Seeing the same person or people in everyday situations such as work or school is also known as repeated exposure which Moreland and Beach (1992) said aids the formation of relationships because the more we see somebody the more we will like them.
Repeated exposure also breeds familiarity, which is another factor that is needed for the formation of a relationship because if we become familiar with a person we will become more accepting of their ways.
According to Newcomb another key aid to the formation of relationships is similarity because it becomes easier to form a relationship with someone we have something in common with even if it is just the way we look.
There are also theories of why we form relationships. The first of these is the social-biological approach, which states that our primary motivation in forming a relationship is to ensure the ongoing survival of our genes by promoting them to others. Basically this approach suggests that any behaviour we carry out I selfish because the main reason it is being carried out is to protect and promote our genes.
This theory of why we form a relationship relates to Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution that states that creatures will adapt their behaviour in a way that will best protect and promote their genes. This is known as Adaptive Behaviour.
A criticism of the socio-biological approach is that it does not explain homosexual behaviour because such behaviour will not enable an individual to spread their genes.
An alternative to the socio-biological approach is the Reinforcement and need satisfaction theory, which was introduced by Byrne (1971) who based it on Thorndikes Law of Effect, which states “any act that is rewarded is likely to be repeated” This means that in a relationship we each have our own individual rewards and that any behaviour that helps us receive these rewards will be repeated.
Foa (1975) found that rewards in a relationship can include sex, status and love and that these are rewarding because they meet our social needs.
A criticism of the Reinforcement and need satisfaction theory is that rewards are difficult to measure as all rewards are subjective.
These theories explain how and why a relationship is formed but do not tell us what initially attracts us to an individual. This can be explained by a person’s physical attractiveness, however there are different views as to what makes one person appear attractive to another.
Cunningham (1986) stated that we all unconsciously agree on what is attractive and that men and women need certain physical characteristics in order to be attractive E.g. men should have broad shoulders. These attributes often promote health and fertility, which supports the idea that we need to protect and promote our genes.
Another theory of attractiveness is the Matching Hypothesis suggested by Goffman. The idea behind the Matching Hypothesis is that instead of searching for the most attractive partner we will seek a partner that has a similar level of physical attractiveness to ourselves because it reduces the fear of rejection. This supports the idea that similarity plays a key role in the formation of a relationship and it is this theory I will base my coursework on.
