When one's partner wants out: Awareness, attachment anxiety and accuracy

Abstract

Can a person tell whether their romantic partner wants to break up and, if so, how is such accuracy associated with their own attachment anxiety? We examined these questions by proposing and assessing the construct of perceived partner dissolution consideration (PPDC), including its validity. We then assessed the extent to which partners were accurate in their perceptions of each other's dissolution consideration, focusing on the perceiver's attachment anxiety as a potential moderator. Specifically, in two studies involving couples, dyadic analyses of couple data showed that couple members significantly underestimated (negative mean‐level bias) partner dissolution consideration and also projected their own dissolution consideration onto their partners. Couple members higher in anxiety were particularly accurate (tracking accuracy) in their assessments of dissolution consideration. Implications for partner perceptions and judgements of dissolution consideration on relationship functioning are considered.

Relationship commitment regulation: Influencing a partner's commitment to achieve one's commitment goals

“…In such cases, when someone sees strong potential for the new relationship to become committed, they may prefer their partner to be more committed than they currently are. Conversely, when someone does not see as much potential for the future, perceiving that their partner wants to leave (Tan et al, 2023) -or they realize their own commitment is beginning to wane -a reciprocal developmental trajectory may commence, in which they realize that they would like to leave the relationship and they may prefer their partner also become less committed (VanderDrift et al, 2009). In both examples, people's preference is for their partner's commitment to match their own commitment level (or desired commitment level; see Pusch et al, 2023, for research on the benefits of minimizing discrepancies in self-reported closeness between partners within a relationship).…”