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1. What are examples of gender role messages and age-related messaging that negatively impacts our view of elderly sexuality and relationships?

2. What do we mean by the term transgender, and what are some social and psychological ways people can provide support to transgender people?

3. What does it mean to be intersex, and how is that different than being transgender?

4. Patricia Hill Collins discusses interlocking oppression in her book Black Feminist Thought, what is this concept, and why is it important for everyone, not just Black women?

5. How is queer theory different than just studying the lives of LGBTQ people?

6. What is gender performativity, is it the same thing as being a drag queen or king and getting on stage? why/why not?

7. Why might someone not leave an abusive (sexually or otherwise) relationship?

8. Do men and women engage in developing romance and intimacy in the same way, why/why not? Also, make sure your answer covers whether these differences/similarities are due to biology or something else.

9. From your reading by Niobe Way on “Emotionless Boys” and resistance, what were some of the main, or most important, findings that she discusses from her work?

C U R RE N T DI R EC TIO N S I N P SY CH O L O G I CA L SC I EN C E Emerging Perspectives on Distinctions Between Romantic Love and Sexual Desire Lisa M. Diamond University of Utah ABSTRACT—Although sexual desire and romantic love are often experienced in concert, they are fundamentally distinct subjective experiences with distinct neurobiological substrates. The basis for these distinctions is the evolutionary origin of each type of experience. The processes underlying sexual desire evolved in the context of sexual mating, whereas the processes underlying romantic love—or pair bonding—originally evolved in the context of infant-caregiver attachment. Consequently, not only can humans experience these feelings separately, but an individual’s sexual predisposition for the same sex, the other sex, or both sexes may not circumscribe his or her capacity to fall in love with partners of either gender. Also, the role of oxytocin in both love and desire may contribute to the widely observed phenomenon that women report experiencing greater interconnections between love and desire than do men. Because most research on the neurobiological substrates of sexual desire and affectional bonding has been conducted with animals, a key priority for future research is systematic investigation of the coordinated biological, behavioral, cognitive, and emotional processes that shape experiences of love and desire in humans. KEYWORDS—attachment; sexual desire; gender; sexual orientation; evolutionary theory It is a truism that romantic love and sexual desire are not the same thing, but one might be hard pressed to cite empirical evidence to this effect. In recent years, however, researchers in fields ranging from psychology to animal behavior to neurobiology have devoted increasing attention to the experiences, physiological underpinnings, and potential evolutionary origins that distinguish love and desire. The results of these investigations suggest that romantic love and sexual desire are governed by functionally independent social-behavioral systems that evolved for different reasons and that involve Address correspondence to Lisa M. Diamond, Department of Psychology, University of Utah, 380 South 1530 East, Room 502, Salt Lake City, UT 84112-0251; e-mail: diamond@psych.utah.edu. 116 different neurochemical substrates. Furthermore, there are gender differences in the interrelationship between love and desire that may have both biological and cultural origins. This emerging body of theory and research has the potential to profoundly reshape the way we conceptualize human sexuality, gender, sexual orientation, and social bonding. INDEPENDENCE BETWEEN LOVE AND DESIRE Sexual desire typically denotes a need or drive to seek out sexual objects or to engage in sexual activities, whereas romantic love typically denotes the powerful feelings of emotional infatuation and attachment between intimate partners. Furthermore, most researchers acknowledge a distinction between the earlier ‘‘passionate’’ stage of love, sometimes called ‘‘limerence’’ (Tennov, 1979), and the laterdeveloping ‘‘companionate’’ stage of love, called pair bonding or attachment (Fisher, 1998; Hatfield, 1987). Although it may be easy to imagine sexual desire without romantic love, the notion of ‘‘pure,’’ ‘‘platonic,’’ or ‘‘nonsexual’’ romantic love is somewhat more controversial. Yet empirical evidence indicates that sexual desire is not a prerequisite for romantic love, even in its earliest, passionate stages. Many men and women report having experienced romantic passion in the absence of sexual desire (Tennov, 1979), and even prepubertal children, who have not undergone the hormonal changes responsible for adult levels of sexual motivation, report intense romantic infatuations (Hatfield, Schmitz, Cornelius, & Rapson, 1988). Furthermore, extensive cross-cultural and historical research shows that individuals often develop feelings of romantic love for partners of the ‘‘wrong’’ gender (i.e., heterosexuals fall in love with samegender partners and lesbian and gay individuals fall in love with other-gender partners, as reviewed in Diamond, 2003). Although some modern observers have argued that such relationships must involve hidden or suppressed sexual desires, the straightforward written reports of the participants themselves are not consistent with such a blanket characterization. Rather, it seems that individuals are capable of developing intense, enduring, preoccupying affections for one another regardless of either partner’s sexual attractiveness or arousal. Copyright r 2004 American Psychological Society Volume 13—Number 3 Lisa M. Diamond MEASURING THE EXPERIENCE AND SUBSTRATES OF LOVE AND DESIRE Of course, one’s interpretation of such data depends on one’s confidence in the methods used to assess and contrast love and desire. Whereas sexual arousal can be reliably and validly assessed by monitoring blood flow to the genitals, no definitive test of ‘‘true love’’ exists. Psychologists have, however, identified a constellation of cognitions and behaviors that reliably characterize (and differentiate between) romantic love and passion across different cultures. As summarized by Tennov (1979), passionate love is a temporary state of heightened interest in and preoccupation with a specific individual, characterized by intense desires for proximity and physical contact, resistance to separation, and feelings of excitement and euphoria when receiving the partner’s attention. As passionate love transforms into companionate love, desire for proximity and resistance to separation become less urgent, and feelings of security, care, and comfort predominate. Some of the most provocative and promising research on love and desire focuses on the neurobiological substrates of these distinctive behaviors and cognitions. Although little direct research in this area has been conducted with humans, converging lines of evidence (reviewed by Fisher, 1998) suggest that the marked experiential differences between love and desire may be partially attributable to their distinct neurochemical signatures. Sexual desire, for example, is directly mediated by gonadal estrogens and androgens (see Diamond, 2003; Fisher, 1998), yet these hormones do not mediate the formation of affectional bonds. Rather, animal research indicates that the distinctive feelings and behaviors associated with attachment formation are mediated by the fundamental ‘‘reward’’ circuitry of the mammalian brain, involving the coordinated action of endogenous opioids, catecholamines,1 and neuropeptides such as oxytocin, which is best known for its role in childbirth and nursing. These neurochemicals regulate a range of emotional, cognitive, behavioral, and biological processes that facilitate social bonding by fostering conditioned associations between specific social partners and intrinsic feelings of reward (reviewed in Carter, 1998). At the current time, it is not known whether such processes mediate the formation and maintenance of pair bonds between humans, as they have been shown to do in other pair-bonding mammalian species, such as the prairie vole (Carter, 1998). For example, we are only beginning to understand the range of emotional and physical phenomena (other than labor and nursing) that trigger oxytocin release in humans, and whether oxytocin release has consistent effects on subjective experience. Preliminary studies have found fascinating individual differences in the amount of oxytocin released in response to sexual activity, positive emotion, and massage (Carmichael, Warburton, Dixen, & Davidson, 1994; Turner, Altemus, Enos, Cooper, & McGuinness, 1999), and this is a key direction for future research. 