Eudora Welty is an author concerned with relationships between human beings. Throughout A Curtain of Green and Other Stories, The Wide Net and Other Stories, and The Golden Apples, Welty's characters search for ways in which to establish and sustain viable bonds. Particularly problematic are the relationships between opposite sexes. I argue that Welty uses communication as a tool for sustaining a relationship in her early work. I further argue that when her stories provide mostly negative outcomes, Welty moves on to a illuminate the possibility and subsequent failure of relationships via innocence in the natural world. Finally, Welty explores, through her characters, the attempt at marginalization and the quest for relationships outside the culture of the South.

The sense of humour is a uniquely human skill and understanding humour is an important and rewarding part of social interaction. This thesis begins by discussing the definition of humour, followed by a review of the evidence we have that humour is an evolved and adaptive behaviour. Humour may play an important role in helping individuals to bond and signal cooperation, which may be further communicated by the humour style which is used to communicate. Research has also demonstrated that humour is an attractive quality in a mate, though the precise reasons for this are currently debated (Chapter 1). Empirical work in the first section of the thesis is consistent with evidence demonstrating that humour is attractive and sexually selected for. Chapter 2 tests the influence of modality and relationship context in an effort to further our understanding of why humour is attractive and provides evidence that more attractive people are rated as being funnier than less attractive people. Humour was also found to be more attractive for short-term relationships than long-term relationships, possibly due to the similarity between funniness and flirtatiousness. In Chapter 3, attractiveness ratings of vignettes in the style of personal advertisements, which contained either aggressive or affiliative humour, demonstrated the importance of humour style. An affiliative humour style was more attractive for long-term relationships whereas an aggressive humour style was more attractive for short-term relationships. Further testing provided evidence that humour styles were associated with personality traits which are highly relevant in a mating context, helping to explain the functions of different humour styles. The second section of the thesis examines the relationship between humour, cooperation, and dominance as an alternative explanation for the evolution of humour. Chapter 4 contains an extended introduction to the physical, verbal, and nonverbal cues to dominance and the sex differences that exist in expressive behaviours. Chapter 5 continues this theme and elaborates further on the function of humour in group situations, before providing empirical evidence of how humour is used in the context of a competitive ‘desert-island’ style conversation between same-sex dyads. Chapter 6 further expands on this line of research as empirical evidence presented in this chapter demonstrates that males may be using humour as a way of communicating the desire to cooperate with other males who are of a similar level of dominance. The communication of dominance is further examined in Chapter 7, where ethological evidence showed that males who were more physically dominant tended to knock doors with greater frequency than males who were less physically dominant. In the final chapter of the thesis (Chapter 8), the evolution of humour is discussed in light of the evidence presented in Chapters 2-7. The thesis presents evidence to suggest that humour production is an important skill for males for two reasons. Firstly, a good sense of humour is a highly attractive quality to females and may be a cue to genetic quality or good partner qualities, depending on the humour style used. Secondly, it may be important for males to use humour to signal cooperation to other males in order to form alliances. In females, the evidence presented in the thesis suggests that humour production may be a way for females to demonstrate romantic interest or flirtatiousness but the function of humour use between females remains largely inconclusive.

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship between ease of discussion of sexual likes and dislikes with a sexual partner and religious, expressive, and affectional influences in the family of origin.

Battered women's perceptions of gender roles within the family were studied. Twenty white, working-class women who were victims of domestic violence were interviewed. It was determined that battered women have very traditional views of gender roles in the family and these views affected the choices that they made within their relationships and their ability to escape these abusive relationships.

This thesis examined student-participants' self-reported use of romantic relational maintenance strategies and their partners' reports of relational satisfaction. Additionally, individuals outside the romantic relationship reported on student-participants' general communicator style. The research proposed that general style reports would be predictive of relational maintenance strategy usage and of romantic partners' relational satisfaction. The study found that general style behaviors may not be indicative of relational maintenance strategy usage or romantic partners' relational satisfaction. Tests of sex differences revealed that females' expression of various relational maintenance strategies and style behaviors are associated with male partners' relational satisfaction; however, no results were obtained indicating specific behaviors expressed by males result in female partners' relational satisfaction.

