John G Holmes
Biographic Data
| ID | 106452 |
|---|---|
| NAME | John G Holmes |
| GIVEN NAMES | John G |
| FAMILY NAME | Holmes |
| SIGNATURE | HOLMES J G |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Waterloo |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 76 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 1486 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 76 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1966 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2021 |
| H-INDEX | 18 |
Singlehood and Attunement of Self-Esteem to Friendships
Romantic relationships activate a process of psychological attunement whereby self-esteem becomes responsive to the romantic bond, thereby potentially benefitting relationship quality and bolstering self-esteem. Yet some people are romantically single, raising the question: Do single people also exhibit psychological attunement? In a 2-year longitudinal study of young adults ( N = 279), we test whether singles psychologically attune to their frie…
Our adventures make me feel secure: Novel activities boost relationship satisfaction through felt security
Dispositional pathways to trust: Self-esteem and agreeableness interact to predict trust and negative emotional disclosure
Expressing our innermost thoughts and feelings is critical to the development of intimacy (Reis & Shaver, 1988), but also risks negative evaluation and rejection. Past research suggests that people with high self-esteem are more expressive and self-disclosing because they trust that others care for them and will not reject them (Gaucher et al., 2012). However, feeling good about oneself may not always be enough; disclosure may also depend on how …
Who can't take a compliment? The role of construal level and self-esteem in accepting positive feedback from close others
Inhibiting Self-Protection in Romantic Relationships: Automatic Partner Attitudes as a Resource for Low Self-Esteem People
A daily diary study of married couples tested the hypothesis that automatic partner attitudes regulate self-protection for low, but not high, self-esteem people. For 14 days both partners reported trust in the other’s caring and perceived and actual rejecting and selfish behavior. On days after low self-esteem people reported less trust in their partner’s caring, those with more positive automatic partner attitudes perceived their partner to be l…
The equilibrium model of relationship maintenance
A new equilibrium model of relationship maintenance is proposed. People can protect relationship bonds by practicing 3 threat-mitigation rules: Trying to accommodate when a partner is hurtful, ensuring mutual dependence, and resisting devaluing a partner who impedes one's personal goals. A longitudinal study of newlyweds revealed evidence for the equilibrium model, such that relationship well-being (as indexed by satisfaction and commitment) decl…
Framing memories of relationship transgressions: How visual imagery perspective activates relational knowledge
How people interpret the meaning of minor relationship transgressions can impact broader relationship well-being. It is proposed that picturing relationship transgressions from a third-person (vs. first-person) visual perspective prompts people to think of them in the context of their chronic relationship beliefs and goals. In doing so, individuals who are relatively anxious about their relationships become more insecure, whereas less anxious ind…
A Relationship With God? Connecting with the Divine to Assuage Fears of Interpersonal Rejection
We examine the possibility that people can leverage their “relationship” with God as a stand-in for interpersonal relationships. More specifically, we hypothesize that people will seek closeness with the divine when facing the threat of interpersonal rejection and that conversely, they will seek interpersonal closeness when facing the threat of divine rejection. We test this idea across four studies. Along the way, we test additional predictions …
A little acceptance is good for your health: Interpersonal messages and weight change over time
This research examines whether acceptance messages from close others about one's weight predict changes in stressful weight concern and body mass index (BMI) over time. Participants reported weight concern and BMI in three waves of data collection spanning approximately 9 months, and reported the messages they received from parents, friends, and romantic partners concerning their weight in the second wave of data collection. Participants normativ…
Discount and disengage: How chronic negative expressivity undermines partner responsiveness to negative disclosures
Partner responsiveness-the degree to which partners respond with caring, understanding, and validation to one another's disclosures (Reis, Clark, & Holmes, 2004; Reis & Shaver, 1988)--has been heralded as a "core, defining construct" in relationship science (Reis, 2007, p. 28). Yet little is known about the determinants of responsiveness in ongoing relationships. The present research elucidates one such set of processes, focusing in particular on…
You can’t always give what you want: The challenge of providing social support to low self-esteem individuals
