Week 1: Building Blocks of R/s + Research Methods Flashcards
What is social psychology?
The scientific study of how our thoughts, feelings and behaviour are affected by the real, imagined, or implied presence of others
What is the effect of relationships on well-being?
Social networks and physical health
- Larger quantity of social networks, better physical health (Alameda County Study, 1979; The Cold Study, 1997)
Relationship quality and health
- Higher relationship quality, better health (Heart disease study, 2001)
What are the results of the Alameda County Study (1979)?
Crude measure of social network: 1) married, 2) close friend/relative, 3) religious membership, 4) informal group membership
Results: Across age groups, the most isolated Ps were 2-3 times more likely to die over the next 9 years than the least isolated Ps
What are the results of The Cold Study (1997)?
Social network measure: Diversity of social roles
Results: Ps with fewest roles were 4 times more likely to develop a cold than Ps with the most roles
What are the results of The Heart Disease Study (2001)?
Measured r/s quality through surveys and objective coding of a lab-based conflict discussion
Results: Ps with congestive heart failure were more likely to die over the ensuing 4 years if they had a worse marriage
What is the need to belong?
The powerful drive to establish intimate connections to others
What are the 6 components of intimacy?
1) Knowledge
2) Caring
3) Interdependence
4) Mutuality
5) Trust
6) Commitment
What are the characteristics of interdependence for intimate partners?
Intimate partners have - strong - diverse - endearing influence on each other
What are the three relationship challenges?
- The porcupine challenge
- The naive realism challenge
- The commitment challenge
What is the porcupine challenge?
How to balance the need for connection with the fear of rejection?
What is the naive realism challenge?
How to reconcile the tendency to believe our reality is objectively time with the fact that building a successful r/s requires that we acknowledge our cognitive distortions
What are the 3 tenets of naive realism?
- I perceive things accurately
- Other fair-minded people would share my view if armed with the same facts
- If others deviate from my views, they are biased, stupid, or characterised by bad motives
What is the commitment challenge?
How to develop and sustain a loving, time-consuming r/s despite the existence of so many alternative partners in the world
What is the influence of interaction?
R/s emerge from the combination of the partners’ experiences and talents
Often much more than the sum of those parts
Unique r/s
Fluid, dynamic processes (vs. static, changeless)
What are the methods to develop a question?
- Personal experience
- R/s norms
- Social problems
- Previous research
- Theories
What are the methods for obtaining participants?
- Convenience sample
- Representative sample
Potential problem: Volunteer bias
What is volunteer bias?
Ppl who agree to participate may differ from those who refuse
Why are convenient samples used in relationship science?
Many processes studied by r/s scientists are so basic that they don’t differ much from group to group
What are the types of research design used in relationship science?
- Correlational
- Experimental
- Developmental
> Cross-sectional
> Longitudinal
> Retrospective
What are correlational designs?
Measure naturally-occurring events, looking for associations between them
What are experimental designs?
Manipulate events to delineate clearly the causal connections between them, to illuminate cause and effect
What are developmental designs?
Study the manner in which events change over time
What are cross-sectional designs?
Compares diff. group of people who are at different stages or eyes over a period of time
What are longitudinal designs?
Studies the same group of people with repeated measurements over a period of time
What are retrospective designs?
- Asks people about their past experience
What are the types of data collected in r/s science?
- Self-reports
- Observations
- Couples’ report
- Physio measures
- Archival evidence
What are self-reports?
- Asking ppl about their feelings and behaviour
- Inexpensive, easy to obtain
- Helps us to u’stand personal points of view, giving immaculate info to help us understand the workings of r/s
What are observations?
- Watching behaviour directly
- Highly trained observers, highly detailed watching
- Experience-sampling: Use short, intermittent periods of obv. to capture samples of behaviour that occur over longer periods of time
What are physiological measures?
- Assess partner’s autonomic and biochemical responses
What are couples’ reports (dyadic data)?
Involve self-reports of one’s own behaviour and obv. of the other’s behaviour from both
–> Compare for accuracy
What are the 3 sources of variance for interdependence?
1) Actor
2) Partner
3) Relationship
–> Can be disentangled by: speed-dating
How are the results in r/s science interpreted?
Paired, interdependent data
> Partners infl. e/o, their responses are not indpt
Diff levels of analysis
3 sources of influence: Indiv partner, idiosyncratic partnership
What are meta-analyses?
Studies that statistically combine the results from prior studies to identify themes they contain
What is the power of social reality?
- The way we think we’ll respond to romantic situations differ from how we actually respond
- Our motivations colour our perceived reality