This thesis examined 199 college students' reported use of relational maintenance strategies and their reports of the occurrence of sexual communication strategies within the relationship with their partners' reported relational satisfaction.

M.A. / Of late there has been an accelerated impetus in the study of marriage and its associated issues. A veritable deluge of research articles are regularly devoted to the topic, for example Hatfield and Sprecher (1986); Fincham and Bradbury (1987); Dion and Dion (1993); Kamo (1993). There has also been some recent South African research on marriage and mate selection, particularly Crous and Pretorius (1994). New books appear with striking regularity while instruments to measure aspects of relationships are readily available. These include Hendrick and Hendrick's Love Attitude Scale, Spanier's Dyadic Adjustment Scale, and Rubin's Love Scale (Tzeng, 1993). Relationships, love and marriage are becoming increasingly measurable and as more questions become answered, researchers are able to unravel some of the complexity within the field. Adams (1988) looks back at fifty years of family research to discover that it has become increasingly scientific despite dealing with so-called "soft" variables like adjustment and attitudes. When even more elusive constructs like satisfaction, contentment and love are introduced, social scientists find that the terrain might be uncomfortably abstract. However, it is anticipated that as this domain, once only the estate of poets and philosophers becomes steadily more understood, it will bear fruit by answering questions which can then be profitably applied in many couplecounselling situations. The concepts of mate selection, marriage and familial stability are at the heart of societal functioning. There are a myriad of variables that impact on these constructs, as is evident from Surra's (1990) decade review. Recent research has shed some light, albeit theoretical, on the reasons why two people form a marital dyad. Social scientists are thus slowly building a solid mass of knowledge relating to the entire process of how and why a couple eventually exist. This goes hand in hand with contemporary urgency, for the accelerating forces of career, sociological, psychological and economic pressures play havoc with older traditional values of stability and permanence in all these domains. Soaring divorce rates are only one symptom of couples and individuals buckling under these tremendous pressures. Clearly, whatever can be done to better understand the choices individuals make in forming marital dyads, can only be regarded as useful information. In the South African context, this type of research is similarly required. With the wealth of family and marriage research being done abroad, it is important to know if this information applies to South African couples. Thus the primary motivation for the study is to better understand the way South Africans love. Lee's (1976) treatise is widely accepted as a valuable model of love. To date no work appears to have been done using this model in South Africa. The aims of this study thus are: To determine if there is any relationship between the various lovestyles and marital satisfaction for a South African sample. To examine several contemporary models of love.

Submitted in the partial fulfilment for the Degree of Master of Arts in the Department of African Literature University of the Witwatersrand, March 2017 / This research reads the popular literature genre, chick lit, as a site for the elaboration of new forms of womanhood in post-Apartheid South Africa and through an analysis of the novel Happiness is a Four-Letter Word seeks to discover how new constructs of black female identity in the genre of chick lit disrupt as well as extend earlier representations of female experience in South Africa. The literary aspect of this research is essentially a genre study that attempts to identify how we recognize genre. Chick lit was initially read as a homogenously white normative genre, it was imagined, theorized and researched through the western gaze to the exclusion of other races and classes. This research rejects this essentialism of gender and as such recognizes that when addressing gender in Africa not only race and class need to be contextualized but further historical and cultural contexts are fundamental when constructing the black woman’s subjectivity. Postfeminism is understood as a modern social sensibility declaring that women are ‘now empowered,’ and celebrating and encouraging their consequent ‘freedom’ to return to normatively feminine pursuits. There is a growing field of research around postfeminism and chick lit pertaining to black African women and this is where this research locates itself. By positioning existing western literature, on chick lit, in dialogue with scholarship around chick lit in Africa, a transnational analytic and methodological approach to the critical study of chick lit and postfeminism can be made. Chick lit signals a transition for black women living in post-Apartheid South Africa, one of upward social mobility. This research looks at the contradictory space that black middleclass women occupy in this transition. There is a spectral ‘other’ that restricts black women in fully expressing their agency in the private sphere despite the progress made for women on a national scale. This I have called ‘the Ghost of the Township.’ I explore the extent to which the narrative opens up alternative avenues for writers to represent women’s interests. The author, Cynthia Jele, like other authors writing chick lit about black African women, illustrates how women writers can rethink and reposition the roles of women as they continue to live in patriarchal societies that marginalize and oppress them. In this research, I endeavor to explore if and how these new roles for women create contradictory zones for women by at once empowering and oppressing them. I also ask to what extent things have changed for black women and examine the effects of these changes. / XL2018

