CHAPTER ELEVEN Relationships

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CHAPTER ELEVENRelationships
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Friendships in Adulthood

• Three broad themes underlie adult friendships
• Affective or emotional basis
• This includes self-disclosure, expressions of
  intimacy, appreciation, affection, and support.
• Based on trust, loyalty, and commitment
• Shared or communal nature
• Friends participate in or support activities of
  mutual interest.
• Sociability and compatibility
• Friends keep us entertained and are sources of
  amusement, fun, and recreation.

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Men, Womens, and Cross-Sex Friendships

• Women tend to have more friendships than men.
• Friendships between men and women tend to
• have a beneficial effect, especially for men
• be difficult to maintain

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Love Relationships

• Sternberg has identified three ideal
• components of love
• Passion
• Intimacy
• Commitment
• Assortative mating selecting a mate based on
  shared values, goals, and interests
• Homogamy the degree to which people share
  similar values and interests

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Violence in Relationships

• Abusive relationships occur when one person
  becomes aggressive toward their partner.
• Aggression can range from verbal to physical to
  murder.
• People remain in abusive relationships for many
  reasons,
• including low self-esteem
• and the belief that they
• cannot leave
• Battered woman syndrome

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Violence in Relationships

• Many college students report experiencing abuse
  while dating.
• In studies done since 2000
• 7 reported physical abuse
• 36 reported emotional abuse
• Acquaintance (date) rape is experienced by 1 in 4
  college women
• Roughly 40 to 50 of women are injured during a
  sexual attack

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Violence in Relationships

• Honor killings Common cause of womens murders
  in Arab countries is brother or other male
  relatives killing the victim because of honor.

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Elder Abuse, Neglect, and Exploitation

• Elder abuse has several categories
• Physical
• Sexual
• Emotional or Psychological
• Financial or material
• Abandonment
• Neglect
• Self-neglect
• Risk factors and causes of Elder Abuse, Neglect,
  or Exploitation
• Spouses or partners who have a history of being
  abusive tend to remain that way in late life.
• Unscrupulous businesspeople take advantage of
  cognitively disadvantaged older adults.

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Singlehood

• Most adults between 20 and 24 are single
• Approximately 80 of men and 70 of women
• People remain single for a variety of reasons.
• Three distinct groups of young singles
• Those who suffer distress at being single.
• Those who are experiencing a continuum of
  desiring to remain single and wanting to be
  married.
• Others that are quite happy being single.

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Cohabitation

• Becoming an increasingly popular lifestyle choice
• 523,000 couples in 1970
• 5,500,000 couples in 2000
• Couples cohabitate for three main reasons
• Convenience, sharing expenses, sexual
  accessibility part-time or limited cohabitation
• Couples are engaging in a trial marriage with an
  intent on marrying premarital cohabitation
• Long-term commitment that is a marriage in fact,
  but lacking official sanction substitute
  marriage

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Marriage

• The median age at first marriage is increasing
  and has done so over the last few decades.
• Factors influencing marital success
• Maturity of the partners at time of marriage
• Homogamy - Marriage
• based on similarity
• Feelings of equality
• Exchange theory
• each partner contributes
• something to the
• relationship that the other
• would be hard pressed to
• provide

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The Developmental Course of Marital Satisfaction

• Marital satisfaction is highest at the beginning
  of the marriage, falls until children leave home,
  and rises in later life.

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Keeping Marriages Happy

• Most long-term marriages tend to be happy,
  because both members of the couple
• show an ability to adapt to changes in their
  relationship
• realize that expectations about one's marriage
  change over time
• Seven Key Things to Keep a Good Marriage
• Make time for your relationship
• Express your love to your spouse
• Be there in times of need
• Communicate constructively and positively about
  problems in the relationship
• Be interested in your spouses life
• Confide in your spouse
• Forgive minor offenses, and try to
• understand major ones

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DivorceGrandma's Advice Video Clip

• Divorce in the U.S. is common and rates are
  higher than in many other countries.
• Men and women agree on reasons for divorce
• Infidelity Incompatibility Drug and alcohol
  use Growing apart

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Effects of Divorce on the Couple

• Divorce may impair well-being even several years
  later.
• Divorce Hangover inability to let go
• Divorce in middle- or late-life
• If the woman initiates the divorce, she reports
  self-focused growth and optimism.
• If she did not, she tends to ruminate and feel
  vulnerable.
• Middle-aged divorced women are less likely to
  remarry and more likely to have financial
  problems than men.

