Report 2:

The Unity Model of Marriage:

Sex, Love, and Marriage

By Sean Mosier

The instructions for this report are found at:

www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/409b-g26-report2.htm

I am answering Questions 6, 11, 7, 8, and 4.

Introduction

In this report, I will be answering four of the questions posed to us by Dr. Leon James at: www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/409b-g26-report2.htm; the questions I will be answering (in order) are 6, 11, 7, 8, and 4. Then, I will be summarizing two reports from generation 26 – reports done by Annette Akaveka and Kaysha Blow at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2007/akaveka/akaveka-409b-g26-report1.htm and http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2007/blow/blow-409b-g26-report1.htm respectively. And finally, I will be writing a section, giving advice to future generations of Psy 409 students, as well as telling them what important lessons they’ll be learning. For now, I’ll return to the first part of my report, answering the questions.

A. Q&A

The Question I am answering is Question 6:

Question 6:

(a) Consider Section 5.1 Sexuality: Love of the Sex vs. Love of One of the Sex  in the Lecture Notes 
www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/409b-g26-lecture-notes.htm#sexuality 
Describe the difference between the two types of loves as explained there.

(b) Go to Dr. Phil's Web site www.drphil.com/shows/show/378 and look at the synopsis of his advice to several women who are seeking his advice on how they can improve their sexual relationship with their husbands. As for example here: www.drphil.com/slideshows/slideshow/2009/?id=2009&isTip=&slide=1&null=null  
You can also look at some other materials by him. Now analyze Dr. Phil's approach to sexuality in relation to your answer in (a).

(c) State your conclusions and recommendations.

(a) Consider Section 5.1 Sexuality: Love of the Sex vs. Love of One of the Sex in the Lecture Notes 
www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/409b-g26-lecture-notes.htm#sexuality 
Describe the difference between the two types of loves as explained there.

Love of the sex belongs to our “hellish mind or lower nature”. Love of the sex is non-exclusive, and doesn’t contain mental intimacy. This form of love is a natural love that we have in common with animals. In loving this sex without intimacy, you are saying that you love the pleasure you receive when having sex with whoever is available. It doesn’t matter who you are doing it with, as long as you derive pleasure from it. When a man fantasizes about having sex with various other women, he distance himself from his wife, and his sexuality can’t achieve intimacy with his wife. These types of thoughts can also be called natural-sensuous thoughts and desires, and can occur spontaneously. However, if the man wants to develop an exclusive relationship with a woman, he must learn to reject these thoughts when they pop into his head.

Exclusive love of one of the sex includes an intimate sexual relationship with one person. This form of sexuality belongs to our “heavenly mind or higher nature”. Exclusive love has several phases: at Phase 1 sexuality, the sensorimotor system predominates where they are physically intimate, but have not reached cognitive or affective unity. At Phase 2 sexuality, the couple shares their thoughts and plans, and now intimacy involves both the cognitive and sensorimotor self. However, the sensorimotor sexual activity’s intimacy increases as cognitive intimacy intertwines with sensorimotor intimacy. And at Phase 3 sexuality, the couple shares their feelings and emotions, and now they have reached affective intimacy. Now all three phases (affective, cognitive, and sensorimotor) interact to enhance sexual pleasure.

While love of the sex was natural and common with animals, exclusive love of one of the sex is intimate and spiritual, limited to humans. That’s because exclusive love is to love one person sexually rather than whoever is convenient. This is done at the spiritual-sensuous part of your mind, where exclusive love and sex solidifies the union between husband and wife. As a couple progresses through the phases of sexuality and achieves the unity phase of marriage, the couple becomes a conjoint self. Because of the deep level of affective, cognitive, and sensorimotor intimacy at this phase, it produces the most pleasurable sensual experiences as the couple’s sex reaches it’s full potential. At this phase the couple’s relationship becomes spiritual and eternal. They have reached conjugial love, which is a spiritual marriage that bonds the couple together in a spiritual marriage. This spiritual level of their relationship is eternal because the spiritual marriage carries on into the afterlife.

(b) Go to Dr. Phil's Web site www.drphil.com/shows/show/378 and look at the synopsis of his advice to several women who are seeking his advice on how they can improve their sexual relationship with their husbands. As for example here: www.drphil.com/slideshows/slideshow/2009/?id=2009&isTip=&slide=1&null=null 
You can also look at some other materials by him. Now analyze Dr. Phil's approach to sexuality in relation to your answer in (a).

In the slides that showcase Dr. Phil’s advice pertaining to sex in marriage, I chose “More Adventurous Sex” (http://www.drphil.com/slideshows/slideshow/2010/?id=2010&null=null) which discussed the problem of a woman, Kelli, who has been married for 14 years. This woman wants to be intimate with her husband, Dan, but she gave into his fantasy of a threesome. However, she wasn’t really into it, she did it for her husband. Now he constantly asks for it when she no longer wants to do it. Because the wife doesn’t want to give in again, they are constantly fighting about it.

The husband here tries to claim that because of the threesome, the wife made him feel like he was loved, and that she would do anything for him. However, because she wouldn’t commit to another one Dan said he feels “teased” and is “fed up”. The husband had leukemia and was undergoing treatment for 9 years. Dr. Phil mentioned that Dan uses that against Kelli, telling her “who knows how long I’ll be here?” to get his way. And if that wasn’t bad enough, Dan gave her a 30 day deadline to find another woman for the threesome or he’s walking out on her.

When Dr. Phil starts asking about why it’s so important to the husband that he has a threesome, Dan mentioned that they had started talking about it because it was his fantasy. When he originally told Kelli about the threesome, he said that she was interested, and now that she’s backing out of it, he feels like he was misled. When Dr. Phil asked Kelli about if she wanted a threesome, she said that she didn’t, but that she would do it to make her marriage work because she wanted to give her husband everything he wants.

Dr. Phil said that giving into the threesome just to please the husband is wrong. When Dan said that he would be OK with Kelli bringing another man into the bedroom if she wanted it, Dr. Phil said that “You don’t ever solve a relationship problem by turning away from your partner.” This is very much in line with what I’ve learned in “Sexuality: Love of the Sex vs. Love of One of the Sex”. The husband right now is only focused on “love of the sex” or non-exclusive love. He desires not only to have sex with his wife, but with another woman as well. Because this is no longer exclusive sex for his wife, they can no longer have an intimate sexual relationship.

