Interpersonal relationships: concept, examples, classification

What are interpersonal relationships?

Interpersonal relationships are all types of interactions in which people enter: feelings, judgments, communication, joint affairs, exchange of emotions, etc. They are based on social connections that already exist or emerge again between members of society. As a rule, interpersonal relationships are established for a specific purpose : to obtain some benefit, share emotions, receive support, learn or communicate something. An important component of such relationships is mutual trust and understanding.

Interpersonal relationships are realized primarily in the form of three main forms of interaction:

verbal – exchange of information through oral speech;
nonverbal – transmission of information through gestures and other nonverbal signals;
affective - the exchange of emotions through such means of expression as laughter, crying, etc.

The first interpersonal relationships begin to form in a child immediately after birth (despite the fact that the newborn is not yet formally considered a person). Through crying, laughter and other emotions, he interacts with his parents, informing them of his feelings and desires. Gradually, the interaction becomes more and more conscious, but this can be considered real interpersonal relationships when the child’s primary socialization is completed.

What are the parameters of education?

Among the parameters of parental education, it is worth highlighting parental control and parental requirements. Why exactly them?

Every parent usually demands exemplary behavior from their child. The higher the parents' demands and expectations, the more the child tries to exceed these expectations. But sometimes a parent can get too carried away, not realizing that the child cannot always live up to their desires and hopes.

As a result, the child makes every effort to make the parent happy, but does not receive proper encouragement and praise. Because of this, dissonance occurs and the child’s psychological state is disturbed. Therefore, the parent must control his requirements and understand whether they are feasible for the little person. Otherwise, it may negatively affect his health.

It has become the norm for parents that all the actions of their children are under their strict control. In many families, it is accepted that children obey their parents and unquestioningly do what they are told. This comes either at the genetic level or from childhood. But this is how it used to be: children had to obey their elders and follow any of their instructions.

Features of interpersonal relationships

This type of interaction has a number of characteristic features:

Interpersonal relationships are highly dependent on emotional assessments , both conscious and unconscious. This rule is observed even for formal and business relationships.
Each of the interacting subjects participates in them as a unique individual , possessing certain character traits and occupying a certain place in society.
These relationships do not arise spontaneously, but develop gradually through communication and other types of communication.
Interpersonal relationships are not constant. They can change both for the better and for the worse, sometimes changing their vector to the opposite.

Examples of Interpersonal Relationships

To better understand what interpersonal relationships are, consider a few typical examples that each of us has encountered, regardless of social status and other factors:

Everyday. This group includes all types of interaction that do not involve too close communication. This type of interpersonal relationship covers a wide circle of people, which includes everyone with whom we come into contact in one way or another in everyday life: neighbors, colleagues, employees of neighboring offices, sellers, hairdressers and other people.
Friendly. This group includes relationships that are not too close, but involve pleasant time spent together. For example, if your friend invited you to hang out with his colleagues and you had a lot of fun together, you are unlikely to immediately call them friends. But if you want to meet these people again, that's what friendship is.
Friendly. This form of relationship implies that people are connected by a certain common activity. However, they are not close enough to be considered friends, but they have common goals and trust each other.
Friendly. Such relationships imply that people are very close. Friendship does not arise simply on the basis of common interests or mutual sympathy. To become friends, people communicate for a long time, get closer emotionally, learn to understand each other, taking into account all the features and subtleties of their characters.
Love ones. This form of relationship involves emotional intimacy and the presence of romantic feelings. In love, people are not as selective as in friendship (therefore they do not always choose partners rationally), but in terms of the degree of affection, love relationships are the strongest.
Related. Involvement in kinship relationships occurs at birth, and yet they can exist in different forms. For some, all relatives are close people, for others only close people are important, and other relatives are equated to ordinary acquaintances.
Marital. Despite the fact that marital relationships originate from love relationships, they are very different in content. By their nature, they are closer to family relations, and at the same time they imply compliance with a number of mutual obligations, the violation of which entails public censure and some forms of legal liability (such as a deliberately losing position in a divorce).

The level of interpersonal relationships depends on how mature the individuals involved are. Each participant must understand his responsibility to the other and adhere to certain rules, which, although not specifically stated, are implied.

Reasons for the development of an alliance with replacement

Substitute relationships in men and women can arise for a number of reasons:

desire to make your ex-partner jealous;
fear of loneliness, search for support in life, including financial;
the intention to quickly close the sad page of the past;
the need for affection, care, coziness, familiar comfort.

