1. Apologies in Close Relationships Jennifer Ripley & Nicole Noble Regent University

2. Variables of Interest Attachment Style Religious Commitment Time since offense Severity of offense Acceptance of apology Perceived sincerity of apology

3. Why Apologies Apologies are key to maintaining long-term intimate relationships Goffman theory Impression management theory Forgiveness Theory

4. Participants 239 participants in the covenant longitudinal study 123 from VCU and 116 from historically religious colleges 75% female 36% single, 29% dating, 7% separated, 1% married, 7% cohabiting, 7% engaged Average age 25

5. Procedure Presented one of 4 scenarios –Severity: flirting vs. slept with –Immediate apology vs. 1 month later –Constants: all offered a clear apology, taking full blame, asking for forgiveness but not asking for reconciliation. None confessed, all were discovered through second party

6. Measures Multi-item measure of adult romantic attachment (Brennan et al 1998) Religious Commitment Inventory (Worthington et al 2003) Single item measures for DVs The TRIM (McCullough et al 1998)

7. Results- Apology Acceptance, R 2 =.39 βsr 2 Severity-.61*.37 Timing-.03.00 Avoidance.03.00 Anxiety-.03.00 Relig. Commit.15*.02

8. Results- Apology Sincerity, R 2 =.30 βsr 2 Severity-.55*.29 Timing.03.00 Avoidance-.04.00 Anxiety-.03.00 Relig. Commit.11*.01

9. TRIM Avoidance Motivation R 2 =.44 βsr 2 Severity.67*.44 Timing-.03.00 Avoidance.07.00 Anxiety.04.00 Relig. Commit -.02.00

10. TRIM- Revenge Motivation R 2 =.18 βsr 2 Severity.35*.12 Timing-.14*.02 Avoidance-.01.00 Anxiety.16*.02 Relig. Commit -.11.01

11. Qualitative Analysis Selected themes from the literature and had 2 research assistants rate whether the theme existed in open ended questions about why they would accept the apology or not

12. Qualitative Analysis Kappa values and % of free responses with theme Sincerity (.72) 40% Emotions conveyed by offender (.96) 26% Offense Severity (.95) 18% Relationship Factors (.85) 16% Timing (.86) 16% –Apology occurred too late (.74) 19% Ramifications of actions (.98) 13% Breech of Trust (.87) 13%

13. Qualitative Rumination (.82) 9% Justification (.95) 8% Moral Evaluation (.92) 8% Personality factors (.97) 6% Conditional acceptance (.89) 6% Time invested in relationship (.71) 5% Offender accepts responsibility (.79) 5% Empathy theme (.95) 4%

14. Themes less than 4% Negative Judgments about Self Negative judgments about others Religious or spiritual evaluation References to Love, desire to reconcile and apology occurring too soon