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Discuss the nature of relationship in other cultures (i.e. comparison between Western and non Western cultures)

One of the main differences between cultures is that Western cultures or individualistic countries are more independent whilst non-western countries are interdependent. Individualistic countries emphasize in personal needs such as rights, goals or selfish benefits rather than collectivist countries who find desires of collectivist units such as family or society more important rather than selfish needs. Another difference is that western countries are voluntary when it comes to their needs while non-voluntary when it comes to relationships. Western Countries find love as the primary basis of marriage and because they have considerable geographical and social mobility and are therefore free to interact with a larger number of people and can have a greater choice when it comes to choosing partners while on collectivist countries, doesn't take note of love but the partner's family background, alliances or economic arrangements. They are also less geographical and has less social mobility and so have less choice in who they interact with and who might be deemed as a suitable partner. Relationship between western countries tend to be impermanent than non-western countries.

As you may think
This was supported by Shkodriani and Gibbons (1995) where they investigated differences between Mexican (collectivist) and US (individualitsitc) students and found that students from Mexico were more independent in terms of their relationship with friends neighbours and co-workers compared to students in the US. This therefore concludes that in collectivist cultures, a marriage is often seen more as a union between families that a union between two individuals. This, however, is contradicted by Li et al (2006) when they compared attitudes towards various types of relationships for people from Canada (individualistic) and China and India (collectivist) and found that there were very few differences between the Canadians and the Chinese but it did show differences between the Chinese and the Indian people. Heine et al (2002) suggested that "reference group effect" may have occurred as individual member of the collectivist culture may think of themselves as not particularly interdependent when comparing themselves to other more "collectivist" member of their cultures.

Myers et al. (2005) provided evidence for voluntary and involuntary differences based on factors such as satisfaction. They asked 45 individuals (22 couples and one widowed person) living in India in arranged marriages to complete a questionnaire measuring marital satisfaction, as well as the characteristics they considered to be important in marriages. They found that there were no differences in marital satisfaction between people living in arranged marriages and marriage of choice. there is however some cultural differences the factors considered important for a successful marriage. For example, those living in the US placed high priority on love as a precursor to marriage, whereas in India, love was regarded as less important.

Another part
There also studies regarding love relating to difference on western and non-western relationships. Allegeiert and Weiderman (1991) as US college students "If a boy/girl had all the other qualities you desired, would you marry this person if you were not in love with him/her. As a result, only 14% of the males and 9% of the females said they would marry someone they did not love. This suggest that in western culture, romantic love is a requirement for marriage. The study lacks population validity and is culture bias. As they used questionnaires, the participants may also lie. This study was replicated by Sprecher et al (1994) where they asked American, Japanese and Russian students the same question. They found that the Japanese were as romantic as the Americans and expresses a reluctant to marry in the absence of love. The Russian students, on the other hand, were far more practical about marriage and particularly women, were far more likely to settle for a loveless marriage provided all their requirements met.

Studies have also been taken regarding whether the relationships were permanent or impermanent. Simmel (1971) argues that individualism is associated with higher divorce levels because it encourages individuals constantly to seek their ideal partner. Mckenry and Price (1995) reported that, in cultures, where females have become more independent and influential, divorce rates have risen considerably, suggesting that the lower divorce rates often seen in non-individualistic cultures are a reflection not of happy marriages, but of male dominance.

Generally
Some of the research and theories based their results on "love". Pinker (2008) offers an evolutionary perspective on the universality of romantic love. He suggest that love is a species-specific adaptation that has evolved to promote survival and reproduction among human beings. This has been supported by a study of Jankowiak and Fischer (1992) where they found that in traditional societies, "romantic love" would have kept our distant ancestors alive long enough to reproduce and pass on their genes, so that nowadays our uniquely human predisposition for romantic love is still alive and well.

Most of the research were culturally biased. Most researchers would interpret observations in terms of their own cultural norms; for example, using measuring tools or questionnaires devised in one particular culture. most research only takes account in interest of Western psychology and seeing if they replicate other cultures, disregarding what is important in the other cultures (Kim and Berry (1993)) There are problems in comparing sumtures as samples are rarely identical which can invalidate results.