Looking for Safety in All the Right Places: When Threatening Political Reality Strengthens Family Relationship Bonds

Abstract

Elections and pandemics highlight how much one’s safety depends on fellow community members, a realization that is especially threatening when this collective perceives political realities inconsistent with one’s own. Two longitudinal studies examined how people restored safety to social bonds when everyday experience suggested that fellow community members inhabited inconsistent realities. We operationalized consensus political realities through the negativity of daily nationwide social media posts mentioning President Trump (Studies 1 and 2), and the risks of depending on fellow community members through the pending transition to a divided Congress during the 2018 election season (Study 1), and escalating daily U.S. COVID-19 infections (Study 2). On days that revealed people could not count on fellow community members to perceive the same reality of President Trump’s stewardship they perceived, being at greater risk from the judgment and behavior of the collective community motivated people to find greater happiness in their family relationships.

Lovers in a Dangerous Time: Ecologically Motivated Relationship Safety Regulation

“…Consequently, the model further assumes that the representational overlap between physical and relational experiences gives people license to deflect concerns about their own physical vulnerability through motivated, symbolic distortions of relationship safety. Consistent with this logic, growing evidence suggests that people distort their perceptions of their closest relationships to deflect the vulnerability they experience outside their relationships ( Murray et al, 2017( Murray et al, , 2018( Murray et al, , 2020( Murray et al, , 2021. For instance, people deflect daily anxiety about depending on fel-Fig.…”

“…This process is expected to be moderated by individual differences in the strength of the evidence supporting relationships as offering safety from harm, and individual differences in the ability to construct evidence that relationships offer safety. low community members who cannot be trusted to vote for the "right " candidates or behave responsibly during a pandemic by finding greater happiness in their families ( Murray et al, 2021 ). They can also defend against reminders of death and the fragility of human existence by drawing closer and reaffirming their commitment to their relationships ( Florian et al, 2002 ;Mikulincer et al, 2004 ;Plusnin et al, 2018 ).…”

I love you but I hate your politics: The role of political dissimilarity in romantic relationships.

“…Finally, we believe research is needed to unite our with work showing that people see their close relationships as a safe haven amid societal uncertainty (Murray et al, 2018(Murray et al, , 2021. Although most partners appear to share political beliefs, for the minority that do not, it would be fruitful to understand how conflicting tensions might shape their relationship behavior during times of sociopolitical uncertainty.…”

“…When individuals are confronted with a political landscape that does not match their own reality, they turn toward close others, such as their romantic partner, to establish a sense of security (Murray et al, 2021). But what happens when one's romantic partner also does not share one's views?…”

Pursuing safety in social connection regulates the risk-regulation, social-safety, and behavioral-immune systems.

“…L. Murray et al, 2017, 2018; S. L. Murray, Lamarche, et al, 2021; Murray, Seery, et al, 2021; Williamson et al, 2021). By functioning to make depending on others more foreseeable and existentially certain, the social-safety system can be enlisted, as needed, to make social connection feel collectively safer.…”