Chapter 5 guide notes Flashcards
What is relational context?
Characteristics of the relationship and how the couple defines it. Factors such as companionship, trust, commitment level, intimacy needs, and types of conflict.
Example: If a couple has underlying conflict in their relationship, such as unresolved problems with the in-laws, this conflict is always in the background of the couple’s relationship. Much life background noise that can interrupt or interfere with out concentration when reading, unresolved conflict can ultimately interfere with how each partner experiences elements associated with intimacy, such as trust and/or commitment
Describe Emotional Attachment
Feelings that promote a sense of closeness, bonding with one another, and connection.
Intimacy can be thought of as a three-prolonged process that involves:
(1) Disclosing things that are personal and private to ourselves
(2) Experiencing positive feelings about ourselves and the other person(s) involved with the relationship
(3) Having interpersonal interactions that serve to advance or reflect partners’ understanding of each other.
For instance, as a couple shares, over time, private things about themselves with one another, they negotiate the differences in the way they think, feel, and behave. This sharing leads to the couple’s “speaking the same language,” which in turn, strengthens the couple’s common bond and their emotional attachment to one another.
How does intimacy change over time?
The intimacy we share with our partners and family today will not be the same intimacy levels we share with them 5, 10, or even 20 years from now.
As we get to know another person and as we begin to self-disclose our thoughts and feelings, personal sharing often leads to deepened levels of trust. This trust facilitates greater self-disclosure and greater sharing of personal vulnerabilities, which even further deepens the level of trust. Over time, these interactions strengthen the intimate bonds couples and families share.
Which component of intimacy is the degree to which partners allow each other to know their most personal thoughts, beliefs and feelings?
Expressiveness
What impact does religion have on intimacy?
Adolescents who attend religious services with one or both of their parents are more likely to feel greater well-being while romantic partners who pray for their “significant others” experience greater relationship commitment.
Spirituality and shared religious faith are the foundation of all other components of intimacy. For example, shared religious and ethnic heritages provide couples with a useful resource and a strong foundation from which they can navigate and negotiate their differences.
The shared religious beliefs provide common ground (the “glue”) for the marital couple. Others also found spirituality and faith to be a foundation of marital intimacy. They note that sharing and self-disclosing of a person’s spiritual life and self-disclosing through moments of shared prayer are “probably the strongest knot that binds a couple.”
(Definition) Preintimates Intimacy Status
Capable of intimacy, and may even desire it, but they lack the ability to make the commitment necessary to sustain long-term, or perhaps long-distance, relationships. For instance, education or career demands or a military deployment may impede someone from being able to fully commit to his or her partner until the individual’s circumstances change.
Some clergy, such as nuns and priests, may also be considered to be preintimates because their statuses preclude them from being able to share commitment and depth ina couple relationship
(Definition) Pseudointimate Intimacy Status
Appears to be intimate on the surface but lacks depth.
Pseudointimate relationships may never progress beyond friendships, or the pseudointimate may experience only superficial levels of emotional closeness in a dating, cohabiting, or marital relationships. Some pseudointiamtes bounce from one seemingly intimate relationship to another, but because of their inability to develop emotional closeness—and thus, their inability to fully commit to another person—these relationships are doomed from the outset.
Describe Erikson’s Trust vs. Mistrust developmental stage
Age: Infancy 0-24 months
Child develops a belief that his or her caregivers will provide a secure and trustful environment
How dues autonomy impact relations with others?
People who are autonomously motivated for their relationship and who function generally autonomously in life, respond less defensively during arguments with their love partner and are more open to their partner’s perspective.
We might expect a 3-year old who has banged his head to scream and cry or run over to a parent for emotional and physical comfort, but this little boy, cut and bleeding, did not cry. He did not come to his father for help. Instead, he got out of the swimming pool, lay down on the concrete, and put his head in his arms. Quiet. Not seeking help.
This story illustrates the significance of early relationships and their impact on relational intimacy in later life stages. Because this child received little or no nurturing and affection from his first intimate relationship—the mother-child relationship—he did not develop a sense of trust in his caregivers, as most children do. And because of this lack of trust, he did not turn to his father when he was hurt. Without a doubt, having security and comfort needs to be met in the early years of life plays a significant role in shaping intimate relationships.
