that you can tell someone your secrets, that they understand you, soulmates |
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Term
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Definition
| Physiological arousal, usually associated with sexual passion |
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Term
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Definition
| Agreement to be together long term |
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Term
| Types of adult Attachment |
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Definition
1. Secure
2. Avoidant
3. Anxious-ambivalent |
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Term
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Definition
55%
Comfortable in the relationship, secure. Its all going smoothly. |
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Term
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Definition
25%
Not sure if you want to be committed. |
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Term
| Anxious-ambivalent Attachment |
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Definition
20%
Really tense fear that that person is going to dessert you |
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Term
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Definition
- Relatively straightforward thing to feel
- Mother-child bond is universal
- Good evolutionary reasons to assume a considerable genetic contribution that we would be predisposed to love our babies
- Infant strategies for “being lovable” include smiling, looking cute. Is enough for making us want to be caregivers
– Necessary for breastfeeding, babies cannot do anything for themselves to survive |
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Term
| Parental love in different cultures |
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Definition
| All cultures, put the mother child bond at the center of the culture i.e. cultures cannot survive of mother and child are separated |
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Term
| Romantic Love in Different Cultures |
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Definition
Jankowiak & Fischer (1992) Study of 168 cultures found evidence of romantic love in nearly 90%, with the evidence unclear for the rest.
HOWEVER – people in individualist cultures appear to put more emphasis on love as the basis for marriage (or marriage-like relationships) |
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Term
| Study Levine et al. (1995). - Romantic Love in Different Cultures |
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Definition
- Compare people from the USA and India, and asked them ‘If somebody had all the characteristics that you wanted in a partner, would you marry them if you weren’t in love?’
- 3.5% of USA sample would marry without love, 49% of Indian sample would do so |
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Term
| Lantz, Schultz & O’Hara (1977) - Romantic Love in Different Cultures |
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Definition
Found a steady increase in these themes in USA magazines between 1741 and 1865:
- Love at first sight
- We will only ever have one true love
- True love will conquer all
etc.
Emphasised in individualistic culture |
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Term
| Why does love and first sight not exist? |
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Definition
| We forget before the moment of ‘love at first sight’, is that there were events that previously happened similar to that moment, before it resulted a person you actually matched. |
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Term
| What do researches suggest that romantic love involves? |
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Definition
| Physical arousal, a set of emotions and beliefs (cognitions). |
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Term
| Arousal and Different Emotions |
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Definition
| We feel arousal in different types of emotions (anger, nervousness, fearful). Arousal is general, and for us to decide that we feeling love, anger, or nervousness, we need to have an object in front of us to project the emotion on to. |
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Term
| RESULTS of Arousal Dutton and Aron (1974) – Swing Bridge study |
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Definition
- When she approached them on the swing bridge, one in three men rang her. (Would have been aroused by the adrenaline of the bridge).
- When she approached them further away from the bridge (no longer aroused), many fewer men called her. |
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Term
| EXPLANATION of Arousal Dutton and Aron (1974) – Swing Bridge study |
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Definition
- Researches suggested that on the sing bridge, the men misattributed the reason for their arousal to her.
- Whereas when they weren’t on the swing bridge, all they had was her power to arouse. To some men this was enough, but not as many as before. |
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Term
| Effect and example of misattributed arousal |
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Definition
Researcher have suggested that at times of high tension we might be more likely to feel more romantic love, because we project this tension on our partner.
Passion and war – arousal from war transferred to a romantic partner
Romeo and Juliet effect – parental opposition can intensify passionate attraction, adrenaline from sneaking around. |
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Term
| METHOD - Belief In Love as a Key Factor - Averill & Boothroyd (1977) Study |
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Definition
85 participants aged 18-54, 41 men and 44 women
Participants where given newspaper account of Floyd and Ellen and examples of ‘great romances’ i.e. where given a context of what researches meant by love.
Asked to rate own most intense love experience on a 10 point scale in terms of its resemblance to the ‘romantic ideal’. |
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Term
| RESULTS - Belief In Love as a Key Factor - Averill & Boothroyd (1977) Study |
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Definition
- 40% at each of the extreme ends – 1,2,3 or 8, 9, 10.
- Researchers thought that the people with the most intense experience just had a more intense experience
- Written descriptions of their experiences were coded, and it was found that there was no clear difference between the descriptions of those who rated their experience high or low on resemblance to the romantic ideal.
- Led them to think of the importance belief, of how a person labels of what is going on, not what is really going on. |
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Term
| What is Romantic love as a syndrome? |
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Definition
Idealization of the other, suddenness of onset, absorbing thoughts (obsession), willingness to make sacrifices
- Thought that each individual reinterprets their experience by judging it by these elements of the syndrome
- Those who were cynical need a whole package to say they are in love. Take the need for all elements to be in place to say they are in love
- The others only need one or a few elements to believe they are in love e.g. thinking of them all the time |
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Term
| METHOD - Physical attractiveness Walster et al. (1966) study of 752 university students |
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Definition
Told that they were given the opportunity to go to a dance and would be given a blind date. Criteria that a shorter man could not be paired with a tall woman. Had to fill in some surveys to show personality and intelligence. When they went to pick up the ticket, the person giving the ticket would rate them on physical attractiveness.
- They then went to the dance with their blind date, and after where asked if they would go to a second dance again. |
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Term
| RESULTS - Physical attractiveness Walster et al. (1966) study of 752 university students |
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Definition
The factor measured with the strongest relationship to their desire to date their partner in the future, for both men and women, was physical attractiveness.
