456 Close Relationships
relationships (e.g., romantic relationships, marriages, or
parent-child relationships).
On the other hand, sometimes there are considerable bar-
riers to leaving a close relationship. Investments may be high,
alternatives may not seem attractive, and there may be strong
social and personal pressures working against a person’s
leaving the relationship. We suspect that when such barriers
are high, people whose needs have been seriously neglected
will stay in the relationship but switch from adherence to a
communal norm to adherence to a contingent record-keeping
norm such as equity, equality, or exchange. This may happen
in many marriages in which investments that cannot be
recouped have been made (e.g., children, a joint house, finan-
cial success, joint friends), alternatives seem poor (being
poorer, living alone, leaving the house), and strong prescrip-
tions against leaving exist (one’s church or parents would dis-
approve). In such circumstances, the best option may seem to
be to continue relationship but to switch the basis on which
benefits are given in such a way that one feels more certain
that one’s needs will be met. This may seem most workable
even if one has to sacrifice a sense of being nurtured and of
nurturing.
Individual Differences Matter
We believe that it is the situation that triggers people to
switch from communal to contingent, record-keeping distrib-
utive justice norms, but we also believe that personality mat-
ters. People differ from one another in terms of their chronic
tendencies to believe that others will be responsive to their
needs and that they are worthy of such responsiveness. This
has been a major theme in recent relationship literature. It is
especially evident in the attachment theory and the empirical
work that has been based on that theory. Secure individuals
are assumed to view close others as likely to respond to their
needs on a consistent basis, and they feel comfortable de-
pending on others for support. Insecure people do not. How-
ever, attachment theorists are not the only ones who have
emphasized differences in how people tend to view their part-
ners. Others have talked about people differing in their
chronic tendencies to trust other people in close relationships
without necessarily referring to attachment theory (Holmes &
Rempel, 1989), or about how chronic levels of self-esteem
may relate to views of, and reactions to, close partners
(Murray, Holmes, MacDonald, & Ellsworth, 1998). For our
own part, we have discussed chronic individual differences in
communal orientation, which refers to the tendency to re-
spond to the needs of others and to expect others to respond
to one’s own needs on a noncontingent basis (Clark et al.,
1987).
We suspect that these chronic individual differences that
people bring to their close relationships will be important
determinants of switching from communal to exchange
norms in the face of evidence that one’s partner is neglecting
one’s needs. We suspect that almost everyone (regardless of
attachment style, trust, self-esteem, or communal orientation)
understands communal norms as we have discussed them.
Moreover, we would assert that almost everyone believes that
communal norms are ideal for friendships, romantic relation-
ships, and marriages and that people start off such relation-
ships following such norms. Indeed, it is by following such
norms in the first place that people signal to potential partners
that they want a friendship or romantic relationship with an-
other person.
However, we also suspect that people who are insecure,
have low trust in others, are low in self-esteem, or are low in
chronic communal orientation (variables that we suspect co-
occur) will be especially vulnerable to switching from a com-
munal to an exchange norm in the face of real or imagined
evidence that the other is neglecting their needs. They are the
people, we assert, who react to the slightest evidence of such
neglect with conclusions that the evidence indicates that the
other is selfish and does not care for them or that they are un-
worthy of care. Further, we suggest that such conclusions, in
turn, lead them to back away from the relationship. Alter-
natively (perhaps because they also are likely to perceive
that they have fewer good alternatives than others do), these
insecure individuals might be led to switch to a contingent,
record-keeping norm such as equality, equity, or exchange as
a basis for giving and receiving benefits in their relationship.EvidenceThe arguments we have just made suggest something that,
to date, has not received attention in the distributive justice
literature. Researchers in that tradition have typically advo-
cated that there is one real rule that governs the giving and re-
ceiving of benefits within close relationships. Some suggest it
is equality (Austin, 1980; Deutsch, 1975, 1985, for friend-
ships); some suggest it is equity (Sabatelli & Cecil-Pigo,
1985; Utne et al., 1984; Walster et al., 1978); and some say it
is a need-based rule (Deutsch, 1975, 1985, for family rela-
tionships; Lamm & Schwinger, 1980, 1983; Mills & Clark,
1982). Whatever rule they advocate, though, it has tended to
be a single rule, and they have suggested that people in close
relationships generally follow thatrule. If a person does a
good job following the particular rule, all is well. If the rule is
violated, unhappiness results, and either the distress must be
resolved or the relationship may end. We are suggesting
something quite different.