The 'secrets' of a successful long-term relationship

Abstract
The ABS (2001) reported that 53.6% of Australian marriages end in divorce. This is an increase of 25% since 1983. So is this increase due to more unhappy marriages? More unhappy individuals? Or a society that is more accepting of divorce? Through undertaking study of the societal, dyad and individual aspects of divorce the 'secrets' of a successful long-term relationship may be uncovered.


Introduction
In Australia and many other parts of the world divorce and separation are on the rise. The study of social norms, dyad models and individual aspects may all play a role in determining the successfulness of a long-term relationship and an understanding of the increase in divorce rate. To understand divorce and maybe more importantly to find the secrets of a successful long-term relationship each of these levels should be explored. Firstly, there is less social stigma and more assistance (eg. financial) available to divorced persons. Additionally, culture may also play a role at this level. Secondly, transition from passionate love into companionate love, Gottman's work and the investment model all focus on the dynamics between the two people in the relationship. And thirdly, attachment styles are an individual assessment, which is believed to play a role in the success of a relationship. Therefore, relationship success is a very complex area of study with many variables. However, through this study particular variables have been identified as 'secrets' of a successful relationship.

Societal level
As the divorce rate rises so does its acceptance in society. With such high rates, divorce is almost the 'norm'. Gardern (2002) reported that in the past there were just as many unhappy marriages but as divorce resulted in social stigma and alienation couples mostly just stuck with it to avoid these consequences. Additionally, many women could not afford to leave unhappy marriages, as they were dependent on their husbands. The introduction of the supporting parent benefit in 1973 and the 'no-fault divorce' laws in 1976 meant that married individuals, particularly women, were able to leave their marriage (Gardern, 2002). The introduction of these benefits and laws also showed a change towards more social acceptance. As women have begun working outside the home, again their independence has increased and this maybe reflected in the increase in divorce rates. To summarise, many barriers within the societal level have now been removed and termination of a long-term relationship may now have fewer consequences than in the past.

However, this differs in different cultures as they do not have the same social norms. As social norms differ so do the meanings of long-term relationships. One example is arranged marriages in the past in non-Western cultures. In East China marriage is a family business and is arranged by the parent in accordance with the social hierarchy (Higgins, Zheng, Liu & Sun, 2002). These different views of marriage can result in varied successfulness, as China still has a low divorce rate. This does not neccessarily mean the couples themselves are happier.

Dyad Level
When referring to long-term relationships or marriage we are studying the interactions of two individuals. Over the life time of a relationship individuals are likely to come across many new experiences; having children, retirement, moving homes or states. The passionate to companionate love theory, Gottman's work and the investment model all aim to identify qualities between the individuals within the relationship that determine the likelihood of success or divorce.

Firstly, a relationship is likely to begin with passionate love. Passionate love includes; strong desires for one another, excitement and feelings of longing for one another. This love seems to be the easy bit and results in the initail attraction. The success lies in transforming this love into companionate love. Companionate love is calmer, it consists of perceiving your partner as your best friend and soul mate, and means there is a strive to make the relationship work. It is imperative to a successful long-term relationship as it signifies commitment (Baumeister & Bushman, 2008).

Secondly, Gottman's work has been reported to have a 93% success rate in predicting if a couple will stay together (Parra-Cardona & Busby, 2006). Gottman studies many couples and his theory aims to predict; divorce or martial stability, relationship satisfaction and adaptibility to childbirth or retirement (Tell, Pavkov, Hecker & Fontaine, 2006). The main conclusion behind Gottman's theory was that, positivity towards one's partner should outweigh the negativity. Furthermore, he believed that the presence of certain negative affects were more detrimental for the relationship than others. This is the basis of 'The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse' as Gottman called it. The Four Horseman include; criticism, contempt, defensiveness and withdrawal (Holman & Jarvis, 2003).
Gottman describes criticism as the change from complaining about their partner, which is essentially about their behaviour to criticising them, which is more detrimental as it is essentially about their personality. Gottman indicates that complaints are healthy for a relationship, however, if they go unheard the individual places blame on their partner, such as thinking they are selfish. Secondly, contempt includes; insults and psychological abuse against one's partner. There is no longer mutual attraction and compliments are rare. Thirdly, defensiveness results as a response to contempt. This is a natural response when insults are hurled at you, however, it is further damaging to the relationship. Lastly, withdrawal occurs as one is exhausted and overwhelmed by the insults and/or defensiveness and so they are no longer responsive at all. This results in a complete communication breakdown. At this point of the sequence the relationship is in a downward spiral, and the relationship requires a great deal of work to prevent its ending (Gottman & Silver, 1994).

