Course Description
Students will learn how to improve their own relationships by
studying the science behind relationships: the good, the bad,
the ugly, and how to fix it when it is not working. Students
will explore what draws people together, the processes in how
they either stay together or break up, and both the advantages
and disadvantages to learning how to be in a relationship in a
contemporary context.
Athena Title
Intimate Relationships
Equivalent Courses
Not open to students with credit in HDFS 3930E
Prerequisite
HDFS 2100 or HDFS 2100H or HDFS 2100E or PSYC 1101 or PSYC 1030H or PSYC 1101E or SOCI 1101 or SOCI 1101H
Semester Course Offered
Offered fall and spring
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Student Learning Outcomes
- Students will select appropriate theories and methods used to generate knowledge about intimate relationships.
- Students will identify and discuss the basic processes of forming and maintaining relationships.
- Students will discuss the process by which relationships are dissolved and enhanced.
- Students will prepare high-quality oral and written presentations regarding the current fund of knowledge about interpersonal relationships.
- Students will apply knowledge about the influences on relationships, such as gender, personality, conflict, relationship beliefs, and meaning making in relationships, as well as how power and violence are manifested in relationships.
Topical Outline
- Couples research
- Theories that inform relationship science
- Gendered power
- Attraction
- Personality's influence on relationships
- Communication in couples
- Couple conflict
- Relationship beliefs
- Meaning making in relationships
- Relationship stressors
- Friendships
- Couple maintenance and interventions
- Dating in the digital age
