Theories of romantic relationships: Rusbult's investment model Flashcards
What is the investment model?
It is a development of the social exchange theory where commitment depends on three factors: Satisfaction, Comparisons with alternatives, Investment.
What is Factor 1: Satisfaction?
It is the extent to which romantic partners feel the rewards of a relationship exceed the costs.
It is based on the concept of the comparison level.
Each partner is satisfied if they are getting more out of the relationship than they expect based on previous experience and social norms.
what is Factor 2: Comparison of alternatives?
A judgement that partners make concerning wether a relationship with a different partner would bring more rewards and fewer costs.
What is Factor 3; Investment?
The resources associated with a romantic relationship which partners would lose if their relationship were to end.
Rusbult realised that Comparison level and comparison level of alternatives from SET are not good enough to explain commitment and many relationships would end as soon as the costs outweigh the rewards.
Therefore, he introduced a third factor- investment.
He argued that there are two types of investment:
intrinsic investment- any resources we put directly into the relationship ( money, possessions, energy, emotion, self disclosures)
Extrinsic investment: Resources that previously did not feature in the relationship, but are now closely associated with it. (mutual friends, cars, children).
Putting the three factors together, what can we predict?
If the partners in a relationship experience high levels of satisfaction and the alternatives are less attractive and the sizes of their investment are increasing, than we can confidently predict that partners will be committed to the relationship.
Explain satisfaction vs commitment
Rusbult et al. argued that commitment is the main psychological factor that causes people to stay in romantic relationships, with satisfaction a contributing factor.
How can commitment explain why dissatisfied partners stay in a relationship?
Because they have made an investment that they do not want to see go to waste. therefore, they will work hard to maintain and repair a damaged relationship.
What are relationship maintenance mechanisms?
Committed partners aim to promote their relationship through accommodation, Willingness to sacrifice and forgiveness.
Evaluation: Research support from meta analysis.
Benjamin Le and Christopher Agnew reviewed 52 studies which included about 11000 participants from 5 countries.
They found that satisfaction, comparison with alternatives and investment size all predicted relationship commitment.
Relationships where commitment was greatest were the most stable.
This suggests there is validity to Rusbult’s claim that these factors are universally important features of romantic relationships.
Evaluation: The model is an explanation of abusive relationships.
Rusbult studied domestically abused women and found that those most likely to return to an abusive partner reported having made the greatest investment and having the fewest alternatives.
Therefore, the model shows that satisfaction on its own cannot explain why people stay in relationships- commitment and investment are also factors.
Evaluation: One limitation is that it oversimplifies investment.
Wind Goodfriend and Christopher Agnew point out that there is more to investment than just the resources you have already put into a relationship.
As the partners also invest in the future and are motivated to each other as they want to see their future plans work out.
This shows hoe the original model is limited because it fails to identify the full complexity to investment.
