Female Friends Research Articles

An ecological perspective on risk factors for repeat induced abortion in China

IntroductionRepeated induced abortion (RIA) is a challenging public health issue. Although many studies have investigated the characteristics of women who experience multiple abortions, most have focused only on limited intrapersonal variables. To frame the analysis, this study used an ecological model integrating intrapersonal, interpersonal and environmental variables to explore factors associated with RIA. MethodsSingle-site (Maternal and Child Health Hospital, Hubei, China) cross-sectional data were collected from 405 women between July 2015 and November 2015 using a self-administered questionnaire. Characteristics of women who experienced only one abortion were compared to those who had RIA (≥2 abortions). ResultsAmong the 316 eligible women who completed the questionnaire, 110(34.8%) experienced one abortion, 206 (65.2%) experienced two or more. Multivariate binary logistic regression analysis showed a higher odds of RIA among women who were older, reported earlier age at sexual debut and reported higher abortion frequency among close female friends. Factors appearing to protect against RIA included higher frequency of partner agreement to women’s contraceptive preference. ConclusionsAdapting an ecological perspective, this study examined social and environmental factors related to RIA. Our findings emphasize the importance of developing interventions that target both women and their male partner. Group norms relating to contraceptive use also need to be addressed to improve contraceptive use and reduce the risk of repeat abortions.

Social Norms, Social Connections, and Sex Differences in Adolescent Mental and Behavioral Health

This study examined whether sex-related health disparities that emerge during adolescence are linked to social norms and social connections within three primary social contexts: families, friendships, and schools. Using data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (N = 18,921), we assessed links between social norms and social connections with parents, friends, and schools and depressive symptoms and substance use separately for males and females. In addition, we considered parents, friends, and schools as both combined and sex-specific contexts. Results suggested that links between social norms and adolescent health were stable across the sex of the recipient but varied by sex of the provider, whereas links between social connections and adolescent health varied across the sex of both provider and recipient. Social norms from mothers and female schoolmates (but not from fathers or male schoolmates) were associated with both male and female substance use. In contrast, connectedness with fathers served as a protective factor for male depressive symptoms, whereas connectedness with female friends was a risk factor for female depressive symptoms. These findings extend the literature investigating sex disparities in adolescent mental and behavioral health by locating significant influences from multiple social contexts, revealing sex-specific social norms and social connections within these contexts as playing a salient role, and identifying several areas for preventative efforts, specifically (a) maternal and female schoolmate social norms in reducing substance use, (b) paternal connectedness in reducing male depressive symptoms, and (c) connectedness within female friendships as a risk for female adolescents’ mental health.

British Quaker Women's Fashionable Adaptation of their Plain Dress, 1860–1914

Throughout the period 1860–1914, British Quaker women sought to negotiate the incorporation of fashionable attire into their wardrobes to varying degrees, after the religion's hierarchy made prescriptive religious ‘Plain’ dress optional in 1860. After centuries of restrictive Advices, which used Scripture alongside peer pressure to encourage female Friends to dress ascetically, Quaker women began to interpret their new sartorial freedoms in diverse ways. Through the presentation of three female case studies from across the period, this article will suggest three newly identified distinct stances that Quaker women enacted in responding to the new Advice and adapting to fashionable ensembles, up until the devastating events of the First World War. These three stances were non-adaptive, semi-adaptive and fully adaptive. Based on empirical research conducted in dress collections across Britain, this article will describe and present the garments worn by these women, to illustrate and introduce these distinct sartorial stances.

A Qualitative Analysis of Bystander Intervention Among Heavy-Drinking College Men.

This study qualitatively examines how heavy-drinking college men conceptualize bystander intervention. Twelve semi-structured individual interviews were conducted with college men reporting past-month heavy drinking and sexual activity within the past 2 months. NVivo software was used to conduct a thematic analysis. Following the stage model of bystander intervention, men in this sample described situations-predominantly in drinking contexts-when other men made sexual advances toward women who were not interested or who were intoxicated as opportunities for intervention. Men reported relying on women's expression of verbal and nonverbal cues as a sign that a situation was problematic, and warranting intervention. Men reported a desire to protect women from experiencing a sexual assault, or to protect a peer from being accused of rape. Men perceived themselves to be more likely to assume responsibility for intervening when the situation involved someone they knew, especially a female friend. A variety of intervention strategies were also reported. Preliminary support was offered for considering alcohol myopia as a barrier to intervention. The interviews also provided preliminary support for further investigation into the role of alcohol expectancies regarding "liquid courage" and "aggression" as factors that can influence bystander intervention when intoxicated. Implications for future research and the development of tailored sexual assault prevention efforts for heavy-drinking men are discussed.

