Assessment of Couple Relationships Standards in Same-Sex Attracted Adults

Relationship standards are beliefs about what makes a good romantic relationship. To date, no research on relationship standards in same-sex relationships has been conducted. This paper describes development of the Rainbow Couples Relationship Standards Scale (Rainbow CRSS). In common with measures of relationship standards developed with heterosexuals, the Rainbow CRSS assesses the importance people attach to Couple Bond standards (expression of love, caring, intimacy), Family Responsibility standards (extended family relations, maintenance of face and harmony), Religion, and Relationship Effort standards. The Rainbow CRSS also assesses three standards hypothesized to be of particular importance to same-sex couples: Relationship Outness (public disclosure of the relationship), Sexual Openness (acceptance of open sexual relationship), and Dyadic Coping with Homophobic discrimination. Participants were 414 same-sex attracted men and women who completed the Rainbow CRSS online, plus some validation scales. The Rainbow CRSS showed a coherent two-level factor structure that was similar to that in heterosexual couples for the Couple Bond and Family Responsibility Scales. Same-sex attracted people's standards were similar for men and women, and for singles versus those in a relationship. Same-sex attracted people's standards were very similar in endorsement of Couple Bond, Family Responsibility, Religion, and Relationship Effort standards to those of heterosexuals. The Relationship Outness and Dyadic Coping with Homophobia scales assessed potentially important standards that reflect some distinctive challenges for same-sex couple relationships.

Realizing Relational Preferences Through Transforming Interpersonal Patterns

Family therapy has often been conceptualized as a conversational process whereby therapists and clients generate new meanings. Based on a 3-year study of conversational practices observable in successful family therapy processes of Chilean families with a child/adolescent who is engaged in disruptive behaviors, we looked for clinical examples of Transforming Interpersonal Patterns (TIPs). TIPs are a key aspect of the IPscope, a framework we used to explore the meaning-making processes in family therapy. TIPs constitute a novel approach to explore therapeutic processes by identifying empirically traceable conversational practices involved in generating "new meanings." TIPs are involved in bringing forth and discursively articulating ("talking-into-being") clients' preferred ways of relating and living (i.e., relational preferences or RPs). We analyze conversational data from successful family therapy sessions/treatments, and present an emergent model of five categories of conversational practices making up TIPs, namely: Preparatory TIPs, Identifier TIPs, Tracker TIPs, Transformer TIPs, and Consolidator TIPs. We have called them "realizers" because these conversational practices help families talk-into-being (or "make real") particular relational preferences. We also offer user-friendly descriptors of realizers' subcategories (e.g., Measuring TIPs) which may help practitioners to recognize, learn, and perform these conversational invitations. Theoretical consequences and future lines of research are discussed.