It can be challenging for support providers to facilitate effective social support interactions even when they have the best intentions. In the current article, we examine some reasons for this difficulty, with a focus on support recipients' self-esteem as a crucial variable. We predicted that recipients' receptiveness to support would be influenced by both support strategy and recipient self-esteem and that receptiveness in turn would impact pro…
The costs of being put on a pedestal: Effects of feeling over-idealized
This research explored the possibility of feeling over-idealized, or "put on a pedestal" by a partner, examining whether there is an optimal level of perceived idealization, such that too little or too much is detrimental. Perceived over-idealization was manipulated experimentally with 99 dating couples (Study 1), and in surveys of 89 married (Study 2) and 156 dating couples (Study 3). Study 1 found that participants physically distanced themselv…
Perceiving low self‐esteem in close others impedes capitalization and undermines the relationship
Disclosing positive experiences to others (i.e., “capitalization”) is associated with personal and interpersonal benefits (Gable & Reis, 2010). Unfortunately, people who perceive low self‐esteem ( LSE ) in close others are reluctant to capitalize, holding back from those they expect will be unsupportive (MacGregor & Holmes, 2011). In Study 1, we extend previous findings by demonstrating the importance of the type of experience disclosed; particip…
The dynamics of relationship promotion: Controlling the automatic inclination to trust
A dynamic model of how trust regulates relationship promotion is proposed. The model assumes that trust has both impulsive (i.e., automatic attitude toward the partner) and reflective (i.e., beliefs about the partner's caring) forms. Because overriding evaluative impulses requires self-regulatory resources, the model further posits that self-regulatory capacity controls whether people strengthen relationship connections in the face of threats to …
Sex, “Lies,” and Videotape: Self-Esteem and Successful Presentation of Gender Roles
When presenting themselves to others, people attempt to create the impression that they possess socially desired traits. Verbally claiming to possess such traits is relatively simple, but making good on one’s promises by actually behaving in kind is more challenging. In particular, lower self-esteem individuals’ relational insecurity may undermine their ability to present themselves in a socially desired manner. The present research used a behavi…
Cautious to a fault: Self-protection and the trajectory of marital satisfaction
Managing motivational conflict: How self-esteem and executive resources influence self-regulatory responses to risk
This article explores how self-esteem and executive resources interact to determine responses to motivational conflict. One correlational and 3 experimental studies investigated the hypothesis that high and low self-esteem people undertake different self-regulatory strategies in "risky" situations that afford opportunity to pursue competing goals and that carrying out these strategies requires executive resources. When such resources are availabl…
Rain on My Parade: Perceiving Low Self-Esteem in Close Others Hinders Positive Self-Disclosure
Ample evidence suggests that the behavior of people with low self-esteem (LSEs) can lead to problems in close relationships. To the authors' knowledge, however, no research has investigated the role that perceptions of close others' self-esteem play in undermining beneficial relational processes. In this article, the authors propose that capitalization, a process associated with greater relationship quality, might be hindered by the friends, part…
System justification and the defense of committed relationship ideology
A consequential ideology in Western society is the uncontested belief that a committed relationship is the most important adult relationship and that almost all people want to marry or seriously couple (DePaulo & Morris, 2005). In the present article, we investigated the extent to which the system justification motive may contribute to the adoption of this ideology. In Studies 1 and 2, we examined whether a heightened motive to maintain the statu…
Signaling when (and when not) to be cautious and self-protective: Impulsive and reflective trust in close relationships
A dual process model is proposed to explain how automatic evaluative associations to the partner (i.e., impulsive trust) and deliberative expectations of partner caring (i.e., reflective trust) interact to govern self-protection in romantic relationships. Experimental and correlational studies of dating and marital relationships supported the model. Subliminally conditioning more positive evaluative associations to the partner increased confidenc…
Cascading Metaperceptions: Signal Amplification Bias as a Consequence of Reflected Self-esteem
People expect intimate partners to understand their personality, including feelings of self-worth. These general assumptions about transparency may influence situation-specific estimates of how others view the self (i.e., metaperceptions). In contexts that elicit evaluative concerns, lower self-esteem individuals, who think their chronic self-doubts are obvious to partners, should believe that their partners will infer they are anxious, whether t…