Homophily of music listening in online social networks of China

Homophily, ranging from demographics to sentiments, breeds connections in social networks, either offline or online. However, with the prosperous growth of music streaming services, whether homophily exists in online music listening remains unclear. In this study, two online social networks of the same group of active users who listened to complete songs over 1000 times and posted over 100 tweets are established, separately, in Netease Music and Weibo. Through presented multiple similarity measures, it is evidently demonstrated that homophily does exist in music listening for both online social networks. The unexpected listening similarity in Weibo also implies that knowledge from generic social networks can be confidently transferred to domain-oriented networks for context enrichment and algorithm enhancement. Comprehensive factors that might function in the formation of homophily are further probed, and many interesting patterns are profoundly revealed. It is found that female friends are more homogeneous in music listening and that positive and energetic songs significantly pull users close. Our methodology and findings shed light on realistic applications in online music services.

"No messages needed-just pats on the back": Exploring young men's reports of male and female friends' sexual communications.

The current study provided an exploratory mixed methods investigation of the messages undergraduate men received about sex and relationships from their male and female friends. Participants included 310 undergraduate men who provided written responses regarding the specific messages they had received from male and female friends. Descriptive codes included: Just Do It, Meaningful Intimacy, Gentlemen, Postpone Sex, Women's Sexual Desire, and Objectification of Women. Reports of sexual communications were typically consistent with the Heterosexual Script and congruent with the friend's gender. Accordingly, reports of male friends' communications often portrayed the accumulation of sexual experiences and partners as necessary and desirable, whereas serious, romantic relationships were often portrayed as hindrances. Reports of female friends' messages, in contrast, primarily focused on the importance of romantic relationships and the idealization of sex within such relationships. Reports of messages that were incongruent with the Heterosexual Script were rare, and were more often found in reports of female friends' communications. For example, female friends were the only source of messages regarding women's sexual needs, desire, and pleasures. By documenting patterns of common and uncommon messages and their sources, the present study contributed insights into how male and female friends similarly and differentially reinforce different dimensions of hegemonic masculinity.

Knapp, Liza Anna Karenina and Others: Tolstoy's Labyrinth of Plots (review)

REVIEWS 543 Puleri’s first monograph is sure to confront scholars of both Ukrainian and Russian studies with the need to put aside binary schemes by challenging rigid schemes of national exclusivity and monological narratives. Puleri’s ability to show the vividness of Russian-language Ukrainian culture, its diversity and its rootedness in the cultural life of contemporary Ukraine, will surely help both specialists and non-specialists to better grasp the vitality of the culture of Europe’s largest country. The book, at the same time a model of solid, although accessible, literary scholarship and an indirect political statement promoting dialogue and openness, clearly deserves to be translated into English, Ukrainian and Russian. Monash University Alessandro Achilli Knapp, Liza. Anna Karenina and Others: Tolstoy’s Labyrinth of Plots. The University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, WI, 2016. x + 326 pp. Notes. Bibliography. Index. $79.95. All roads lead to (and from) Tolstoi in this beautiful book, which reads nineteenth-century novels of adultery as works that explore the complexities of loving one’s neighbour. In Anna Karenina, as Liza Knapp convincingly demonstrates, Tolstoi ‘novelized’ (p. 4) the spiritual questions that would afflict him thereafter. Taking her cue from Tolstoi’s own oft-quoted statement about ‘an endless labyrinth of linkages’ (p. 19) that comprised his art, Knapp investigates these linkages, first within the novel itself and then between Anna Karenina and Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, George Eliot’s Middlemarch, English evangelical Protestantism, Pascal’s Pensées and, finally, Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway. The linkages seem endless indeed, especially in the first chapter, where Knapp shows how ‘segments of the novel that appear unrelated […] complement one another in Tolstoi’s labyrinth through the subtle interaction of mundane details from related spheres’ (p. 23). Thus, Petritskii’s spilt coffee is linked to the spoilt broth eaten by Oblonskii’s children as both episodes allude to the chaos these adulterers’ behaviour provokes, while Levin’s care for his cow is contrasted to Vronskii’s mistreatment of his horse, each signalling those men’s treatment of their human paramours. In addition to the many intratextual linkages, Gogol´’s Dead Souls and Tiutchev’s poem ‘Day and Night’ appear as intertextual influences on certain parts of the novel. ChapterstwoandthreecompareAnnaKareninatoherAmericanandEnglish ‘cousins’ in what I would call a contiguous reading of these novels. While neither The Scarlet Letter nor Middlemarch bore a direct influence on Tolstoi’s SEER, 96, 3, JULY 2018 544 novel (in fact, as Knapp points out, Tolstoi disliked the former), they belong to the ‘many sources figuring in the depths of Tolstoy’s creative consciousness’ (pp. 54–55) and the parallels are too many to be ignored. If they abound in the case of Hester Prynne and Anna Karenina — from the particulars of their fine attire to the shame they experience as adulteresses — they also exist in the case of Arthur Dimmesdale and Tolstoi’s autobiographical Konstantin Levin, both of whom struggle with a guilty conscience. Between Middlemarch and Anna Karenina, the parallels appear in the form of contrasts as Dorothea and Lydgate’s soulful interaction is juxtaposed with Levin and Anna’s, and Dorothea and Rosamond’s with Dolly and Anna’s last meeting. While Levin’s attitude towards Anna changes from judgement to pity, the answer to the question, ‘Could a bond have developed between Levin and Anna analogous to that between Dorothea and Lydgate?’ (p. 109) is a resounding no. In Tolstoi’s view friendships between men and women cannot exist without sexual tension, while compassion is a zero-sum game and must, therefore, be confined to one’s family. This is why Dorothea manages to, in Eliot’s own words, ‘save’ Rosamond, while Dolly cannot save Anna, whose visit, tellingly, interrupts Dolly and her sister’s breastfeeding consultation. This particular juxtaposition of female friendships displays the productiveness of Knapp’s contiguous approach as, for the present reviewer at least, Dolly’s failure to save Anna never appeared so stark or cruel until compared to Dorothea’s compassion for Rosamond. Chapter four describes the ministry of Lord Radstock in Russia and examines the drafts of the novel where Miss Flora Sulivan is replaced by Varenka as Kitty’s...

