This study concerns itself with the reliability of spouses as observers of the behaviors that occur in their own marital relationships. Distressed and nondistressed couples were paid to collect data in the home on 21 consecutive evenings. Once per day, spouses completed a behavioral checklist in which they independently indicated which of 409 behaviors had occurred during the preceding 24 hours. Consensus was measured by calculating both percentage agreement and kappa statistics. The average agreement for all couples was 47.8%. Across the entire checklist, nondistressed couples exhibited significantly greater consensus than did distressed couples, based on both percentage agreement and kappa. However, when comparisons were made on selected individual categories of behavior, differences between distressed and nondistressed couples held up only for percentage agreement. Suggestive evidence was presented that inferential items were less reliably coded than noninferential items. Discussion of these results centers on the implications for viewing spouse-collected data as observational data, possible innovations in data collection procedure that could result in more reliable recording, and theoretical implications of the low rate of consensus between spouses.

A great deal has been written in recent years about the importance of close personal relationships and the benefits of their attendant states and processes (e.g., love, companionship, intimacy). Ironically, however, acknowledgment and documentation of the centrality of relationships has also led to the emerging recognition that, at the very least, relationships comprise the context in which much of the annoying and more severe trauma of life unfolds and, at the worst, that relationships are the primary source of much of the pain and suffering experienced by people in their day-to-day lives. Accordingly, the central focus of this chapter is on interpersonal betrayals between relationship partners.We have been interested for some time in the dark side of relationships, examining incidents of betrayal, the circumstances in which they occur, and their consequences both for the relationship partners involved and for their relationships. In our research, we have conceptualized betrayal as a broad range of incidents in which betrayers have violated the expectations of the betrayed. In some cases, we have elicited responses to standardized stimuli assessing various aspects of betrayal, whereas in other stud-233

In a four-person coalition situation, 10 groups of male and 10 groups of female undergraduate students made written offers to form coalitions. Coalition frequency (over six trials) and division of rewards to the coalition members were compared with the predictions of four theories: minimum resource theory, minimum power theory, bargaining theory, and the weighted probability model. Though all theories received some support, the bargaining theory seemed to provide the best fit. Analyses of demands made, number and magnitude of offers received, and magnitude of offers accepted and rejected indicated significant interactions between sex and power position in the game. When in the "weak" position, females made greater demands than males but were excluded more frequently; when in the "strong" position, males made greater demands than females. On the basis of these results, an explanation is suggested for Gamson's paradoxical hypothesis that strength is weakness.

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