Theses and Dissertations
This collection includes both ASU Theses and Dissertations, submitted by graduate students, and the Barrett, Honors College theses submitted by undergraduate students.
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Description
An offender's expression of remorse plays an important role following relational transgressions, yet it is not well understood how the experience and expression of remorse relate to both victim responses to hurt and forgiveness in close relationships. This study uses a social functionalist framework to investigate the role of remorse in the forgiveness process and tests whether offender remorse experiences mediate the associations between victim responses to hurt and remorse expressions. Undergraduate participants (N=671) completed questionnaires about a time when they hurt a close relational partner and reported their partners' responses to hurt, their own experiences and expressions of remorse, and their perceptions of forgiveness. Results indicated that victims' sad communication positively predicted offenders' other-oriented and affiliation remorse experiences; victims' threatening communication positively predicted offenders' self-focused remorse experience; and victims' conciliatory communication and withdrawal positively predicted offenders' affiliation and self-focused remorse experiences. Results of the mediation analyses revealed that self-focused remorse fully mediated the relationship between victim threatening communication and low status behaviors; other-oriented remorse partially mediated the association between victim sad communication and apology/concern behaviors; and affiliation partially mediated the relationship between victim conciliatory communication and connection behaviors. Victims' withdrawal behaviors and offenders' use of compensation were not related. Finally, offenders' apology/concern and connection behaviors associated positively with perceptions of forgiveness, whereas low status behaviors negatively predicted forgiveness. Use of compensation following a hurtful event was not significantly related to forgiveness. Results are interpreted within the framework of evolutionary psychology and further validate the functional approach to studying emotion.
ContributorsGracyalny, Monica (Author) / Mongeau, Paul A. (Thesis advisor) / Guerrero, Laura K. (Committee member) / Shiota, Michelle N. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
Guided by Alberts, Tracy and Trethewey's (2011) integrated theory of the division of domestic labor, this dissertation examined the influence of domestic labor response threshold (i.e., the point at which one is sufficiently disturbed by a task undone so as to feel compelled to attend to it) on domestic labor performance and domestic labor conflict. Three-hundred-ten heterosexual participants (155 marital dyads; average marriage length of 20 years) completed an online questionnaire about their performance of household labor, household labor conflict, and response thresholds. Response thresholds were assessed using traditional verbal measures as well as two visual (i.e., photographic) measures developed for this investigation. The data were analyzed using three methods of dyadic data analysis: structural equation modeling, repeated measures multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA), and actor-partner interdependence models using multilevel modeling. Results indicate that the lower one's response threshold, and the higher one's partner's response threshold, the greater one's contributions to household tasks. Additionally, the lower one's response threshold, and the higher one's partner's response thresholds, the more likely the demand-withdrawal pattern is to emerge in domestic labor conflicts. Finally, mutual avoidance is more likely when one partner perceives that it is less costly to complete domestic work than to engage in conflict about it, or when one partner perceives that domestic labor is not a worthwhile or appropriate conflict topic. Contributions of this investigation include support for the integrated theory of the division of domestic labor, increased understanding of how individual differences (working in concert with actor sex) contribute to domestic labor allocation and conflict, a more sensitive measure of response threshold, and preliminary evidence of the "logics" of avoidance of domestic labor conflict.
ContributorsKnight, Kendra Rebecca (Author) / Alberts, Janet K (Thesis advisor) / Guerrero, Laura K. (Committee member) / Christopher, F. Scott (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
Depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts or actions are on the rise in adolescents (National Institute of Mental Health, 2015; Bridge, Asti, & Horowitz, 2015). Parents, school administrators, and therapists are searching for resiliency factors with in at-risk groups to aid students in need. In previous work, Luthar and Zigler (1992) reported that intelligent youth are more resilient than less intelligent youth under low stress conditions but they lose their advantage under high stress conditions. This study examined whether intelligence (reflected in grade point average; GPA) and maladaptive (internalizing and externalizing symptoms) behaviors are negatively related in adolescents, and tested whether level of stress, reflected in emotion regulation and friendship quality, moderated that association. It also probed whether the relationships differ by gender. Sixth-graders (N=506) were recruited with active parental consent from three middle schools. Adolescents completed self-report questionnaires Regarding demo graphics, maladaptive behaviors, emotion regulation, and friendship quality, and GPA data were collected from the school. Regression analyses found that GPA was negatively related to externalizing symptoms. Girls with poor friendship communication report significantly higher maladaptive behaviors. This relation was more pronounced for girls with high GPAs, as predicted. Results support the theory that intelligent female adolescents are more reactive under adverse circumstances. Future efforts should follow students through middle school into high school to evaluate whether friendships remain important to adjustment, hold for boys as well as girls, and have implications for relationship interventions.
ContributorsGonzales, Ashlyn Carol (Author) / Luthar, Suniya (Thesis director) / Davis, Mary (Committee member) / Infurna, Frank (Committee member) / Department of Psychology (Contributor) / Sanford School of Social and Family Dynamics (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-12
Description
Emerging adulthood represents a liminal space between adolescence and adulthood. Attachment with a romantic partner is commonly developed during this time; however, the nature of the dating relationship often remains ambiguous and/or undefined. Dating provides emerging adults the opportunity to develop their romantic competence and navigate these particular attachment relationships. Conflict, and how it is managed, is a critical variable during this time and differentiates between couples who progress in their relationship from those who terminate. What is more, partners may become stuck in destructive cycles, or patterns, of conflict (i.e., demand-withdrawal). Using the theoretical frameworks of attachment theory and emotionally focused couples therapy, this study’s goal it to examine the impact of a brief writing-intervention on relational quality, secure attachment behaviors (i.e., accessibility, responsiveness, and engagement) and attachment dimensions (i.e., anxiety, avoidance). Sixty-seven participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions for a two-wave study: (1) a treatment condition that was provided an educational presentation regarding couples’ negative cycles of interaction and attachment needs, followed by a guided writing task; (2) a comparison condition that only received the educational presentation; and (3) a control condition that received neither the educational presentation nor the writing task. Hypotheses proposed that participants in the treatment condition would experience increased relational quality, secure attachment behaviors (for both themselves and their partner), and greater secure attachment (i.e., decreased anxiety and avoidance) across time compared to the comparison and control conditions. Data did not support the hypotheses. These findings offer important implications for the development of future brief couples’ interventions and aim to generate future research.
ContributorsTruscelli, Nikki Irene (Author) / Mongeau, Paul (Thesis advisor) / Guerrero, Laura K. (Committee member) / Randall, Ashley K. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020