Cultural Variation in Communication Directness in Romantic Relationships: Chinese preferred indirect (vs. direct) communication more than European Americans; effect was more strongly pronounced in positively valenced situations

How You Talk About It Matters: Cultural Variation in Communication Directness in Romantic Relationships. Fiona Ge, Jiyoung Park, Paula R. Pietromonaco. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, April 3, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1177/00220221221088934

Abstract: Communication plays an integral role in shaping romantic relationship quality. Yet, little is known about whether people from different cultural backgrounds communicate differently in their romantic relationships. Here, we addressed this issue by examining (a) whether the extent to which individuals communicate directly or indirectly in their romantic relationships varies by culture, (b) what mechanism underlies these cultural differences, and (c) how the fit between culture and communication style contributes to expected relationship satisfaction. Three key findings emerged across three studies (total N = 1,193). First, Chinese preferred indirect (vs. direct) communication more than European Americans, and this effect was more strongly pronounced in positively (vs. negatively) valenced situations (Studies 1–3). Second, interdependent (vs. independent) self-construal mediated the cultural difference in indirect communication both in positive and negative situations (Study 3). Finally, both cultural groups anticipated greater relationship satisfaction when they imagined their partner using the culturally preferred mode of communication—that is, indirect communication for Chinese and direct communication for European Americans (Study 3). These findings advance theory on culture and romantic relationship processes by demonstrating cultural differences in preferred communication styles across different situational contexts, identifying self-construal differences underlying these preferred communication styles, and highlighting the importance of congruence between culture and communication style for the quality of relationships.

Keywords: culture, communication directness, interdependence versus independence, romantic relationships, relationship quality

Illusory improvement: Participants remembered their romantic relationship one year ago more negatively they had reported it originally, creating a sense of improvement over time

Projecting current feelings into the past and future: Better current relationship quality reduces negative retrospective bias and increases positive forecasting bias. Johanna Peetz, Justin P. K. Shimizu, Courtney Royle. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, April 7, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1177/02654075221084280

Abstract: We examine bias in how people perceive their romantic relationship over time. Participants appraised their relationship 6 months and 1 year ago on average more negatively than they had done at the time (retrospective bias) but showed no significant mean-level forecasting bias. Higher relationship quality at the time of appraisal was linked to less negative retrospective bias but to more positive forecasting bias (Study 1). Similarly, participants who were experimentally manipulated to focus on the high relationship quality aspects in their relationship (vs. considering challenging aspects of their relationship) showed more forecasting bias and less retrospective bias (Study 2). This pattern occurred due to participants’ projecting positive current feelings onto predicted relationship quality in the future and remembered relationship quality in the past. This projection reduced the overall negative bias in recalled relationship quality for those currently perceiving higher relationship quality but increased positive bias in forecasted relationship quality.

Keywords: Temporal appraisal, illusory improvement, relationship change, relationship bias

Illusory improvement

People like to see improvement over time and prefer to remember the past in a way that implies such improvement—even if this means remembering the past self as worse than it actually was. For example, students rating themselves 4 months apart showed similar ratings at each point in time. However, when reflecting on what they were like 4 months ago, students rated their past self more negatively than they had at that time, creating a sense of improvement over time (Wilson & Ross, 2001). In the realm of relationships, people similarly distort their memory of their relationship over time, creating a sense of relationship improvement (Frye & Karney, 2004; Karney & Coombs, 2000; Karney & Frye, 2002; Ogolsky & Surra, 2014; Sprecher, 1999; Zygar-Hoffman & Schönbrodt, 2020).

Retrospective bias

People can be motivated to see improvement in their relationships even where none exists. Such illusory improvement might be expressed in direct judgments of change (e.g., “My relationship has improved”) or might be expressed in how the relationship is judged at different points in time (e.g., “Last April my relationship was good, now my relationship is great”). Thus, in retrospective judgments, people might judge the relationship more negatively in the past than it really was, creating a sense of improvement.

Several studies have shown a memory bias when recalling how one’s relationship has changed over time (Frye & Karney, 2004; Ogolsky & Surra, 2014; Sprecher, 1999). For example, newly dating people reported retrospectively that their commitment had increased in the past 7 months, whereas concurrent rating actually stayed the same (Ogolsky & Surra, 2014), and newlyweds reported remembering an increase in relationship satisfaction in the past 6 months at each point of assessment over 2.5 years, even though actual ratings declined across time points (Frye & Karney, 2004). Thus, it appears that people want to believe that their relationship has been improving, despite actually stable or declining relationship appraisals over time.

While these studies looked at perceived retrospective trajectories rather than a comparison of how the relationship was rated at a given time and how it is rated retrospectively for that same time, there exists also evidence of such retrospective memory bias. In a study assessing marital satisfaction of the wives of university staff over two decades, retrospective reports of marital satisfaction 10 years ago were negatively biased, such that they reported remembering their relationship to have been worse 10 years ago than they had reported at the time (Karney & Coombs, 2000). This negative retrospective bias also extends to evaluating specific emotions rather than global relationship judgments: Two experience sampling studies comparing relationship partner’s online reports of annoyance at their partner over 2 weeks with their remembered annoyance at the partner at the end of the 2 weeks showed exaggerated annoyance in retrospect (Zygar-Hoffman & Schönbrodt, 2020). To sum up, people tend to perceive illusory improvement in their relationships by recalling their relationship as having been worse in the past than they actually thought at the time.

