Hembree 1

Devin Kyle Hembree

Mrs. Thomas
UWRT 1102-021
20- October 2015

Demir, MelikAah. "Sweetheart, You Really Make Me Happy: Romantic Relationship Quality
and Personality As Predictors of Happiness Among Emerging Adults." Journal of
Happiness Studies. 9.2 (2008): 257-277. Print.

This peer-reviewed scholarly article is about how the quality of a romantic relationship can
predict happiness in emerging adults. It is a scientific psychological study that was done by the
Department Of Psychology at Wayne State University in Detroit. Two studies were completed.
The first one had 221 participants, while the second one had 350 participants. Study 1 developed
the hypothesis that romantic relationship quality would be positively related to happiness and
would contribute to happiness beyond the influence of personality. Study 2 was intended to
extend the findings of the first study. They did this by using different instruments to assess
relationship quality due to the robust role it plays in happiness. Study 2 had a similar hypothesis
as study 1. However, it took companionship and self-validation into account, along with
identity formation. Demir explains: happiness was assessed in terms of global life satisfaction,
presence of positive affect and absence of negative affect. As a result of these studies, emotional
security and companionship were shown to be the strongest factors of romantic relationship
quality that can be used to predict happiness.

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The article was not the easiest read and was quite repetitive. Due to the fact that it was about a
psychological study, they used very challenging vocabulary. Demir spoke of the big five often
throughout the text when discussing personality. The big five is a model that refers to
personality traits that are used to describe human personality. The five traits are openness,
conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. I learned about this in my
psychology class; however, they never tell you what the big five is in the article. Most likely this
is due to the fact that this is intended for an educated audience that is very knowledgeable in
psychology. The author of the article, Demit, explains the result of the research very clearly by
stating:

One major conclusion that could be drawn from the studies reported is that the quality of
romantic relationships contributes to happiness above and beyond the influence of

personality among emerging adults.

Results revealed that emotional security and companionship were the strongest features
of romantic relationships that predicted happiness.

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