Relationship social comparisons in dating and marital relationships: Adding relationship social comparison interpretations

• Published in: The Journal of social psychology Vol. 159; no. 4; pp. 398 - 416
• Main Authors: Morry, Marian M., Sucharyna, Tamara A.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Routledge 04-07-2019; Taylor & Francis Inc
• Subjects: Adult; Cognitions; Dating; Female; Happiness; Humans; Indirect effects; Interpersonal Relations; Life satisfaction; Male; Marital relations; Marriage; Marriage - psychology; Marriage - statistics & numerical data; Personal Satisfaction; Quality; relationship quality; Relationship satisfaction; relationship type; Romantic relationships; Sexual Partners - psychology; Social comparison; social comparisons; Social Perception; Young Adult; social comparisons; relationship quality; relationship type; Cognitions
• ISSN: 0022-4545; 1940-1183
• DOI: 10.1080/00224545.2018.1498826

How an individual interprets a relationship social comparison may have important implications for the self and one's relationship. We asked whether these interpretations significantly mediated the relation between the manipulated social comparison direction and relationship satisfaction, relationship commitment, satisfaction with life, and happiness for both dating (Studies 1 and 2) and married (Study 2) individuals. Participants were randomly assigned to make an upward or downward comparison to a friend's romantic relationship and completed measures of their interpretations, relationship quality, satisfaction with life, and happiness. For both dating and married individuals, there were indirect effects of manipulated social comparison direction through the interpretations for all dependent variables. Although there were some differences in mediation for married and dating individuals, the effect sizes were not significantly different.