A science of close relationships stands to benefit from an understanding of the situations in which interactions between partners take place. In this chapter, we briefly review recent advances in situation research. Within the current decade, several new taxonomies have been put forward that describe how people perceive situations. Functional Interdependence Theory, in particular, posits that people are well-prepared to understand situations in terms of interdependence. New instruments based on Functional Interdependence Theory and other taxonomies for the first time allow researchers to measure in a comprehensive way how people subjectively perceive situations. Coupled with experience sampling methods, which allow the collection of psychological measures in everyday life, these instruments enable researchers to paint a full picture of the interdependent situations people experience in their relationships. We discuss how studying the situations partners experience together in daily life allows researchers to find new answers to questions arising from a) Interdependence Theory, b) Attachment Theory, and c) theorizing on relationship maintenance behaviors. Finally, we offer a framework for research on situational interdependence in close relationships.

Close relationships are, at the same time, a source of risk and a resource that can mitigate risk, fear, and insecurity. Specifically, close relationships provide the potential for rejection and hurt, but a) close others can behave in ways that diminish these perceived relational risks to encourage deepening connection, and b) involvement in close relationships can mitigate risks external to relationships (i.e., risks in the physical and social environment) to facilitate personal thriving. This chapter will describe the relational risks individuals face when they form interdependent relationships as well as partner behaviors that demonstrate commitment and promote trust (e.g., sacrifice, affectionate touch) to reduce the perceived cost of interdependence. Although all people are subjected to risks when they form interdependent relationships, individuals differ in the extent to which they perceive risks and in the ways in which their partners might mitigate these risks. People with insecure attachment orientations (i.e., high levels of attachment anxiety and/or attachment avoidance) are especially concerned with relational risks, and they benefit when partners enact behaviors that are sensitive to their specific insecurities. In addition to relational risks, this chapter will also describe how partners regulate external risks that people face when they experience threats (e.g., stressors, health problems) or opportunities (e.g., goals, positive challenges). Research suggests that supportive and affectionate partner behaviors provide a sense of security to mitigate external risks and encourage exploration, which may be especially critical for individuals with insecure attachment orientations. Finally, this chapter will conclude with suggestions for future research.

This passage not only sets the stage for the book, telling the reader what to expect in the 300-plus pages that followed, but clairvoyantly told the field what to expect in the 60-plus years that have followed. IT has indeed been useful as a guide to research and as a way to order the myriad empirical facts uncovered about relationships, not just in social psychology, but in diverse disciplines spanning the social and behavioral sciences. In this volume, we hope once again to contribute some order and simplification to an even more increasingly robust literature, as the simple assumptions of IT remain as relevant as ever.

This chapter reviews research on relational expectations as interdependence and commitment develop. There are myriad pathways to commitment which vary by individual, relational, and contextual factors. The goal of this chapter is to focus on existing typologies of relationship development and review literature on how and why individuals become increasingly committed to their partners. In doing so, we will review the origin and development of research on commitment to wed and track its history over time. We will also discuss previously unpublished data that capture the diverse reasons for upturns and declines in commitment and explore how expectations influence relationship maintenance/continuity. We will conclude with a discussion of methodological concerns and future directions.

Closeness and interdependence are considered to be essential components of any intimate relationship of significant duration.These core processes, however, can also be manifested in one-time interactions between strangers, with positive consequences including an increase in positive mood and belongingness. Many years ago, Art Aron and his colleagues developed a closeness-generating exercise (sometimes referred to as the Fast Friends procedure) that was designed to generate “a temporary feeling of closeness, not an actual ongoing relationship” within pairs of strangers. Other closeness- and interdependence-inducing tasks have also been developed including additional ones based on structured, self-disclosure and some based on doing activities such as playing a game or engaging in humorous activities.In this chapter, I describe the different tasks that have been developed to create a feeling of closeness or interdependence in initial structured interactions, the types of research questions that have been addressed with this method, and sample findings across multiple lines of research. Although there are limits in the degree to which findings from research based on temporary feelings of closeness in a laboratory setting can generalize to initial interactions and developed relationships in the “real world,” creating closeness and interdependence in a laboratory setting allows researchers to test the influence of various theoretically-important variables, including individual characteristics (shyness), the context of the interaction (medium of communication), and mediators (perception of being liked by the other).

Insecurely attached people have less happy, more unstable romantic relationships, but the quality of their relationships should depend on how their partners regulate them. Some partners find ways to buffer (emotionally and behaviorally regulate) insecurely attached individuals, which can make them feel better, behave more constructively, and improve their relationships. Understanding when, how, and why this important interpersonal process works requires a dyad-centered approach. In this chapter, we first review key tenets of attachment theory and the two primary forms of attachment insecurity (anxiety and avoidance). We then discuss the Dyadic Regulation of Attachment Insecurity Model, which outlines how and why certain types of buffering behaviors should soothe the worries and improve the relationship perceptions and behaviors of highly anxious and highly avoidant people. Following this, we discuss recent studies that illustrate some of the ways in which partners can successfully buffer the insecure reactions of highly anxious and highly avoidant individuals and how they can develop and maintain more “secure” environments. We conclude by suggesting future studies that might extend these recent findings and compare our model with some of the core concepts of Emotion-Focused Therapy.