The increase of divorce rate and infidelity with rapid economic development leads people to think about the influence of money on romantic relationships. Previous studies focused on the exploration of the relation between income and romantic relationships. They revealed that money facilitates the development of romantic relationships, but is also associated with relationship conflicts and crisis. However, little is known about how money is related to the occurrences of relationship problems. The current study centered on the negative effects of money on romantic relationships, and explored the possible psychological processes underlying these effects. I predicted that some money-related attitudes and feelings would exert a negative effect on individuals’ relationship satisfaction and investment, and increase the possibility of getting a better alternative by motivating them to approach the attractive opposite-sex, thus decreasing relationship commitment. I recruited Mainland Chinese college students and community samples involved in romantic relationships and conducted three studies under the framework of the investment model. A paper-and-pencil questionnaire was used in Study 1 to investigate the relationship between attitudes towards money and relationship investment. Results showed that people who assigned a high value to money underestimated their partners’ investment, and performed fewer pro-relationship behaviors. In Study 2 and Study 3, I used the priming method to trigger a relatively rich or poor feeling. Study 2 focused on respondents’ satisfaction with their partners and revealed that men feeling relatively rich were less satisfied with their partners’physical appearance than those feeling relatively poor. This difference was not significant for women. In Study 3, I examined how individuals thought and behaved in a situation with an opposite-sex attractive alternative. Results showed that men feeling relatively rich sat closer to the attractive alternative than men feeling relatively poor. Compared with men, women feeling rich reported less interest in dating the attractive alternative but sat closer to him than women feeling poor. Put simply, the importance that an individual places in money is negatively related to relationship investment, and the awareness of being rich may cause low satisfaction and increase an individual’s propensity to approach the alternative. According to the investment model, results from my studies demonstrate that these money-related attitudes and feelings could potentially exert a negative impact on romantic commitment, and this could be an important reason for the instability of romantic relationships. Findings from my studies also revealed some gender differences in the influences of money, indicating that the magnitude and direction of these influences could partially depend on which relationship partner owns the money. These findings have both conceptual and practical implications for the psychology of money and romantic relationships. / 近年來，中國經濟在飛速發展，與此同時，離婚率不斷上升，出軌事件日益增加，這讓人們開始思考金錢對愛情關係的影響。已有研究者探討了收入與愛情之間的關係，發現金錢可以促進愛情關係的發展，但是也與關係中的衝突和危機相關。金錢如何導致了關係問題的出現，有關這一問題的研究成果有限。因此，本研究以金錢對愛情關係的消極影響為焦點，探索這些影響背後可能的心理機制。我假設某些與金錢有關的態度和感受對關係滿意度和關係投資會有消極影響，並且，會增加個體獲得一個更好的新關係的可能性，根據投資模型(Rusbult, 1983)，關係承諾由此會被削弱。我以正處於愛情關係中的大學生和成人為被試，在投資模型的理論框架下實施了三個研究。研究一使用紙筆測驗考察了個體對於金錢的態度和關係投資之間的關係，結果表明，重視金錢的人往往會低估伴侶對關係的投入，並且做出較少的親關係行為。在研究二和研究三的實驗中，我使用了啟動方法引發相對富有或貧窮的感覺。研究二以對伴侶的滿意度為焦點，發現感覺相對富裕的男性對伴侶外貌的滿意度低於感覺貧窮的男性，對女性來說，這種差異不顯著。研究三的目的是檢驗在有吸引力異性在場的情境中個體的想法和行為。結果表明，與感覺相對貧窮的男性相比，感覺富有的男性選擇了距離有吸引力的異性比較近的座位。與感覺相對貧窮的女性相比，感覺富有的女性與有吸引力異性約會的興趣較小，但是選擇了距離其比較近的座位。簡言之，個體對金錢的重視程度與關係投資負相關，並且感覺富有可能會導致較低的滿意度和較高的接近其他異性的傾向。根據投資模型，可以認為這些與金錢有關的態度和感受可能會對關係承諾有消極影響，這可能是導致愛情關係不穩定的一個重要原因。本研究的結果揭示了一些有關金錢影響的性別差異，表明金錢影響力的大小和方向可能在某種程度上取決於在關係中哪一方擁有金錢。這些研究結果對於金錢心理學和愛情關係心理學都有重要的理論和實踐意義。 / Li, Yiming. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2014. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 89-101). / Abstracts also in Chinese. / Title from PDF title page (viewed on 20, December, 2016). / Detailed summary in vernacular field only.

