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Rusbult's Investment model 16 mark essay (Psychology - AQA )
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Example essay for relationships - 16/16 mark given. Psychology - AQA .
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Describe and evaluate Rusbult’s investment model of romantc relatonssips [16]Rusbult proposed an investment model, a development of Social Exchange Theory aiming to address
its limitations. The investment model emphasises that commitment is highly important in
relationships. He suggested that commitment depends on three factors satisfaction, comparison
with alternative and investment size. Satisfaction and comparison with alternatives are similar
elements found in Social Exchange Theory.
High levels of satisfaction, less atractive alternatives and increasing investment confdently predict
that partners are commited.
A strength of Rusbult’s investment model it that there is supporting evidence. This comes from a
meta-analysis by Le and Agnew (2003) who reviewed 52 studies, involving 11,000 participants from 5
different countries. They found that satisfaction, CLalt and investment size all predicted the level of
relationship commitment. Those with greater commitment had the most stable and longer lasting
relationships. This supports Rusbult’s claims as it shows that the three factors of commitment he
proposed in his investment model lead to greater relationship success and allowed prediction of
commitment. The evidence is signifcantly supportive as it found the same outcomes in men and
women, heterosexual and homosexual relationships and across all the cultures in the analysis.
Therefore, increasing the validity that Rusbult’s investment model shows universally important
factors of romantic relationships. However, the results are merely a correlationn it does not allow us
to say the factors cause commitment in romantic relationships it is not causal evidence. It may be
that the more commited we are to someone, the more we invest the direction of causality is
unknown. This shows that we may not be able to reliably predict whether a couple will stay
together or breakdown.
Satisfaction is based on the concept of our comparison level in which we compare rewards and
costs, fnding proft to give satisfaction especially when the individual gets more out of the
relationship than they expect.
Our comparison with alternatives involves the age old question of Can I do beterr’, a person is not
satisfed if they can fnd higher levels of satisfaction in another relationship or no relationship at all.
Investment is the importance of resources associated with the relationship anything we can lose if
the relationship ends. There are two types of investments intrinsic and extrinsic. Intrinsic
investments are resources we put directly into the relationships such as money (tangible) and
energy/emotion (intangibles). Extrinsic investments are features now closely associated with the
relationships such as possessions bought together, memories or children.
A limitation of the investment model is that it oversimplifes investment, ignoring its complexity.
Goodfriend and Agnew extended Rusbult’s model so that investment model should include a feature
of future investment. This includes future plans such as marriage and children. This gives the
partners motivation to commit to each other because they wish to see these plans work out. This
shows that the original model proposed by Rusbult is limited in its explanation as it does not
recognise that future planning can infuence levels of commitment. Therefore, this development of
the model shows that there is more to investment than what has been put in showing that even in
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