Close Relationships and Dyads Workshop

Workshop description

The formation and maintenance of close relationships with friends, romantic partners and family members is vital to the health and resilience of individuals and families as well as to the functioning of society. Moreover, social psychology is fundamentally about relationships and interactions between people, yet its methods have often focused on the individual. Contemporary methods allow for more in-depth study of social psychological processes within dyads and relationship partners.

This workshop will consider how social psychology has approached interpersonal relationships (e.g., through friendship, attraction, close romantic bonds, and families). It will discuss how individual (e.g., goals, self, personality traits) and social factors (e.g., groups, culture) impact those relationships and how those relationships in turn impact the individual and society. The workshop will also discuss how core social psychological principles can be studied in dyadic contexts. Thus, students will have the opportunity to develop research projects that focus on close relationships or that apply previously individually-focused ideas to dyads.

 As methods of studying interactions and dyads often involve observational and real-time methods, students will have an opportunity for training and pilot-testing with Surrey’s new observational laboratory. Students will also be able to learn how to tackle the statistical challenges that dyadic data present. This workshop will thus broaden students’ theoretical understanding as well as methodological skills, enabling them to use contemporary and innovative methods in their summer school research proposals and future work.