Ordinary Letters: Contextual Research Method

In broadest sense, this article deals with ordinary writing, ordinary people and everyday life that researchers find hardly accessible and antidisciplinary. The author pursues two definite interrelated goals. First, it is identifying the nature of letters by poet Janina Degutytė and working out an appropriate method for their primary investigation. The second goal stems from the nature of these letters and the circle of the poet’s correspondents: that is revealing the field of letters covered by unauthoritative, ordinary people. Epistolary heritage by the Lithuanian poet Janina Degutytė (1928–1990) comprises correspondence with her closest female friends and acquaintances, none of whom (with only one exception) worked as culture professionals. Several tactics emerge from Degutytė’s letters, including bonding (when nothing particular needs to be conveyed, yet letter aims at keeping in touch), business matters (today best arranged by phone), and – rarely – narration (when writing from a place unfamiliar to the addressee). Such mode of writing can be adequately defined by the notion of ordinary or everyday writing (Daniel Fabre). Rather than indicating some lack, such definition reveals the essential quality of the letters.Ordinary letters invite asking simple questions stemming from them as such and looking for the most relevant ways of answering. Inductive approach produces three tactics of contextualization. The first one recreates the field of letters composed of letters by the participants of the correspondence and partly – of letters written by the main characters acting in Degutytė’s letters. Seven hundreds of letters written by the poet are presented together with numerous other letters. This allows for understanding the poet’s life among the lives of other people. The second tactic is fieldwork, which is suitable because the letter research is conducted at the time when contacting many of the poet’s correspondents and people mentioned in her letters is still possible. Interviews with these people particularly well elucidate the public and hidden conditions of life in the soviet Lithuania from 1950s to 1980s that were also mentioned in the letters. The third tactic employs investigating periodicals as quotidian press. Among other things, this enables discovering some hitherto unknown poems by Degutytė or different versions of her popular poems, published in newspapers and magazines. In general, this reveals variation in her work, its changeability resulting from modifications introduced by the author and her editors. All these three tactics reach outside the textual boundaries of letters and reveal their different contexts. This answers the requirements inherent in the nature of letters, since they, especially the ordinary ones, are characterized by metonymic language that points to the writing situation and denotes the lived life. This case proves that separation between text and context should not be overestimated. Another point stemming from the contextual research – all the tactics serve to create a polyphonic and polycentric view. Individual voices correct and modify each other, not falling into one coherent line. All this makes prerequisites for their kaleidoscopic, rather than microscopic, investigation (Liz Stanley).Ordinary letters written by a person who acts as a culture professional leads us into the field of letters written by ordinary people, enabling understanding them as a research subject still absent from the Lithuanian cultural studies, yet definitely worthy of them.Besides, all these epistles uncover simplicity of the lived life, providing researcher with a rare possibility to observe the daily distribution of attention, care, time and energy, along with intentionality of consciousness that is seldom available to investigation.