Being Interdependent: The Legacy of Caryl Rusbult
The regulatory function of self-esteem: Testing the epistemic and acceptance signaling systems
The authors draw on sociometer theory (e.g., Leary, 2004) and self-verification theory (e.g., Swann, 1997) to propose an expanded model of the regulatory function of self-esteem. The model suggests that people not only possess an acceptance signaling system that indicates whether relational value is high or low but also possess an epistemic signaling system that indicates whether social feedback is consistent or inconsistent with chronic perceive…
A smart unconscious? Procedural origins of automatic partner attitudes in marriage
Fostering relationship resilience: An intervention for low self-esteem individuals
The benefits of positive illusions: Idealization and the construction of satisfaction in close relationships
It is proposed that satisfaction is associated with idealistic, rather than realistic, perceptions of one's partner. To provide baselines for assessing relationship illusions, both members of married and dat-ing heterosexual couples were asked to rate themselves and their partners on a variety of interper-sonal attributes. Participants also rated the typical and ideal partner on these attributes. Path analy-ses revealed that individuals ' impress…
Trust in close relationships
A theoretical model describing interpersonal trust in close relationships is presented. Three dimensions of trust are identified, based on the type of attributions drawn about a partner's motives. These dimensions are also characterized by a developmental progression in the relationship. The validity of this theoretical perspective was examined through evidence obtained from a survey of a heterogeneous sample of established couples. An analysis o…
The self-fulfilling nature of positive illusions in romantic relationships: Love is not blind, but prescient
It is proposed that satisfying, stable relationships reflect intimates ' ability to see imperfect partners in idealized ways. In this study of the long-term benefits (or possible costs) of positive illusions, both members of dating couples completed measures of idealization and well-being 3 times in a year. Path analyses revealed that idealization had a variety of self-fulfilling effects. Relationships were most likely to persist--even in the fac…
Optimizing assurance: The risk regulation system in relationships
A model of risk regulation is proposed to explain how people balance the goal of seeking closeness to a romantic partner against the opposing goal of minimizing the likelihood and pain of rejection. The central premise is that confidence in a partner's positive regard and caring allows people to risk seeking dependence and connectedness. The risk regulation system consists of 3 interconnected "if--then" contingency rules, 1 cognitive, 1 affective…
Self-esteem and the quest for felt security: How perceived regard regulates attachment processes
The authors proposed that personal feelings of self-esteem foster the level of confidence in a partner's regard critical for satisfying attachments. Dating and married couples described themselves, their partners, how they thought their partners saw them, and how they wanted their partners to see them on a variety of interpersonal qualities. The results revealed that low self-esteem individuals dramatically underestimated how positively their par…
Compensatory conviction in the face of personal uncertainty: Going to extremes and being oneself
Study 1 participants' self-integrity (C. M. Steele. 1988) was threatened by deliberative mind-set (S. E. Taylor & P. M. Gollwitzer, 1995) induced uncertainty. They masked the uncertainty with more extreme conviction about social issues. An integrity-repair exercise after the threat, however, eliminated uncertainty and the conviction response. In Study 2, the same threat caused clarified values and more self-consistent personal goals. Two other un…
Kindred spirits? The benefits of egocentrism in close relationships
The authors argue that people are happiest in their relationships when they believe they have found a kindred spirit, someone who understands them and shares their experiences. As reality may not always be that accommodating, however, intimates may find this sense of confidence by egocentrically assuming that their partners are mirrors of themselves. Both members of dating and married couples completed measures of satisfaction and felt understand…
Through the looking glass darkly? When self-doubts turn into relationship insecurities
When rejection stings: How self-esteem constrains relationship-enhancement processes
Three experiments examined how needs for acceptance might constrain low versus high self-esteem people's capacity to protect their relationships in the face of difficulties. The authors led participants to believe that their partner perceived a problem in their relationship. They then measured perceptions of the partner's acceptance, partner enhancement, and closeness. Low but not high self-esteem participants read too much into problems, seeing …
Seeing virtues in faults: Negativity and the transformation of interpersonal narratives in close relationships
