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How late-adolescent friends share stories about relationships: The importance of mitigating the seriousness of romantic problems

University of West Georgia, Nkorobov{at}westga.edu

Avril Thorne

University of California - Santa Cruz

This narrative study explored how late adolescents (N = 64 dyads) jointly told stories about romantic relationships during casual conversations with same-sex friends. Stories about romantic problems were four times more prevalent than stories about romantic nonproblems, and relationship instability was the most frequent type of romantic problem. Furthermore, discussions of romantic problems (versus nonproblems) were particularly likely to be softened or mitigated by projecting a detached, relaxed, or unknowing stance. Case studies of such conversational mitigation vividly illustrate how these primarily White, heterosexual, late adolescents conavigated the vagaries of developing serious and intimate bonds without appearing too invested or troubled by their romantic problems. The findings have implications for understanding the co-construction of social and personal identities.

Key Words: discourse • identity • late adolescence • mitigation • narratives • problems • romantic relationships • stories

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Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, Vol. 24, No. 6, 971-992 (2007)
DOI: 10.1177/0265407507084193


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This Article Abstract Free Full Text (Free PDF) Free Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in Web of Science Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Korobov, N. Articles by Thorne, A. Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?