Finally, the Investment model, initiated by Caryl Rusbult, identifies three factors to explain why people stay together. The three factors are; great satisfaction, poor alternatives and greater investment size (Baumeister & Bushman, 2008). Satisfaction is defined as positive emotion and attraction to one's relationship. That is the relationship provides high rewards (similar values as partner) and low costs (infrequent arguments) and meets one's expectations of a close relationship (Rusbult, Johnson & Morrow, 1986). Secondly, low alternatives refers to the individuals beliefs that there is low quality alternative partners. That is a belief that there is not anyone better available or with whom they would be better off with (Rusbult, Martz & Agnew, 1998). Lastly, investment size is the idea that if one has invested a lot into the relationship they are more likely to stick with it. Investments can include; time, effort, emotion and resources (such as raising kids or accumulating savings). Basically, there is a belief that their relationship could not be rebuilt with another person (Baumeister & Bushman, 2008). A strong role of one factor can keep an individual in a relationship and counteract the others. For example one may not be satisfied in their relationship but if there are no better alternatives or they have invested a lot they are unlikely to leave. While this model is useful to determine why someone might stay in a relationship, even in unpleasant circumstances such as during domestic violence, only the satisfaction factor describes the successfulness of the relationship rather then just succeeding in staying together.

Individual Level
A relationship consists of two individuals, each playing their part. Therefore, if one is not participating in prosocial behaviours there may not be much their partner can do.

One hypothesis on individual contributions towards a successful long-term relationship is that attachment styles can predict behaviours towards their partner. Brennan and Shaver (1995) propose that attachment styles formed in childhood can effect attachment in romantic relationships. Their study found that securely attached (low fear of closeness, low fear of abandonment) people are the happiest in relationships. Furthermore, a study by Klohnen and Bera (1998) found that 95% of women with secure attachment styles got married, with 24% experiencing divorce. In contrast, 75% of women with avoidant (high fear of closeness, high fear of abandonment) attachment styles got married but 50% divorced. This provides evidence that attachment styles play a role in the success of long-term relationships. There are many benefits of a secure attachment style for a relationship. Chappell and Davis (1998) report one benefit is that securely attached people have more positive than negative emotions, as already identified as important by Gottman. Baldwin, Keelan, Fehr, Enns & Koh-Rangarajoo (1996), report increased trust, commitment and a deeper friendship as contributors of securely attached individuals towards successful relationships.


Conclusion
Success of long-term relationships can be due to societal, dyad or individual contributors. Societal norms, culture, passionate to companionate love, Gottman's theory, the investment model and attachment styles all identified 'secrets' of a successful long-term relationship. These secrets include; following social and cultural norms, a deep friendship, high commitment, more positivity than negativity, satisfaction, good communication and absence of criticism, contempt, defensiveness and stonewalling.


References

Baldwin, M., Keelan, J., Fehr, B., Enns, V., & Koh-Rangarajoo, E. (1996). Social cognition conceptualization of attachment working models: Availability and accessibility effects. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 94-109.

Brennan, K.,& Shaver, P. (1995). Dimensions of adult attachment, affect regulation, and romantic relationship functioning. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 21, 267-283.

Baumeister, R., & Bushman, B. (2008). Social psychology and human nature (1st Ed.). Belmont, California: Thomson Wadworth.

Chappell, K., & Davis, K. (1998). Attachment, partner choice, and perception of romantic partners: An experimental test of the attachment-security hypothesis. Personal Relationships, 5, 327-342.

Gardner, M. (2002). The unholy war on divorce. Social Alternatives, 21, 52-56.

Gottman, J., & Silver, N. (994). What makes a marriage work? Psychology Today, 27, 38-45.

Higgins, L., Zheng, M., Liu, Y., & Sun, C. (2002). Attitudes to marriage and sexual behaviours: A survey of gender and culture differences in China and United Kingdom. Sex Roles, 46, 75-89.

