Advanced Search

Journal Navigation

Journal Home

Subscriptions

Archive

Contact Us

Table of Contents

Click here to submit your manuscript to SPPS

CiteULike is a free service for managing and discovering scholarly references - click here to get started.

Sign In to gain access to subscriptions and/or personal tools.
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin
This Article
Right arrow Full Text (PDF)
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
0146167209337543v1
35/9/1220    most recent
Right arrow References
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Right arrow Citation Map
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to Saved Citations
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Right arrow Request Reprints
Right arrow Add to My Marked Citations
Citing Articles
Right arrow Citing Articles via Scopus
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by VanderDrift, L. E.
Right arrow Articles by Wilson, J. E.
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by VanderDrift, L. E.
Right arrow Articles by Wilson, J. E.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Complore   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us   Add to Digg   Add to Reddit   Add to Technorati   Add to Twitter  
What's this?

Nonmarital Romantic Relationship Commitment and Leave Behavior: The Mediating Role of Dissolution Consideration

Laura E. VanderDrift

Purdue University, laura{at}psych.purdue.edu

Christopher R. Agnew

Purdue University, agnew{at}purdue.edu

Juan E. Wilson

Universidad de Chile

Two studies investigated the process by which individuals in nonmarital romantic relationships characterized by low commitment move toward enacting leave behaviors. Predictions based on the behavioral, goal, and implementation intention literatures were tested using a measure of dissolution consideration developed for this research. Dissolution consideration assesses how salient relationship termination is for an individual while one's relationship is intact. Study 1 developed and validated a measure of dissolution consideration and Study 2 was a longitudinal test of the utility of dissolution consideration in predicting the enactment of leave behaviors. Results indicated that dissolution consideration mediates the association between commitment and enacting leave behaviors, is associated with taking more immediate action, and provides unique explanatory power in leave behavior beyond the effect of commitment alone. Collectively, the findings suggest that dissolution consideration is an intermediate step between commitment and stay/leave behavior in close relationships.

Key Words: commitment • dissolution • dissolution consideration • nonmarital romantic relationships

This version was published on September 1, 2009

Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 35, No. 9, 1220-1232 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/0146167209337543
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to Technorati Technorati   Add to Twitter Twitter    What's this?