Dr. Phil again asked Dan why it was so important to him that he have a threesome. Now Dan admits that he wants it because he feels he isn’t getting enough sex. He said that he wants to have sex multiple times, but Kelli always wants to stop after the first time. Dan then says that at least in a threesome there is someone else who he have sex with. He further points out that Kelli never mentioned that the threesome bothered her. In addition, Dan complains that they’ve been having sex problems for 10 years. This further proves my point. Because the husband is focused on “love of the sex” he cannot give his wife exclusive sex, and they cannot have an intimate sexual relationship. It only makes sense that the wife, who cannot deal with her husband’s “love of the sex” cannot feel intimate with her husband sexually. And of course, without intimacy, their sex loses meaning. This easily explains why Kelli always wants to stop after giving in the first time.

Dr. Phil’s advice is for Kelli to “grow a backbone” and not give into her husband’s threesome. Dr. Phil said that from what he can tell, the wife loves her husband a lot, and feels guilty about something that they went through earlier. So to reconcile, she’s doing anything he asks, thinking that “If I loved him I would…” Dr. Phil says that that mentality is unhealthy, regardless of whether he’s giving her the guilt trip, or she’s putting it on herself. This is fairly good advice, because according to the unity model, the last thing that the wife or husband striving for unity could want is non-exclusive sex. Non-exclusive sex means no physical or sexual intimacy. And without intimacy at the sensorimotor, cognitive, and affective self, you can’t achieve unity.

Dr. Phil further recommends that because the couple has different sexual appetites, that they communicate more so that they reach an understanding. Once again, he emphasized that they shouldn’t be bringing another person into the bedroom, but should instead find ways to spice up their own sex life. Although Dan continued to complain about being “misled” by Kelli, Dr. Phil said that she simply changed her mind. He also said that Dan shouldn’t dwell in the past, and should instead talk with Kelli so that they can come up with a plan for the future.

This was also pretty good advice for the most part. Dr. Phil mentioned that they shouldn’t bring another person into their sex life (again), which completely agrees with the section I read. In addition, he says that they should try and work together to find a compromise in their sex life that they’re both comfortable with. This was also important advice. And, Dr. Phil seemed to advocate that the couple talk more about sex and their thoughts about it.

(c) State your conclusions and recommendations.

In the end, I was kind of surprised. Dr. Phil’s advice seemed rather good, and close to what I had read in the lecture notes. Although he didn’t explicitly state that the husband and wife should be striving for affective and cognitive intimacy, he did mention that they needed to talk more about their feelings and thoughts about sex, and that they needed to find a compromise that both would be comfortable with. He also was very much against the non-exclusive sex that is the complete opposite of unity.

I would have to recommend that the couple should listen to the advice that Dr. Phil gave on this subject. By objecting to non-exclusive sex, and promoting the couple getting closer on the subject of sex (both in ideas and feelings), Dr. Phil gave the impression of actually trying to bring the couple closer together in unity (although this isn’t always the case).

In addition, he suggested that the couple should be talking about what they want out of the relationship, sexually so that they can reach an understanding. And I would recommend this as well. As long as the couple can understand each other’s perspective, an understanding can be reached. All it takes is the time and effort to reach that understanding.

A little outside of the scope of section 5.1, was that in another one of our lecture notes readings, we learned that the woman will not want to have sex because of the sexual blackmail the husband imposes on the wife. As Dr. Phil mentioned earlier, it seems like the husband laid a guilt trip on the wife about him having been sick, and needing to enjoy life while he can still live it. This sexual blackmail also likely played a role in the wife’s decreased sex drive, and further led to Dan’s unhappiness. If this sexual blackmail was stopped, I’m sure their relationship would also see an improvement.

The Question I am answering is Question 11:

Question 11:

(a) Inspect the Outlines written by students for this course for G25, G24, and G23 (see Prior Generations link on Class Home Page). Select  a total of 15 Related Links (or more), along with the annotations given, that are found at the end of each Outline, choosing them in such a way that you can organize them into three distinct topic areas, with five links in each.

(b) Copy and paste the three sets of five links into your report, arranged according to the three topics you made up. Put the title of your topic in Bold, then the five links underneath. Then list the Web addresses of the reports from which you selected the 15 links, along with the student authors.

(c) Give a coherent explanation of how the three topics you constructed fit together in relation to the Lecture Notes.

(a) Inspect the Outlines written by students for this course for G25, G24, and G23 (see Prior Generations link on Class Home Page). Select a total of 15 Related Links (or more), along with the annotations given, that are found at the end of each Outline, choosing them in such a way that you can organize them into three distinct topic areas, with five links in each.

“How to Have a Successful Marriage”, “Sex”, and “Discourse”

(b) Copy and paste the three sets of five links into your report, arranged according to the three topics you made up. Put the title of your topic in Bold, then the five links underneath. Then list the Web addresses of the reports from which you selected the 15 links, along with the student authors.

How to Have a Successful Marriage

· http://www.ivillage.co.uk/relationships/marriage/marlife/articles/0,,154_534732-1,00.html from Bao Mien Lau’s Outline 2 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2006/lau/lau-outline2.htm from Generation 24

· http://www.marriagemissions.com/married_men/what_every_husband.php from Dayna Hasegawa’s Outline 7 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bf2006/hasegawa/hasegawa-outline7.htm from Generation 25

· http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=1544461&ad=true from Anthony Lagondino’s Outline 2 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2006/lagondino/lagondino-outline2.htm from Generation 24

· http://ezinearticles.com/?How-To-Show-The-Woman-You-Married-That-You-Love-Her&id=122242 from Caitlin Fields’ Outline 5 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bf2006/fields/fields-outline5.htm from Generation 25

· http://www.geocities.com/cleoswife/MyNeeds1.html from Linda Takahashi’s Outline 10 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bf2005/takahashi/Takahashi-outline10.htm from Generation 23

Sex

· http://www.positive-way.com/men,.htm from Tracy Peter’s Outline 3 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bf2005/peters/peters-outline3.htm from Generation 23

· http://www.marsvenus.com/members/articles.php?id=7&text=sex%20and%20affection from Alton Antonio’s Outline 8 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2006/Antonio/antonio-outline8.htm from Generation 24

· http://sheknows.com/about/ from Cynthia Adam’s Outline 10 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2006/adams/adams-outline10.htm from Generation 24

· http://blogs.webmd.com/sexual-health-sex-matters/2006_02_01_sexual-health-sex-matters-archive.html from Tiffany Akiyama’s Outline 4 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bf2006/akiyama/akiyama-outline4.htm from Generation 25

