No abstract

A theoretical critique and review is presented concerning the character and consequences of changes in the social networks of spouses following separation and divorce. For men, cultural traditions that prescribe the duties and obligations of husbands are thought to encourage the development of personal friendships while simultaneously encouraging independence, thus insulating men from the possible benefits of social support following divorce. For women, the duties and obligations of wives as they are traditionally defined encourage women to accept responsibility for “kinkeeping” during and after marriage while simultaneously discouraging bonds with friends. These circumstances are thought to isolate women from the unique benefits of personal friendship and ensure networks that are dominated by kin, which typically are high in exchanges of both social support and interference. Important distinctions are drawn between the character of relationships with kin and friends, as well as between the concepts of social support and social interference.

By centering on the assumption that clear conceptualization precedes appropriate measurement, four methods for defining and enumerating personal networks are detailed. Global networks are defined in terms of the domain from which all other personal networks are derived. The three additional types, including significant other, exchange and interactive networks, are conceptually unique and largely non-overlapping in their memberships. The network types reviewed here do not exhaust all of the methods available for sampling personal networks, but they do represent methods with favorable psychometric properties and, most importantly, clear conceptual foundations.

This study centers on the connections binding close relationships and networks of kin and friends. Measures of social participation were developed from daily reports of social activity provided by respondents involved in dating relationships. These measures included size of the network and the frequency and length of time spent interacting with network members. As hypothesized, all network measures are inversely related to the stage of courtship under scrutiny. Respondents in the later stages of courtship, relative to respondents in the early stages of courtship, interact with fewer people, less often, and for shorter periods of time. However, based on longitudinal analyses, frequency and duration are more robust indicators than is size of changes in social participation with network members concurrent with an advancing or deteriorating close relationship. Findings are discussed in light of the advantages of longitudinal over cross-sectional designs.Close relationships are shaped by internal forces that have to do with characteristics of the participants, their history, and their patterns of interaction with one another, as well as with the external forces brought to bear by the needs of friends or the rights and privileges of kin. The present study focuses on the environmental context of close relationships by illuminating the connections that bond couples and social networks. Central questions are (a) how involvement in a dating relationship is tied to the pair member's social participation with the network of kin or friends, and (b) how time-ordered change, in the degree to which pair members are involved in a relationship, is connected to changes in social participation with the network.This article is based on the doctoral dissertation of the first author. We appreciated the comments of Robert L.

In an exploratory study of 25 wives and their husbands we examine the associations of spouses with kin and friends as predictors of four marital qualities: love, maintenance, conflict and ambivalence. For husbands, contact with kin, and especially fathers, is tied to greater marital interdependence and lower conflict. For wives, contact with kin, and especially brothers-in-law, is consistently associated with greater marital distress in the form of lower love for her husband and reports of greater conflict and ambivalence on the part of both spouses. Husbands also report greater conflict and ambivalence when their wives interact frequently with friends. Overall, the findings suggest the effects of kin are heterogeneous, varying substantially by the type of role relation, and that the processes underlying relations with kin are distinctly different for wives and husbands.