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Remarriage

• Despite adjustment problems, the vast majority of
  divorced people remarry.
• Usually men and women wait about 3.5 years.
• Few differences between first marriages and
  remarriages.
• Most second marriages have 25 higher risk of
  dissolution than first marriages.
• Remarriage in late life appears to be very happy,
  especially if the partners were widowed.
• In this case, the biggest problem is usually
  resistance by adult children.

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Widowhood

• Experiencing the death of one's spouse is a
  traumatic event, but one which is highly likely.
• Reactions to widowhood depend on the quality of
  the marriage.
• Widowed people are vulnerable to being abandoned
  (socially isolated) by their couples-based
  friendship network.
• Gender differences
• More than half of women over 65 are widows only
  15 of same-aged men are widowers
• Widowhood is more common among women because they
  tend to marry older men.
• Widowed men are typically older than widowed
  women.
• Men are more likely to die soon after their
  spouse.
• Either by suicide or natural causes

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Family Dynamics and the Life Course

• The Parental Role
• Today, couples have fewer children and have their
  first child later than in the past.

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Single Parents in the United States

• Single-parent households have remained constant
  since 1994 at 9 percent.
• Proportion of births to unmarried mothers is at
  an all time high at 37.
• Single parents are mostly women
• Single mothers and ethnic patterns
• 70 of African American births are to single
  mothers
• 48 of Latino births are to single mothers
• 25 of European births are to single mothers
• Concerns/obstacles of the single parent
• Financially less well-off
• Integrating work and
• parenthood is difficult
• Dating

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Midlife Issues Adult Children and Parental
Caregiving

• Sandwich generation
• Middle-aged parents caught between caring for
  their children and acting as caregivers for their
  parents

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Adult Children Becoming Friends and the Empty
Nest

• Middle aged parents experience two positive
  developments.
• Suddenly their children see them in a new light.
• The children leave home.
• Only 25 report negative emotions when their
  children leave home.
• Difficulties emerge when children were a major
  source of a parents identity.
• Most parents typically report distress if adult
  children move back home.

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Caring for ones parents

• Filial obligation to care for ones parents when
  necessary
• 44 million Americans provide care for older
  parents, in-laws, grandparents.
• Caregiving Stresses include
• Coping with parents declining cognitive ability
  and problematic behavior
• Workload burnout
• Loss of previous relationship with parent
• When the caregiving role infringes on other
  responsibilities

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Grandparenthood

• How do Grandparents Interact with Grandchildren?
• Grandparents pass on skills, religious, social,
  and vocational values.
• Grandchildren give to grandparents by keeping
  them in touch with youth and the latest trends
  (computers, iPods).
• Being a Grandparent is meaningful.
• Kivnick has identified five meanings of being a
  grandparent
• Centrality (most important part of ones life)
• Value as an elder (source of wisdom)
• Immortality through clan
• Reinvolvement with ones personal past
• (recalling their own grandparents)
• Indulgence (ability to spoil grandchildren)

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Grandparents, Grandchildren, and Divorce

• Grandparents are increasingly being put in the
  position of raising their grandchildren.
• Approximately 800,000 U.S. households include a
  grandparent raising a grandchild under the age of
  18.
• Grandparents who raise their grandchildren face
  many special problems.
• Reasons for raising grandchildren are varied.

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Family Dynamics and the Life Course

• Great-Grandparenthood
• Increasing numbers of people are living long
  enough to become great-grandparents.
• Which brings additional status and meaning to
  one's life
• Being a great-grandparent is an important source
  of personal and family renewal.