· http://life.familyeducation.com/marriage/sex-counseling/45598.html from Laura Moa’s Outline 5 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bf2006/moa/moa-outline5.htm from Generation 25

Discourse

· http://www.lingutronic.de/Studium/Anglistik/Gender%20Language/Gender%20Language.pdf from Ryken Ako’s Outline 2 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2006/ako/ako-outline2.htm from Generation 24

· http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bf2006/kim/kim-outline6.htm from Paige Kim’s Outline 6 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bf2006/kim/kim-outline6.htm from Generation 24

· http://sheknows.com/about/ from Cynthia Adam’s Outline 10 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2006/adams/adams-outline10.htm from Generation 24

· http://net-burst.net/love/talk.htm from Cynthia Adam’s Outline 7 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2006/adams/adams-outline7.htm from Generation 24

· http://ezinearticles.com/?Communication:-The-Key-To-a-Healthy-Relationship&id=343810 from Paige Kim’s Outline 5 at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bf2006/kim/kim-outline5.htm from Generation 25

(c) Give a coherent explanation of how the three topics you constructed fit together in relation to the Lecture Notes.

The three topics I chose were: “How to Have a Successful Marriage”, “Sex” and “Discourse”. I chose “How to Have a Successful Marriage” because this is part of the aim of the course, and the unity model in general. Of course, the unity model actually goes beyond “having a successful marriage” and instead strives to “have an amazing marriage that lasts through eternity”. However these categories of related links were particularly interesting because there were many related links that gave all kinds of suggestions for how to achieve a successful marriage. Even more interesting is how the advice given can span all the different phases of the unity model of marriage.

For instance here: http://www.ivillage.co.uk/relationships/marriage/marlife/articles/0,,154_534732-1,00.html the author describes secrets to a successful marriage. The first secret seems like a unity value: couples talk about expectations they have of the other person, and if there are disagreements that can’t be overcome (strong religious beliefs, political beliefs, desire/despise of children) then they have to serious wonder whether they should get married or not. If their expectations of each other clash, then they have to keep talking about it until they reach an understanding. However, the very next rule says that: successful married couples keep their individuality. Here, the author says that the couple should have “me” time, hobbies, and even friends. This was the exact opposite thing that we learned in the unity model. The couple should feel like they are one person, and there shouldn’t be this kind of separation, especially if the separation only exists to get away from your spouse.

Other examples of a successful marriage seemed to better fit the unity model: keeping the other person center stage, resolving conflicts well, keeping desire for each other alive, grow and change together, and keep working on your bond together. Many of the links listed under the “How to Have a Successful Marriage” are similar – some of the examples given show true unity values. Others will be equity values, like I showed in the previous paragraph. Some other bits of advice is hopelessly stuck in the dominance phase (Dr. Laura, anyone?). Now that I’ve taken this class, though, I’m better able to categorize the different kinds of advice that’s given, and more importantly, determine which advice is good (unity) and which advice isn’t (equity and dominance).

I chose “Sex” for another topic because regardless of whether you’re in the dominance phase, and want to pleasure yourself, or you’re in the unity phase, and want to pleasure your partner, you’re still thinking about sex. Sex is one of the most important actions humans do – it propagates our species. And for those stuck in non-exclusive, or dominance phase sex, that is about all it does, besides please you. But we have learned that in the unity phase, your affective self and cognitive self enhance sex, making it the best sex ever.

And finally, I chose “Discourse” for two reasons. First, one of the books we had to read dealt with Gender Discourse pretty much exclusively. The second reason that I chose discourse is because discourse, or the “serious discussion between peoples or groups” is very important in relationships. You have to be able to communicate well if you ever hope to understand her, or hope for her to understand you. And of course, being able to communicate your thoughts is key to cognitive intimacy, which is an important stepping stone to affective intimacy, and ultimately, unity.

The Question I am answering is Question 7:

Question 7:

(a) Consider Section 17a. Gender Discourse Within the Three Models in the Lecture Notes at
www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/409b-g26-lecture-notes.htm#17a._Gender_Discourse 
Explain in your own words how the conversational style between husband and wife reflects what is going on in the intimacy of their relationship. Make sure you discuss the three phases in relation to conversational style (dominant style, equity style, and unity style).

(b) Create a conversation between them that exhibits several elements mentioned throughout Section 17a regarding the conversational style of married partners. Number the lines. Add whatever explanatory notes are needed for readers to understand what's going on. (Note: you are allowed to use borrowed parts of an actual conversation you heard or read somewhere -- but you need to edit and adapt it so it fits with this answer.)

(c) Analyze the conversation, explaining to readers what its elements exhibit. Use the line numbers to be specific.

(a) Consider Section 17a. Gender Discourse Within the Three Models in the Lecture Notes at
www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/409b-g26-lecture-notes.htm#17a._Gender_Discourse 
Explain in your own words how the conversational style between husband and wife reflects what is going on in the intimacy of their relationship. Make sure you discuss the three phases in relation to conversational style (dominant style, equity style, and unity style).

The way the husband speaks to his wife can show at what phase their relationship is in, and show how deeply intimate they are at the threefold self. In the dominance phase, the relationship is all for him. His physical pleasure, his thoughts, and his feelings all come first. At this phase, the wife can be little more than a trophy or token wife. That’s because here, the husband doesn’t feel like the wife’s thoughts or feelings matter.

This allows him to treat her poorly – he ignores her, fights with her, yells at her, abuses her. This all happens at the sensorimotor self. At the cognitive self, the husband refuses to listen to his wife’s point of view, and instead only cares about what he thinks, instead of his wife’s thoughts. And at the affective self, he has no intention of being intimate with her, but instead loves the feeling of power he gets from controlling her.

As the husband matures, and becomes wiser (hopefully) he begins to see that things aren’t fair the way they are. Although he insists that he wants to make things fair it won’t always turn out that way. At this equity phase, the husband wants to impose his own views, but in a way that gives the woman a chance to get her voice heard. Although she does get to express her views, the husband will vehemently defend his own position. That’s because at this phase, although both have the freedom to express their own opinions, the husband continues to refuse to commit to her completely. While arguing, he may lie or exaggerate his position to sound as if what he is saying is right, when in reality, the wife is right. And worst of all, when backed into a corner, he may revert to acting dominant by yelling at her or insulting her.

