Equity theory of Relationships (AQA A Level Psychology)

The key features of Equity Theory

• Equity theory is based on the concept of fairness in a relationship i.e. are both partners receiving the same profit and not incurring unequally-weighted costs?

• Equity theory - like Social Exchange Theory and Rusbult’s Investment Model - is an economic theory of relationships but  it attempts to explain aspects of the costs/rewards balance which SET fails to elucidate

• Equity means that both people in the relationship benefit from the relationship rather than one person scooping all of the rewards (known as overbenefitting) while the other person misses out (known as underbenefitting)

• The overbenefitted partner may feel unease, guilt and embarrassment about the inequity in the relationship; the underbenefitted partner may feel anger, resentment and dissatisfaction about the inequity in the relationship

• Perception is everything: if one of the partners feels that the relationship is unfair then this may result in them feeling dissatisfied with it regardless of whether they overbenefit or underbenefit

• Equity is not the same as equality: it is the balance of costs and rewards which is important, not the number of rewards and costs involved

• Insisting on equality in a relationship would involve, say, all tasks being allocated equally between the couple but if one person works away from home for several weeks at a time this is clearly not going to be viable

• Using the example from the above bullet point: equity would be established if the partner who works away from home was responsible for all household accounts and for booking holidays; in this way both partners would feel that the tasks were divided fairly

Can any relationship achieve perfect equity?

Perceived inequity

• Perceived inequity occurs when one partner feels that they are putting in more effort and incurring more costs than the other e.g. Sunita does all of the housework and childcare as well as working part-time whereas her husband Devindra does no housework and only occasionally looks after the children, plus he often plays golf at the weekend

• The balance of a relationship can change over time as couples become complacent and perhaps make less effort to please each other (in the early stages of a relationship people are on their ‘best behaviour’ but, sadly, this rarely lasts)

• Perceptions of inequity can change and adjust with the evolution of the relationship e.g. Sara initially thought that it was fine to let Sally have the spare room for her watercolour painting but now she feels that she, too, would like to have her own space for her crafting hobby but there is only one spare room and Sally has claimed it

• Interestingly, the underbenefitted partner will work harder to restore equity than the overbenefitted partner and they will do this even when the inequity seems quite obvious and unfair to everyone who knows the couple (possibly as a way of ‘saving face’ and showing others that the relationship really is working)

• Alternatively, the underbenefitted partner may use cognitive dissonance to re-frame  the costs and turn them into simply another aspect of the relationship i.e. one which does not cause dissatisfaction e.g. Sara decides that she doesn’t really like crafting anyway and that Sally is such a good artist that she needs the spare room for her artwork

• Of course, a very possible outcome is that the underbenefitted partner reaches a point of ‘no return’ and - feeling extremely disgruntled - will call an end to the relationship!

Too much inequity and too much underbenefitting can mean one partner decides, that’s it, no more!

Research which investigates equity theory

• Utne et a. (1984) - a survey of 118 married couples showed that perceived equity was a predictor of relationship satisfaction 

• Schaffer & Keith (1980) - equity is not stable over the course of a marriage; it has peaks (the ‘honeymoon period’ in the early stages of the relationship) and troughs (for women this is particularly true during child rearing years when women underbenefit and men overbenefit)

• Berg & McQuinn (1986) - longitudinal research of 38 dating couples found that there were no real differences in equity between the couples who split up and the couples who stayed together - other variables such as self-disclosure were found to be more important to long-term happiness than equity 

Evaluation of equity theory

Strengths

• Research such as Utne et al.’s (1984) demonstrates that  equity theory has good validity i.e. it reflects a real phenomenon in the dynamics of relationships

• Much of the research on equity theory uses real-life couples so it could be argued that there is a degree of external validity to studies which investigate this topic

Weaknesses

• Equity theory is not universal: Aumer-Ryan et al. (2007) found that individualistic cultures prefer an equitable relationship whereas collectivist cultures expressed a preference for overbenefitting

• Much of the theory makes assumptions about what people value or prioritise about their relationship when in fact each individual relationship is unique and is of itself its own phenomenon thus the theory lacks reliability

Link to Issues & Debates

It could be argued that equity theory is reductionist to some extent as it attempts to explain the complex and unpredictable behaviours involved in relationship negotiation as a simple balancing act. Taking a holistic approach to understanding the fine details of a relationship would probably prove to be more insightful and meaningful.