The purpose of this study is to examine relational dissolution using the technique of ghosting. This qualitative study explores the emerging adults’ dissolution strategies leading up to and through enactment of disengagement through mediated contexts. Participants ( N = 99) completed questionnaires about their ghosting familiarity and participation as initiators or noninitiators. The majority of participants reported participating in both roles. Five themes described why initiators chose to enact ghosting, and three themes chronicled their ghosting decision-making processes. Noninitiators illustrated how they realized ghosting occurred through three themes. This exploratory investigation offers a definitive definition of ghosting and a modern discussion of its contents to dissolution, communication, and romantic relationship development.

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Breakups are among the most distressing occurrences in life. The affective responses to and recovery from relationship dissolution are multifaceted. Scholarship investigating relationship dissolution and the ensuing processes that follow has come a long way in facilitating a more holistic understanding of affect. These findings have driven empirical and theoretical research exploring important intersections around distress and adjustment, while illuminating the need to replicate and expand findings to more diverse populations. This chapter highlights common variables and questions in empirical relationship dissolution research including dissolution strategies (unilateral and bilateral), breakup roles (initiator and noninitiator), sex differences (reasons and roles), time (relationship length and adjustment), age (life span), and relationship redefinition (continuance or termination). These moderating variables have been studied to understand affective responses to relationship dissolution, yet they fail to fully delineate the complex structures that individuals and couples encounter. This chapter concludes by outlining and discussing gaps in prior scholarship and providing evolutionary extensions for relationship dissolution related to contemporary dating practices. The emergent lexicon of the dissolution process extends conventional metrics stability regarding development, intimacy, and commitment of interpersonal relationships. We discuss future areas for applying an evolutionary psychological perspective and offer a unifying narrative around distress, adjustment, and the moderating variables that call attention to the complex process of romantic relationship dissolution.

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