It is proposed that individuals develop story-like representations of their romantic partners that quell feelings of doubt engendered by their partners' faults. In Study 1, dating individuals were induced to depict their partners as rarely initiating disagreements over joint interests. Such conflict avoidance was then turned into a fault. In scaled questionnaires and open-ended narratives, low-conflict individuals then constructed images of confl…
Balancing connectedness and self-protection goals in close relationships: A levels-of-processing perspective on risk regulation
A model of risk regulation is proposed to explain how low and high self-esteem people balance the tension between self-protection and connectedness goals in romantic relationships. This model assumes that interpersonal risk automatically activates connectedness and self-protection goals. The activation of these competing goals then triggers an executive control system that resolves this goal conflict. One correlational study and 8 experiments man…
Salient private audiences and awareness of the self
University of Waterloo , Ontario CanadaWe used self-awareness and cognitive priming methodologies to test the hypothesis that importantaspects of the experience of self derive from the way one would be perceived and responded to by aprivate audience of internally represented significant others. In the first study, 40 undergraduatewomen visualized the faces of either two acquaintances from campus or two older members of theirown family. Later, whe…
What the Motivated Mind Sees: Comparing Friends' Perspectives to Married Partners' Views of Each Other
The (mental) ties that bind: Cognitive structures that predict relationship resilience
It is proposed that the cognitive structures that help sustain relationships depend on individuals embellishing the significance of virtues and minimizing the significance of faults within hierarchical, integrated representations of their partners. As a means of measuring representation structure, dating individuals were asked to write narratives describing their relationships and their partners' greatest faults and to complete card-sort descript…
Committing Altruism under the Cloak of Self-Interest: The Exchange Fiction
How storytelling shapes memory and impressions of relationship events over time
In 4 longitudinal studies, the authors explicated how storytelling about relationships biases subsequent impressions in the direction of the story told. In Study 1, storytelling about a relationship conflict vignette biased impressions of blame 2 weeks later, even with memory bias neutralized. Study 2 tracked 2 distinct and variable influences on blame,—storyt elling heuristic and memory mediated mechanisms—over a 40-week period. Heuristic but no…
The cost of lower self-esteem: Testing a self- and social-bonds model of health
The authors draw upon social, personality, and health psychology to propose and test a self-and-social-bonds model of health. The model contends that lower self-esteem predicts health problems and that poor-quality social bonds explain this association. In Study 1, lower self-esteem prospectively predicted reports of health problems 2 months later, and this association was explained by subjective reports of poor social bonds. Study 2 replicated t…
More than words: Reframing compliments from romantic partners fosters security in low self-esteem individuals
Although people with low self-esteem (LSEs) doubt their value to their romantic partners, they tend to resist positive feedback from their partners. This resistance undermines their relationships and has been difficult to overcome in past research. The authors investigated whether LSEs could be induced to take their partners' kind words to heart by manipulating how abstractly they described a recent compliment. In 3 studies, LSEs felt more positi…
Testing sociometer theory: Self-esteem and the importance of acceptance for social decision-making
Uncertainty orientation and trust in close relationships: Individual differences in cognitive styles
Because coping with uncertainty is an important aspect of close relationships and is critical to issues of trust, the authors expected individual differences in uncertainty orientation to play a central role in shaping people's representations of their relationships. For a 3-week period, 77 couples completed a series or questionnaires and kept diaries on their interactions. As expected, certainty-oriented persons'need for cognitive closure result…
Putting the Partner Within Reach: A Dyadic Perspective on Felt Security in Close Relationships
The authors argue that felt insecurity in a partner's positive regard and caring stems from a specifically dyadic perception--the perception that a partner is out of one's league. A cross-sectional sample of dating couples revealed that people with low self-esteem feel inferior to their partner and that such feelings of relative inferiority undermine felt security in the partner's regard. Three experiments examined the consequences of reducing su…
Trust and communicated attributions in close relationships