And all those problems were only those associated with the sensorimotor self! Even at the cognitive self, the husband tries to maintain a semblance of fairness, but in reality tries to assert his own views as “fair” instead of being impartial. In addition, at the affective self, he insists that it’s fine for both of them to remain independent on some issues and activities. This, however, is independence and the “agree to disagree” attitude is an anti-unity value. To become closer together and reach conjugial “heaven on earth” they must achieve unity.

At the unity phase, the husband finally realizes that the wife should be the focus of his marriage. Because of this, he is very interested in her thoughts and feelings, and tries to do everything he can not to displease her. Because of this, at the sensorimotor self he refrains from arguing with her and instead pays attention to, and cares about what she says. At the cognitive self, he realizes that to achieve unity he must discard his “hellish” thoughts and traits and agree with his wife’s views. And finally, at the affective self, the husband has reached total intimacy with his wife – affective, cognitive, and sensorimotor. He desires nothing more than to make her happy, and she becomes his number one priority.

(b) Create a conversation between them that exhibits several elements mentioned throughout Section 17a regarding the conversational style of married partners. Number the lines. Add whatever explanatory notes are needed for readers to understand what's going on. (Note: you are allowed to use borrowed parts of an actual conversation you heard or read somewhere -- but you need to edit and adapt it so it fits with this answer.)

The following conversation is a spat between a married couple, Laura, and Phil. Phil said that he and his friends were going out on the town for the night. Phil called at 1:00am to say that he would be home “soon” but it’s nearly 3:00am and he still isn’t home. Laura got worried and called the bar he was at last to see if he was okay. However the bartender told her that Phil had left an hour ago, and Phil didn’t say where he was going. Finally, at 3:30am Phil’s car pulls into the driveway, and Laura greets him at the door:

1 Laura: Phil! Where have you been? I’ve been so worried!

2 Phil: I was out with the boys. Why? Is that a problem?

3 Laura: Well you were out much longer than you said you would be, and when I

4 called the bar you said you would be at, they said you weren’t there…

5 Phil: What?! You were checking up on me?! What gives you that right?!!!

6 Laura: Well I was worried – it had been 2 hours since you said you’d be home

7 soon.

8 Phil: What the hell is wrong with you? Two hours isn’t soon enough? I spend all

9 day with you after I get home from work. Two hours seems perfectly fine

10 for a little “me” time.

11 Laura: Well that’s another thing I wanted to talk to you about. I’m worried about

12 the friends you’re hanging out with. They keep you up until late and the

13 next morning you’re always too hung over to go to work. Not to mention

14 that your bar buddies aren’t helping you kick your smoking habit one bit.

15 Phil: What does that have to do with anything? Look, when we got married, we

16 agreed that we would have some time to ourselves, to hang out with our

17 friends, and do whatever we wanted.

18 Laura: That’s not quite right. We agreed that we were going to give each other

19 space when we need it, and support each other the whole way.

20 Phil: So why don’t you support the time I want to use to be with my friends and

21 have some fun?

22 Laura: Look Phil, you know what I mean. We need to be able to reach a point

23 where you don’t feel compelled to have to leave me and go drinking. We

24 need to be happy together.

25 Phil: And what about my happiness when I’m with my friends? I’m not giving up

26 my “free time” outside of the house, and that’s that.

27 Laura: Phil, please, you’re being unreasonable…

28 Phil: I’m being unreasonable?! I’m being perfectly fair. We each need to have our

29 “alone” time. I’m just spending it with my friends.

30 Laura: That’s what I’m saying. We shouldn’t need our “alone” times anymore.

31 Phil: Whether you think you need your alone time is up to you. I know that I still

32 want it, and I still need it, and I’m going to keep taking it.

After this part of the fight, Phil storms back out of the house, and decides to stay at his friend’s place (unmarried friend, of course) until his wife “wises up.”

(c) Analyze the conversation, explaining to readers what its elements exhibit. Use the line numbers to be specific.

This conversation touches on a little of everything. In Line 1, Laura is rather concerned about where Phil was because he was out late. But at Line 2, Phil shows defensiveness about his “alone” time out with the boys. When in lines 3-4 Laura showed that she was so worried about Phil that she called the bar he was supposed to be at, Phil showed irritation because he felt she was trying to restrict his freedom. And then at line 8, after Laura explained she was only concerned about his safety, he continued to take her statement as a restriction on his freedom. Because he was angry, he lashed out and swore at her.

In lines 11-14, Laura also tries to warn Phil about his friends – her woman’s intuition had told her that they’re bad news. However, Phil deflects this by changing to topic, and then in line 15 he exaggerates their prior agreement to support each other in whatever way is best, and warps it into an excuse for getting away from her, and in lines 20 and 21 he does it again. In lines 22-24, Laura struggles to repair the rift that’s forming between them by explaining they need to find happiness with each other, not leave the house to be happy. However, as evident by lines 25-26, Phil puts his friends above his wife because he absolutely refused to listen to her.

In lines 28-29, Phil tries to say that having “alone time”, and spending it with friends that get him into trouble is “fair”. Laura tries once again to teach him that the “alone time” should be something of the past, in line 30, but Phil isn’t having any of that. He absolutely refuses to give up his own “alone time” and despite the pain it was bringing her, he left the house until she decided to agree with him.

Question 8:

(a) In your own words, describe the unity model of marriage and the mental states of the couple's threefold self.

(b) Describe any difficulty or resistance you have experienced regarding the unity model, including

(i) the idea of a unity couple as a higher state of life than all others 
(ii) the eternal significance of marriage 
(iii) Swedenborg's observations of marriages in heaven.

(c) Describe the reactions of friends when you tell them about the unity model and the idea of marriages in heaven as given in the Swedenborg reports.

(d) How has the unity model influenced your thinking? What benefit do you think do class members acquire when studying the unity model in this course? Do you have suggestions on how to teach the unity model to couples, and at what age?

(a) In your own words, describe the unity model of marriage and the mental states of the couple's threefold self.

The unity model of marriage is a model that exemplifies the stages of an exclusive relationship or marriage. According to the unity model of marriage, most couples start with the husband in the dominance phase. As I described earlier, at this phase in the relationship, he is simply thinking about himself. He looks at her as a means to make him happy. The husband’s interactions with his wife occur at three levels – his threefold self. This threefold self is divided into the sensorimotor self, the cognitive self, and the affective self.