1 The release of catecholamines (most notably, dopamine, epinephrine, and norepinephrine) is associated with a variety of physiological responses that prepare the body to ‘‘fight or flee’’ a stressor (e.g., increased heart rate, blood pressure, and blood glucose levels). In contrast, endogenous opioids are known for their role in diminishing endocrine, cardiovascular, and behavioral stress responses, and are particularly well known for blunting the experience of pain. For this reason, they are often called ‘‘the body’s own pain killers.’’ These neuropeptides also play a role in the subjective experience of pleasure and reward, and facilitate learning and conditioning. Volume 13—Number 3 Another promising avenue for investigation involves the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to identify brain regions that are activated during experiences of desire versus infatuation versus attachment. In one preliminary study (Bartels & Zeki, 2000), the brains of individuals who reported being ‘‘truly, deeply, and madly in love’’ were examined under two conditions: while viewing pictures of their beloved and while viewing pictures of other-sex friends. Compared with viewing friends, viewing pictures of loved ones was associated with heightened activation in the middle insula and the anterior cingulate cortex, areas that have been associated in prior research with positive emotion, attention to one’s own emotional states, attention to the emotional states of social partners, and even opioid-induced euphoria. Viewing pictures of loved ones was also associated with deactivation in the posterior cingulate gyrus, the amygdala, and the right prefrontal, parietal, and middle temporal cortices, areas that have been associated with sadness, fear, aggression, and depression. Notably, the brain regions that showed distinctive patterns of activity when viewing romantic partners did not overlap with regions typically activated during sexual arousal. Clearly, much work remains to be done to develop a comprehensive ‘‘map’’ of normative brain activity during both short-term states and longer-term stages of desire, infatuation, and attachment; to examine changes in brain activity as individuals move between these states and stages within specific relationships; and to explore whether interindividual differences in personality and relationship quality moderate such patterns. Perhaps most important, however, we require a greater understanding of the functional implications of different coordinated patterns of activation and deactivation. THE EVOLUTIONARY ORIGINS OF LOVE AND DESIRE Given the accumulating evidence that love and desire are, in fact, functionally independent phenomena with distinct neurobiological substrates, a natural question is, why? After all, most individuals end up falling in love with partners to whom they are sexually drawn, and this seems to make good evolutionary sense given that pair bonding with one’s sexual partner is a good way to ensure that the resulting offspring have two dedicated parents instead of just one. This view assumes, however, that the basic biobehavioral mechanisms underlying affectional bonding evolved for the purpose of reproductive mating, and this may not be the case. Although these processes would clearly have conferred reproductive benefits on early humans, some researchers have argued that they originally evolved for an altogether different purpose: infant-caregiver attachment. Bowlby (1982) conceptualized attachment as an evolved behavioral system designed to keep infants in close proximity to caregivers (thereby maximizing infants’ chances for survival). Attachment establishes an intense affectional bond between infant and caregiver, such that separation elicits feelings of distress and proximity elicits feelings of comfort and security. Other evolutionary theorists have argued that this system was eventually co-opted for the purpose of keeping reproductive partners together to rear offspring (Hazan & Zeifman, 1999). In other words, adult pair bonding may be an exaptation—a system that originally evolved for one reason, but comes to serve another. The fundamental correspondence between infantcaregiver attachment and adult pair bonding is supported by extensive research documenting that these phenomena share the same core emotional and behavioral dynamics: heightened desire for proximity, 117 Distinctions Between Love and Desire resistance to separation, and utilization of the partner as a preferred target for comfort and security (Hazan & Zeifman, 1999). Even more powerful evidence is provided by the voluminous animal research documenting that these two types of affectional bonding are mediated by the same opioid- and oxytocin-based neural circuitry (Carter, 1998). This view helps to explain the independence between love and desire, because sexual desire is obviously irrelevant to the process of infant-caregiver bonding. Yet even if one grants that affectional bonding and sexual mating are fundamentally distinct processes that evolved for distinct purposes, the question still remains: Why do the majority of human adults fall in love only with partners to whom they are sexually attracted? One reason is obviously cultural: Most human societies have strong and well-established norms regarding what types of feelings and behaviors are appropriate for different types of adult relationships, and they actively channel adults into the ‘‘right’’ types of relationships through a variety of social practices. Additionally, however, both human and animal data suggest that attachments are most likely to form between individuals that have extensive proximity to and contact with one another over a prolonged period of time (Hazan & Zeifman, 1999). Sexual desire provides a powerful motive for such extended contact, increasing the likelihood that the average adult becomes attached to sexual partners rather than platonic friends. IMPLICATIONS REGARDING GENDER AND SEXUAL ORIENTATION Psychologists have long noted that one of the most robust gender differences regarding human sexuality is that women tend to place greater emphasis on relationships as a context for sexual feelings and behaviors than do men (Peplau, 2003). For example, many lesbian and bisexual women report that they were never aware of same-sex desires until after they fell in love with a particular woman (Diamond, 2003). One potential reason for this gender difference is that women appear more likely than men to have their first experiences of sexual arousal in the context of a heterosexual dating relationship, rather than the solitary context of masturbation. Another potential contributor to this gender difference is that historically women have been socialized to restrict their sexual feelings and behaviors to intimate emotional