Young-ok Yum

Associations among Attachment Style, Maintenance Strategies, and Relational Quality across Cultures

Previous research has suggested that attachment style is an indicator of relationship behavior and perception universally across cultures; however, research comparing the effect of attachment style on relational maintenance in culturally distinct societies is still non-existent. The present study investigated the effect of the secure or insecure attachment style on commonly used relational maintenance strategies and desired relational features in three geographically distant cultures: the US mainland, Hawaii, and South Korea. Results indicated that as predicted, regardless of culture, secure attachment style was associated with higher ratings of relationship quality (trust, commitment, liking, control mutuality, and satisfaction) and the self- and partner-perceived uses of Stafford and Canarys (1991) relationship maintenance strategies. Culture did not change the effect of attachment style on the dependent factors; however, culture, as an independent factor, contributed to the variance in the self-/partner-perceived maintenance strategies and relationship quality.

The relationships among loneliness, self/partner constructive maintenance behavior, and relational satisfaction in two cultures

Previous research has shown that individuals in a close relationship or with good support network can suffer loneliness and that feelings of loneliness can cause negative perceptions of relationship quality and communication behavior of self and partner. The present study investigated the associations of self‐/partner‐perceived constructive communication behavior with loneliness and relational satisfaction in close relationships in South Korea and the United States. The results indicated that lonely individuals perceived themselves and their partners as displaying positive behaviors significantly less than did non‐lonely individuals, regardless of culture. Lonely people felt significantly less satisfied in a relationship than did their non‐lonely counterparts across cultures. However, as predicted, cultural differences emerged with respect to the significant indicators of loneliness: only self behavior for Koreans and only partner behavior for Americans. The results suggest that even a moderate level of loneliness can affect perceptions of constructive communication effort by self and others and relational satisfaction in close relationships across cultures.