Anthropology Marriage Practices Zajonc 1966 Moreland Beach 1992 Proximity study showed that higher number of exposures to a person increased the ratings of attraction Schuster Elderton 1906 Showed that a higher proportion in similarities resulted in higher attraction ratings couples agreed on politics and religion friends shared similar attitudes beliefs values and interests Reciprocity People like positive feedback attempts of flattery increase liking being liked leads to positive interpersonal behavior people prefer increasing affinity opposed to decreasing affinity couple s curse Kleinke 1990 Cunningham 1989 Observed likeability of people after using three different types of opening lines flippant innocuous direct Female Courtship Eibl Eibesfeldt 1989 Women s flirting behavior includes smile lift eyebrows in a fast jerky motion open their eyes wide lower their eyelids tilt heads down and to the side look away Moore 1985 1989 Found that female courtship behaviors consisted of nonverbal behavior which resulted in male attention 52 items identified Courtship more important than physical attraction for getting male interest Male Courtship Submissive displays Palms up shoulder shrug tilt head Dominance displays Entering personal space putting arm around shoulder swagger Resources displays Paying for food drink Wearing expensive clothes Bragging Love Phenylethylamine pea A neurotransmitter closely associated with intense passion and attraction Surging levels accompany the initial elation and intense excitement and euphoria of new love Chemically similar to amphetamines When we meet someone who is attractive to us the whistle blows at the PEA factory Dopamine Allied to pleasure reward and addiction Its release produces great pleasure telling us what we like Also similar to amphetamines MRI s of those passionately in love demonstrate that a picture of our beloved leads to heightened activity in parts of the frontal lobes saturated with dopamine receptors Hendrick Hendrick 1993 Had subjects write personal account or story of a romantic relationship Did a factor analysis on prevalence of different themes adjectives Found 6 love styles romantic partners tend to have similar love styles Morrow et al 1995 Triarchic Model of Love Three aspects of love Sternberg 1986 Intimacy Closeness two people feel psychologically how well partners understand each other Passion The amount of physical sexual attraction and romance Commitment The cognitive factors such as the decision to maintain the relationship Equity Theory Homans 1969 Messick Cook 1983 Economic model of love Rewards include love companionship consolation sexual gratification social acceptance Costs include work to maintain relationship conflict compromise sacrifice of other opportunities for relationships Your Benefits Your Contributions Partner s Benefits Partner s Contributions Comparison Level average expected outcome of the relationship Comparisons for alternatives expectation of what could be received in a different relationship Investment what must be put into a relationship that can not be recovered if the relationship ends What is marriage No definition of marriage is broad enough to apply easily to all societies and situations Establishes legal parentage of children Gives spouses rights Genitor the biological father of a child Pater the socially recognized father of a child Exogamy the practice of seeking a spouse outside one s own group Incest having sexual relations with a close relative Parallel cousins children of two brothers or two sisters Cross cousins children of either a brother or a sister depends on sex No universally accepted explanation for the fact that all cultures ban incest Cross cultural findings show incest and its avoidance shaped by kinship structures Focus on risks and avoidance of father daughter incest correlates with a patriarchal nuclear family structure Focus on avoiding brother sister incest in societies that have nonnuclear structures Instinctive Horror Theory Homo sapiens are genetically programmed to avoid incest This theory has been refuted Specific kin types included within the incest taboo have a cultural rather than biological basis Human marriage patterns are based on specific cultural beliefs rather than universal concerns about biological degeneration We consider cousin marriage incest but it is the norm in many cultures and they do not have terrible incidents of genetic problems Malinowski and Freud argued that the incest taboo originated to direct sexual feelings away from one s family to avoid disrupting the family structure and relations The opposite theory argues that people are less likely to be sexually attracted to those with whom they have grown up A more accepted argument is that the taboo originated to ensure exogamy Idea from L vi Strauss The Elementary Structures of Kinship Incest taboos force people to create and maintain wide social networks Incest taboos are seen as an adaptively advantageous cultural construct Endogamy the marriage of people from the same group Homogamy the practice of marrying someone similar to you in terms of background social status aspirations and interests India s caste system is extreme endogamy Although India s varna and U S races are historically distinct they share a castelike ideology of endogamy Manifest function the reason given for a custom by its natives Latent function the effects a custom has that are not explicitly recognized by the natives With European royalty the practice of endogamy was based on cousin marriage Royal endogamy also had a latent economic function If same sex marriages were legal the social construction of kinship could easily make both partners parents Maters socially recognized mothers Same sex marriages have been recognized in different historical and cultural settings Bridewealth a gift from the husband s kin to the wife s kin Dowry a marital exchange in which the wife s group provides substantial gifts to the husband s family Plural marriage being married to more than two spouses simultaneously polygamy Polygyny a man has more than one wife the more common form Polyandry a woman has more than one husband rare Sororate The husband may marry the wife s sister if the wife dies Levirate This is the right to marry the husband s brother if the husband dies Divorce tends to be more common in matrilineal than in patrilineal societies Cross culturally high divorce rates are correlated with a secure female economic position