Forecasting bias

Do people also expect improvement for their relationship in the future? When asked to predict the future of their relationship, the tendency is to be optimistic (MacDonald & Ross, 1999; Murray & Holmes, 1997). Does this optimism extend to predicting how the relationship quality will develop in the future? Evidence on whether people expect their relationship to get better over time is mixed. In a large sample of newlywed spouses, the vast majority predicted their marriage would become better (82%) and less than 1% predicted that their relationship would get worse in the next years (Lavner et al., 2013). However, when actually tracking their marital satisfaction over the following 4 years, participants showed, on average, a decline in marital satisfaction (Lavner et al., 2013). This represents illusory improvement in forecasted trajectories, at least in newlyweds. However, in another study, married relationship partners rating their relationship problems expected these problems to be about as severe in 6 months as they were currently, suggesting no overall forecasting bias (Frye & Karney, 2002). Similarly, an experience sampling study tracking couple’s forecasts of their partners’ prorelational (responsive) behaviors for the next day found both positive and negative forecasting errors (Lemay et al., 2015). Instead of a general tendency toward forecasting positive change, Lemay and colleagues found that relationship partners exhibited a temporal projection bias, where forecasts were biased by current feelings. Participants who experienced more positive affect today or perceived more positive behaviors from their partner today predicted more positive affect and more responsive partner behaviors tomorrow, independent of actual feelings and behaviors the next day (Lemay et al., 2015).

The role of relationship quality

Positive illusions about relationships can be beneficial: for example, people who idealized their partner more reported more increases in relationship satisfaction after 1 year (Murray & Holmes, 1997). In a meta-analysis across 14 studies that assessed relationship quality and bias about various relationship-relevant outcomes, Fletcher and Kerr (2010) found that greater relationship quality was on average linked with perceiving the partner or the relationship overly positively. Furthermore, expectations about the future quality of a relationship tend to be a better predictor of relationship commitment than current relationship quality (Baker et al., 2017; Lemay, 2016), suggesting that perceiving illusory improvement may function as a relationship maintenance strategy (also see Rusbult et al., 2001). If illusory improvement serves a relationship maintenance function, higher current relationship quality should not only be linked to more positive forecasting bias (i.e., more improvement into the future), but it should also be linked to more negative retrospective bias (i.e., more improvement from the past).

On the other hand, it is possible that current relationship quality simply biases appraisals of past and future relationship quality to be more similar to current relationship quality—a temporal projection bias. The temporal projection bias has been shown to influence future affect and future behavior predictions in close relationships (Lemay et al., 2015). Outside of close relationships, similar projection biases have been shown to distort both memories about past loneliness and expectations about future loneliness (Teneva & Lemay, 2020) and past and future emotions more generally (Chang et al., 2018). Such a temporal projection bias would predict that higher current relationship quality should be linked to more positive forecasting bias in relationship quality—but linked to less negative retrospective bias. When projecting current feelings on past relationship appraisals, the more positive participants feel about their relationship in the present, the more positively they would see the relationship in the past (rather than seeing the relationship in the past more negatively to support illusory improvement perceptions).

Forecasting bias

Both illusory improvement and temporal projection patterns would predict that relationship quality at the time of forecast should increase the tendency to predict more change to the better in global relationship judgments for the future. Indeed, this has been borne out in past research (Baker et al., 2017; Frye, 2006; Lemay, 2016; Rusbult et al., 2001). In a study on temporal comparison, Frye (2006) found that the more satisfied participants reported being in their relationship, the more positive change in relationship problems they expected (although the extent to which this expected change might be illusory could not be determined in this particular study, since actual change was not assessed). In the present studies we examine the link of perceived relationship quality with the extent of bias in predicted future relationship quality (Study 1) and examine whether experimental manipulation of relationship quality at the time of forecast increases the extent of positive forecasting bias (Study 2).

Retrospective bias

On the other hand, when it comes to the link between relationship quality and retrospective bias about the relationship in the past, the conception of illusory improvement biases as relationship maintaining is at odds with temporal projection biases. How is relationship quality linked with retrospective biases about the relationship? When examining participants’ recollections of their marriage 10 years ago, those who were most satisfied with their marriage at the time of recall were least likely to bias their recollections of the relationship whereas those least satisfied with their relationship were most biased (Karney & Coombs, 2000). Similarly, those with better global relationship satisfaction at the time of recall showed less retrospective bias about their annoyed feelings toward their partner in the past 2 weeks (Zygar-Hoffmann & Schönbrodt, 2020). Thus, higher relationship quality at the time of recall appears to be associated with less, rather than more, retrospective bias about the relationship in the past. In the present studies we examine the link of perceived relationship quality on the extent of bias in recalled past relationship quality (Study 1) and examine whether experimental manipulation of relationship quality at the time of recall affect the extent of negative retrospective bias (Study 2).

Some kinds of play are more individually or socially adaptive than others; thus, we must not forget that hazing, bullying, animal cruelty, gambling, risk taking, compulsions, & addictions of many kinds can have their origins in play

The centrality and origins of play: The mystery and evolution of animal play. Gordon Burghardt. Apr 6 2022. https://iai.tv/articles/the-centrality-and-origins-of-play-auid-2095

The existence of play in non-human animals is a direct challenge to old-fashioned scientific ideas. Play is dismissed as a human projection or as functional practice for adulthood that only ‘higher”  mammals are capable of. Not so, writes Gordon Burghardt, the contemporary study of play finds it across the animal kingdom from birds to spiders, and help makes sense of why, for us humans, play can be spontaneous, purposeless and fun.

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The Meaning of Play

Rather than search for the “true” or “real” meaning of play, as if it is a unitary phenomenon, the conceptual framework outlined above suggests that we look for the factors in both the environment and the organism that facilitate the performance of play. Some kinds of play are more individually or socially adaptive than others. Thus, we must not forget that hazing, bullying, animal cruelty, gambling, risk taking, compulsions, and addictions of many kinds can have their origins in play.