Content area
Abstract
Interpersonal theory (e.g., Carson, 1969; Kiesler, 1983, 1996) asserts that all interpersonal behaviours can be defined by their placement along two orthogonal dimensions: affiliation and dominance. The present thesis attempts to demonstrate the empirical links between these two dimensions, and the dimensions of destructive-constructive (akin to affiliation) and active-passive (akin to dominance) of accommodation theory – in the hope that doing so will provide a more complete and clearer framework for understanding dyadic interactions. One of the core tenets of interpersonal theory posits that interactions tend to exhibit complementarity (i.e., sameness/correspondence on affiliation, and oppositeness/reciprocity on dominance), and that these interactions are the most satisfying and produce the most satisfactory relationships. However, there are times when acting in a complementary manner may be destructive, for example during conflict Accommodation theory (which only focuses on the affiliation dimension) posits that the most harmonious and satisfying interactions occur when partners accommodate to one another; that is, the ability, when one's partner has engaged in a potentially destructive (or hostile) manner to, (1) inhibit natural impulses to react destructively, in turn (i.e., inhibiting correspondence of affiliation), and (2) instead engage in a constructive reaction (i.e., responding in a non-correspondent manner) (e.g., Rusbult et al., 1982).
Romantic couples' moment-to-moment affiliation and dominance behaviours were assessed using a computer joystick technique (see Sadler et al., 2009) during two contextually different interactions; namely neutral and conflict. The joystick technique provided two main indices of couples' entrainment on affiliation and dominance behaviour: how correlated their overall mean levels of behaviour were, and how correlated their moment-to-moment fluctuations were. Results at both levels provided strong support for the interpersonal principle of complementarity, for both interactions, in affiliation and dominance (Study 1 and Study 2).
Additionally, some support was provided for the principle of complementarity being indicative of greater satisfaction, in that greater affiliation correspondence during the neutral interaction (Study 1), and greater dominance reciprocity during both neutral and conflict interactions (Study 2), were associated with increased satisfaction. Furthermore, weaker affiliation correspondence during conflict was also found to be associated with greater satisfaction (Study 2), providing some support for the idea that accommodation during conflict could be beneficial to the relationship.
Furthermore, some support was provided indicating that a tendency to act in a constructive manner when dissatisfied, was associated with greater affiliation; and a tendency to act in a destructive manner when dissatisfied, was associated with greater dominance. However, a number of validity issues were apparent with the accommodation scale (the EVLN). As such, this scale was examined, in great detail, and a number of its shortcomings are addressed.