Expanding your horizons: The role of disclosure of personal growth in shaping relationship quality — ASN Events
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  3. Expanding your horizons: The role of disclosure of personal growth in shaping relationship quality

Expanding your horizons: The role of disclosure of personal growth in shaping relationship quality (#75)

Cheryl Harasymchuk 1 , Atara Lonn 1 , Emily A. Impett 2 , Amy Muise 3
  1. Psychology, Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
  2. Psychology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
  3. Psychology, York University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Background

Happy relationships are important for people’s health and well-being; however, there are challenges to maintaining relationship satisfaction in established romantic relationships, such as passion decay and relational boredom. According to the self-expansion model (Aron et al., 2022), there are several ways to maintain passion in relationships including novel and exciting activities done with a partner (i.e., relational self-expansion) as well as personal growth from activities done without the partner (i.e., personal self-expansion from activities such as hobbies, work, and volunteering). Although the evidence for the benefits of novel and exciting activities done with a partner is clear, the evidence for the benefits of personal self-expansion for the relationship is limited and mixed. While personal self-expansion has been associated with benefits to the self (e.g., sense of competence, relationship quality), over time, it has been associated with decreases in relationship quality (Carswell et al., 2021).

Aims

Our goal was to examine how personal self-expansion might benefit relationships. Broadly, we predicted that personal self-expansion benefits relationships (i.e., increased relational self-expansion and quality) the more the personal experience is disclosed to the partner.

Method

We conducted a 21-day daily diary study with 150 couples (300 individuals). Participants completed online daily measures of self-expansion (personal and relational), disclosure of personal self-expansion, and relationship satisfaction.  

Results

A moderated-mediation analysis was assessed in Mplus using a three-level model (daily observations nested within partners and couples). Across the study period, actors who self-expanded more than others had partners who reported greater relationship satisfaction, which was mediated through the partner's relational self-expansion only if the actors disclosed their personal self-expansion experiences to their partners.

Conclusion

 Although personal self-expansion has the potential to take time and energy away from the relationship, if people talk to their partners about their personal self-expansion experiences, it could help the partners internalize the experiences as their own (i.e., vicarious self-expansion) and increase relationship quality of both partners

  1. Aron, A., Lewandowski, G., Branand, B., Mashek, D., & Aron, E. (2022). Self-expansion motivation and inclusion of others in self: An updated review. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 02654075221110630.
  2. Carswell, K. L., Muise, A., Harasymchuk, C., Horne, R. M., Visserman, M. L., & Impett, E. A. (2021). Growing desire or growing apart? Consequences of personal self-expansion for romantic passion. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 121(2), 354-377.
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