The quality of interactions and relationships depends on the thoughts and feelings of both partners. Hence, people often try to manage the thoughts and feelings others have about them. This chapter reports the results of a program of research examining the role of interpersonal value goals – goals to be valued as a relationship partner – in interpersonal interactions and relationships. This research suggests that adopting the goal to be valued by others often motivates people to enact prosocial behaviors and adopt compassionate goals, and elicits positive responses from partners. The link between interpersonal value goals and prosocial behavior was particularly strong when participants endorsed lay theories that prosocial behavior elevates people’s interpersonal value and when they were immersed in relationship contexts in which specific partners rewarded their prosocial behavior, suggesting that selection of prosocial strategies as a means to pursue interpersonal value depends on explicit and tacit knowledge of interdependence.

Interdependent relationships are complex because they require the coordination of personal needs with relational needs. A common assumption in the extant literature is that personal needs are divergent from relational needs, requiring individuals to balance personal and relational needs by prioritizing one over the other at any given point. In the first section of this chapter, we draw on self-determination and interdependence theories to review existing research that challenges the assumption that personal and relational needs are inherently in conflict. We propose that personal and relational needs can be conceptualized as complementary, and that pursuing relational needs and goals does not necessarily involve sacrificing or deprioritizing personal ones (or vice versa). Instead, the pursuit of favorable personal and relational needs can serve to facilitate each other. Of course, relationship circumstances do not always allow for such complementary processes. Thus, the second section of this chapter overviews various conditions (e.g., relationship processes, relationship contexts, and individual differences) that pit personal and relational needs against each other, and explores how people adapt to and manage such circumstances. Taken together, this chapter aims to shed light on the complexities of coordinating personal and relational needs in highly interdependent relationships.

In the present chapter, we examine ethnicity as a potential moderator of interdependence processes within Rusbult’s investment model.Using Triandis’s theory of subjective culture (which contends that ethnic groups differ in the cultural values that they embrace) as a point of departure, we review empirical evidence concerning the hypotheses that Thibaut and Kelley’s original version of interdependence theory in general is limited to individualistic (rather than collectivistic) ethnic groups.We conclude that the evidence does not support Triandis’s hypotheses.Nevertheless, we argue that a revamped version of Triandis’s theory that incorporates elements of Kelley and Thibaut’s revised interdependent theory and Rusbult’s investment model can serve as the basis for developing new, testable hypotheses concerning ethnicity as a moderator of interdependence processes.Implications for the relevance of subjective culture to relationship science are discussed.

People often use relationships to characterize and describe places. Some places are described as warm, friendly, and welcoming. Others as cold, harsh, and unwelcoming. Is there any truth to these colloquialisms? How influential is the broader geographic context in affecting our close relationships? Where do people have the happiest relationships and why? In this chapter, I review recent research on geographic variation in relationship-related constructs and outcomes. The review will also feature some empirical examples and methodological considerations for studying geographic variation in close relationships and how they are expressed. A large portion of the chapter will be a discussion on the mechanisms that give rise to geographic variation in relationship-related constructs and behavior that unfold over different time scales. Step-by-step modules and supplementary information for asking geographic questions at different levels of analysis will be provided. Finally, I will conclude with unanswered conceptual and methodological questions related to the study of geographic variation in close relationship behavior.

Romantic relationships affect the levels of security that people generally experience with close others. Experiences with a partner carry immediate outcomes (e.g., feeling appreciated vs. ignored), but they also can have longer lasting effects when they cause people to reflect on their overall worthiness and comfort with closeness/trust toward others. Our chapter examines how such experiences shape the mental representations that underlie chronic tendencies with attachment security, and how these representations may change with new experiences in romantic involvements. We examine change through the lens of the Attachment Security Enhancement Model, which suggests that enhancing security in relationships involves both mitigating momentary insecurity and fostering more secure mental representations over the longer term. Whether partners are effective at enhancing security may depend on the strategies they enact, and optimal strategies depend on whether a person is experiencing momentary anxiety versus avoidance. Over time, partner strategies in new situations – especially those that depart from past insecure experiences (e.g., painful interactions in close relationships) – can lead to revisions of insecure mental representations (e.g., beliefs about the self, expectations of close others). Together, using strategies to manage insecure moments and create opportunities to revise insecure mental representations may enhance security across time.