A new measure, Partner Behaviours as Social Context (PBSC), was developed and tested in two studies (N = 215, N = 316) and tested as a correlate of psychological wellbeing in a third (N = 157). Self-Determination Theory (Deci & Ryan, 2000) and related research has suggested that there are six important dimensions of partner behaviours, which should be associated with individual psychological need fulfilment, wellbeing and development. Three of these dimensions are positive, including warmth, or provision of love/affection; autonomy support, or supporting a partner's decisions; and structure, or being consistent and reliable. Three of these dimensions are negative, namely rejection, or ignoring/being hostile to a partner; coercion, or being controlling/demanding; and chaos, or unpredictability. Factor analysis supported the six-dimensional construct. The six PBSC dimensions, positive and negative subscales and total score had good distributional properties, high internal consistency, related as expected to other relationship quality measures, and diverged from most personality constructs. All PBSC scales were related to wellbeing, with some behaviours more related than others. For example, coercion was strongly associated with compromised wellbeing, while warmth showed weak, positive associations with positive functioning. The PBSC is expected to have utility in both research and clinical settings.

The aims of this research were to develop and validate a Brief Attachment Adjective Checklist (BAAC) to represent the four category model of attachment, compare it with a current measure of attachment, and use both to predict relationship satisfaction. A 32-item operationalisation of a hypothesised four-category model was analysed using a principal component analysis. Results of Study 1 (n = 174) indicated the items of the four-category model reflected good factor structure. Comparison with the four-paragraph Relationship Questionnaire (RQ) showed low correlation between the two operationalisations, suggesting that they were measuring different aspects of attachment. Analyses showed that the BAAC was a weak but better predictor of relationship satisfaction than the RQ. A confirmatory factor analysis in Study 2 (n = 131) refined the structure of the BAAC. The pattern of correlations showing relative independence of the BAAC and the RQ in Study 1 was also shown in Study 2. The frequency of respondents in dominant attachment categories of the RQ was consistent with previous research but the frequency of respondents in dominant attachment categories differed for RQ compared with the BAAC. The replication of the prediction of relationship satisfaction in Study 2 showed that both measures were weak predictors of relationship satisfaction but the BAAC was a better predictor than the RQ.

Theory suggests that rejection sensitivity, a social cognitive processing style characterised by anxious and angry expectations of rejection, develops from experiences of rejection or acceptance by others. The purpose of this study of 417 children and early adolescents (age 9 to 13) was to examine how relationship experiences are directly and interactively associated with their rejection sensitivity. In a multivariate analysis, there was an association of rejection by parents and by peers with rejection sensitivity, with a stronger association between peer rejection and sensitivity than between parent rejection and sensitivity. Regarding interactive effects, peer rejection was found to have a strong association with rejection sensitivity among participants with low or high parent acceptance, and among those with high friendship satisfaction. Yet, there was evidence of a stronger association between peer rejection and rejection sensitivity among those with low parent acceptance or high friendship quality. This was because rejection sensitivity was highest when peer rejection was high and parent acceptance was low, and sensitivity was lowest when peer rejection was low and friendship quality was high. Findings show how young people's relationships in different domains uniquely co-vary with rejection sensitivity and interact in accounting for angry and anxious expectations of rejection by others.