Holman, T., & Jarvis, M. (2003). Hostile, volatile, avoiding and validating couple-conflict types: An investigation of the Gottman's couple-conflict types. Personal Relationships, 10, 267-282.

Klohnen, E., & Bera, S. (1998). Behavioural and experimental patterns of avoidantly and securely attached women across adulthood: A 31-year longitudinal perspective. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 211-233.

Parra-Cardona, J., & Busby, D. (2006). Exploring relationship functioning in premarital Caucasian and Latino/a couples: Recognising and valuing cultural differences. Journal of Comparative Family Studies, 37, 345-359.

Rusbult, C., Johnson, D., Morrow, G. (1986). Predicting satisfaction and commitment in adult romantic involvements: An assessment of the realizability of the investment model. Social Psychology Quarterly, 49, 81-89.

Rusbult, C., Martz, J., & Agnew, C. (1998). The investment model scale: Measuring commitment level, satisfaction level, quality of alternatives and investment size. Personal Relationships, 5, 357-391.

Tell, S., Pavkov, T., Hecker, L., & Fontaine, K. (2006). Adult survivors of child abuse: An application of John Gottman's sound marital house theory. Comtempory Family Therapy, 28, 225-238.

Attachment Styles

Another hypothesis on predicting successful long-term relationships involves attachment styles. Brennan and Shaver (1995) propose that attachment styles formed in childhood can effect attachment in romantic relationships. Their study found that securely attached (low fear of closeness, low fear of abandonment) people are the most happy in relationships.

Furthermore, a study by Klohnen and Bera (1998) found that 95% of women with secure attachment style married, with 24% experiencing divorce. In contrast 75% of women with avoidant attachment styles married but 50% divorced. This provides strong evidence that attachment styles may play a role in the success of a long-term relationship.

The relationship success of secure attachments has been found to have many reasons. Chappell and Davis (1998) report secure attachments have more positive and less negative emotions. Others benefits include: increased trust, commitment and a deeper friendship (Baldwin, Keelan, Fehr, Enns & Koh-Rangarajoo, 1996).



References

Baldwin, M., Keelan, J., Fehr, B., Enns, V., & Koh-Rangarajoo, E. (1996). Social-cognition conceptualization of attachment working models: Availability and accessibility effects. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 71, 94-109.

Brennan, K., & Shaver, P. (1995). Dimensions of adult attachment, affect regulation, and romanic relationship functioning. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 21, 267-283.

Chappell, K., & Davis, K. (1998). Attachment, partner choice, and perception of romantic partners: An experimental test of the attachment-security hypothesis. Personal Relationships, 5, 327-342.

Klohnen, E., & Bera, S. (1998). Behavioral and experiential patterns of avoidantly and securely attached women across adulthood: A 31-year longitudinal perspective. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 211-223.

Is divorce increasing as it is more socially acceptable

I am considering if divorce is increasing due to its increased social acceptable. It the past divorce was look more harshly upon and was social undesirable, and so people would stay together in unhappy marriages just to avoid the social stigma place on divorce. Gardern (2002) says that there were just as many unhappy relationships in the past as the present however they did not end in divorce as the consequences of social stimga, alienation and dependency on their partner prevented it. Dependency was primarily an issue for women, who did not work and so were income dependent on there husbands.

Evidence is provided in support of this, as the incidence of divorce increased with the introduction of the 'no-fault divorce' laws in 1976 and the supporting parent benefit in 1973 (Gradern, 2002).

Do you think a lot of marriages can become happier if they stick it out and work together?? Or are unhappy marriges just something that is always going to occur??

Reference

Gardern, M. (2002). The unholy war on divorce. Social Alternatives, 21, 52-56.

Gottman's Work

To further my research into 'what are the secrets of a long-term relationship' James provided me with a lead to the work of John Gottman.

Gottman studied many couples and his theory aims to predict; divorce or martial stability, relationship satisfaction and adaptibility to childbirth or retirement (Tell, Pavkov, Hecker & Fontaine, 2006). The main conclusion behind Gottman's theory was that positivity towards one's partner needs to outway the negativity. Furthermore, he believed that the presence of some negatives in a relationship are more detrimental than others. "The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" represent the most detriment negatives as; criticism, contempt, defensiveness and withdrawal (Holman & Jarvis, 2003).