relationships—ideally, marital ties—whereas males have enjoyed more social license regarding casual sexual relations. Yet our emerging understanding of the neurochemical substrates of love and desire raises the intriguing possibility that biological factors might also contribute to this gender difference. Specifically, several of the neurochemicals that mediate mammalian bonding processes— most notably, oxytocin, vasopressin, and dopamine—also mediate sexual behavior, and these neurochemicals often show hormone-dependent, gender-specific patterns of functioning. For example, female rats have far more extensive oxytocin brain circuits than do male rats, perhaps to facilitate oxytocin-dependent caregiving behaviors, and oxytocin interacts with estrogen to regulate female rats’ sexual receptivity (Panksepp, 1998). Among humans, women show greater oxytocin release during sexual activity than do men, and some women show correlations between oxytocin release and orgasm intensity (Carmichael et al., 1994). Such findings raise the provocative possibility that women’s greater emphasis on the relational context of sexuality—that is, their greater experience of links between love and desire—may be influenced by oxytocin’s joint, gender-specific role in these processes (in addition to culture and socialization). 118 Furthermore, the fact that women sometimes develop same-sex desires as a result of falling in love with female friends (a phenomenon rarely documented among men) might be interpreted to indicate that oxytocin-mediated links between love and desire make it possible for a woman’s affectionally triggered desires to ‘‘override’’ her general sexual orientation. In other words, whereas the fundamental independence between love and desire means that individuals’ sexual orientations do not necessarily circumscribe their capacity for affectional bonding, the biobehavioral links between love and desire may make it possible for either experience to trigger the other (Diamond, 2003). Although this might be true for both sexes, it is perhaps more likely for women because of both gender-specific oxytocin-mediated processes and the greater cultural permission for women to develop strong affectional bonds with members of their own sex (for a similar argument regarding same-sex female bonds and gender-differentiated patterns of stress response, see Taylor et al., 2000). These notions run counter to the conventional notion that lesbians and gay men fall in love only with same-sex partners and heterosexuals fall in love only with other-sex partners. Yet this conventional notion is also contradicted by cross-cultural, historical, and even animal research. For example, given sufficient cohabitation, both male and female prairie voles have been induced to form nonsexual bonds with same-sex partners (DeVries, Johnson, & Carter, 1997), although these bonds form more quickly and are more robust among females. One fascinating area for future research concerns the conditions under which humans form and maintain sexual and affectional relationships that run counter to their established patterns of desire and affection, the implications of such phenomena for later experience and development, and the specific role played by cognitive, behavioral, emotional, and biological mechanisms in regulating such processes. Historically, it has been assumed that sexual arousal is a more basic, biologically mediated phenomenon than is romantic love, and therefore is more amenable to scientific study. Yet this assumption is outmoded. Research has demonstrated that the distinct behaviors and intense feelings associated with affectional bonds are governed not only by culture and socialization, but also by evolved, neurochemically mediated processes that are a fundamental legacy of our mammalian heritage. Future research on the nature and functioning of these processes in humans will not only provide researchers with novel tools to investigate age-old debates (can you fall in love with two people at once?), but will also make critical contributions to understanding the basic experience of human intimacy and how it is shaped by gender and sexual orientation over the life course. Recommended Reading Carter, C.S. (1998). (See References) Diamond, L.M. (2003). (See References) Fisher, H.E. (1998). (See References) Hazan, C., & Zeifman, D. (1999). (See References) REFERENCES Bartels, A., & Zeki, S. (2000). The neural basis of romantic love. NeuroReport, 11, 3829–3834. Volume 13—Number 3 Lisa M. Diamond Bowlby, J. (1982). Attachment and loss: Vol. 1: Attachment (2nd ed.). New York: Basic Books. Carmichael, M.S., Warburton, V.L., Dixen, J., & Davidson, J.M. (1994). Relationships among cardiovascular, muscular, and oxytocin responses during human sexual activity. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 23, 59–79. Carter, C.S. (1998). Neuroendocrine perspectives on social attachment and love. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 23, 779–818. DeVries, A.C., Johnson, C.L., & Carter, C.S. (1997). Familiarity and gender influence social preferences in prairie voles (Microtus ochrogaster). Canadian Journal of Zoology, 75, 295–301. Diamond, L.M. (2003). What does sexual orientation orient? A biobehavioral model distinguishing romantic love and sexual desire. Psychological Review, 110, 173–192. Fisher, H.E. (1998). Lust, attraction, and attachment in mammalian reproduction. Human Nature, 9, 23–52. Hatfield, E. (1987). Passionate and companionate love. In R.J. Sternberg & M.L. Barnes (Eds.), The psychology of love (pp. 191–217). New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Volume 13—Number 3 Hatfield, E., Schmitz, E., Cornelius, J., & Rapson, R.L. (1988). Passionate love: How early does it begin? Journal of Psychology and Human Sexuality, 1, 35–52. Hazan, C., & Zeifman, D. (1999). Pair-bonds as attachments: Evaluating the evidence. In J. Cassidy & P.R. Shaver (Eds.), Handbook of attachment theory and research (pp. 336–354). New York: Guilford. Panksepp, J. (1998). Affective neuroscience: The foundations of human and animal emotions. New York: Cambridge University Press. Peplau, L.A. (2003). Human sexuality: How do men and women differ? Current Directions in Psychological Science, 12, 37–40. Taylor, S.E., Klein, L.C., Lewis, B.P., Gruenewald, T.L., Gurung, R.A.R., & Updegraff, J.A. (2000). Biobehavioral responses to stress in females: Tendand-befriend, not fight-or-flight. Psychological Review, 107, 411–429. Tennov, D. (1979). Love and limerence: The experience of being in love. New York: Stein and Day. Turner, R.A., Altemus, M., Enos, T., Cooper, B., & McGuinness, T. (1999). Preliminary research on plasma oxytocin in normal cycling women: Investigating emotion and interpersonal distress. Psychiatry, 62, 97–113. 119 This document is a scanned copy of a printed document. