Social Thinking and social Influence - Essay Example

Every relationship has a development or pattern to it. The Knapp’s Relational Development Model asserts there are stages (Rothwell, 278). Friendshipsand romantic love go through theses stages. The Internet has skipped and changed some of these changes, but relationships have stages. The initiating stage is first in friendships and romantic love. This is when people first meet. Physical attributes play a big role in this first stage. Smells, sight, smiles, and so forth set the foundation for friends and lovers.

The next stage is experimentation for friends and lovers. This is when people try to find things in common. The intensifying stage is where people open up more to the other person. Secrets, fears, and other emotions are shared between the individuals. This stage is for friends and lovers. Friends do not generally use the last two phases of this model. The integration phase is when people start sharing their lives together. Lovers at this point become a couple. The final stage is bonding. This is the stage where lovers get married or have a commitment.

Online relationships often skip the initiating stage in a physical form. People do not have to be honest about their physical attributes. Thus when experimentation begins, individuals can be honest or continued a façade. The intensifying of an internet relationship can also be warped due to the lack of physical interaction. If the individuals meet offline, the initiating stage occurs, but is distorted. A woman looking for tall, dark, and handsome they met online, might have to settle for short, pale, and normal.

This then warps all of the stages. Online relationships can be normal and good, just like those in person, but this is not always the case. It is easier to lie, present falsehoods, and cheat when a physical relationship does not hold individuals accountable. BibliographyRothwell, J. Dan. In the Company of Others. 2nd ed. New York: McGraw Hill, 2004.