Gottman describes critism as the change from complaining about their partner, which is essentially about their behaviour to critising them, which is essentially about their personlality. This occurs overtime as complaints (which Gottman describes as healthy for a marriage) go unheard and the individual places blame onto their partner, eg. 'your selfish'. Secondly, contempt includes insults and psychological abuse against one's partner. There is no longer mutual attraction and compliments are very rare. Thirdly, defensiveness results as a response to compempt (It is natural to to defensive as one hurls insults at you). However, this is of course further damaging to the relationship. Lastly, withdrawal occurs as one is exhausted and overwheled by the insults and/or defensiveness and so they no longer respond at all. This results in complete communication break down. At this point of the sequence the relationship is in a downward spiral, this does not mean the end but that a great deal of work is needed (Gottman & Silver, 1994).

Here are some links to help understand his work:
http://ezproxy.canberra.edu.au/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=aph&AN=22065978&site=ehost-live
this link is an article which looks at Gottman's work in relation to culture. It also has a great diagram describing Gottman's work

http://ezproxy.canberra.edu.au/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=pbh&AN=9403017691&site=ehost-liveThis link is really good because it is written by Gottman himself. If also has a quiz you can do to test for relationship.

References

Gottman, J., & Silver, N. (1994). What makes marriage work? Psychology Today, 27, 38-45.

Holman, T., & Jarvis, M. (2003). Hostile, volatile, avoiding, and validating couple-conflict types: An investigation of the Gottman's couple-conflict types. Personal relationships, 10, 267-282.

Tell, S., Pavkov, T., Hecker, L., & Fontaine, K. (2006). Adult survivors of child abuse: An
application of John Gottman's sound marital house theory. Comtempory Family Therapy, 28, 225-238.

Long-term intimate relationships

So I am finally starting my blog 2, for which, my topic is: What are the secrets of a "good marriage" (or long-term intimate relationship)?

So the textbook explains that a successful relationship begins with passionate love. Passionate love includes strong desires, excitment and feelings of longing for another person. The tricky bit then can be transforming passionate love into companionate love, which is calmer and is perceiving your partner as your best friend and soul mate. Companionate love signifies commitment and so is essential to long term relationships (pp. 360). Therefore, a high incidence of divorce could be due to difficulties in creating companionate love.

Sternberg's triangle tries to explain contributors of successful long-term marriages. He believes relationships are made up of three components; passion, intimacy and commitment. All three are needed but in different ratios can produce different types of relationships.

What does everyone else think is the most important contributor to a successful long-term relationship??

Concept Map depicting socio-psychological factors of attitude change

Determining success of attitude change prgrams: A focus on safe sex

Abstract

The prevalence of Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STI) is on the rise. An increase in the number of sexual partners and a younger age of initiating sexual intercourse are factors contributing to this increase. The use of condoms can greatly minimise the spread of STIs, however, many people still do not use them. There are many health campaigns worldwide aimed at encouraging preventive behaviours to reduce the prevalence of STIs. The success of a health campaign can be assessed based on how effectively it uses the principles of the Health Belief Model. Cognitive dissonance is helpful in provoking a need for change and persuasion techniques can influence this change towards preventive health behaviours.

Introduction

As health is very important for quality of life, there are many health promotion campaigns in today’s society to try to improve the health of individuals. The success of a health campaign to change an individual’s attitudes towards preventive health behaviours requires a campaign to encompass many variables. An individual’s beliefs are greatly reflected in their behaviour and attitudes and so a change in beliefs may be imperative to attitude change and therefore behaviour. The Health Belief Model (HBM) is one of many theoretical concepts which can be used to assess the likelihood of success of a health campaign in changing risk health behaviours into preventive behaviours. The HBM consists of five core beliefs of an individual towards health; these are; perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, benefits of engaging in preventive behaviour, costs of engaging in preventive behaviour and cues to action (Scandell & Wlazelek, 2002). Health campaigns can then invoke cognitive dissonance in the individual around these principles of the HBM, which will then be followed up with persuasion towards healthy beliefs, attitudes and behaviours. NSW Health released a health campaign “Safe Sex. No Regrets”
(http://www.health.nsw.gov.au/sexualhealth/campaigns.html), this example will be assessed on its likelihood of successfully changing attitudes towards condom use, for the prevention of sexually transmitted infections (STI).