The sensorimotor self is the level of physical interactions between the husband and wife. At the sensorimotor self, he fights with his wife when she disagrees with him, so he goes on interrupting her, yelling at her, and insulting her (if not abusing her!) for her “defiance”. At the cognitive self, he believes that she is always wrong when she disagrees with him, and so whatever she thinks isn’t important. And at the affective self, he disregards her feelings and takes pleasure out of controlling her.

In the equity phase of the marriage, the marriage focuses more on rules like taking turns and fairness than it does on one person. Of course, this is the ideal of equity. In reality, “equity” is just a step up from dominance. This is because at the cognitive self, the husband considers his view point the “fair” one, while the wife’s views are either “unjust” or not pertinent to the topic. By locking out the wife’s point of view and thoughts, the husband is hardly being fair.

At the affective self, the husband will insist that his independence is very important to him, and that he can’t give it up. In addition, when he thinks he is right, he will continue to single-mindedly argue with his wife, refusing to relent from the position he finds “fair”. This is awful because it disregards the wife’s feelings just so he can preserve his own beliefs. And finally, the sensorimotor phase strongly reflects of the affective and cognitive phases – because the husband considers his views to be just, at the sensorimotor phase, he will argue with the wife to convince her that he is right – even if he has to lie or exaggerate to do it. In addition, he argues with her to defend his independence, and if he gets angry enough, he’ll revert back to the dominance phase and start insulting her.

If the wife has fought this far through the husband’s terrible behavior, and finally gets him to see the light, the couple has achieved the unity phase. At this phase in the relationship, the husband realizes that he should be focusing on his wife, the love of his life (this is the aforementioned “light”). When this happens, at the affective self, he loves to make the wife happy, and loves reaching full intimacy with her. This invariably affects his cognitive self, because now he isn’t very concerned with his views, but instead focuses on her views, so that he can achieve a deeper intimacy and total unity. This desires to please the wife also shows up at the sensorimotor self, because he would never do or say anything to displease her. Instead he is always kind, attentive, and supportive of what she says and does. Because of this, they can bond, body, mind, and heart in the afterlife, which leads to conjugial heaven.

This conjugial heaven is the bliss associated with being together in the afterlife, with the partner you’ve conjoined to. But you don’t have to die to begin enjoying the rewards of unity! Instead, you enter a “heaven on earth” where you and your partner have achieved peace and bliss in your relationship.

(b) Describe any difficulty or resistance you have experienced regarding the unity model, including


(ii) the eternal significance of marriage 
(iii) Swedenborg's observations of marriages in heaven.

(i) the idea of a unity couple as a higher state of life than all others

Now I had no problems thinking that a couple in unity is a higher state of life than all others. Even when I was in middle school, I gave thought to what an ideal relationship would be like, and the conclusion I reached was so similar to unity, I was surprised when I heard the theory in class. I thought that once a couple achieves this unity, that they could be happy and their lives would be so much better that they can’t even bear the thought of being away from their loved one for too long.

(ii) the eternal significance of marriage

Again, this wasn’t a very difficult concept for me. My family has always been a very spiritual family, and we believe strongly that our ancestors watch over us. Because of this, it wasn’t hard for me to realize that if you have achieved a marriage where your partner is your world, then of course you’ll stay together in the afterlife.

(iii) Swedenborg's observations of marriages in heaven.

I have to admit, I certainly had a hard time with this concept. Using the positive bias was the ultimate challenge in this class. Classical teaching would have be dismiss what Swedenborg observed because it doesn’t follow the golden rule of (negative bias) science: It must be observable, and repeatable under different conditions and with different investigators. Thus, because Swedenborg was the only one who was privilege with being able to observe heaven, the negative bias would tell me that it cannot be proven, and thus I should reject his observations.

.

In this class, we were taught the positive bias, where we don't automatically reject data because it’s not readily observable. In fact, many discoveries by the ancient Greeks were done before they could actually back up their theories with proof – and there are several big examples in science. Democritus is credited by being the father of the atomic theory. One of his major theories was that nothing can be created out of nothing. Anaximander came up with the primary thoughts of evolution. He originally thought that sealife was forced to come ashore and then evolved into land creatures. The list goes on.

As I’ve become more accustomed into thinking about things in the positive bias, I’m starting to see how Swedenborg’s observations could be true. Another major obstacle to believing it is that he, of all people, was chosen to observe this. And only he was able to observe it. Why just one man? Heck, why a man at all? Based on the teachings, I would think that God would choose a woman to learn about conjugial love. After all, knowing that this happiness awaits them will help women put up with their husband and guide them down the right path.

Although, I do suppose it does make some sense to have a man do it – since men would be more likely to listen to a man say that husbands need to listen to, and support, their wives. Although it still doesn’t answer why only on person was picked, at least I’ve come to a reasonable answer as to why Swedenborg may have been picked. Besides being a man, he was a reputable scientist who did many good things for science. So I suppose it stands to reason that because of his clout, more people would listen to what he has to say.

(c) Describe the reactions of friends when you tell them about the unity model and the idea of marriages in heaven as given in the Swedenborg reports.

All of my friends had the same problem with Swedenborg’s observations that I did, although some others also had problems with unity. For example some of my friends could not, and would not believe that the wife could have an “intuition” about them that allows the wife to see things the husband cannot. A couple of my friends outright rejected that they should give up independence to be with their spouse. They, like my brother, argued that the independence would bring new thoughts and ideas to the marriage, making the partner more interesting to be around.

As for marriages in heaven, a majority of my friends were skeptical, but they did like the idea. Because many of my friends are agnostic or atheists, they had a hard enough time believing in the afterlife, much less marriage existing in the afterlife.

(d) How has the unity model influenced your thinking? What benefit do you think do class members acquire when studying the unity model in this course? Do you have suggestions on how to teach the unity model to couples, and at what age?

Unlike most people, I’m sure, the unity model hasn’t radically changed my perceptions, because I had already believed in many elements of the unity model. It did, however, reassure me that others thought the same way I did, and that I was correct in my assumptions. The positive bias that we learned in this class, however, was very interesting, and is something that always has me questioning assumptions we make and don’t make in science.

I believe that the two most important lessons that people learn from this course relate to the positive bias (understanding what it is, and thinking from that perspective), and secondly identifying what is disjunctive and conjunctive acts and discourse. It is a given that many people forget the finer details of things they learn in class over the years. However, essentially everything we’ve done this semester can be boiled down to defining (and then acting on) what is conjunctive versus disjunctive. Disjunctive acts fall into the equity and dominance phase of marriage, and are things we don’t want to do in our marriage. Conjunctive acts fall into the unity phase of marriage, and are things that we want to do in our marriage.

