PSY Ch.9

expectations

The predictions about what is likely to happen in the future in a particular relationship, often (but not always) based on general beliefs about how relationships function.

Stereotype Accuracy Effect

- Any 2 people are likely to agree on basic ethics and values - Both partners may share many of their beliefs and values and still be no more similar to each other than they are to any other member of their population

Perceptual Confirmation

• If you expect people to behave a certain way, you're more likely to perceive that they have behaved in that way. • perceptual confirmation appears to be an important mechanism through which beliefs and expectations can affect intimate relationships.

Sex-Role Traditionalism

• People who score high in sex role traditionalism value a clear separation of the roles and responsibilities for men and women. • They tend to believe that men should be responsible for the financial security of the family and women should be responsible for the home and children. • People who score low in sexrole traditionalism value a more egalitarian approach. Not only do they reject the idea that women and men have different spheres of influence • They care about both partners having an equal role in making decisions as well.

Culture

- Shared attitudes, beliefs, norms, value people who speak the same language, and share a geographic area, during a specific period of time

Locus of Control

An especially relevant set of expectations is the ability of partners to bring about desired changes within their relationship

belief

An idea or theory about what the world is actually like. • A lot of our knowledge about relationships takes the form of beliefs, such as "Couples who fight a lot are probably unhappy" and "Blondes have more fun." • Beliefs are simple descriptions of the world.

Self-fulfilling Prophecy

Individuals act to bring about the experiences they expect to happen.

Value

Judgements about how important something is to us -Values are subjective judgments. - We may make a judgment of how important something is relative to something else. For example, one may judge that helping others is more important that becoming famous. - Values may be principles that help us make important personal decisions. These would be considered personal values. For example, if a person highly values creativity, the person may strive to find a career that will allow him or her to be creative.

Behavior Confirmation

Our beliefs or expectations can also shape the way we experience the world by affecting our behavior toward others.

External Locus of Control

People with an external locus of control believe their successes and failures are due to forces outside themselves.

Internal Locus of Control

People with an internal locus of control feel that the power to achieve their goals lies within themselves.

Attitude

Positive or negative evaluation of someone or some thing. General attitudes are what telephone surveys and public opinion polls tend to measure.

Standard

Whereas an attitude is an expression of an evaluation, a standard is like a yardstick for making that evaluation. • In the context of intimate relationships, a standard is the minimum set of qualities and attributes partners require to be satisfied with the relationship.

Ideal Standards Model

makes similar predictions for the role values play in evaluating relationships