Romantic Relationship Among Emerging Adulthood: A Stud Study

Coping with Conflicts in Romantic Relationship among Emerging Adulthood
Abstract: The human wants and desires are insatiable since the pristine times. The paramount of all is the longing for falling in love and being loved eternally. This opens doors for special bond between opposite sexes called as Romantic Relationship. Once it takes off and proceeds further with the investment of time and emotions, it blossoms in to a very special feeling of attachment. As time passes by, the couples face a threat to their relationship from the emerging conflicts. However, based on the attachment styles, the varied coping styles evolve to keep risk of detachment at bay. Here is an attempt to apprehend the nature of conflicts and subsequent coping styles to let the romantic relationships flourish bountiful and conquer all adversities successfully and if one is not able to do it what are the main reasons behind it. We have tried to unravel the differences in the variables that revolve around gender and cities.

Study is a mixed method study and was conducted in two phases.

Main aim of the study was to study the impact of attachment styles on the nature of conflicts and coping strategies in romantic relationships. In the first phase of the study that is the quantitative part 120 emerging adults were approached and were asked to fill in the questionnaires i.e., Experiences in Close Relationship (Brennan, K.; Clark, C.; Shaver, P.(2004)) and Conflict Style Questionnaire(Sybil Evans (2005)) to examine their attachment style and what coping strategy they use to cope up with any situation in their romantic relationship. In the second phase of study 16 emerging adults were interviewed to find out the main coping strategy they opt for and the various reasons why they get into any

conflict.
The qualitative data revealed that mostly boys are securely attached than girls and the coping style that scored the highest across gender was solution focused style and compromising style. Quantitative data shows that most of the participants did indulge in substance abuse when in a conflict but didn’t think that it is a coping strategy but a savior to relieve their stress and the reason to get into any argument was because of lack of time, having opposite gender friends and for some family issues. During in-depth interviews one thing that emerged was participants living in Vadodara (Baroda) were more concerned about their parents where in New Delhi participants didn’t mention about their families.
Lastly, we have participants who fall somewhere in the middle of the above two extremes. These people tend to be securely attached, and experience relationships that are characterized by interdependence, love, self-disclosure, commitment, trust and overall satisfaction. Consequently, when their relationship dissolves, they experience a sense of loss and sadness. Such participants have a tendency not to rely heavily on one particular type of coping strategy and perhaps employ components of both task coping (which is typically thought to be more adaptive) and emotion coping (in order to regulate emotional distress). It is hoped that the present study has served to contribute to our understanding of coping strategies and their relation to attachment in a romantic relationship. Eventually, these findings could be extended to include other variables that could possibly contribute to the observed individual differences in this complicated arena of human emotion. Further investigations can shed higher light on the processes that people go through when they experience dissolution of a romantic relationship.