Elsevier

Computers in Human Behavior

Volume 73, August 2017, Pages 303-310
Computers in Human Behavior

Full length article
Can insecurely attached dating couples get compensated on social network sites? —The effect of surveillance

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2017.03.046Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Insecure attachment has negative effect on each dyad's relationship quality (RQ).

  • SNS surveillance buffer the negative effect of female's avoidance on male's RQ.

  • Person with insecure attachment couldn't benefit from one's own SNS surveillance.

Abstract

Insecure attachment is detrimental to romantic relationships. However, surveillance through Social Networking Sites (SNSs) is assumed to be beneficial for romantic relationships in prior studies. Does surveillance offer a compensatory effect for insecure couples? The present study aims to explore the combined effect of romantic attachment and surveillance on relationships for college dating couples. The actor and partner interpersonal model (APIM) was introduced to deal with mutual influences between both parts of the couples. We recruited 250 dating couples for this research. Our study revealed that both anxiety and avoidance have negative effects on one's own and one's partner's perceived relationship quality. Furthermore, surveillance may offset males' lower perceived relationship quality when this perception is caused by partners' avoidance. Although surveillance may not compensate for lower perceived relationship quality caused by one's own insecure attachment, it may help mitigate the effects of an avoidant partner.

Introduction

Establishing and maintaining romantic relationships is highly significant for college students (Berscheid, 1999). Each stage of a dating relationship entails numerous opportunities for the perfection of personality and emotional intelligence, the development of self-concept and values, and improvements in mental health. What shapes one's perceived relationship quality? According to the relevant literature, past dating experiences, communication style, bonding with original family, and other socioeconomic factors greatly impact one's relationship quality (Barnes et al., 2007, Jang et al., 2002, Sprecher and Felmlee, 1992, Donnellan et al., 2005). Particularly, romantic attachment, which fundamentally shapes one's expectations and interactions, is one of the most predictive indicators in romantic relationship (Fraley and Shaver, 2000, Simpson and Rholes, 1998). Romantic attachment is conceptualized as consisting of two dimensions, avoidance and anxiety. The former reflects the extent to which one feels comfortable with intimacy. Individuals who score high on avoidance tend to invest less emotion into relationships and are more prone to keep distance from partners, both physically and mentally. For its part, the latter refers to an individual's sense of security in an intimate relationship. Individuals who score high on anxiety always worry about being abandoned (Bowlby, 1976, Bowlby, 1980). Prototypically securely attached individuals tend to score low on both of these dimensions, whereas insecurely attached individuals probably score high on at least one dimension. In the past decade, the advent of social networking sites (SNSs) has substantially changed the way people communicate and connect and how dating couples interact (Hand et al., 2013, Stern and Willis, 2007).

A noteworthy change provided by SNSs is that a person can discover his or her partner's online and offline behaviors by simply clicking on a profile page. With an increasing number of couples engaging in monitoring or stalking of partners over SNSs, researchers began to conceptualize it as surveillance, which led to the investigation of this phenomenon's psychological effects and the relational outcomes (Fox and Tokunaga, 2015, Marshall, 2012, Tokunaga, 2011, Tong, 2013, WarberKatie, 2014). Though prior research has enriched our understanding of surveillance, little is known about its impact on ongoing relationships. There are several reasons for this lack of in-depth knowledge. First, many studies have been conducted on couples that were no long together or at the relationship termination stage (Fox and Tokunaga, 2015, Lyndon et al., 2011, Marshall, 2012, Tong, 2013). Data gleaned from broken relationships cannot be generalized to ongoing relationships. Second, although several studies have been conducted on ongoing relationships and revealed the motivation behind surveillance, these studies did not address the gap between the motive behind surveillance and the outcomes of surveillance (Marshall et al., 2013, Muise et al., 2009). Third, despite the fact that surveillance conjures a negative picture of looking into someone else's life without permission, some scholars have asserted that, given the convenience and affordance of SNSs, surveillance may not be associated with jealousy or detrimental outcomes in romantic relationships. Rather, it may foster the newly formed relationship by helping the individual who engages in surveillance get to know his or her partner as well as promote intimacy between couples with insufficient interactions because of geographical separation or psychological reasons (Guerrero and Afifi, 1998, Lampe et al., 2006, Marshall et al., 2013, Tokunaga, 2011).