Unfortunately, vicarious difficult relationships after a breakup for guys and girls develop according to the scenario of the previous ones, since it will not be possible to quickly switch to a different line of behavior.

The structure of interpersonal relationships

Despite all the variety of interpersonal relationships, their structure is quite simple and includes three main components: cognitive, emotional and behavioral. Let's look at each of them in more detail.

1. Cognitive component

This component includes various types of cognitive activity that arise in one way or another in interpersonal relationships (perception, thinking, imagination, and others). The cognitive component depends on mutual understanding, which has two main characteristics:

adequacy – correct interpretation of incoming information;
identification – unconscious identification of oneself with a partner.

2. Emotional component

These are the emotions that a subject experiences in relation to another subject in different forms of interaction:

sympathy and antipathy;
happiness and contentment;
empathy (compassion).

3. Behavioral component

Without noticing it ourselves, we involuntarily express our attitude towards other people through various signs: facial expressions, gestures, intonation, the use of atypical speech patterns and other manifestations of a special attitude. Despite the fact that the behavioral component is weakly dependent on our will, it is the most important factor regulating interpersonal relationships, since it is easier to notice it from the outside than to control it.

Types of parent-child communication

The way a parent communicates with a child directly affects his future life.

In responsive families, parents and children constantly interact due to which a trusting relationship develops between them.

When a parent constantly monitors a child, controls his SMS and social networks, a hostile type of communication prevails in the family.

With a material-oriented type of communication, parents strive to create material well-being in the family and provide their children with all kinds of benefits, for example, sending them to study at higher institutions.

Children are completely dependent on their parents. And it is extremely important to remember that the well-being of each child is in the hands of his parents.

Levels of interpersonal relationships

Depending on the duration, depth and degree of attachment of the participants, psychologists divide interpersonal relationships into 3 levels:

Perceptual. This level is typical for the very beginning of a relationship. It implies that participants perceive different features and individual characteristics of each other. They may deny it, but their relationships are influenced by appearance, various personality traits, race and gender characteristics.
Level of mutual attraction (or repulsion). Gradually, individuals get used to and become attached to each other (or, conversely, begin to experience antipathy), and the influence of perception weakens. They continue to get to know each other better and look for new ways to interact. If people are unpleasant to each other, but are forced to interact frequently, the hostility between them also increases.
Interactive level. At this level, active emotional interaction between individuals occurs. Each of them feels that they need to exchange emotions, so they look for reasons and create situations in which they can communicate more. People who dislike each other also switch to emotional interaction, which is realized in the form of conflicts that only intensify their dislike.

The family develops the child.

The more parents devote time to their child, the more full-fledged member of society he grows. Thanks to the sensitive attention of mom and dad, any child will develop into a mature personality and will be ready to enter adulthood.

But parents often ignore this fact. Sometimes a child wants to speak out, share, ask for advice, but at that moment the parents are busy with their own affairs and work. And it also happens that a child has only one parent and he cannot give enough attention and love to his baby. Then the child looks for where to make up for the communication lost from an early age.

The child keeps all his experiences inside, begins to withdraw into himself, and then splashes out all his problems on the surrounding society.

Classification of interpersonal relationships

Interpersonal relationships are any form of interaction between individuals. Depending on the place each of them plays in society and how they are related to each other, several main types of relationships can be distinguished:

Formal (official). Such relations are usually regulated by certain norms, rules, regulations, instructions or other documents. Participants in such relationships, as a rule, do not have personal attachments, but interact with each other in connection with some official, administrative or other need.
Business (rational). These are interpersonal relationships that involve joint, mutually beneficial activities. Participants in such relationships can distribute responsibilities among themselves so that everyone does their part to achieve a common goal. Also, one of the participants can perform work for another for a fee.
Informal (unofficial). This group includes various relationships that are not regulated by any formal rules. This could be, for example, friendly or friendly relations, joining teams to play football or volleyball, and so on. As a rule, in informal relationships the emotional component plays some role.
Personal. This is a relationship based on an emotional connection. Typically, personal relationships take a long time to form and develop, during which their participants get to know each other better and get closer. Personal relationships can turn into friendships, companionship, friendships and love. Relationships built on hostility can also be classified as personal, although they develop according to different principles and usually imply that people interact forcedly, and not of their own free will.

It is worth noting that the listed types of interpersonal relationships are not completely independent, but intersect with each other. Thus, business relationships can be formalized to varying degrees, and personal relationships are usually informal (at the same time, marital relationships imply formalization and the consolidation of certain obligations).