Early intimate relationships provide a “crystal ball” that allows us to look into the future of a child’s relational and intimate abilities.
Describe the (stage one) Pre-Crowd Stage in developing and mastering friendships
From about kindergarten through fifth grade, during this stage of friendship development, isolated unisex peer groups exist in the form of cliques, small groups of four to nine members. Spontaneous shared activities provide the opportunity to relate personally.
Boys tend to join larger groups and enjoy doing activities together, whereas girls tend to join smaller, more intimate groups.
These peer group types dominate the school years. It is not uncommon to see these types of peer groups on a social playground, where boys are excluding girls from their pickup football game at recess, or where girls forbid boys to listen in on their “girl talk.”
Members are attracted to one another on the basis of similar interests, neighborhoods, schools, or religions. Boys’ groups are often larger and more stable than girls’ groups.
_____ - The aspect of identity that involves a person taking responsibility for their own actions
Autonomy - One’s desire to self-rule, or one’s will
Refers to not only establishing a sense of independence but also becoming a self-governing person with the context of relationships. Adolescents must begin to take responsibility for their actions and decisions that affect themselves and those around them.
For instance, if an adolescent chooses to have unprotected sex, he or she must realize that this decision may carry associated risks, such as acquiring a sexually transmitted infection or resulting in an unwanted pregnancy, and that these risks don’t just affect them but their partner and families, as well.
_____ - The process of forming an identity separate from one’s family of origin
Individuation - The process of forming an identity separate from one’s family of origin.
This developmental process of individuation affects the development of intimacy because as teens open up and disclose to their peers, it helps them clarify their own thoughts and emotions thus helping them better define their own uniqueness.
As teens share with their peers and the significant others in their lives, they develop a deeper understanding of not only themselves but also of others.
Intimate friendships are more common during adolescence because teens feel that it’s safer to reveal their thoughts and feelings to friends rather than to family.
In essence, teens feel that because others their same age are going through similar experiences, they are better able to relate. The outcome of this process is that as adolescents approach the transition to early adulthood, they have a clearer sense of their values, beliefs, and relationship expectations. This enhanced sense of identity promotes intimacy.
How does culture impact intimacy?
According to Dolich’s study, it did not determine whether culture ultimately influences the experience of friendship during adolescence.
How does family impact intimacy?
Intimacy Development is determined by the closeness and trust with influential adult figures—not whether they group up in a same-sex or opposite-sex household.
Different families and different cultures relate and communicate in different ways. For example, each culture has its own standards about nonverbal communication, such as how much distance between the communicators is acceptable or how much eye contact can be made. Each culture also has its own rules about emotional expression or the expression of intimacy, such as what kind and how much.
In Asian cultures, the emotional reserve is not only expected, it is cherished.
On the other hand, Italian and Greek cultures’ feelings’ are freely expressed loudly.
Just as culture influences our experiences and expressions of intimacy, past family experiences are very much a part of present relationships.
The relationship adolescent boys have with their fathers, for example, has more impact on intimacy formation than does their relationship with their mothers. Good communication with fathers was linked to close, personal relationships in adolescent boys. These boys had more close friends, longer friendships, and higher self-esteem. The significance of the boys’ relationships with their fathers cuts across ethnic and racial differences. Meaningful relationships with fathers help adolescent males achieve close, personal, and enjoyable relationships with their peers,
In contrast,
adolescent girls from single-parent homes headed by mores are more likely to become teen single mothers, engage in high levels of sexual activity, and experience poorer interpersonal relationships with the opposite sex. Father-absent females tend to experience less intimacy in their marriages than father-present females.
Children raised in same-sex parent households experience little or no differences in the kinds and levels of intimacy compared to those children reared in opposite-sex parent homes. It is not the family structure that influences the development of a healthy sense of intimacy, but whether the adolescent feels closeness and trust with influential adult figures.
Integrated Family Theory
The theory that patterns of relational functioning (including intimacy) are passed down from generation to generation
The theory’s basic premise is that our parents acquired their family relational patterns from their parents, who acquired them from their parents, and so on. Consequently, the way we relate to and interact with others is a product of not just our parents’ influence on our lives but also the relational patterns that were passed down to them.
Our intimacy patterns with our parents (and their parents) are replicated someday with our own spouses, children, friends, and significant others.