These lessons are things that we will remember for a long time, especially because they’re very different from how we’ve been thinking up until this class. Because these two concepts were practiced often in this class, it makes sense that they have become a part of us now. Heck, I find myself classifying disjunctive and conjunctive behaviors every so often, while I watch romantic comedies.

I think that these concepts are probably best thought by talking to a couple separately, however. Otherwise, the husband is likely to become fixated on his perceived loss of power, and not realize what he’ll be getting out of it. By talking with the wife and teaching her about unity, she can be given the encouragement she needs to hang in there and try harder to teach unity to her husband. In this way, the teacher and the wife would be able to “gang up” on the husband. As the wife tries to teach the husband at home, the teacher would be able to affect the husband when he’s away from his wife.

Teaching the husband separately also confers an additional bonus. If he has questions as to how to treat his wife, or what he is doing wrong, he has someone to talk to about it. If his wife is there, he might feel embarrassed to ask. This said, I think there are really two ideal ages to teach unity at: college (18-25) and middle age (30-40). That’s because such concepts are too hard to understand for high school students to learn in a class. In addition, teenagers are usually more self-centered and care more about themselves than their pattern. As a result, they probably wouldn’t pay attention to the unity model, dismissing it as something that can come later in life.

However, in college, people are out looking for love and their life partner. They want to learn how to make a relationship work, what they’ve been doing wrong, and what they need to do to se things right. The reason I don’t say that anyone from 26-29 should learn is because if they’ve been taught before, when they were between 18-25, and they still haven’t learned, it’s time for some life lessons. After experiencing how things are without unity in the relationship, they will better be able to understand how unity is what they want and need. That is basically the reason I selected the 30-40 year old group as well. Whether you’ve been taught unity before or not, if you’ve been in bad relationships and are still single when you’re 30-40, it’s likely that you’ll be more open to new ideas to keep your marriage alive. Even in Dr. Laura’s book, many of the people who thanked her for her advice (misguided as it may be) made a bigger effort in their second marriage than their first.

Question 4:

(a) Consider Section 21 in the Lecture Notes at
www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/409b-g26-lecture-notes.htm#unity-values .
It gives a selection from an article titled "Secrets to a Happy Marriage." Read and discuss the article.

(b) Are these good instances of unity values or not? Explain.

(c) Search the Web using Google to find advice that is given to couples. Evaluate the advice given in terms of what you know of the unity model of marriage.

(a) Consider Section 21 in the Lecture Notes at
www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/409b-g26-lecture-notes.htm#unity-values .
It gives a selection from an article titled "Secrets to a Happy Marriage." Read and discuss the article.

This article gives what the author calls the first secret to a healthy marriage: there should be full disclosure of money between the couple. He says that love of money is the root of all evil, and that money can put unnecessary pressure on a household. He says that full exposure of monetary assets that you have is necessary – and not just so you don’t lose money if you die unexpectedly. He said that because money is power, full disclosure of money will put the husband and wife on equal footing.

Another reason not to keep hidden accounts is that if (or when) the spouse discovers your hidden account, their trust in you will be broken. By bringing out these hidden accounts, it creates an atmosphere of love, intimacy, and most importantly, trust.

In Part 2, Dr. Trey says that each spouse must develop competent communication skills. He says the spouses must work hard to understand each other, to prevent misunderstandings and rejection. He says that to develop good communication skills, the spouses must talk, and ask each other what they mean. Only by clarifying the intent and purpose behind each others’ statements, will you be able to understand each other better. He continues by saying that without good communication, they would be become distant and confused, and eventually they would drift apart. He finishes by saying that good communication “empowers both spouses in love and harmony”.

The third secret Dr. Trey gives is that you must praise your spouse often. He argues that little annoying habits and little complaints gradually build up to form an “emotional wall” between the husband and wife. To break through this wall of rejection, you must be kind and praise your wife. By praising your wife, you show how much value she has to you, and that can mean all the difference in the world. He goes on to say that every time you complain about your wife in public you do the opposite – you slander your marriage, and lose part of your connection to them because you’re lowering their value to you.

He also cautions that by saying that you should praise the wife, he doesn’t mean that you should lie, or make up something about the spouse. They’re not supposed to be your puppy that you give a treat to when it performs a trick. You need to be praising their actual strengths and abilities, so that you attribute a higher value to them as your partner. And remember not only to praise your spouse when you’re in public – praise them to their face. It’ll help strengthen the emotional bonds in your relationship. And as you praise them daily, you’ll find yourself thinking about them more. In this way, the little things that you go through, that created the emotional wall between the spouses, will seem trivial.

In the fourth part of the Dr. Trey’s series of articles, he says that after you fight, you must reflect on it in a way that honors and respects the spouse. After the most passionate part of the fight is over, make sure you sit down with your spouse and review the fight. At this point, you can learn from the fight, but only if you recognize that the fight is over – there is no need to be “going for blood”. Instead, consider the feelings of your spouse, and take care not to interrupt them, so that you can understand where they’re coming from. By taking this time to review the fight, it can give you a chance to see the issues without all the emotion and drama. In addition, by taking this approach to fights, it will help reduce or eliminate the fear, insecurity, and hurt that cause fights, and thus, you will find that you and your spouse fight less.

For the fifth secret, Dr. Trey calls for a balance between couples who are inseparable and can’t get along without the other, and those couples who only live in the same house and nothing more. He says that finding what he calls “the self in the we” is challenging because just gong off and doing your own thing can leave the partner feeling hurt and rejected. He says that to find this balance, the couple must communicate – only then can they connect with their individual selves without damaging their relationship together.

Dr. Trey goes on to say that if the husband and wife don’t connect with their own selves, then it’ll lead to co-dependence that could end up detrimental to the marriage and family. He clarifies by saying that children need to see their parents pursuing individual activities, because it teaches them that they are two individuals that can work together as a team. He says that it can be bad for marriage when the husband or wife do not communicate that they need their own space, and this can lead to fights, which isn’t good for the marriage.

In the sixth article, Dr. Trey says another secret of marriage is that the dating shouldn’t end after marriage. He explains that after being married for some time, the newness will wear off. When that happens, boredom can set it – and that isn’t good. He says that dating is just the answer to keep the marriage alive, and exciting. The rules for dating (holding hands, opening doors, etc.) are all good rules for marriages, too! He says that dating often is important – and that it should be your top priority.