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material. Couple and Family Psychology: Research and Practice 2017, Vol. 6, No. 2, 94 –105 © 2017 American Psychological Association 2160-4096/17/$12.00 http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/cfp0000077 Positive Emotional Expression Among Couples: The Role of Romantic Competence Joanne Davila, Haley Wodarczyk, and Vickie Bhatia This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. Stony Brook University We examined the association between romantic competence and positive emotional expressions in a relationship-promoting task serving the dual function of (1) furthering our understanding of the skills needed for adaptive expression of positive emotion that can foster intimacy among couples, and (2) further validating the construct of romantic competence. Eighty-nine emerging adult couples in different-sex relationships were assessed with the Romantic Competence Interview for Emerging Adults and participated in an interaction task, which assessed their ability for adaptive positive emotional expression. Results indicated that women’s romantic competence was positively associated with both her and her partner’s ability for positive emotional expression, even controlling for relationship satisfaction. Implications for understanding positive emotional expression in young couples, as well as the need for increasing romantic competence to facilitate it, are discussed. Keywords: romantic competence, emerging adults, relationship satisfaction, positive emotion, couples Gottman, & Katz, 1992; Christensen, Dimidjian, & Martell, 2015; Cordova, 2014). Indeed, satisfied couples are more likely than dissatisfied couples to demonstrate more positive affect and intimacy when positively reminiscing (Osgarby & Halford, 2013), and married couples who tell more positive stories about their relationship are less likely to divorce (Buehlman et al., 1992). Positive emotions also can serve to undo the physiological arousal effects of negative emotions during couple conflict interactions (Yuan, McCarthy, Holley, & Levenson, 2010). Despite the apparent importance of positive emotional expression in couples, and as noted by a growing number of researchers (Hershenberg, Mavandadi, Baddeley, & Libet, 2016; Levenson, Haase, Bloch, Holley, & Seider, 2013; Osgarby & Halford, 2013), the field has largely focused on negative emotion in couples and on interactions that emphasize conflict and problem-solving, and other challenging circumstances. These researchers are increasingly calling for a focus on positive emotions and on methods that can elicit them. Recently, Osgarby and Halford (2013) provided a direct examination comparing behavior in a positive reminiscence interaction to that in a typical problemsolving discussion task. They found, among satisfied couples, that positive affect and dyadic The ability to express positive emotion to one’s partner is considered an important aspect of what makes relationships succeed (see Gottman & Gottman, 2015, for a discussion). Theory and research in a variety of domains support this notion. For example, research on capitalization indicates that perceiving one’s partner as responding enthusiastically to the sharing of a positive experience or event is associated with greater satisfaction, trust, and intimacy, and less conflict (Gable, Reis, Impett, & Asher, 2004). Having partners talk about the positive aspects of their relationship, often by reminiscing or telling their story of how they got together, is a common technique used in couple interventions to reduce distress and create a platform for increased relationship satisfaction (Buehlman, Joanne Davila, Haley Wodarczyk, and Vickie Bhatia, Department of Psychology, Stony Brook University. Haley Wodarczyk is now at the Center for Community Independence in Somerville MA. Vickie Bhatia is now at the Ralph H. Johnson VA Medical Center, Charleston, SC. We thank Katie Chan, Alexandra Byrne, and Nicole Barle for assistance with data collection. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Joanne Davila, Department of Psychology, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY 11794-2500. E-mail: joanne.davila@stonybrook.edu 94 This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. POSITIVE EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION IN COUPLES intimacy occurred at higher rates in positive reminiscence than in problem-solving, attesting to the fact that traditional types of behavioral interactions used to study couples may not be well-suited to fully understanding positive affect and its effects on relationships. As such, it is important that researchers continue to examine the expression of positive emotion in contexts that are relationship promoting. Furthermore, given the evidence that expressing positive emotion is healthy for relationships, it is critical that we understand what contributes to partners’ ability to do so. Although there may be a variety of factors involved, we focused on one— romantic competence (RC)—which is defined by a set of skills believed to contribute to a wide range of aspects of healthy relationship functioning (Davila et al., 2009, 2017). The skills underlying RC are (1) insight, which reflects awareness of one’s own and one’s partner’s needs, goals, motivations, and effects on others, awareness of causes and consequences of behavior, and ability to learn from experience; (2) mutuality, which involves consideration of the needs of self and other, and attempts to maximize outcomes for both; and (3) emotion regulation, which is the ability to regulate emotions in response to relationship-relevant experiences (Davila et al., 2017). As elaborated in Davila et al. (2009, 2017), the construct of RC, and the three skills underlying it, was developed from social– cognitive theories of interpersonal problem-solving, attachment theory, and theories of emotion regulation, and the common themes across them. For example, social– cognitive models of interpersonal problem-solving stress the importance of mutuality and consequential thinking by emphasizing the need to think through interpersonal situations in a way that recognizes consequences and respects the needs and outcomes of both people involved (Brion-Meisels & Selman, 1984; Schultz, Yeates, & Selman, 1989; Selman & Demorest, 1984; Spivack, Platt, & Shure, 1976; Yeates, Schultz, & Selman, 1990). Attachment theory (Bowlby, 1969, 1973, 1980) stresses that adaptive relational functioning requires insight and the ability to reflect on self and others and to learn from prior experience (Treboux, Crowell, & Waters, 2004). It also stresses the importance of adaptively regulating distress and maintaining self-worth in the face of threats to security (see Cassidy, 1994; Cassidy & Shaver, 1999; Mikulincer, Shaver, & Pereg, 2003). Theories of 95 emotion regulation similarly emphasize the adaptive nature of the ability to regulate distress and maintain a coherent and positive sense of self (see Cole, Michel, & Teti, 1994; Salovey, Hsee, & Mayer, 1993). Davila et al. (2017) demonstrated that the three skill domains (insight, mutuality, and emotion regulation) form a valid latent construct of RC, and that RC is associated with key domains of relational and individual well-being, including greater relational security, healthier relationship decision making, greater relationship satisfaction, and fewer symptoms of depression and anxiety. In view of the fact that it is skill based, RC is a particularly good choice to examine as a correlate and potential predictor of positive emotional expression because it is potentially malleable. Other individual difference variables, such as personality traits or attachment security, which are associated with the propensity for expressing positive emotion (see Livingstone & Srivastava, 2014; Mikulincer & Shaver, 2013), may be less open to change. It may be possible to teach people the skills that allow for greater RC, which may then result in more adaptive couple behavior. In the current study, we hypothesized that RC would be associated with the ability to express positive emotion in a relationship-promoting interaction task. The task is designed to elicit positive emotional expressions from both members of the dyad by creating a demand for establishing intimacy (see Hershenberg et al., 2011). Behavior in the relationship-promoting task was coded for positivity of verbal expressions and congruence of verbal content and affect displayed. The positivity code reflects a person’s ability to say something positive about the partner. The congruence code reflects their ability to do so while expressing congruent (i.e., matching) emotion. We included a congruence code because how one says something affects its meaning (e.g., giving a compliment while rolling one’s eyes or in a sarcastic tone). One might say positive words, but if the emotion does not match, then the impact may be different. More romantically competent partners should be more appropriately responsive to the demand this task creates owing to their ability to understand and care about their partner’s needs (which requires insight and mutuality), to be aware of one’s true feelings and how one expresses them, or not (which requires insight), to recognize the effects of their behaviors on the partner (which also This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. 