Psychological and Social Influences on Satisfaction in Couple Relationships

Dear Colleagues,

Couple relationships are interpersonal links that are subject to multiple psychological, social and cultural influences in their formation, maintenance or rupture, with diverse discursive dialectics, from which, in turn, implications are derived in the interactive dynamics.

The accelerated social changes that are globally reassigning a new and leading role to women are gradually modifying the anthropological stereotype of the woman as the caretaker and the man as the provider, and even though the formal roles in the couple relationship have changed radically in the last 30 years, romantic relationships (in their quintessential sense) are still present in a stigmatic form (desire for control, exclusivity, jealousy, dependence, etc.), since feelings and emotions depend on the relationship and not always homeostatically. In short, in contemporary society, the archetypal model of romantic relationships, with its myths and paradoxes, is still present in the collective imagination as a socio-cultural construction. On the other hand, new interactive modalities are being installed in conditions of individualism imposed by network connectivity, which affects the mechanisms of personal identification. Thus, a differentiated use of communication patterns is employed, which may be mediated by the omnipresence of social networks and their interaction norms (desirability in networks, obedience to influencers and superfluous trends, etc.), which influence interactive processes in couple relationships.

In addition to highly rewarding affective and sexual experiences in couple relationships that generate satisfaction, optimise communication styles and affective expression, and promote well-being and emotional strengthening, there are other experiences that are harmful. A number of antecedents contribute to the maintenance of such relationships, some of which are psychosocial in nature, such as gender roles and romantic attitudes, intimacy control mechanisms and processes of  control through social networks, among others.

This conceptualisation of romantic relationships (omnipotence, predestination, pairing, exclusivity, fidelity, durability, heretocentrism, etc.) is one of the main risk factors for maintaining relationships where emotional dependence may exist, and which can be associated with maladaptive relational patterns and distorted perceptions of the idealised partner. In such relationships, empathy (directly related to satisfaction) and conflict resolution are two major psychological elements.

Ultimately, human attachment relationships, in any of their forms of interaction, are necessary given our social nature and, specifically in the context of couple relationships, can generate emotional well-being and stable interdependence or constitute the basis of internal conflicts that lead to suffering, emotional dependence, self-deception and a whole range of associated psychopathologies, all of which will be the subject of study in this Special Issue.

Dr. María De La Villa Moral Jiménez
Dr. Carlos Sirvent
Guest Editors

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• couple relationships: satisfaction and emotional well-being
• attachment styles and myths in romantic relationships
• communication and conflicts in couple relationships: impacts of social networks
• affective dependence and power and control mechanisms
• dark personality tetrad and maladaptive couple relationships