The Health Belief Model

The Health Belief Model consists of five core beliefs an individual has towards health; these are; perceived susceptibility, perceived severity, benefits of engaging in preventive behaviour, costs of engaging in preventive behaviour and cues to action (Scandell & Wlazelek, 2002). If the “Safe Sex. No Regrets” campaign is to be successful it would need to persuade individuals that; they are highly susceptible to STIs, STIs are severe and that the benefits of using condoms out way the costs of using them. A health campaign itself could be considered a cue to action, through providing education and awareness (Ogden, 2004). Another cue to action could be experiencing a symptom of an STI. The information brochure for this campaign provides information from which an individual could recognise their symptoms as having an STI.

The “Safe Sex. No Regrets” campaigns brochure (NSW Health) states that “genital warts are very common in Australia” (page 4), “STIs and HIV exist in all countries and cultures and can affect anyone” (page 10) and “thinking ‘it won’t happen to me’ provides no protection” (page 10). These statements aim to increase the awareness of susceptibility in society but also for the individual themselves. Furthermore, by refuting the common belief that ‘it won’t happen to me’ increases the perceived susceptibility because STIs are common, this cannot apply to all people. Another issue is their perceived likelihood that the other person they are engaging with will have an STI (Browes, 2006). This campaign states ‘You can’t tell whether someone has an STI based on how they look, dress, behave or who they have slept with’ (page 10) this aims to reduce the belief that the other person is unlikely to have an STI. The television campaign also displays typical young adults dancing in a typical night club scene, which implies that they could be carrying an STI, just as anyone could. A problem with statements such as ‘very common in Australia’ could be that as STIs are social undesirable, it is an unlikely topic to be discussed with many people and so people may not believe STIs are very common as they do not know anyone who they think has had one. A very important task for this campaign is that it educates that using condoms will decrease the likelihood of susceptibility of STIs. If this is not achieved it would be unlikely that people will use condoms.

A belief that STIs are severe is likely to increase the likelihood of using condoms. While this campaign provides descriptions of symptoms which are undesirable, another technique in other campaigns is to provide pictures of diseases, such as, genital warts in extreme cases to increase perceived severity. Explaining that STIs often have no symptoms but if they progress can result in infertility, may increase perceived severity. One problem with promoting severity is that there is also a need to educate that often STIs are easily treated; this is to encourage STI checks but may decrease the perceived severity of contracting an STI, as it is easily fixed. However, some STIs would be more undesirable than others, (the ones which are hard to cure) but as you cannot choose or know which one you will get you need to use condoms to prevent against all. Severity may also be viewed in relation to social aspects. If an STI is contracted and has obvious symptoms how is this going to affect future relationships?

While it is quite obvious that the benefits of using condoms is not contracting an STI and the cost of not using one would be an increased possibility of contracting an STI there are many other factors. Peer pressure can play a role, as normative influence may prevent asking a partner to use a condom and also because it requires self-efficacy (Doheny, Sedlack, Estok & Zeller, 2007). Other barriers could include; alcohol use, access to condoms and gender roles – believing it is the other genders role to bring a condom (Boone & Lefkowitz, 2004). Success of a campaign could be gained through promoting that belief condom use is a social norm and minimising any stigma behind it.

Several studies have found that perceived susceptibility of contracting an STI is the best predictor of condoms use (Denny-Smith, Bairan & Page, 2006; Scandell & Wlazelek, 2002, Browes, 2006). This campaign provides awareness which in itself could increase perceived susceptibility, as people will know STIs are prevalent in society.

Cognitive Dissonance

For an attitude change campaign to be successful it may need to induce cognitive dissonance within the individual in relation to the core beliefs of the HBM. Cognitive dissonance is the presence of discomfort that has resulted from holding inconsistent cognitions, which can result in motivation to reduce discomfort by aligning cognitions (Gosling, Denizeau & Oberle, 2006). A health campaign may provide information which is inconsistent with the current risk taking behaviour. This inconsistency usually results changing attitudes to be in line with behaviour (Norton, Cooper, Monin & Hogg, 2003). Therefore a change in attitude (and behaviour) can occur through a change in beliefs. Persuasion techniques can be helpful to do this.

