Relationship Matrix: A Social Psychological Approach

Relationship(s) are purely a choice, except those blood relations that are by chance. There are different people that we meet in our life and get acquainted to, attracted to, attached to and sometimes aversive too. Sociometry is the study of human connectedness. Sociometry is based on the fact that people make choices in interpersonal relationships. Whenever people gather, they make choices - where to sit or stand; choices about who is perceived as friendly and who not, who is central to the group, who is rejected, who is isolated. As Moreno (1953) says, “Choices are fundamental facts in all ongoing human relations, choices of people and choices of things. It is immaterial whether the motivations are known to the chooser or not; it is immaterial whether [the choices] are inarticulate or highly expressive, whether rational or irrational. They do not require any specialjustification as long as they are spontaneous and true to the self of the chooser. Each and every relationship is hence different and knowing them they are different and handling these differences is a greatest challenge in life. If we understand that each one is different to us, it has to be clearly manifested in the way we treat them, greet them or relate with them. In a relationship (especially intimate ones) we fail most of the time to make our loved ones feel that they are loved and they are special. Failing to do this either would end up in others having a set of expectations from us, which we may not or do not want to fulfill and/or we would end up in not differentiating our near and dear ones from a mere acquaintances or associates. When we can handle different relationships, we will be able to handle differences in relationship(s), since we know the importance or level of intimacy of that relationship(s) to us The concept of 'personal space' in social psychology talks more about placing different people at different physical distances. This paper attempts to build a model (based on several social psychology theories) on human relationships by classifying different relationships, based on the importance, intimacy and emotional connect/bonding with which we see that relationship(s).