W12 RELATIONSHIP DISSOLUTION

Question 1

What are the predictors of relationship dissolution?

Answer 1

1. Investment Model
2. VSA Model
3. Language
4. Disillusionment

Question 2

How does Investment Model predict dissolution?

Answer 2

Investment + Alternatives + Satisfaction > Commitment Level > Probability of Dissolution

Question 3

How does VSA model predict dissolution?

Answer 3

Enduring vulnerabilities + stressful events + adaptive processes > marital quality > marital stability

Question 4

How does language predict dissolution?

Answer 4

Study that researched on archives social media data, from users who posted about break ups. Increase in I and we words, cognitive processing words, decrease in analytic thinking words. (i.e. rumination)

Those who posted about breakup for longer were less well-adjusted a year after breakup.

Question 5

What did the PAIR project show regarding prediction?

Answer 5

Enduring dynamics + emergent stress models predicted how happy marriages would be

Disillusionment predicted if couples would divorce - i.e. when ‘magic’ faded, for those who were especially affectionate when their marriages began

Question 6

What is a prevalent pattern to the way people end unwanted relationships?

Answer 6

Most of the time, they never tell their partners that they seek to leave, so their efforts are indirect rather than explicit and direct
Their efforts are usually selfish and self-oriented instead of considerate and other-oriented.

Question 7

What are traditional break up strategies?

Answer 7

POCAM DPDA
police on cam, don’t pda
1. positive tone/self blame
2. open confrontation
3. cost escalation
4. avoidance/withdrawal
5. manipulation
6. distant/mediated communication
7. positive tone > desire to stay friends
8. de-escalation
9. Avoidance/withdrawal > more negative outcomes after break up

Question 8

What are modern trends in relationship dissolution strategies?

Answer 8

1. Ghosting
2. Churning
3. Conscious Uncoupling

Question 9

What are 2 ways in which dissolution could happen?

Answer 9

1. Discontent grows gradually
2. Catastrophe theory (sudden death, 25% of people)

Question 10

Week 12/13: Attachment styles and Personal Growth, Mediated by Distress, Rumination and Tendency to rebound (BTR)

What are the main findings?

Answer 10

Study 1: Attachment Style & Personal Growth
- Anxiously attached individuals experience greater breakup distress, which is associated with greater personal growth
- Avoidantly attached individuals inhibit breakup distress (i.e. block it out; don’t really feel it), which is associated with lower personal growth

Study 2 -
- Anxiously attached individuals experience greater personal growth because greater breakup distress leads to greater brooding (engaging in deep thought), rumination and tendency to rebound (3 mediators)
- BTR may not necessarily always be bad
- Rebound relationships can be just as satisfying and helps to distract us from the previous relationship/ partner
- Rebound could lead to personal growth because of self-expansion, e.g. exposure to new interests

Question 11

What does the recovery process consist of?

Answer 11

CLOSURE AND MOVING ON - self-concept clarity
1. Visualizing the future without the old partner
2. Taking lessons away from the experience
3. Revising the breakup story
4. Exploring new alternatives

Question 12

What do some post-dissolution relationships look like?

Answer 12

Scale from 0-100
1. Complete cut off
2. Friendship (but could prevent them from moving on)
3. Back-burner relationship
4. Grey area (FWB)
5. Churning

Question 13

How does post-dissolution affect an individual?

Answer 13

1. Well-being (i.e. depression)
2. Health
3. Self

Question 14

How does dissolution affect well-being?

Answer 14

Divorce is linked to diminished life satisfaction, albeit with a partial recovery over time

Divorce predicts depression, but only among those already at risk

Study: Baseline and 9-year follow-up

Question 15

What are the consequence of dissolution to health?

Answer 15

In the U.S., relative to married people, people whose marriage has dissolved are less likely to be fully healthy

The never-married may be just as healthy as the married

Question 16

What are the consequences of dissolution to self?

Answer 16

1. Self-regulatory consequence
   For people who were highly dependent on partner for personal goals, once relationship dissolved, goal progress dissolved too.
   For people who were lowly dependent on partner for personal goals, once relationship dissolved, goal progression improved.
2. Self-concept clarity
   “I have a clear sense of who I am”
   Lowered when they were broken up
3. Affective forecasting
   We appear to overestimate
   the magnitude of their risk before we break up—both immediately and three months out

People who were highly “in love” when making their forecasts overestimate their distress the most (although they actually are more distressed than those who were less “in love”)

Question 17

What are positive outcomes of relational break ups?

Answer 17

PREF
1. Personal Positives (increased self-sufficiency)
2. Relational Positives (Know how to develop, maintain terminate r/s better)
3. Environmental Positives (Concentrate more on school, work, friends)
4. Future Positives (Knowing what one wants and doesn’t want in future relationships)