Attitude Dissimilarity and Relationships: Investigating the Impact of Attitude Dissimilarity and Type of Partner on Relationship Outcomes

Abstract

The present study examines how individuals change their attitudes and the types of attributions and explanations they make when they discover that another person, more specifically, a close friend, a romantic partner, or an acquaintance, has different beliefs and attitudes than their own. A survey was conducted with two randomly assigned conditions: a close friend/ romantic partner condition and an acquaintance condition. Participants were asked to imagine this person and answer questions according to this person. Findings showed that upon learning information that the individual had differing beliefs and attitudes, participants in both conditions showed decreased feelings of intimacy and decreased time they would want to spend with the individual they were thinking about. This was inconsistent with the hypothesis for the close friend/ romantic partner condition, but consistent with the hypothesis for the acquaintance condition. Moreover, participants in the close friend/ romantic partner condition were more likely to shift their attitudes to align with the individual and to make an external attribution that the person was peer-pressured into the behavior. There was no difference between conditions for participants to make the internal attribution that the behavior reflects the person’s beliefs and attitudes. The present study shows that it did not matter the nature of the relationship, that learning information about someone’s differing beliefs and attitudes had negative consequences on different relationship outcomes. Furthermore, participants continue to make internal attributions no matter the person they are thinking about. This study helps to understand the different ways attitude dissimilarity can have an impact on different types of relationships. Keywords: romantic partner, close friend, acquaintance, attributions, attitude alignment, attitude dissimilarity, intimacy