The attributional statements intimate partners communicate to one another were examined as a function of trust. In discussions by 35 married couples, 850 attributions and corresponding events were coded on dimensions of valence, globality, and locus. Results of regression and contingency analyses indicate that attributional statements expressed in high-trust relationships emphasized positive aspects of the relationship. Medium-trust couples activ…
Signaling when (and when not) to be cautious and self-protective: Impulsive and reflective trust in close relationships
A dual process model is proposed to explain how automatic evaluative associations to the partner (i.e., impulsive trust) and deliberative expectations of partner caring (i.e., reflective trust) interact to govern self-protection in romantic relationships. Experimental and correlational studies of dating and marital relationships supported the model. Subliminally conditioning more positive evaluative associations to the partner increased confidenc…
System justification and the defense of committed relationship ideology
A consequential ideology in Western society is the uncontested belief that a committed relationship is the most important adult relationship and that almost all people want to marry or seriously couple (DePaulo & Morris, 2005). In the present article, we investigated the extent to which the system justification motive may contribute to the adoption of this ideology. In Studies 1 and 2, we examined whether a heightened motive to maintain the statu…
Marital locus of control and marital problem solving
The Anglo‐Canadian neurosis: A mood of exasperation
The effects of prenegotiation expectations on the distributive bargaining process
Functions of a third party in the resolution of conflict: The role of a judge in pretrial conferences
The role of situational restrictiveness on self-fulfilling prophecies: A theoretical and empirical extension of Kelley and Stahelski's triangle hypothesis
The Integration of Implicit Personality Theory Schemas and Stereotype Images
Subjects were asked to form an impression of either an Irish or a Chinese stimulus person described by two traits. These traits were either part of the stereotype image of the stimulus person's ethnic group, or were unrelated to this image. Results showed that the Irish stereotype traits were used to characterize the Irish stimulus persons and Chinese stereotype traits were used to characterize the Chinese stimulus person, whatever their trait de…
The Influence of Stereotypes in Impression Formation: A Reply to Locksley, Hepburn, and Ortiz
This paper discusses the evidence that led us to conclude that stereotypes play an important role in social perception (Grant and Holmes, 1981:114). We show that despite the criticisms of Locksley, Hepburn, and Ortiz (1982) this conclusion is completely justified. Specifically, Locksley and her colleagues are incorrect when they argue that our experimental design was inadequate, and the reanalysis reported by those authors misses a fundamental di…
Focus of attention and self-evaluation in social interaction
Trust in close relationships
A theoretical model describing interpersonal trust in close relationships is presented. Three dimensions of trust are identified, based on the type of attributions drawn about a partner's motives. These dimensions are also characterized by a developmental progression in the relationship. The validity of this theoretical perspective was examined through evidence obtained from a survey of a heterogeneous sample of established couples. An analysis o…
Marital locus of control and marital problem solving
Salient private audiences and awareness of the self
University of Waterloo , Ontario CanadaWe used self-awareness and cognitive priming methodologies to test the hypothesis that importantaspects of the experience of self derive from the way one would be perceived and responded to by aprivate audience of internally represented significant others. In the first study, 40 undergraduatewomen visualized the faces of either two acquaintances from campus or two older members of theirown family. Later, whe…
Observational goals and the integration of trait perceptions and behavior: Behavioral prediction versus impression formation
Seeing virtues in faults: Negativity and the transformation of interpersonal narratives in close relationships
It is proposed that individuals develop story-like representations of their romantic partners that quell feelings of doubt engendered by their partners' faults. In Study 1, dating individuals were induced to depict their partners as rarely initiating disagreements over joint interests. Such conflict avoidance was then turned into a fault. In scaled questionnaires and open-ended narratives, low-conflict individuals then constructed images of confl…
Uncertainty orientation and trust in close relationships: Individual differences in cognitive styles
Because coping with uncertainty is an important aspect of close relationships and is critical to issues of trust, the authors expected individual differences in uncertainty orientation to play a central role in shaping people's representations of their relationships. For a 3-week period, 77 couples completed a series or questionnaires and kept diaries on their interactions. As expected, certainty-oriented persons'need for cognitive closure result…
The benefits of positive illusions: Idealization and the construction of satisfaction in close relationships