96 DAVILA, WODARCZYK, AND BHATIA requires insight), and to adaptively experience and express their emotions when called for and in appropriate situations (which requires emotion regulation). As such, more romantically competent partners should exhibit more positivity and more congruence than less romantically competent partners. Therefore, we predicted that greater RC would be associated with greater positivity and greater congruence. Examining the association between RC and positive emotional expressions in a relationshippromoting task serves the dual function of (1) furthering our understanding of the skills needed for adaptive expression of positive emotion that can foster intimacy among couples, and (2) further validating the construct of RC. If the skills underlying competence do form the basis for healthy relationship functioning, then competence should be associated with key behaviors exhibited by partners. Indeed, this is one of the first studies examining RC and observable couple behavior. Using data from this same sample, we have shown that RC is associated with more adaptive social support behavior among couples (Bhatia & Davila, 2017), strengthening confidence in the prediction that competence also will be associated with positive emotional expression. We also examined whether predicted associations held accounting for relationship satisfaction. We have already shown that RC is related to satisfaction in this sample (Davila et al., 2017), and it is typically the case that satisfaction is associated with observed behavior among couples, although this study will be the first test of the association between satisfaction and positive emotional expression using this specific relationship-promoting task. Based on Osgarby and Halford’s (2013) finding that satisfaction was associated with positive affect and intimacy expressed when positively reminiscing, we predicted that satisfaction would be associated with greater positivity and congruence. However, we also predicted that RC would retain its association even when controlling for relationship satisfaction. If so, it would indicate that RC can provide a unique way to understand the skills needed for adaptive behavior that is separate from the effects of simply being in a satisfying relationship. The hypotheses were tested in a sample of emerging adult couples. Emerging adults are an important group in which to study relational pro- cesses, and there is a growing literature examining their romantic functioning. Not only are they looking for relationships and trying to determine what type of relationship/partner is right for them (Arnett, 2000; Scott, Schelar, Manlove, & Cui, 2009), they also have high rates of relationship involvement, sexual activity, and cohabitation (Arnett & Schwab, 2012; Chandra, Mosher, Copen, & Sionean, 2011; Copen, Daniels, & Mosher, 2013), and, for some, marriage (Copen, Daniels, Vespa, & Mosher, 2012). Therefore, emerging adults are making important decisions about relationships that have the potential for long-term impact. Indeed, the quality of their relationships is related to a host of important outcomes (Braithwaite et al., 2016; Norona & Welsh, 2016; Whitton & Kuryluk, 2012) and may set the stage for future romantic experiences. Studying romantic functioning among emerging adults may, therefore, help identify ways in which we can help people increase relational success early on and in the future, and, consequently, reduce negative consequences. Method Participants and Procedure Participants were 89 different-sex couples (women: M age ? 20.16, SD ? 1.63; men: M age ? 20.65, SD ? 1.82; M relationship length ? 73.9 weeks, SD ? 76.5 weeks) recruited from the Psychology Human Subject Pool and via flyers and announcements on the campus of a large state university in the Northeast United States. To be eligible for participation, participants were required to be between 18 and 25 years of age, in a relationship of at least 3 months’ duration, unmarried and with no children, fluent in English, willing to be audioand video-recorded, and free from reading, vision, or motor problems that would affect completion of study tasks. Couples were racially/ethnically diverse; 52.8% of men described themselves as Caucasian, 22.5% as Asian/Pacific Islander, 15.7% as Latino, 4.5% as Middle Eastern, 3.4% as Black/ African American, and 1.1% as another ethnicity; 41.6% of women described themselves as Caucasian, 33.7% as Asian/Pacific Islander, 11.2% as Latina, 5.6% as Black/African American, and 7.8% as another ethnicity. The vast majority of participants were students, with This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. POSITIVE EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION IN COUPLES only four females and four males (4.5% each) indicating they were not enrolled in school. After providing consent, participants completed, individually, an in-person interview to assess RC and questionnaires (using a Webbased survey protocol), and engaged in the positive-interaction task. They received either course credit or payment ($25) for participation. The study was approved by the university institutional review board. Measures Romantic competence. RC was assessed with the Romantic Competence Interview for Emerging Adults (RCI-EA; available on request from the first author). The RCI-EA was adapted from the Romantic Competence Interview created for adolescents (Davila et al., 2009). Davila and colleagues (Davila et al., 2017) provided evidence of reliability and validity of the RCI-EA in three samples of emerging adults, including the present sample. The RCI-EA is a semistructured interview that probes, using developmentally appropriate language, scenarios, and relationship contexts, participants’ thoughts about, preferences for, and approaches to romantic activities and relationships. It probes experiences in actual relationships and reactions to hypothetical scenarios, both normative and challenging. The RCI-EA interviewer codes responses based on all materials from the interview. Codes are made for four skill domains (insight, learning, mutuality, and emotion regulation), as well as overall global competence. The global competence code was used in the present study, as prior research has shown that the four skills domains form a coherent latent RC factor, which is highly correlated with the global code (Davila et al., 2017). The global code was made on a scale, with behaviorally specific anchors/examples, ranging from 1 (low) to 5 (high) with [1/2] points allowed. The interview and coding system can be requested from the first author. Interviewers were graduate students in clinical psychology and undergraduate psychology majors who were trained by the developer of the interview. Interviews were audio-recorded to assess reliability. Intraclass correlations (ICCs; two-way random, absolute) were conducted on 20 randomly selected women’s and 20 randomly selected men’s interviews (40 total; 22.5% of the 97 sample) coded by the interviewer and one reliability coder. The ICC for the global code was .88. Relationship satisfaction. Satisfaction was assessed with the 16-item version of the Couple Satisfaction Index (CSI-16; Funk & Rogge, 2007), a well validated, psychometrically sound measure (Funk & Rogge, 2007; Whitton & Kuryluk, 2012). The CSI-16 is a self-report measure in which participants respond to 10 global