In Dr. Trey’s final article, he suggests worshipping together to build up spiritual togetherness. He explains that a relationship consists of three parts: physical aspects, the mental aspects, and the spiritual aspects of the relationship. He says that you need all three to have “a sense of wholeness and well being”. He says that because God brought together husband and wife to be partners in life, losing the intimacy that you get when you worship together is a sad thing indeed. He also brings up how difficult it would be if the husband and wife have differing religious beliefs – to solve this, he says that the couple should share their religious beliefs with one another regularly. He concludes that by sharing their religious beliefs, they can find commonalities and connect with each other, and will form a stronger bond.

(b) Are these good instances of unity values or not? Explain.

There are, in fact, many instances of unity values in the material he provided. The first secret to marriage, that the couple shouldn't keep hidden money, was very similar to a unity value we learned in the class. We learned that it is wrong, especially for the husband to keep secrets in the relationship because it creates a part of himself that refuses to conjoin with the wife. By exposing all the money, it shows he has nothing to hide, and that he’s being completely honest and open with her.

In addition, Dr. Trey mentioned that good partners need good communication skills. This, too, is important in unity. It’s important for the couple to understand what the spouse is saying for them to understand each other and reach cognitive intimacy. For the third secret, praising your spouse often, this is especially true in the unity model. The husband should make the wife feel loved and appreciated, and praise is a good way to do just that! Also, Dr. Trey said that complaining about your wife to others is bad – that was actually one of the disjunctive behaviors listed in section 17a. Talking bad about your wife to others hurts not only other’s opinion of your wife, but yours as well – and that causes disjunction

In the fourth part of the article, Dr. Trey says that after a fight, you must together and review the fight. Although this can certainly be a good thing, if the husband’s in the unity phase of marriage, the first thing he should do is make up adequately with his wife. Then they can discuss the issue that caused the argument calmly and hopefully come to a solution. However, if the topic is completely offensive to your wife, or if she’s distraught whenever you bring it up, it’s best to not talk about it.

The fifth secret Dr. Trey gives out is that you need to achieve a balance between a couple that is completely inseparable, and one that is completely aloof. This is completely false. The disadvantages of being inseparable are also completely false. He says that the children need to see the parents working together – well that much is true. And it’s also true that each person can have his or her own hobbies. But if they enjoy doing the same thing together, then they should do it together! By seeing positive and strong unity role models, the children will learn to look for this kind of ideal relationship when they get older.

As for Dr. Trey saying that the couple will eventually try to retain independence, which will lead to rejection and hurt feelings – this too is false. It’s because once the couple has reached the point in the unity phase where they want to be together and do things for one another, they won’t want to be apart! When they’re together, it’s “heaven on earth”… and I can’t recall ever hearing someone wish to go to hell…

In the fifth article, Dr. Trey says that dating shouldn’t end after marriage – and he’s right! This was actually the very first rule of conjugial conversation. Dr. Trey also said in this article that one of the rules in dating relationships is to have a free environment where the partner feels special, loved, and respected – and this is part of rule four of conjugial conversation!

As for the sixth secret, Dr. Trey says that the couple should worship together. Although we’ve talked about overcoming different religious for the sake of unity, it’s really up to the couple as to how they can handle their differing views. However, it is important that they reach some sort of understanding, whether it be that they both practice each other’s religion as well, or that they take turns practicing their religion.

(c) Search the Web using Google to find advice that is given to couples. Evaluate the advice given in terms of what you know of the unity model of marriage.

Here, I is an article entitled “How To Show the Woman You Married that You Love Her” http://ezinearticles.com/?How-To-Show-The-Woman-You-Married-That-You-Love-Her&id=122242

This article gives five pieces of advice to husbands. First of all, they say that you should validate your wife. What this means is that you should be understanding of your wife’s feelings and listen to them without criticizing her. Show her respect for what she does. Accept her. This follows many of the rules of conjugial conversation, including the husband denying himself the right to express disagreement with her and creating a safe environment for her to talk in.

Secondly, you should be more affectionate with your wife. Pay attention to her feelings and rub her back when she needs it, or hold her hand when you’re walking together. This is obviously a unity value because it creates a sense of closeness with your wife.

The third thing this article tells husbands to do is to surprise the wife with some unexpected event, like watching the fireworks, or a candlelight dinner. Basically, make your wife feel special and loved while keeping things fresh. This is similar to the first conversational rule of conjugial interaction: where every day should be like a date, and the fourth rule, where the husband uses conversation to enhance the wife’s mood.

Another thing you should do for your wife, to show her that you love her, is to give the wife the whole day off from working around the house. Let her have some fun with her friends or have a long lunch out. Then when she comes home, make sure she knows she’s appreciated, and be there for her all evening. This too, falls in line with unity values. Doing things for your wife to make her feel special and appreciated will always end up bringing you two closer together. Although did mention that the wife could hang out with her friends while the husband does the housework, I still believe this is a unity value because the husband wants to do these things for his wife, and wants her to enjoy herself.

And the final bit of advice given was appreciate all your wife does. This shows you love, respect, and value her for just being there for you. By understanding your wife’s feelings and acting on them, on a daily basis, you will have a much closer relationship. Of course, this definitely fits inline with the unity values I’ve seen in this class. Loving and respecting your wife is a given in the unity phase, and showing your appreciation for her kind of fits with the fourth rule of conjugal conversation by making her feel young and heart and enhancing her mood. All in all, I believe that I managed to find some pretty good advice. It seems that unity model advice exists in pieces across the internet, so I guess it’s all a matter of finding the right pieces and putting it together, to make a successful marriage. Either that, or you can visit http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/409b-g26-lecture-notes.htm

B. My Report on the Current Generation

In this section, I will be summarizing two reports from my generation, Generation 26. I will be summarizing Annette Akaveka’s report one at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2007/akaveka/akaveka-409b-g26-report1.htm, as well as Kaysha Blow’s report one at http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2007/blow/blow-409b-g26-report1.htm.