Both anxiety and avoidance have maladaptive impacts on romantic relationships. Perhaps highly anxious individuals worry about being abandoned and/or have a strong desire to maintain proximity. As a result, for such individuals, being apart from one's partner decreases relationship satisfaction. With the help of SNSs, anxious individuals can access their partners by visiting their personal profiles whenever needed. That is, surveillance may offer anxious individuals a way to engage with the partners regardless of geographical separation or even partner permission. In contrast, avoidant individuals' relationship dissatisfaction comes from discomfort over closeness and fear of rejection. Given that the set goal of attachment system is to feel secure (Collins & Read, 1990), avoidant individuals still desire proximity though they suppress their feelings and deny their needs. Exercising surveillance in a remote way may help fulfill the needs of proximity while avoiding discomfort and fear of rejection. Most importantly, surveillance over SNSs may help avoidant individuals learn more about their partners and reduce the psychological distance caused by avoidance. A more detailed literature review about the interplay between attachment theory, surveillance, and relationship quality is needed before carrying out the research.

Section snippets

Anxiety and avoidance

Romantic attachment theory stems from adult attachment theory, and it is defined as the connection between intimate partners (both for dating couples and married couples). It is established on the basis of one's stable notions of self as well as one's stable notions of his or her intimate partner. It determines an individual's reactive mode toward stimuli and continuously shapes his or her interactions with the partner. In 1987, Hazan and Shaver coined the phrase in the article “Romantic Love

The current study

In accordance with prior research showing that relationship quality is affected by one's own attachment styles and those of one's partner (Kane et al., 2007, Karantzas et al., 2014, Molero et al., 2016, Simpson, 1990), we hypothesize that both anxiety and avoidance would be negatively associated with the individual's own as well as his or her partner's relationship quality. Gender differences regard to attachment and its influential power show that female's anxiety is more decisive to her

Participants

Our sample consisted of 250 dating couples from 4 universities in Beijing, Shanghai, Henan, and Hebei. We invited dating couples to participate in the research on campus, recruiting participants in places such as open libraries, playgrounds, cafés, and school canteen. Each member of a couple was asked to separately (though simultaneously) fill out a questionnaire on-site, without referring to a partner's answers. To prevent interference, researchers sat or walked near each member to collect

Results

As shown in Table 1, for both males and females, perceived relationship quality was not only correlated with one's own attachment style (anxiety and/or avoidance) but it was also significantly correlated with one's partner's attachment style (anxiety and/or avoidance). Moreover, the correlation coefficients for females' attachment styles and males' relationship quality (r = −0.19, p < 0.01; r = −0.46, p < 0.01; for anxiety and avoidance, respectively) were greater than those for males'

Discussion

This study was conducted to examine the adaptive effect of surveillance over SNSs on dating couples, namely to determine if exercising surveillance offsets lower perception of relationship quality caused by insecure romantic attachment.

Conclusion

An increasing body of research shows that surveillance is not necessarily associated with negative motivations and negative consequences. We expand on this research by showing that surveillance over SNSs is beneficial for dating couples. Surveillance may do little to offset the harm caused by one's own anxiety or avoidance in terms of one's own perceived relationship quality. However, it has the potential to make males feel better about their relationships if they are coupled with avoidant

Author disclosure statement

No competing financial interests exist.

Acknowledgments

The authors gratefully acknowledge the generous support from Social and Liberal Sciences Revitalization Foundation of Tsinghua University (Grant No. 2011WKYB006).

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