evaluations of their romantic relationship on a 6-point Likert scale (0 ? not at all true/ never; 5 ? completely true/all the time) and six characteristics of their relationship on a bipolar adjective scale (e.g., 0 ? miserable, 5 ? enjoyable). A total score was calculated by summing the responses to all items, with higher scores indicate higher relationship satisfaction (? ? .91). Positive interaction task. Couples engaged in an unstructured 2-min interaction task, where they were instructed to “spend 2 minutes telling each other what you like most about each other.” Following that instruction, the research staff person left the room to begin videorecording. Couples were made aware that research staff would not be listening to their interaction as it occurred but would be monitoring it visually to make sure they were on camera. Interactions were coded with a version of the global coding system utilized by Hershenberg et al. (2011) to code a similar interaction engaged in by adolescent–parent dyads. Trained coders viewed the entire interaction and made ratings along 5-point scales on (1) how positively each partner spoke about their relationship (1 ? very negative, 3 ? mixed, 5 ? very positive); and (2) how congruent each partner’s verbal content and affect was (1 ? very incongruent, 5 ? very congruent). Coders also rated overall positivity and overall congruence of the interaction as a whole (using the same 5-point scales) taking into account both partners’ behavior. Twenty interactions (22%) were rated by an additional coder. The ICCs between the two coders’ ratings were: (1) positivity about the relationship (women: .90; men: .80; overall: .82), (2) congruence (women: .71; men: .68; overall: .67), indicating acceptable interrater reliability. There were two interactions during which the man did not have the opportunity to speak (his partner spoke the entire time) and one interac- 98 DAVILA, WODARCZYK, AND BHATIA tion in which the woman did not have the opportunity to speak (her partner spoke the entire time). It was decided by the coding team to code the nonspeaking partner’s data as missing because it was not that they had nothing positive to say, but that they did not get the chance to say anything. This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. Results Preliminary Analyses Table 1 presents means, standard deviations, and correlations between the variables. As the means show, on average, both women and men showed moderate to good levels of RC, generally positive and coherent interaction behavior, and were generally satisfied. The correlations indicated the following. First, partners’ RC was correlated, as was their satisfaction (which was shown in our previous analyses; Davila et al., 2017). Next, women’s RC was positively associated with virtually all aspects of interaction behavior (hers, his, and overall), and with her own satisfaction, in line with predictions. Effect sizes were generally small. Contrary to predictions, men’s RC was not significantly associated with any of the behavioral data, and existing associations were negative. Men’s RC and satisfaction also were not significantly associated. This differs from what was reported in Davila et al. (2017), where RC and satisfaction were marginally associated for men, likely owing to differences in the analytic approach (Davila and colleagues exam- ined Actor–Partner Interdependence Models (APIMs) of the association between partners’ RC and satisfaction; the coefficients reported are, however, similar in magnitude). Also unexpectedly, men’s satisfaction was not significantly associated with their behavior, though women’s satisfaction was with their positivity and the overall interaction positivity. Correlations with men’s satisfaction may have been affected by the restricted range on this variable. Satisfaction scores for men ranged from 50 to 81, whereas for women they ranged from 31 to 81. Primary Analyses These were conducted as APIMs (Kenny, Kashy, & Cook, 2006) using structural equations modeling in AMOS (v. 22). Data from partners within couples are typically dependent on one another, and this is true in this sample (as shown in the correlations in Table 1). Therefore, APIM was selected because it handles the nonindependence of dyadic data by treating the dyad, rather than the individual, as the unit of analysis. It also allows for the independent and simultaneous estimation of both actor (withinpartner) and partner (cross-partner) effects. Although we did not make predictions about cross-partner effects, the ability to examine them with this analytic strategy is an advantage. We specified two separate APIMs. We first examined whether RC was associated with positivity and congruence of each partners’ comments. Paths representing both within- and Table 1 Correlations, Means, and Standard Deviations for All Variables Variable 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 1 RC-W RC-M .26? Positivity-W .26? Positivity-M .22? Congruence-W .09 Congruence-M .29?? Overall positivity .28?? Overall congruence .27? Relationship satisfaction-W .30?? 10. Relationship satisfaction-M .03 M (SD) 3.60 (.58) 2 3 4 5 6 7 ?.09 ?.04 ?.09 ?.14 ?.14 ?.15 .45?? .63?? .29?? .75?? .75?? .33?? .61?? .63?? .65?? .41?? .69?? .63?? .60?? .53?? .82?? .14 .32?? .20 .21 .08 .28?? 8 9 10 .16 .17 .16 .10 .06 ?.07 .13 .07 .48?? 3.57 (.63) 4.30 (.79) 4.30 (.79) 4.20 (.76) 4.07 (.77) 3.98 (.92) 4.20 (.84) 70.36 (9.8) 70.44 (7.6) Note. N ? 89 couples; W ? women; M ? men; RC ? romantic competence. ? p ? .05. ?? p ? .01, two-tailed. This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. POSITIVE EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION IN COUPLES cross-partner associations were specified between each partner’s RC and their positivity and congruence scores. Partners’ RC was correlated, and errors were correlated within and across partner positivity and congruence scores (all possible correlations). This resulted in a saturated model for which fit could not be examined. However, paths from men’s RC to everything except his congruence were not significant, as was the path from women’s RC to her congruence (all ps ? .12), and when dropped, the resulting model fit the data well (?2(4) ? 3.17, p ? .53, CFI ? 1.00, RMSEA ? 0.001; see Figure 1). Partners’ RC was correlated, r ? .26, p ? .02, and the paths from women’s RC to her positive comments (? ? .20, p ? .01) and his congruence (? ? .30, p ? .002) were significant and positive. The path from women’s RC to his positive comments, although significant in the saturated model, became marginally significant (? ? .19, p ? .06). The path from men’s RC to his congruence was significant, but in the opposite direction as predicted (? ? ?.18, p ? .03). All significant paths reflected small effect sizes. We then examined whether RC was associated with the overall positivity and congruence ratings for the interaction. Paths were specified between each partner’s RC and the overall positivity and congruence scores. Partners’ RC was correlated, and errors were correlated for overall positivity and congruence scores. This resulted in a saturated model for which fit could not be examined, and all paths in the model were significant (see Figure 2). Partners’ RC 99 was correlated, r ? .26, p ? .02. The paths from women’s RC to overall positivity (? ? .34, p ? .001) and overall congruence (? ? .33, p ? .002) were significant and positive. The paths from men’s RC to overall positivity (? ? ?.22, p ? .03) and overall congruence (? ? ?.24, p ? .02) were significant and in the opposite direction predicted. Again, all significant paths reflected small effect sizes. Each of the two models was rerun including both women’s and men’s relationship satisfaction in the model. Within-partner correlations between RC and satisfaction were specified, as was the correlation between partners’ RC and between partners’ satisfaction. Within- and cross-partner paths were specified from satisfaction to each interaction variable. Across all models, all significant paths from RC to behavior remained. In addition, in the first model, women’s satisfaction was significantly associated with her positivity, r ? .26, p ? .03, and her congruence, r ? .23, p ? .05. In the second model, women’s satisfaction was only marginally associated with overall positivity, r ? .20, p ? .09. No other significant associations with satisfaction emerged. Overall, these findings suggest that RC has a unique association with behavior controlling for associations between satisfaction and behavior. Post Hoc Exploratory Analyses We conducted a set of post hoc analyses to explore the negative associations between men’s RC and behavior, which were opposite Figure 1. Actor–Partner Interdependence Model predicting individual behavior from romantic competence. ?2(4) ? 