Competition Elicits more Physical Affiliation between Male than Female Friends

Across species, cooperative alliances must withstand internal tensions. The mechanisms by which allies respond to competing against one another have been studied extensively in non-human animals, but much less so in humans. In non-human species, affiliative physical contact and close proximity immediately following a contest are utilized to define reconciliation between opponents. The proportion of conflicts that are reconciled however differs markedly by species and sex. The purpose of this study was to examine whether, like many other social species, humans utilize physical contact and close proximity following a competition between friends, and if so, whether one sex is more likely to exhibit these behaviors. Using a standardized procedure, two same-gender friends competed against one another producing a clear winner and loser. Prior to and following the competition, the friends relaxed together. Videotapes of the relaxation periods showed that male friends spent more time than female friends engaged in affiliative physical contact and close proximity both before and after the competition, but not during a brief intervening cooperative task. These results suggest that in the face of competing self-interests, physical contact and close proximity facilitate repair of males’ more than females’ valuable relationships.

Cultural Adaptation of Taiwanese Female Marriage Migrants in Hong Kong

This study proposes to explore trans-border marriage migrants from Taiwan to Hong Kong, which are historically and politically separate entities despite similarities in Chinese culture. An understanding of marriage patterns was obtained from 38 in-depth interviews of Taiwanese women married to Hong Kong men. Patrilocal residence and acceptance of the patriarchal customs was the norm for the early female Taiwanese migrants. While encountering various difficulties in adapting to a different kind of Chinese culture, the early arrivals have successfully made Hong Kong their homes. Through joining various Taiwanese organizations, they have developed female friendship networks over the years. While developing careers, their socio-economic contributions to the Hong Kong society goes beyond the families into which they have married. Despite successful efforts in planting new roots by becoming Hong Kongers over the last few decades, some of the immigrants mentioned returning (luò yè guī gēn 落葉歸根) to Taiwan. Personal connections maintained with their homeland through frequent visits have enabled them to be aware of the latest developments, while trans-border linkages with their parents and siblings in Taiwan have strongly affected their desire to return. A more hospitable environment combined with a better quality of life compared to that of Hong Kong are the main considerations for their intention to leave their host community.

Exploring Turn-Taking and Discourse Markers through Generations

While studies have explored organized turn-taking conventions (Schlegoff et. al 1974) and conversational analysis among friends (Tannen, 1984), less work has investigated how small units of discourse differ across generations (though see Schiffrin 1987 and Naya 2006). In this study, I audio-recorded conversations between female friends of two generations - Baby Boomers and Millennials – and compared the frequency and form of minimal feedback (i.e., “mm hm”, “yeah”) between the two groups. The results suggest that both the overall frequency of minimal feedback has changed over time, as well as the discourse markers used in giving minimal feedback.

‘Come with me, sweetest sister’: Unravelling the Enigma of Sacred Sisterhood in Aurora Leigh by Elizabeth Barrett Browning and “Goblin Market” by Christina Rossetti

Throughout the Victorian era, Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Christina Rossetti occupied a prominent position in a newly emerging female literary movement. Both authors sought to resist and revise the limitations of Victorian womanhood through the composition of controversial works that rivalled the achievements of their male contemporaries. In the 1856 epic Aurora Leigh by Elizabeth Barrett Browning and the 1862 narrative poem “Goblin Market” by Christina Rossetti, both Barrett Browning and Rossetti employ an early feminist perspective to explore the parameters of Victorian sisterhood and the potential strength of female friendship. Although Laura, Lizzie and Jeanie in Rossetti’s work possess a sororal relationship that is distinct from Marian Erle and Aurora Leigh’s relationship in Barrett Browning’s work, the innumerable connections between both publications have caused critics to compare and hierarchize the two authors. Thus, a literary sisterhood has developed between Barrett Browning and Rossetti that curiously mirrors the sisterhoods of their fictions. This paper seeks to assess the inescapable presence of sisterhood in Aurora Leigh and “Goblin Market” by analyzing the manner in which a sisterly connection, not only through blood relations but also through close friendships that resemble sisterhood, allowed female forces to be allied, nurtured, and empowered amidst the patriarchal and misogynist structures of mid-nineteenth century Britain.

