Romantic Involvement and Social Network Involvement

The role of social networks has been largely overlooked in research on dyadic involvement. Hypotheses linking network involvement and romantic involvement were developed from an analysis of the interpersonal processes underlying structural transitivity. Data were gathered on 193 premarital romantic relationships. Results showed that romantic involvement was positively associated with perceived support from the subject's own network of family and friends, perceived support from the partner's network, attraction to the partner's network, communication with the partner's network, and the number of people met in the partner's network. Further analysis indicated that the network factors were tightly interrelated. Differences in support received from various network sectors were small, but significant. The Romeo and Juliet effect only occurred in one sector of,the network and then for only some levels of some variables. The predominant relationship between social support and romantic involvement was positive and linear.