PLEASURE AND PAIN IN DOING WELL, TOGETHER - AN INVESTIGATION OF PERFORMANCE-RELATED AFFECT IN CLOSE RELATIONSHIPS

In a series of four studies, the self-evaluation maintenance (SEM) mod el is used to predict peoples' self-reported affective responses to do ing better or worse than their partners. Both self-protective reaction s to comparison (i.e., those predicted by the original SEM model) and empathic reactions to the partner's response (i.e., those predicted by the extended SEM model) were obtained. In addition, as predicted on t he basis of both models, comparisons with romantic partners resulted i n a different pattern of self-reported affect than did comparisons wit h strangers. Unexpectedly, it appeared that empathic effects were mini mal or absent among dating partners when comparisons were in areas of high self-relevance.