Lam Siu Mun. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 126-137). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Acknowledgements --- p.i / Declaration --- p.iii / Abstract --- p.iv / 論文摘要 --- p.v / Chapter Chapter 1: --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- Background of research --- p.1 / Chapter 1.2 --- Objectives and Significance --- p.7 / Chapter 1.3 --- Research Questions --- p.9 / Chapter 1.4 --- Map of the Thesis --- p.10 / Chapter Chapter 2: --- Literature Review --- p.12 / Chapter 2.1 --- Prevalent Theoretical Explanations on Gender Relation --- p.12 / Chapter 2.2 --- Gender Perspective: Multiple Levels of Analysis on Gender Relations --- p.16 / Chapter 2.3 --- The Gender Relation in Hong Kong --- p.29 / Chapter 2.4 --- Analytical Framework --- p.31 / Chapter Chapter 3: --- Research Methodology --- p.33 / Chapter 3.1 --- Conceptual Framework --- p.33 / Chapter 3.2 --- Methodology --- p.46 / Chapter Chapter 4: --- Marital Negotiation Dynamic in Gendered Resources --- p.49 / Chapter 4.1 --- Influence of Economy on Marital Negotiation --- p.49 / Chapter 4.2 --- Influence of Culture on Marital Negotiation --- p.54 / Chapter 4.3 --- Influence of Kinship System on Marital Negotiation --- p.59 / Chapter 4.4 --- Conclusion --- p.63 / Chapter Chapter 5: --- Marital Negotiation Dynamics-Cases for Working Class --- p.66 / Chapter 5.1 --- Marital Negotiation in Traditional Provider-Traditional Homemaker Family --- p.67 / Chapter 5.2 --- Marital Negotiation in Traditional Provider- Egalitarian Homemaker Family --- p.73 / Chapter 5.3 --- Marital Negotiation in Egalitarian Provider-Egalitarian Homemaker Family / Chapter 5.4 --- Conclusion --- p.86 / Chapter Chapter 6: --- Marital Negotiation Dynamics- Cases for Middle Class --- p.89 / Chapter 6.1 --- Marital Negotiation in Traditional Provider-Traditional Homemaker Family --- p.89 / Chapter 6.2 --- Marital Negotiation in Traditional Provider- Egalitarian Homemaker Family --- p.94 / Chapter 6.3 --- Marital Negotiation in Egalitarian Provider-Egalitarian Homemaker Family --- p.99 / Chapter 6.4 --- Conclusion --- p.104 / Chapter Chapter 7: --- Conclusion --- p.107 / Chapter 7.1 --- Summary of Finding --- p.107 / Chapter 7.2 --- Implication --- p.110 / Chapter 7.3 --- Limitations and Recommendation for Further Study --- p.116 / Appendix 1: Profile of Informants and Families --- p.118 / Appendix 2: Guiding Questions for the semi-structured Interviews --- p.122 / Bibliography --- p.126 / List of Tables --- p.138 / Table 1.1 Educational attainment by sex --- p.138 / Table 2.1 Labor force participation by sex --- p.138 / Table 2.2 Female Labor force by marital status --- p.138 / Table 3.1 Employed persons by sex and occupation --- p.139 / Table 4.1 Median monthly employment income by sex and occupation --- p.141