relationships👩‍❤️‍💋‍👨 (rustbult)

Question 1

what does Rusbult say commitment depends on?

Answer 1

satisfaction level, comparison with alternatives and investment size.

Question 2

what is satisfaction and comparison with alternatives?

Answer 2

• a satisfying relationship that’s seen to be profitable if it has many rewards and few costs. each partner is generally satisfied if they’re getting more out of relationship than expected.
• comparison with alternatives is when the partners ask themselves whether alternatives are more rewarding
• alternatives include not just relationships with others, but the possibility of having no romantic relationships at all

Question 3

what are the main two types of investment?

Answer 3

intrinsic investments: can be tangible things ie money and possessions. or energy and self-disclosure
extrinsic investments: resources that didn’t feature in relationship previously like kids of possessions they brought together

Question 4

what is investment size in rusbults theory?

Answer 4

refers to the extent and importance of resources associated with the relationship.
we could lose these at the end of the relationship.

Question 5

what happens with the investment size if the partners recieves high levels of satisfaction ?

Answer 5

partners will stay committed if alternatives are less predicted, the size of investments are increasing and level of satisfaction is high

Question 6

why does commitment explain why people stay in dissatisfied relationships?

Answer 6

• main psychological factor
• theyre so committed they’ve made investments into relationship and they don’t want to see them go to waste thus they work hard to maintain and repair a damaged relationship

Question 7

what are relationship maintenance mechanisms?

Answer 7

• model says if partners do not engage in tit-for-tat retaliation but act to promote relationship(accommodation) and partners will also put partners interests first and forgive any serious transgression (forgiveness).
• there are cognitive elements to relationship maintenance. committed partners think about each other and potential alternatives in specific ways. they’re unrealistically positive about their partner and negative about tempting alternatives and others relationships, much more so than less committed partners.

Question 8

✅AO3- why does rusbults investment model explain abusive relationships?

Answer 8

• key factor is clearly not satisfaction in abusive relationships. Rusbult and Martz studied battered women at a shelter and found people are likely to return to an abusive partner if they made great investments and had the fewest alternatives.
• model recognises the victim of IPV (abusive relationships) don’t have to be satisfied with the relationship to stay in it.

Question 9

AO3❌

Weakness of rustbults theory?

Answer 9

goodfriend and Agnew argue that there’s more to investment that the resources that you’ve already put into the relationship. after all in early stages of romantic relationship, the partners will have made little investments, and may not even live together. researchers extended rusbults original model by including investment romantic partners make in their future plans. they are motivated to commit to each other bc they want to see their cherished plans for the future to work out. the original model is a limited explanation of romantic relationships as it fails to recognise the true complexity of investment

Question 10

AO3✅

strength of investment model- methodological.

Answer 10

evidence relies on self report measures such as questionnaires and interviews. these r appropriate bc its not the objective reality of factors such as investment size that matters, its the individual partners perceptions of these factors. its your belief that you have made a big investment in ur current relationship, or ur belief that u have no attractive alternatives. whether this belief matches the objective reality of the situation is really neither here nor there.