“Let's Do What Together?!” Shared Activity Perceptions and Relationship Closeness

ABSTRACT

This study examined when the shared activity of extreme sports predicts relationship closeness. Participants who were skydivers involved in a relationship with a nonskydiver or a fellow skydiver were asked about perceived severity and perceived likelihood of possible negative events related to skydiving. Those who shared the activity of skydiving with their relationship partner reported higher levels of closeness than those who did not. However, this difference was contingent on perceptions of skydiving. Among those who perceived that possible negative events related to skydiving would be likely to happen but low in severity, closeness was higher if skydiving was an activity they shared with their partner. Results are discussed in terms of their implications for the role of shared activities in relationship closeness.

KEYWORDS:

• family leisure satisfaction
• life satisfaction
• psychological well-being

Notes

1 Examination of the data from nonskydivers who were in a relationship with skydivers revealed that, in contrast to groups examined in the current study, closeness was not significantly predicted by the interaction of perceived severity and perceived likelihood, β (SE = .08) = −.04, p = .63.

2 When marital status was added to the statistical model, it did not moderate the three-way interaction found in the current study, β (SE = .30) = −.22, p = .46.

3 Given the large range in time skydiving, the analyses of the current study were conducted using just data from those participants whose time spent skydiving was less than two standard deviations above the mean; the same pattern of results was found.

4 When time spent skydiving and age were included in the model, the three-way interaction between partner skydiving status, perceived risk, and perceived severity remained significant, β (SE = .13) = −.37, p < .01.

5 This three-way interaction between whether partner skydived, perceived severity, and perceived likelihood of negative events was marginally significant when satisfaction and relationship length were not included in the model, B (SE = .02) = −.03, p = .06. Gender did not moderate this effect, B (SE = .06) = −.08, p = .18.