Examining the Contributions of Disability to Suicidality in the Context of Depression Symptoms and Other Sociodemographic Factors.

We examined the contribution of disability status to suicidality when accounting for depression and sociodemographic risk factors in 438 American adults, 82 (18.7%) of whom identified as having disabilities. Participants with disabilities had significantly higher depression scores and were more likely to be unemployed and unpartnered, all of which were also associated with increased suicidality. However, disability remained a significant predictor of suicidality even when depression and sociodemographic risk factors were accounted for in a linear regression. Other significant predictors of suicidality in this regression were female gender, depression symptoms, and family and friend suicide history; identifying as a member of a religion was a significant protective factor against suicidality. Our findings suggest that the contribution of disability to suicidality goes beyond that which can be explained by increased depression symptoms and sociodemographic vulnerability.

Women Photographers and Female Identities: Annemarie Schwarzenbach, New Dandy and Lesbian Chic Icon

This article explores how Swiss writer and photographer Annemarie Schwarzenbach (1908–1942), used photography, both as author and subject, to define a new identity and build a new visibility for women. It begins by exploring the shared poetics that drew women’s artistic activities towards photography at the turn of the twentieth century. At that time, photography was a medium of choice for women seeking to reclaim their bodies and subtract them from the male gaze. It also provided women with an expression of identity, gender achievement and gendered negotiation. The article analyzes Schwarzenbach’s photographic practice as a distinctive and complex case study within this context. A well-educated and wealthy young woman, Schwarzenbach embodied the image of the emancipated and independent new woman, both in her life and professional choices, bravely embarking on dangerous and difficult journeys, writing articles and taking photographs of far-away, diverse and suffering people. Nevertheless, it was only when she moved to the other side of the camera and became the subject of portraits taken by her female friends and partners that Schwarzenbach became the first-hand witness and icon of a new search for gender visibility. Her fashion choices and her own body expressed and codified a sophisticated lesbian chic style.

Barriers to Exclusive Breastfeeding Among Women With Gestational Diabetes Mellitus in the United States

ObjectiveTo identify differences in breastfeeding-related knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and experiences between women with gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) and women without GDM. DesignCross-sectional and prospective cohort study. SettingSecondary analysis of data from the U.S. Infant Feeding Practices Study II. ParticipantsPregnant women with GDM (n = 195) and pregnant women without GDM (n = 2,815) were included in cross-sectional analyses. For prospective analyses, complete data were available at the postpartum time point for 107 women with and 1,626 women without GDM. MethodsWe compared women with and without GDM for breastfeeding knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs during pregnancy and hospital experiences and problems with breastfeeding after birth. We used multivariate logistic regression to estimate associations between GDM and dependent variables. ResultsWomen with GDM were less likely to say that breastfeeding is the best way to feed an infant (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] = 0.62, 95% confidence interval [CI] [0.46, 0.85]), more likely to say that the fathers of their infants prefer formula feeding (aOR = 1.74, 95% CI [1.02, 2.97]) or mixed feeding (aOR = 1.78, 95% CI [1.21, 2.61]), and more likely to say their physicians prefer formula (aOR = 2.82, 95% CI [1.17, 6.79]). Women with GDM were less likely to report feeling comfortable breastfeeding in front of female friends (aOR = 0.70, 95% CI [0.50, 0.98]). Newborns of women with GDM were less likely to stay in their mothers’ hospital rooms (aOR = 0.55, 95% CI [0.36, 0.85]). ConclusionWe identified differences in breastfeeding-related knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and experiences between women with GDM and women without GDM that could be targets for further research and intervention.

Unresolved implicative dilemmas: a cognitive-constructivist reading of Emma Donoghue’s The Sealed Letter

The protagonist of Emma Donoghue’s historical novel The Sealed Letter (2008), Emily “Fido” Faithfull, is a New Woman, a campaigner for women’s rights, whose involvement in a scandalous divorce that shocked the London society of 1864 was overtly silenced. In an attempt to unearth her role as one of the leaders of first-wave feminism, Donoghue explores the nature of female friendship through her unfortunate attachment to a troublesome woman with a duplicitous nature and her resentful husband. Considering the game of perspectives displayed in the narrative as propositions for the coexistence of a plurality of truths, this article will venture towards the understanding of the implicative dilemmas characters have to unravel in face of each other and of Victorian mores, as these have been defined by constructivist epistemology and, more specifically, within the framework of constructive psychology.

