Awareness and equity of behavioral sacrifice and same‐sex relationship quality: Heterosexist discrimination as a distal predictor

• Published date: 01 December 2023
• Author: Xiaomin Li,Zhenqiang Zhao,Melissa Curran,W. Roger Mills‐Koonce,Hongjian Cao
• Date: 01 December 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12854

RESEARCH

Awareness and equity of behavioral sacrifice

and same-sex relationship quality: Heterosexist

discrimination as a distal predictor

Xiaomin Li

1

|Zhenqiang Zhao

2

|Melissa Curran

3

|

W. Roger Mills-Koonce

4

|Hongjian Cao

5

1

Department of Applied Social Sciences,

The Hong Kong Polytechnic University,

Hong Kong

2

Department of Psychology, Fordham

University, New York, NY

3

Department of Family Studies and Human

Development, University of Arizona,

Tucson, AZ

4

Department of Human Development and

Family Studies, School of Education,

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,

Chapel Hill, NC

5

Applied Psychology Program, School of

Humanities and Social Science, The Chinese

University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen),

Shenzhen, China

Correspondence

Hongjian Cao, Applied Psychology Program,

School of Humanities and Social Science, The

Chinese University of Hong Kong (Shenzhen),

No. 2001 Longxiang Boulevard, Longgang

District, Shenzhen, China 518172.

Email: caohongjian1020@gmail.com

Funding information

Preparation of this article was supported by

funding from the National Institute of Child

Health and Human Development (NICHD;

1K01 HD075833-01, principal investigator:

W. Roger Mills-Koonce) and by funding from

the American Psychological Foundation’s 2015

Roy Scrivner Research Grant (principal

investigator: Hongjian Cao).

Abstract

Objectives: We included two sacrifice constructs to reflect

the awareness and (in)equity of behavioral sacrifice in

same-sex relationships: (a) the receiver’s awareness (whether

the receiver under-, over-, or unbiasedly estimated the

other’s frequency of sacrifice behaviors) and (b) the pro-

vider’s perceived (in)equity (whether the provider perceived

themselves as underbenefitted, overbenefitted, or equitably

treated). We then tested how heterosexist discrimination

related to same-sex couples’relationship quality via

receivers’awareness and providers’perceived (in)equity.

Background: Sacrifices are pro-relationship efforts in

which individuals forgo self-interests for the partner or the

relationship. The links from sacrifice to same-sex couples’

relationship quality are still understudied. Further, no

study has examined whether sexual minority stressors

relate to sacrifice in same-sex relationships.

Method: We used dyadic, survey data from 141 same-sex

couples and conducted actor–partner interdependence

models.

Results: For receivers’awareness, unbiased estimation and

overestimation were related to higher relationship quality;

underestimation was related to lower relationship quality.

For providers’perceived (in)equity, being underbenefitted—

a situation in which individuals perceived that the other

made fewer sacrifices than they did—was related to lower

relationship quality. For indirect pathways, when one indi-

vidual encountered heterosexist discrimination, this individ-

ual’s sacrifice was likely underestimated by the receiver; in

turn, this individual’s partner experienced low relationship

quality.

Received: 25 February 2022Revised: 18 August 2022Accepted: 1 January 2023

DOI: 10.1111/fare.12854

© 2023 National Council on Family Relations.

3100 Family Relations. 2023;72:3100–3116.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/fare

Conclusions: To better understand sacrifice and relation-

ship quality for same-sex couples, heterosexist discrimina-

tion should be considered.

Implications: Interventions are needed when practitioners

work with same-sex couples who feel that their sacrifices

were underestimated, and efforts are still needed to reduce

heterosexist discrimination.

KEYWORDS

heterosexist discrimination, relationship quality, sacrifice, same-sex

couples

Sacrifices are often considered as prosocial behaviors in which individuals can choose to forgo

their own immediate self-interest for the sake of the partner or the relationship (Righetti &

Impett, 2017). Providing the two partners the opportunity to demonstrate care and love for

each other, sacrifices theoretically should bode well for couple relationships (Kelley, 1979). Yet

according to a meta-analysis of 82 data sets (Righetti, Sakaluk, et al., 2020) and a narrative

review (Righetti et al., 2022), results for whether sacrifice is beneficial are more nuanced. Spe-

cific to behavioral sacrifice, which can be defined as whether a sacrifice has occurred and

assessed as an occurrence of daily behavior or a frequency of behavior over a longer period

(Righetti, Sakaluk, et al., 2020), its implications for receivers’and providers’well-being are

complex. To explain such nuances, we put forward two explanations.

The first explanation is specific to receivers’awareness—more specifically, the general ten-

dency of receivers’underestimation—of behavioral sacrifices. For example, 50% of sacrifices

were missed by receivers, and these missed sacrifices were then associated with lower relation-

ship satisfaction (Visserman et al., 2019). The second explanation is specific to providers’per-

ceived (in)equity of behavioral sacrifices. Sacrifice providers often expect the other to pay them

back (Kelley, 1979; Righetti, Schneider, et al., 2020). When providers felt underbenefitted—a

situation in which individuals perceived that the other made fewer sacrifices than they did—

lower relationship quality was reported (Lan et al., 2017). The predictive roles of providers’per-

ceived (in)equity were identified after controlling for the total amount and actual (in)equity of

the two partners’behavioral sacrifice, and the actual (in)equity was not related to relationship

quality (Lan et al., 2017). Notably, receivers’awareness and providers’perceived (in)equity of

behavioral sacrifices should link to relationship quality for different theoretical considerations.

Thus, we considered associations between receivers’awareness and relationship quality and also

examined associations between providers’perceived (in)equity and relationship quality.

Besides, it should be noted that—even though sexual minority individuals have been

included in studies on sacrifices (i.e., 50% of 82 samples in a meta-analysis included some indi-

viduals or couples from sexual minority communities; Righetti, Sakaluk, et al., 2020)—only

one study focused explicitly on sacrifices in sexual minority couple relationships (Cooper

et al., 2017). As distinctions between heterosexual cisgender relationships (hereafter referred to

as heterosexual couples and relationships) and same-sex relationships, same-sex couples often

experience greater relational ambiguity and create different scripts for how each partner con-

tributes to the relationship (Monk & Ogolsky, 2019). To better understand the implications of

sacrifices for sexual minority populations, we used a sample of same-sex couples.

Interdependence theory: Receivers’awareness and relationship quality

Guided by the attributional proposition from interdependence theory, when relational part-

ners were asked to estimate each other’s contributions to pro-relationship activities, efforts

DISCRIMINATION, SACRIFICE, AND SAME-SEX COUPLES3101