FRIENDS AND LOVERS

This article reports the results of two studies looking for evidence o f social norms governing the behavior of college-age heterosexual men and women toward their friend's romantic partners. Respondents read sc enarios describing a protagonist trying to start a relationship with a friend's romantic partner and were asked to rate their approval or di sapproval of that behavior. The studies varied information about the s ex of the protagonist, friend and romantic partner, and the relationsh ip of the romantic partners. Controlling for respondents' race and soc ial class, we found that for both men and women a social norm exists o nly when a third party was viewed as interfering with a couple's relat ionship, which was described as clearly known and shared by all partie s. The lack of a norm when there was ambiguity about the level of comm itment between romantic partners is interpreted as the result of confl ict among three alternative ideologies of loving relationships.