Relationships (formation) Flashcards
Wilson
Wilson believes ‘survival efficiency’ drives all of our romantic relationships; any behaviour which helps us achieve our goal of passing on our genes to the next generation is beneficial. So any behaviour that helps us form relationships and allows us to have sex with a potential mate is ‘adaptive’.
Ansiomanic
Humans are ‘anisogamic’, (i.e. the male and female gametes are different sizes) and the female ‘investment’ in the production of a healthy infant is considerably higher than the minimum ‘investment’ made by a male. Sociobiologists therefore believe that males and females need to maximise their reproductive potential by demonstrating different behaviours.
Lonley hearts
Dunbar & Waynforth (1995) analysed 900 ‘lonely hearts’ adverts from US newspapers. They found distinct differences in the adverts of males and females, 44% of males requested a physically attractive partner (compared to 22% of women).
Buss
Buss (1989), in his study of 37 cultures including over 10,000 people, claims that men were much more likely to rate youth and good looks as extremely important, while females valued a cluster of characteristics which includes good financial prospects and older age (more likely to have resources) BUT Buss ignored the fact that ‘kind’ and ‘intelligent’ were ranked above ‘physically attractive’ and ‘good earning power’ by both men and women.
Criticism of sociobiological
Sociobiological explanations are deterministic. This means that it considers our behaviour to be controlled by forces beyond our control, in this case our evolutionary needs/desires. It does not allow for free will, that we as individuals have the right or ability to decide our own partners. Is the sociobiological explanation out of date?
Matching Hypothesis
Murstein (1972) found that the faces of engaged couples were rated as being more similar in terms of physical attractiveness than those couples who had been randomly allocated to each other. He claims the matching hypothesis is a balance between picking the best person available with someone who is likely to accept us.
By matching ourselves with other individuals who have a similar level of attractiveness we are in fact safe guarding our self-esteem.
Filter Model
Filter theory suggests that people with whom we may potentially form relationships are assessed and put through a series of filters which either allows them to continue with relationship formation or may stop it in its tracks! First filters tend to rely on assessing external characteristics. next filter is to check on how closely the other persons beliefs and attitudes are to our own. The last filter suggested is that of role fit; how much does the other person fit with your needs.
Social exchange theory
Social exchange theory is an ‘economic’ theory of relationship that was proposed by Thibaut & Kelley (1959). It assumes everyone tries to maximise their rewards (e.g., receiving affection and attention) and minimise their costs (e.g., have to devote time and effort to the others). So for a relationship to be successfully formed, people must assume that they are making and will continue to make a healthy profit.
Argyle
Argyle (1988) denounced social exchange theory claiming that the research done to support social exchange theory has little ecological validity, he claims that it “has led mainly to very artificial experiments. Research on real life relationships has been hampered by the different scaling of rewards”.
Natually Selfish.
Social exchange theory sees people as fundamentally selfish. It assumes that all of our relationships are determined by our own self interest. Are all of our relationships based really like this? Are human beings actually capable of being altruistic?
