The effects of attitude similarity, expectation of goal facilitation, and actual goal facilitation on interpersonal attraction

Abstract

Sixty college study served as subjects in an experiment in which the similarity of person's attitudes, expected goal facilitation on a two-person task, and actual goal facilitation were manipulated. In additional condition in which the subjects did not expect to interact with another person having similar or dissimilar attitudes was run. The major dependent variable was interpersonal attraction. The results show that the similarity of another person's attitudes has a positive effect on a subject's attraction toward the other only when the subject did not expect to interact with the other in a goal interdependent situation. When the subject expects such interaction, the results indicate that attitude similarity has no effect on attraction when the extent to which the subject expected the other to facilitate his goal attainment was experimentally controlled, whereas expected goal facilitation had a positive effect on attraction toward the other when attitude similarity was experimentally controlled. These data suggest that the motive of consensual validation mediates the effects of attitude similarity on attraction under circumstances of no expected interaction, but that expected goal facilitation mediates the relationship between attitude similarity and attraction in goal interdependent interaction. The results also indicate that when a subject expects the other to facilitate his goal accomplishment and in fact the other frustrated it, the subject's liking for the other did not significantly decrease, but when the subject expected the other to frustrate his goal accomplishment and the other in fact facilitated it, the subject's attraction towards the other increased.