ON-LINE RELATIONAL MAINTENANCE STRATEGIES AND PERCEPTIONS OF PARTNERS WITHIN EXCLUSIVELY INTERNET-BASED AND PRIMARILY INTERNET-BASED RELATIONSHIPS

The fourth research question asked whether perceptions of similarity, quality of communication, and relational communication among people maintaining EIB relationships differed in terms of the type of on-line relationship a person has and how frequently he or she communicated with his or her on-line partner. As with the third research question, the researcher limited the analysis to friendship and acquaintance relationships. A series of 2 × 8 ANOVAs were conducted using type of on-line relationship (acquaintance or friendship) as one factor and frequency of interaction (daily, weekly, or monthly) as independent variables and each perception of relational partners (similarity, quality of communication, and relational communication) as the dependent variable.

In terms of attitude similarity, the ANOVAs indicated that, for people within EIB relationships, there was a significant interaction effect between type of on-line relationship and frequency of interaction, F (2, 55) = 6.64, p .05, or frequency of interaction, F(I, 55) = 1.88, p > .05. A post hoc analysis showed that people in EIB relationships who interacted with an on-line acquaintance on a daily basis had higher attitude similarity scores (M = 24.16; SD = 4.30) than those who interacted with an on-line friend on a daily basis (M = 16.75; SD = 4.80), but individuals in EIB relationships who communicated with an on-line friend on a weekly basis had higher attitude similarity scores (M = 19.85; SD = 3.99) than participants who interacted with an on-line acquaintance on a weekly basis (M = 18.00; SD = 4.49). In other words, participants in EIB relationships who talked daily to on-line acquaintances perceived their partner to be more similar in terms of attitudes than people who talked with on-line friends on a daily basis. However, people who talked only on a weekly basis with on-line friends felt they were more similar to their partner than people who talked to an acquaintance on only a weekly basis.

Similarly, as far as background similarity was concerned, the ANOVAs revealed that, for people within EIB relationships, there was a significant interaction effect between type of on-line relationship and frequency of interaction, F (2, 55) = 3.25, p .05, or frequency of interaction, F (2, 55) = .18, p > .05. Much like the findings for attitude similarity, the post hoc analysis indicated that people in EIB relationships who interacted with an on-line acquaintance on a daily basis had higher background similarity scores (M= 21.83; SD = 7.33) than those who interacted with an on-line friend on a daily basis (M = 14.62; SD = 3.88), but individuals in EIB relationships who communicated with an on-line friend on a weekly basis had higher background similarity scores (M = 19.95; SD = 5.64) than participants who interacted with an on-line acquaintance on a weekly basis (M = 18.16; SD = 5.60). Like attitude similarity, people who talked daily with on-line acquaintances perceived their partner to be more similar than people who talked to friends on a daily basis, but people who talked to on-line friends on a weekly basis perceived their partner to be more similar in terms of background than people who talked weekly to an on-line acquaintance.