Persuasion

There are many persuasion techniques, which, when used together may increase effectiveness. Credibility, fear and repetitiveness are three examples of persuasion.

Credibility: the credibility of the source providing the information has been found to be a higher predictor of persuasion. When the source is considered to have expertise and trustworthiness, persuasion is likely (Umeb & Stanley, 2005). Tormala, Brinol and Petty, (2007) stated that people expect expert sources to have more valid arguments which creates a positive bias towards their information. The “Safe Sex. No Regrets” campaign is a government initiative, which for many would indicate expertise and trustworthiness.

Fear: the use of fear in health campaigns is used to invoke a negative emotion into the individual, who will then be motivated to reduce this negative emotion, by engaging in behaviour which will prevent this emotion (Lewis, Watson, White & Tay, 2007). Baumeister and Bushman, (2008) report that a picture along with written text, was 60 times more inspiring to change behaviour then just written text alone. This is believed to be because the picture shows that participating in preventive behaviour will avoid the situation in the picture. This technique is not used in the “Safe Sex. No Regrets” campaign, however, as previously stated other campaigns use pictures of diseases, such as, genital warts in extreme cases, to invoke fear, to influence preventive behaviours.

Repetition: Repetition can be useful in health campaigns for several reasons; mere exposure effect that familiarity breeds liking, increased memory and increases understanding through deeper thought processes (Cacioppo & Petty, 1989). The “Safe Sex. No Regrets” campaign in its brochure states on every page that condom use will minimise risk of contracting STI. This is repeated as it is the most important message and so it is essential to be remembered.

Conclusion

Attitude change can be a difficult task. The Health Belief Model provides core principles which health campaigns need to address to change health behaviours. Cognitive dissonance can invoke a negative state which may motivate an individual to change attitudes and behaviours. During this change, a health campaign can provide persuasion towards preventive health behaviours. A health campaign is one influence towards attitude change. However, there are also many other socio-psychological factors which contribute to attitude change, as outlined in the concept map.


References

Baumeister, R., & Bushman, B. (2008). Social psychology and human nature (1st Ed.). Belmont, California: Thomson Wadsworth.

Boone, T., & Lefkowitz, E. (2004). Safer sex and the health belief model: considering the contrivutions of peer norms and socialisation factors. Journal of Psychology and human sexuality, 16, 51-68.

Browes, S. (2006). Health psychology and sexual health assessment. Nursing Standard, 21, 36-39.

Cacioppo, J., & Petty, R. (1989). Effects of message repetition on argument processing, recall, and persuasion. Basic and Applied Social Psychology, 10, 3-12.

Denny-Smith, T., Biaran, A, & Page, M. (2006). A survery of female nursing students’ knowledge, health beliefs, perception of risk, and risk behaviours regrading human papillomavirus and cervical cancer. Journal of the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners, 18, 62-69.

Doheny, M., Sedlak, C., Estok, P., & Zeller, R. (2007). Osteoporosis knowledge, health beliefs and DXA T-scores in men and women 50 years and older. Orthopaedic Nursing, 26, 243-250.

Gosling, P., Denizeau, M., & Oberle, D. (2006). Denial of responsibility: a new mode of dissonance reduction. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 90, 722-733.

Lewis, I., Watson, B., White, K., & Tay, R. (2007). Promoting public health messages: should we move beyond fear-evoking appeals in road safety? Qualitative Health Research, 17, 61-74.

Norton, M., Cooper, J., Monin, B., & Hogg, M. (2003). Vicarious dissonance: attitude change from the inconsistency of others. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 85, 47-62.

NSW Health. Website: http://www.health.nsw.gov.au/sexualhealth/campaigns.html

Ogden, J. (2004). Health psychology: A textbook (3rd Ed.). Berkshire, England: Open University Press.

Scandell, D., & Wlazelek, B. (2002). A validation study of the AIDs health belief scale. The Canadian Journal of Human Sexuality, 11, 41-51.

Tormala, Z., Brinol, P., & Petty , R. (2007). Multiple roles for source credibility under high elaboration: it’s all in the timing. Social Cognition, 25, 536-552.

Umeb, K., & Stanley, S. (2005). Effects of communicator credibility and fear on adaptive and maladaptive coping reactions to the HIV threat. Journal of Applied Biobehavioural Research, 10, 183-198.