3.17, p ? .53, CFI ? 1.00, RMSEA ? .001. W ? women; M ? men; RC ? romantic competence; E ? error term. Paths with dotted lines were nonsignificant. ?? p ? .01. ? p ? .05. ? p ? .06, two-tailed. This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. 100 DAVILA, WODARCZYK, AND BHATIA Figure 2. Actor–Partner Interdependence Model predicting overall behavior from romantic competence. W ? women; M ? men; RC ? romantic competence; E ? error term. ?? p ? .01. ? p ? .05, two-tailed. than what had been predicted. Given that in the APIMs women’s RC tended to be a more consistent positive predictor of men’s behavior and overall interaction behavior than was men’s RC, we explored whether the interaction of partners’ RC could shed light on the negative findings. To do so, we reconducted the APIM analyses using the final models described above (not controlling for satisfaction, given that including it did not change the findings). Interaction variables were computed using each partner’s centered RC score. The centered scores were included to control for the main effects of each partner’s RC, and the correlations between the centered variables and the interaction term were included in the model. In the first analysis, we examined whether the interaction between partners’ RC predicted men’s congruence scores, as men’s RC was a significant negative predictor. The interaction was not a significant predictor (r ? .02, p ? .83). In the second analysis, we examined whether the interaction between partners’ RC predicted the overall positivity and congruence ratings. The interaction was a marginally significant predictor of both positivity, r ? .17, p ? .08, and congruence, r ? .18, p ? .07. Although only trends, we elected to decompose the interactions to explore their nature. We based this decision on the fact that the small sample size lowers power for detection of small interaction effects. That the interactions were nearing significance suggests a trend that may be potentially meaningful and worthy of exploration. Of course, that the effect sizes were small suggests they should be interpreted cautiously, as does the fact that the analyses were post hoc. The interactions were probed using procedures for examining simple slopes specified by Aiken and West (1991). When women were coded as high on RC (specified as one SD above the mean), men’s RC was not significantly associated with positivity, r ? ?.06, p ? .64, or congruence, r ? ?.08, p ? .57. However, when women were coded as low on RC (specified as 1 SD below the mean), men’s RC was significantly negatively associated with positivity, r ? ?.39, p ? .005, and congruence, r ? ?.41, p ? .003. This tentatively suggests that men who are more romantically competent may fail to behave in a positive manner only when they are partnered with women who are low in RC. Again, these results should be interpreted cautiously.1 1 Given that these findings emerged only for the overall interaction variables, which reflect dyadic behavior, not just men’s behavior, we conducted one additional post hoc analysis to examine the extent to which each partner’s individual behavioral codes contributed to the overall interaction codes. An APIM was run in which women’s and men’s positivity and congruence codes predicted the overall positivity and congruence codes. All possible paths were specified, as were all correlations between the individual codes, as well as the errors of the overall codes, resulting in a saturated model. Results identified one nonsignificant path from men’s congruence to overall congruence. This path was deleted and the resulting model provided a less than adequate fit based on the RMSEA (?2(1) ? 2.13, p ? .15, CFI ? .99, RMSEA ? .11). Nonetheless, the model was compared with one that constrained corresponding women’s and men’s paths from the individual codes to the overall codes (e.g., women’s path from positivity to overall positivity was constrained to be equal to men’s path from positivity to overall positivity) to examine whether women’s and men’s individual codes equally contributed to the overall codes. The constrained model also provided a less than adequate fit based on the RMSEA (?2(4) ? 7.83, p ? .10, CFI ? .99, RMSEA ? .09). Importantly, the ?2 difference test 2 (?diff (3) ? 5.66) was nonsignificant, indicating that the constrained model provides an equally good fit to the data (i.e., it is not a worse fit than the unconstrained model). This suggests that, except for men’s congruence, which was not a significant predictor, women’s and men’s individual codes contribute equally to the overall codes. Path coefficients from individual codes to overall codes ranged from .25 to .43. POSITIVE EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION IN COUPLES This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. Discussion This study was designed to examine whether RC was associated with more positive emotional expression during a relationship-promoting interaction task, serving the dual function of increasing knowledge of the skills needed for adaptive expression of positive emotion and providing additional data validating the construct of RC. The following findings emerged. First, as predicted, among women, greater RC was associated with their ability for greater positive emotional expression, meaning that more competent women were able to say more positive things about their partner in a situation that calls for doing so. Greater RC among women also was associated with her partner’s ability for greater and more congruent positive emotional expression, meaning that partners of romantically competent women were able to say more positive things about the women, and did so in a manner in which their affect matched what they were saying. These individual findings emerged at the dyadic level as well. Greater RC among women was associated with greater positivity and congruence as reflected in the overall interaction codes, which take into account both partners’ behavior. This suggests that dyadic interaction characterized by adaptive positive emotional expression in a situation that has the potential to enhance intimacy may be fostered by the women’s RC. Following from the definition of RC, the ability to approach one’s relationship with insight, from a place of mutuality, and in an emotionally regulated manner can help women behave in ways and create dyadic behavior that can promote relationship health through intimacy-building positive emotional expression. Interestingly, the post hoc, exploratory analyses also highlighted the role that women’s competence may play in this type of dyadic interaction, though they must be interpreted cautiously. These analyses were conducted in an attempt to better understand the negative association between men’s RC and both their own and the dyadic behavior. It is counterintuitive that men’s competence would be associated with less adaptive positive emotional expression. The