It is proposed that satisfaction is associated with idealistic, rather than realistic, perceptions of one's partner. To provide baselines for assessing relationship illusions, both members of married and dat-ing heterosexual couples were asked to rate themselves and their partners on a variety of interper-sonal attributes. Participants also rated the typical and ideal partner on these attributes. Path analy-ses revealed that individuals ' impress…
The self-fulfilling nature of positive illusions in romantic relationships: Love is not blind, but prescient
It is proposed that satisfying, stable relationships reflect intimates ' ability to see imperfect partners in idealized ways. In this study of the long-term benefits (or possible costs) of positive illusions, both members of dating couples completed measures of idealization and well-being 3 times in a year. Path analyses revealed that idealization had a variety of self-fulfilling effects. Relationships were most likely to persist--even in the fac…
A Leap of Faith? Positive Illusions in Romantic Relationships
It is proposed that satisfying, stable relationships reflect intimates' ability to see imperfect relationships in somewhat idealized ways-to make a leap of faith. Both members of dating and married couples completed a measure of relationship illusions, tapping idealized perceptions of the partners' attributes, exaggerated perceptions of control, and unrealistic optimism. Results of concurrent analyses revealed that relationship illusions predicte…
The meaning of social interactions in the transition from acquaintanceship to friendship
The transition from acquaintanceship (nonunit) to friendship (unit) was conceptualized in terms of a preunit relationship. The authors theorized that in transitional relationships, discrete interactions are imbued with surplus meaning. Using a mental simulation procedure in 3 studies, participants randomly assigned to focus their attention on an exemplar from their social worlds representing unit, preunit, or nonunit same-sex relationships respon…
Through the looking glass darkly? When self-doubts turn into relationship insecurities
Interpersonal risk and the evaluation of transgressions in close relationships
An experiment examined individuals’willingness to excuse a romantic partner of blame for a transgression when perceptions that a relationship is risky are salient. Participants evaluated an actual transgression on measures tapping three levels of appraisal: (a) initial impressions of the act (i.e., severity of the transgression), (b) considerations of the context in which it occurred (i.e., judgments about excuses and extenuating context), and (c…
How storytelling shapes memory and impressions of relationship events over time
In 4 longitudinal studies, the authors explicated how storytelling about relationships biases subsequent impressions in the direction of the story told. In Study 1, storytelling about a relationship conflict vignette biased impressions of blame 2 weeks later, even with memory bias neutralized. Study 2 tracked 2 distinct and variable influences on blame,—storyt elling heuristic and memory mediated mechanisms—over a 40-week period. Heuristic but no…
The (mental) ties that bind: Cognitive structures that predict relationship resilience
It is proposed that the cognitive structures that help sustain relationships depend on individuals embellishing the significance of virtues and minimizing the significance of faults within hierarchical, integrated representations of their partners. As a means of measuring representation structure, dating individuals were asked to write narratives describing their relationships and their partners' greatest faults and to complete card-sort descript…
Don't interrupt! A good rule for marriage
In a study investigating the relationship between conversational interrupting and marital satisfaction, 78 couples were videotaped while discussing a conflictual issue. Coders counted total interruptions and also categorized each interruption by its function: agreement, disagreement, clarification, or tangentialization. Agreement interruptions were positively correlated, and disagreement interruptions negatively correlated, with both the couple's…
Social relationships: The nature and function of relational schemas
This paper reviews developments in the field of close relationships from an interdependence theory perspective. It concludes that focusing on the relational, dyadic aspects of relationships has led to a much better understanding of social cognition and of interpersonal processes. In this vein, the nature and function of relational schemas seems a particularly promising new direction for research. It encompasses recent work on self-in-relation-to-…
What the Motivated Mind Sees: Comparing Friends' Perspectives to Married Partners' Views of Each Other
An Experimental Test of the Role of Alcohol in Relationship Conflict
Psychology (76 works) · Social Psychology (74 works) · Attachment and Relationship Dynamics (52 works) · Social Psychology (35 works) · Developmental psychology (33 works) · Social and Intergroup Psychology (25 works) · Death Anxiety and Social Exclusion (22 works) · Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior (21 works) · Perception (21 works) · Behavioral Health and Interventions (19 works)