Type of Document	Thesis
Author	Leo, Jennifer L.
Author's Email Address	jll08c@fsu.edu
URN	etd-09202010-110422
Title	The Dark Side of Commitment: Intrasexual Vigilance Among the Chronically Jealous
Degree	Master of Science
Department	Psychology, Department of
Advisory Committee	Advisor Name Title Jon K. Maner Committee Chair E. Ashby Plant Committee Member Jesse Cougle Committee Member
Keywords	Commitment Jealousy Romantic Rivals
Date of Defense	2010-07-28
Availability	unrestricted
Abstract Commitment is essential to the long-term maintenance of romantic relationships. Commitment promotes relationship maintenance strategies and a variety of other positive relationship outcomes. However, when paired with jealousy, commitment may heighten people’s concerns about infidelity and trigger vigilance toward romantic rivals. Two experiments tested the hypothesis that commitment and jealousy would interact to promote negative implicit evaluations of attractive same sex targets, reflecting a basic cognitive attunement to potential relationship threats posed by romantic rivals. Across both studies, priming feelings of commitment and love toward one’s partner led people high in chronic jealousy (but not those low in chronic jealousy) to negatively evaluate attractive same sex individuals at implicit levels of cognition. The current research thus provides insight into an understudied negative consequence of being highly committed to a relationship: the more committed one is, the more one has to lose, and thus the more concerned one becomes about having one’s partner stolen away by a potential competitor.
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