Similarity and Attraction: A Longitudinal Study

Abstract

Although it is generally acknowledged that psychological similarity influences the development of same-sex friendship, empirical studies often fail to delineate the differential impact of attitude, personality, value, construct and structural similarity as predictors of attraction. The present naturalistic study examines the discriminability of these similarity subtypes, and notes the impact of each upon friendship formation over 8 weeks of assigned dyadic interaction. Factor analyses of the similarity subtypes reflected the emergent nature of relationship development, with greater subtype differentiation occurring over time. Regression analyses suggested that similarity subtypes may be hierarchically related, with some being more accessible than others for purposes of social comparison. More specifically, attitude similarity was a significant predictor of initial attraction across pairs, whereas only personality and cognitive-structural similarity predicted later attraction. With regard to overall relationship success, analyses of variance indicated that attitudinally similar dyads moved in the direction of greater attraction across time, whereas attitudinally dissimilar dyads tended to deteriorate in their level of mutual attraction. Results are broadly consistent with a filtering model of relationship development, which suggests a movement from relatively more superficial to relatively deeper levels of social comparison over the course of acquaintance.

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