Abstract
Positive and negative forms of social control are commonly used to regulate another person’s health-related behaviors, especially in couples. Social control efforts have been shown to result in desirable, but also undesirable effects on different outcomes. Little is known for which outcomes, when, and under which contextual conditions these different effects unfold in people’s everyday lives. Using the dual-effects model of health-related social control, we predicted that same-day and previous-day positive social control would result in desirable effects on target behavior, and same-day positive control on affect. Same-day and previous-day negative control was assumed to result in undesirable effects on reactant responses (i.e., doing the opposite of what the partner wanted and hiding the unhealthy behavior), and same-day negative control on affect. Further, we explored whether it makes a difference if one or both partners intend to change their health behavior. Three daily diary studies addressed these questions for smoking (Studies 1 and 2), and physical activity (Study 3). Receiving more positive control related to more desirable target behavior, and feeling better; more negative control was associated with more reactant responses and feeling worse. Social control unfolded its effects within 1 day, but hardly across days, indicating that control and its reactions to it are fast-acting processes in daily life. The pattern of results were the same for couples with one and both partners intending to change their behavior. Further, results replicated when using partner-reported provided control. Based on these results, social control cannot be unanimously recommended as a behavior change strategy in couples. Future studies should follow up on dyadic and temporal dynamics of social control in couples’ everyday lives in different contexts.
Highlights
Interest in the role of social relationships for health-related self-regulation has increased in social and health psychology in recent years, with a growing number of publications (e.g., Overall et al, 2009; Fitzsimons et al, 2015; Young et al, 2019)
Does Positive Social Control Predict Daily Number of Cigarettes Smoked (H1a and H1b)? In contrast to H1a assuming a previous-day effect, but in support of H1b assuming a same-day effect, positive control on the same day, but not the previous day was significantly related to smoking: On days with higher than usual same-day positive control smokers reported 5% less cigarettes smoked
Does Positive Social Control Predict Daily Number of Cigarettes Smoked (H1)? Comparable to results of Study 1, and only supporting H1b, it was only same, but not previous day positive control that was significantly related to smoking and only in men: On days with higher than usual same day positive control male smokers reported 4% less cigarettes smoked
Summary
Interest in the role of social relationships for health-related self-regulation has increased in social and health psychology in recent years, with a growing number of publications (e.g., Overall et al, 2009; Fitzsimons et al, 2015; Young et al, 2019). Social Control in Daily Life health behaviors and additional outcomes, such as affect or reactant responses, is mostly based on cross-sectional studies, while the few available longitudinal studies mainly speak to differences between persons (Craddock et al, 2015). It is largely unknown how and when, and for which outcomes social control effects unfold within individuals over time. It is an open question whether effects of social control differ depending on context, i.e., whether one or both partners of a dyad intend to change their health behavior.
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