Overt expressions of affection in male-male interaction van Morman en Floyd (1998) - Article

Summary with the article: Overt expressions of affection in male-male interaction van Morman en Floyd (1998)

Background on expressions of affection in male-male interaction

All human beings have the need to share affection. Some researchers see affection as one of the six fundamental human needs. Affection plays a big part in therapeutic interventions and developmental psychological processes. Although affection is important, it also has certain risks. One of those risks is that people might interpret affection as something else. This risk may be bigger in male-male relationships. In our culture, men ‘should’ not show overt expression of affection. This was not always the case. In the 19th century young men developed romantic relationships with each other. We would probably see these relationships as homosexual, but they were not. Men wrote love letters to each other, slept in the same bed and held each other. This was widely accepted in that time.

Nowadays men don’t show a lot of affection towards each other. Research shows that when men hug, they show distress. These men noted that they worried that if they showed more affection towards their male friends, they might get the wrong impression. Both men and women find that the display of affection is more appropriate when at least one woman is involved. The study in this paper tests the effect of three variables on men’s expectancies for appropriate over affection in male-male relations. The first one is the type of relation, the second one is the emotion intensity of the context and the third one is the privacy level of the context.

Research has shown that men in male-male relationships are less affectionate than in male-women relationships. Also, they showed less affection than women in female-female relations. Women express themselves more and show overall more affection than men do. One can ask the question when is it appropriate for men to show overt affection? Research shows that men who are related are ‘more allowed’ to show overt affection than men who are not related. After all, people would expect a sexual relationship between family members less than between non-family members. Research also shows that in emotionally charged situations it is more allowed for men to show overt affection. These situations can be a wedding or a funeral. Acceptance of overt affection may also depend on the context. Is the affection displayed in private or in public? Non-romantic affection may be more accepted by men if it is shown in public. If they get a hug in public, they know that the other person knows that everybody is watching. But if they get a hug in private, they might think that there’s something more behind it.

In this study these hypotheses were tested:

1. Affection is more appropriate among brothers than among friends. This is a relationship type effect

2. Affection is considered more appropriate in emotionally charged contexts than in emotionally neutral contexts. This is the emotional intensity effect.

3. Affection is considered more appropriate in public contexts than in private contexts. This is the privacy level effect.

4. Emotional intensity and privacy level interact and that the difference between emotionally charged and neutral contexts is greater in private than in public settings.

The experiment

For this study 140 males between the age 17 to 42 were used. Half of them had to report on a male friend and half of them on a brother. The men that had to report on a close friend had to think of someone who wasn’t a relative and the men that had to report on a brother had to report on a full brother who wasn’t their twin. There were 2 x 3 x 2 conditions. The first was the brother or friend condition. The second was the negative, neutral or positive emotional valance condition. The last was the public vs. private condition. The subjects got a paper where the situations was described on and they were asked to note which form of expression they would find appropriate or inappropriate in this situation. The men in the emotionally negative conditions were asked to imagine that they were at a funeral for someone close to the friend or brother (this was the public condition) or that they were at the friend or brother’s house when he was informed that somebody has just died (this is the private condition). The men in the emotionally neutral condition were asked to imagine that they were attending class (public condition) or studying at the friend’s or brother’s home together. The men in the emotionally positive condition were asked to imagine that they were at the friend’s or brother’s wedding (public) or at the friend’s or brother’s home when the participant was just informed of the friend/brother’s wedding (private).

Results

As hypothesized affection between men was considered to be more appropriate among brothers than among male friends, in emotionally charged situations than emotionally neutral situations and public contexts than in private contexts. As told before, the culture doesn’t expect for brothers to have a sexual relationship and because of that brothers are less hesitant to show affection towards each other than towards other male friends. The reason people find it more appropriate to show affection in emotionally charged situations is because they can ascribe the affection to the demand characteristics of the situation. There was also an interaction between emotional intensity and privacy. The level of emotional intensity had a greater effect on expectancies for private contexts.