Patterns of behavior in relationships.

Patterns (or strategies) of interactions in relationships differ. Basically, the centers of their differences are the goals set by each person, the methods of achieving them, and the peculiarities of influencing each other in the process. In total, there are 5 main tactics.

Cooperation.

In cooperation, people's goals can be both common and different, but not contradictory. At the same time, the participants necessarily help each other move towards the end point, not forgetting about their needs and guidelines. This is the best option for interaction, as it allows you to take care of another person without violating your own principles. And the result is a goal achieved.

In order for cooperation to be effective and to take place at all, it is important to observe the 5 components of a healthy relationship, which have already been written about in the first paragraph. In addition, it is based on complete reciprocity, since the efforts of one party will not be enough. Then cooperation will turn into altruism, which will be discussed later.

Individualism.

Individualism is movement towards personal goals without taking into account the interests and needs of a partner. In this case, the landmark or end point may be identical. However, partners, despite the benefits of working together, prefer to move alone.

A typical example is the heads of competing companies. They can join forces and enter into a partnership to achieve more together. However, they choose competition to single-handedly take first place in their niche. Individualism is also chosen by both parties if one of them refuses to cooperate when the other has a desire (refusal of altruism).

Compromise.

In modern psychology, in contrast to the theories of the twentieth century, it is generally accepted that compromise is not a solution to the problem. This is a mutual voluntary sacrifice of part of one’s interests for the sake of the “common good.” How does this manifest itself in everyday life?

Conditions . Spouses have different interests and weekend plans. The wife wants to go to the theater or any other cultural institution together. My husband wants to relax in nature.
Solution . As a result of the conversation, the spouses agree to compromise - to spend some weekends according to the woman’s plan, others according to the man’s plan.
Problem . Every second weekend, one of the spouses is forced to endure an unloved activity. Over time, the situation heats up, discontent accumulates, it becomes harder to adapt, and conflicts arise.

There are two solutions: either the spouses find an option for cooperation, that is, they avoid sacrifices (for example, she goes to the theater with her friends, he goes on a hike with colleagues), or constant quarrels will lead to a breakup or a negative form of the relationship.

Altruism.

Altruism in this context is helping an opponent achieve his goals while ignoring or abandoning his own. That is, this is one-sided assistance, making their altruist a victim of the situation at his own request.

Usually, the patience and selflessness of altruists do not last long in personal relationships and do not appear at all in business relationships. The only exceptions are spiritual, consciously platonic, sublime relationships. However, they appeal to few people.

Differences between interpersonal relationships and social ones

Essentially, all types of human relationships can be divided into two categories: interpersonal and social. If interpersonal relationships are the direct interaction of specific individuals among themselves, then social relationships imply various forms of interaction within the framework of public life. In essence, social relationships are relationships between the social roles of individuals (between a doctor and a patient, a taxi driver and a passenger).

An important difference between social relationships and interpersonal relationships is that they are regulated and subject to certain rules, depending on the social roles of the individuals participating in them. This implies that the individuals themselves are depersonalized, and only their functions in society or within a specific social group are considered (manager and subordinate, taxi driver and passenger, parents and child).

Interpersonal relationships always involve interaction between specific individuals, taking into account all their individual characteristics. Social roles can also be taken into account, but not necessarily. The most characteristic differences include the following features of interpersonal interaction:

feelings, experiences and emotional assessments of the participants play a significant role;
they form and develop rather slowly (whereas social relationships arise immediately, for example, when hiring);
they are constantly developing and changing (whereas social ones are usually static and change only under the influence of external factors, for example, when promoted).

Despite the presence of a very obvious difference, a clear boundary between social and interpersonal relationships cannot be drawn, since they intersect with each other. This is how colleagues often become friends, and office romances often arise between them. Marriage combines both types of relationships, since it is initially based on love, but at the same time implies formalization and certain social roles.

Birth of a baby and role position.

The great Austrian psychologist Freud identified an interesting pattern. He discovered that the older a child gets, the more responsibility he takes on.

Older siblings often notice that parents show more attention and love to their younger children precisely because they are the youngest.

If a child has no brothers and sisters and grows up alone in a family, he does not have any problems with self-esteem. But children from large families often suffer due to a whole bunch of complexes. So children have to constantly fight for the attention and love of their parents. And if one of the kids receives less attention, they begin to suffer. In the future, such children continue to fight for the attention of others throughout their lives, and sometimes use not the most honest methods to achieve their goals.