Investigation on knowledge, attitude and practice (KAP) of college students on foodborne parasitic diseases in Wuhu City

To understand the status of knowledge, attitude and practice (KAP) on foodborne parasitic diseases and the influencing factors among college students in Wuhu City, so as to provide the evidence for the development of strategies on health education. A total of 1 685 college students from five colleges were selected through the randomly stratified cluster sampling method, and then they were investigated by questionnaires to understand their KAP on foodborne parasitic diseases. Chi-square test was performed and regression models were constructed to analyze the influencing factors of knowledge on food-borne parasitic diseases. Among the 1 685 college students surveyed the awareness rates of knowledge about foodborne parasitic diseases and their harms were 33.5% (565 cases) and 31.4% (529 cases). There were statistically significant differences among/between the grades, schools, places of origin, family incomes, whether or not having the male or female friends, whether or not having the medical personnel in the family, whether or not having the insistence on the annual physical examination, whether or not receiving the health education, and whether or not having the history of parasitic diseases (all P < 0.05). The logistic regression analysis showed that the school, receiving the health education, having the insistence on the annual physical examination, and the history of parasitic diseases were the independent influencing factors of the awareness rate of knowledge on foodborne parasitic diseases (all P < 0.01). The awareness rate, healthy behavior and correct attitude formation about foodborne parasitic diseases are low among the college students in Wuhu City, and therefore, it is necessary to offer the courses related to foodborne parasitic diseases in colleges and universities.

Prospective Associations of Actual and Perceived Descriptive Norms with Drinking Among Emerging Adults

ABSTRACTBackground: Descriptive norms are commonly associated with participant drinking. However, study participants may incorrectly perceive that their peers drink about the same amount as they do, which would bias estimates of drinking homogeneity. Objectives: This research examined the magnitude of associations between emerging adults' reports of their own drinking and peer drinking measured the previous year by measures of (1) participants' perceptions of friends' drinking; and (2) actual drinking reported by nominated peers. Methods: The data are from annual surveys conducted in 2014 and 2015, Waves 4 and 5 (the first 2 years after high school) of 7 annual assessments as part of the NEXT Generation Health Study (n = 323). Associations of participant alcohol use with perceived friend use (five closest, closest male, and closest female friends), and with actual peer use. Logistic regression analyses estimated the magnitudes of prospective associations between each measure of peer drinking at W4 and participant drinking at W5.

Collecting the World: Female Friendship and Domestic Craft at Bulstrode Park

AbstractThis article explores the gendered translation of global objects collected by Margaret Cavendish Bentinck, duchess of Portland (1715‐1785), and displayed in her museum at Bulstrode Park. It does so by engaging with the epistolary and craft productions of women associated with the site, revealing how materials assembled from around the world served to advance Bluestocking values and female friendship. It demonstrates how processes of collecting and crafting served to map a complex and rapidly expanding material world within an elite domestic environment to reflect the carefully cultivated identities of the duchess and her circle.

Lyčių dominavimo skirtumai tarpasmeninės sąveikos metu: draugų diadų ir romantinių porų palyginimas

Dominance can be found in every dyadic relationship including romantic couples, friendships or business partnership. Even though research confirms that men tend to have more power than woman not only in romantic relationships, but also in friendships. However, some scholars doubt that men’s dominance and women’s submissiveness are just an established stereotype. Thus, more information about gender differences in power distribution in different types of dyads (friends and romantic) during interpersonal interaction is needed. Aim.The aim of this study was to assess the differences in male and female dominance during the interpersonal interaction considering the types of dyads (same-sex friendships or heterosexual romantic partners). Participants. 36 dyads participated in this study, which consisted of male friends’ dyads (N = 12), female friends’ dyads (N = 12), and heterosexual romantic couples (N = 12). The participants aged between 18 and 31 years old with a mean age of 22 years old (SD = 2.23). Method. The study consisted of two stages. In the first stage, the participants were asked some questions about themselves and their relationship, and were invited to participate in the experiment. All of the participants were informed about the terms of experiment (usage of video record) and were able to express their willingness to participate in this study in written form. The second stage of the research was a quasi-experiment. During this stage participants, i.e. friends and romantic partners’ dyads, played the game “Jenga” for about 20 minutes. Results, conclusion. It was found that women tend to dominate more than men during the interpersonal interaction in general and in romantic couples. No differences in dominance were found comparing female friends’ and male friends’ dyads. However, more dominance was found in heterosexual romantic couples comparing to the male and female friends’ dyads.