post hoc analyses tentatively suggest that this is only the case when women are lower in competence. Therefore, men who are more romantically 101 competent may fail to behave in a positive manner only when they are partnered with women who are low in RC. That is, men who are partnered with women who are not competent may have a harder time adaptively expressing positive emotion even in situations that explicitly call for it. On the other hand, one might interpret this finding to mean that men who are less competent may express more positive emotion only when partnered with less romantically competent women. The meaning of this is unclear. Perhaps it could be an effort to compensate for the partner’s inability to express positive emotion in attempt to bolster the relationship. Or, perhaps it does, in fact, reflect incompetent behavior on his part. Saying something positive when your partner is unable to do so may be a sign of poor insight, dependence on the partner for self-esteem (which reflects poor mutuality), and/or poor emotion regulation. Of course, all of this is highly speculative and based on small effect sizes that emerged from a post hoc analysis. Future research will be needed to replicate and further explore whether and how partners’ RC may interact to predict positive emotional expression. That it was women’s RC that seemed to drive the behavior of both members of the couple is consistent with a fairly large body of literature that points to women as being more responsible for regulating the affective balance of relationships (Bloch, Haase, & Levenson, 2014; Gottman & Notarius, 2000), although this has not been found to be exclusively so (see Bloch et al., 2014). Importantly, most prior research has focused more on negative emotion and behavior, and so, continued examination of gender differences in positive emotion expression is needed. Separate from the notion of women’s competence driving the behavior of both partners, it is important to consider the following about the negative association between men’s competence and behavior. Specifically, it raises the issue of whether the construct of RC is valid for men. All of our prior studies have suggested that it is (i.e., men’s relational functioning was associated in expected ways with competence, even with another behavioral task; Bhatia & Davila, 2017; Davila et This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. 102 DAVILA, WODARCZYK, AND BHATIA al., 2017), but perhaps it is not as valid in predicting positive behavior, or in this particular task. Perhaps the task is experienced differently by men than women and/or has a different meaning for them. This would be an important area for future research. Another important finding was that the results for RC held when controlling for relationship satisfaction. Indeed, for women, despite that competence, satisfaction, and positive behavior were all related to one another, competence emerged as a unique predictor of positive behavior (separate from satisfaction). If competence was simply a proxy for satisfaction, this result would not have emerged. This finding is important because it suggests a way to help couples engage in more positive adaptive behavior, specifically by teaching them (at least women) skills to become more romantically competent. That satisfaction is associated with positive behavior provides no specific direction for clinical intervention. Therefore, the findings suggest that competence can provide a unique way to understand the skills needed for adaptive behavior that is separate from the effects of simply being in a satisfying relationship. The findings have a number of important implications. First, they begin to shed light on one, potentially malleable, factor—RC—that may increase partners’— or at least women’s—ability to express positive emotion in situations that have the potential to increase relationship intimacy. This has important clinical implications. Mirgain and Cordova (2007) demonstrated that partners with good emotion skills experience greater intimacy and, consequently, are more satisfied. Therefore, given that expressing positive emotion is healthy for relationships, helping women become more romantically competent may promote skills that allow them to create healthier relationships. This suggests that programs (e.g., relationship education) that focus on increasing RC through training in the skills of insight, mutuality, and emotion regulation, may be beneficial, at least for young women. Whether they would be for young men is unclear from our findings, further supporting the importance of clarifying whether and how competence is related to positive emotional expression for men. The findings also provide more support for the validity of the RC construct. Prior research has demonstrated associations with self-reported indicators of healthy relationship functioning (Davila et al., 2017). This study, along with that of Bhatia and Davila (2017), shows that RC is associated with key behavioral indicators of adaptive relational functioning. The findings also support the use of our positive interaction task to assess positive emotional expression. There are few such tasks described in the literature. This one is easy to administer, brief for the couples, and able to be quickly and reliably coded. Naturally, the findings must be interpreted with the following limitations in mind. First, the study was cross-sectional in nature. Although we view this as appropriate for an initial test of associations between competence and behavior, future research would benefit from prospective designs that can address issues of temporal ordering (e.g., do competent partners behave better? Do better behaved partners become more competent in their relationships?) and prediction of relationship outcomes (e.g., does positive emotional expression mediate associations between competence and increases in satisfaction or other indicators of relationship health?). Second the study only included emerging adults. Although they are a relevant sample on which to focus because they may be making decisions of consequence to their future, we do not know the extent to which the findings generalize to couples at other ages and relationship stages, nor do we know whether the findings generalize to couples in same-sex relationships, as all participants were in different-sex relationships. Additional research will be needed in examining different types of couples at different ages and developmental phases. In addition, the task we used, because of its focus and brevity, only captures basic positive emotional expression. It does not assess more complex emotional processes, such as upregulation or coregulation in couples (Levenson et al., 2013). In addition, although the 2-min interaction creates a high-demand situation and was successful in eliciting a range of behaviors in this study and in our prior research (Hershenberg et al., 2011), the short time and This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. POSITIVE EMOTIONAL EXPRESSION IN COUPLES the instruction to say what you like about each other may have created an artificial situation, and may have contributed to the limited associations with relationship satisfaction. Future research should examine positivity in other types of interactions as well as longer interactions (Laurenceau, Kleinman, Kaczynski, & Carver, 2010). Finally, although the sample size was wellpowered enough to detect predicted effects (though not the interactions), larger samples are always necessary for purposes of replication and generalization. Related to this, effect sizes were small. Their replicability and practical significance must be determined in future research, particularly if they are to be used to guide relationship education programs as suggested earlier. 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