NOTE: Have to remember that dances are where physical attractiveness is highly at play, more than other scenarios. So study like this over emphasizes it. Also at dances it is hard to talk and get to know a person. BUT the study does bring out the fact that physical attractiveness is a mating game. |
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Term
| Halo effect as part of the mating game |
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Definition
| Being physically attractive may lead to be judged more positively on other dimensions. Physical beauty potentially leads to the assumption that the person is smart etc. |
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Term
| Matching hypothesis as part of the mating game |
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Definition
People tend to settle into relationships with others who have a similar level of physical attractiveness as themselves
- People get the idea of where they stand and get to know who is in their league or not
- More likely to stay in long term relationship with a person is around the same amount of attractiveness we are
- People tend to settle with a person who they believe that they can get and with someone who is on their physical attractiveness level
- We know this because our society is permeated with it (we can’t deny things that don’t seem very noble about the human character) |
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Term
| Is physical attractiveness subjective? |
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Definition
Yes and no, but mostly no.
As people judging other people, we do seem to have a general and objective sense that is in common with each other of what is ‘good looking’. |
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Term
| Langlois and Roggman (1990) The ‘Average’ face |
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Definition
Took a whole load of photographs of different people and computer generated it to make an ‘average’ (symmetrical) face. All of the ‘unattractive’ things about people is balanced out by opposite characteristics.
Found that the average face is more attractive than real faces. |
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Term
| Cross-cultural view on attractiveness |
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Definition
- Reasonable cross cultural agreement: Still able to judge attractiveness from different cultures
- Comes down to these features of ordinariness, not having the diseases or mutations
- This is different to body attractiveness, as different cultures favor different body types |
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Term
| Is physical attractiveness the most important asset of attraction? |
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Definition
No! judgments of attractiveness are influenced by other characteristics
(so this is why if you can’t be good looking, it is a good idea to be warm and friendly)
- When we get to know people intimately as friends, we no longer look at someone based on their attractiveness
- Personality also affects what we perceive about the attractiveness of the person
- A study showed that students found a professor more attractive when he was warm and friendly rather than cold and moody
- Personality comes through and changes the view of attractiveness |
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Term
| Evolutionary arguments of physical attractiveness |
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Definition
The importance of physical attractiveness in sexual attraction and partner choice is often argued to have an evolutionary basis in indicating good health.
- in the past it was people’s faces showed signs of disease or being injured, or not being nourished in womb
- Facial attractiveness is an indicator of good health, and we want to have babies with people who are ‘healthy’
BUT partner choice is more complex than physical health, even from an evolutionary perspective.
- In the past the characteristic that was most important was your acceptance into a community, which were people that were liked and good with others, not based on attractiveness |
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Term
| Differential parental investment |
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Definition
A woman tends to make a greater investment in any single pregnancy and child than a man (certainly things are biologically set up this way)
The cost of sex is potentially huge to a woman and minimal to a man.
- It takes men much less time to create a baby, whereas it takes women months and years to raise a child |
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Term
| RESULTS Buss (1989) Study - Studied men and women from 37 cultures. Asked what they prefer in a partner. |
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Definition
| Kindness and intelligence were the prime things valued by both genders. So in the long haul, people want the most kind and intelligence to raise a family. |
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Term
| RESULTS Buss (1989) Study - Men's preferances |
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Definition
Men prefer traits that signify fertility – symmetrical face, smooth skin (have not had disease), 7:10 waist-hip ratio (has enough fat to have a healthy pregnancy)
“Telling men not to become aroused by signs of youth and health is like telling them not to experience sugar as sweet” |
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Term
| RESULTS Buss (1989) Study - Women's preferences |
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Definition
Status, ambition and dominance cues appeal to women; characteristics that would provide resources to support children. (Men don’t need to have ‘body fat’ for pregnancy etc).
Women prefer men 2-5 years older and men prefer younger women |
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Term
| REASON Buss (1989) Study - Men's preferences |
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Definition
| Older men and men with high status more able to provide for children (women ‘want’ one man who will help them rear their children). |
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Term
| REASON Buss (1989) Study - Women's preferences |
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Definition
| Younger women with the key physical characteristics more fertile (men ‘want’ to get as many women pregnant as possible). |
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Term
| Polygamous marriage systems explained by differential parental investment |
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Definition
| One male, a lot of wives and children. Said that this is ok as long as the male can provide for all the families. |
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Term
| Jealousy in men and women |
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Definition
- Idea that men are very sexually jealous, where as women are emotionally jealous.
- Worst thing that can happen to a man, is that their partner would fall pregnant with another man’s child and raise it as their own |
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Term
| If men are more concerned with women’s physical characteristics and women with men’s social status, why do both value physical attractiveness so highly in dating studies? |
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Definition
In most cultures women’s economic status is dependent on men. By choosing high status men, women are therefore acting to suit the situation. As women get more economic power, they become more concerned with physical attractiveness.
However, the biological factor remains that women have babies, and that having a baby in that moment is not compatible with some of the other things that can get you a high economic status |
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Term
| Speed & Gangestad (1997) Male power and polygamy |
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Definition
men’s perceived financial or leadership status not related to romantic appeal.
- Men say that they are in charge so they can have lots of wives
- If ‘women’ were in charge, they would say they could have lots of husbands
- But this is not common for a woman to think this, so does not mean that women do not marry men with power and lots of money, but are probably not doing it due to evolutionary reasons |
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