Predicting Responses to Bids for Sexual and Romantic Escalation in Cross-Sex Friendships

Abstract

The transition from a platonic cross-sex friendship to a more intimate sexual and/or romantic relationship is an interesting, yet somewhat understudied, phenomenon. In this study, we introduce and test relationship adaptation theory to predict cross-sex friends' predispositions for reciprocating a bid for escalation to an exclusive dating or friends with benefits (FWB) relationship. Analyses of data collected from 288 participants found participants' dating status, anticipated rewards from escalating the relationship, expected social disapproval, friendship quality, and their friend's attractiveness predicted disposition to reciprocating a cross-sex friend's hypothetical bid for escalation to an exclusive romantic escalation. In addition, participants' biological sex, anticipated rewards from escalating the relationship, expected social disapproval, sexual permissiveness, and their friend's attractiveness emerged as predictors of disposition toward a friend's hypothetical bid to escalate a platonic friendship to a FWB relationship.

Amigos con beneficios vs. sexo casual: definiendo sus comportamientos sexuales, amor, celos y creencias románticas

“…AMB es un tipo de relación sexual ocasional en la que hay ausencia de fidelidad y de compromiso (Bisson & Levine, 2009;Furman & Shaffer, 2011;Lehmiller, VanderDrift, & Kelly, 2011;Letcher & Carmona, 2015;Lyons, Manning, Giordano, & Longmore, 2010;Santos Vega, 2009;Scott, Hash, Stevens, & Tejada, 2016); además, presenta particularidades, como el componente de la amistad, los rasgos de intimidad emocional y la pasión que la aproximan a una relación romántica (Owen, Fincham, & Polser, 2017). Aunque el placer y la gratificación sexual es la meta de esta relación, los participantes obtienen además el soporte afectivo y social asociado a la amistad (García-Serrán & Soriano-Ayala, 2016;Gusarova, Fraser, & Alderson, 2012), aunque también, puede estar motivada por deseos románticos (Akbulut & Weger, 2016;Bisson & Levine, 2009). Desde una perspectiva dimensional, AMB se sitúa en uno de los extremos de las relaciones informales, con una dinámica más estable y próxima a una relación comprometida, mientras que el polo más inestable y efímero lo ocupa el contacto sexual con personas desconocidas, llamado aventura de una noche o "rollo" de una noche.…”

Creating Sustainable Workplace Environments: An Exploratory Study of Social Energy Expenditure in Cross-Sex, Heterosexual Organizational Friendships

“…Although research on same-sex friendships is common (Caldwell & Peplau, 1982;Reisman, 1990), scholars are turning their attention toward cross-sex friendships (Akbulut & Weger, 2015;Guerrero & Chavez, 2005). Some communication and social psychology scholars have explored the specifics of cross-sex, heterosexual friendships in a workplace context (Fritz, 1997;McBride & Bergen, 2015;Riordan & Griffeth, 1995;Sias, Smith, & Avdeyeva, 2003).…”