Annette Akaveka’s Report One: http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2007/akaveka/akaveka-409b-g26-report1.htm

In Section A: Categorizing the Ennead Chart, Annette created an ennead chart, and then attached a table with the nine zones named, along with a short snippet that is supposed to describe where it came from in the movie. Underneath, she describes a scene in each movie that relates to a zone. For zone 1 (sensorimotor dominance), she wrote about Rafi and David arguing in the movie Prime, and Eddie controlling the keys for the lemonade stand in the movie Five People You Meet in Heaven. In Zone 2, she describes David avoiding Rafi’s question as Cognitive Dominance in Prime. For a Zone 3 (affective dominance) example she uses Prime again, and relates that when Rafi is upset at David’s mother for not telling Rafi that she knew Rafi was having a relationship with her son, that David defended his mother and tried to joke about the situation.

As an example of sensorimotor equity (zone 4), Annette talks about when Rafi asked David to take her to a club that he usually goes to. From the movie Five People You Meet in Heaven, she also described that when Eddie didn’t want to dance with Marguerite after getting married, because of his bum leg, Marguerite stared at him and then he agreed. At zone 5 (cognitive equity) in the movie Prime Rafi asks David to avoid talking about his mom when on a date. And in Five People You Meet in Heaven, an example was given where Eddie was about to ship out to Vietnam, and Marguerite stopped Eddie from asking her to wait for him. And as an example of affective equity (zone 6) she gave the scene where David apologizes to Rafi for sleeping with a coworker. And in Five People You Meet in Heaven, she give the example of Marguerite offering to fix Eddie food at 4 in the morning after a nightmare, but he tells her to go back to sleep.

In zone 7, sensorimotor unity, Annette describes the scene where David agrees to have a child with Rafi because it is what she wants, however, she refuses. Another example given is where Marguerite takes Eddie back to their old wedding reception hall, and they dance. Exemplifying cognitive unity (zone 8), David’s willingness to have a child with Rafi just because she wants it shows how much he loves her. And from Five People You Meet in Heaven, she relates the scene where Eddie dies, and meets Marguerite in the afterlife, and then they embrace and kiss. And finally, the example for affective unity is when the fifth person he was supposed to meet in the afterlife takes him back to Marguerite, and they embrace and ride the Ferris Wheel.

Annette then goes on to summarize Prime, saying that in the end, Rafi and David go their separate ways, but there is still that hint of mutual love and respect. And for Five People You Meet in Heaven, she summarizes it as a story where Eddie has to learn that his life has not be inconsequential, and to do that, he is taught by people from his past.

In Section B, Annette looked at AUV (anti unity values) in the Media that was discussed by previous generations, and then gave her reactions to what the previous generations said. Laura Moa and Annette both agreed that stereotyping that occurs in the media, and subliminal messages in advertisements, affects the younger generations. As for Tiffany Akiyama’s report, Annette found it a bit confusing because Tiffany talked about many different things, including possible solution for the amount of AUV present in TV, but in the end agreed that there are a large amount of AUVs in the media, but not with “children’s intake percentage”. Annette really agreed with Crystal Bulda’s statement that “young children can only refer to their environment” to learn AUVs, whether it be the parents, or the media.

Annette also agreed with Angela Murray when she said that using sex appeal to sell “simple” products sends confusing messages to the younger generation, but also had questions for her regarding her personal report on her sisters and nieces. And although she agree with Christine Gora when she said that the media and society exposes children to too many AUVs, she says that although there are programs out there to help kids, there are biases in those programs that need to be addressed first. She goes on to say that the positive behavior parents try to teach their children are subjective, although she agrees that children are having sex at an earlier age. She then questions whether it is “hormones, the home or media who influence some teenagers?” Annette also agrees with Katie Ida when she said that the media and toys are gender based, and that children can pick up on that. And finally, she mentions Afronin’s report, and that his statement that education needs to occur for change to happen. She also mentions that peer pressure can be a more powerful force than education, and that this would need to be addressed.

Annette then talked about how these reports and the anit-unity values affect her. She mentions that although anti-unity values have been around forever, today they are the norm. She also mentions that classes like this one have taught her to adjust her views, and reflects on previous influences on her life, and her reactions to them. For example, she mentions that she grew up in a male dominant household, but he was still opened minded and seemed to reach equity. Her father strongly valued education, and also gave them the freedom to choose what church they could attend. She was also taught the value of hard work, and to be self-sufficient (cooking, cleaning, etc.) and she hopes these values are continued to be taught in the future. She concludes by mentioning the various mediums that AUV affect children (media, toys, internet, etc.) and that the thought of these overwhelming odds is depressing.

And for the final part of section B, Annette talks about her research into seduction, where she talks an article that describes high divorce rates because of “idealistic expectations from the media.” She also links to a book that has a compilation of sexual content in the media, and offers insight as to how it affects teens .

In section C, Disjunctive VS Conjunctive Verbal Interactions, Annette summarizes the verbal interactions by saying that there are three levels of interactions that differ depending on the husband’s focus. If the husband’s conversation style is focused on himself, then he’s in the dominance phase. If the man’s conversation style is focused on the task or topic, then he’s in the cognitive phase. And if the man’s conversation style is focused on the wife, then he’s in the unity phase. When the husband supports his wife, as in the unity phase, he speaks in a “sexy” conversation style. When the husband speaks to support himself.

When giving her opinion, she stated that she agreed with many of the conjunctive and disjunctive verbal interactions. She defines disjunctive as disjoining, and relates this to the husband focusing on himself instead of the wife. She then defines conjunctive, and talks about it it being together, where the couple’s focus is on each other. She found this useful because she was able to draw parallels to her own marriage, and says that she was patient while he figured out that being in the dominance phase was hurting their marriage.

She then analyzed a snippet from Deborah Tanner’s Gender and Discourse, and chose a snippet that was conjunctive, and in the equity model (focus on topic). However, the conversation broke down, and became disjunctive in a way, because Johan seemed to be agreeing with her just to calm her down.

In the final section, conclusions Annette talks about how she’s finally starting to understand the unity model of marriage, and what she has to do to achieve it. Because of it, she’s better able to understand her own marriage, as well as setting her goals for how to achieve unity. She then says that people would be better off if they understood the three levels of self (sensorimotor, cognitive, and affective) and the three phases (dominance, equity, and unity). She states that she’s in the Affective Equity Phase right now, and hopefully they’ll achieve the next stage soon. In addition, she relates that she gave her friend a link to this class, and that the friend has started to try to achieve unity in her marriage as well.

The last part of the report, Annette gives the following tips for the future generations: (1) Always keep an open mind, (2) Strive to do your best work, (3) know where to get your sources for links, (4) Always ask questions if you’re not clear on concepts or instructions, (5) try to do a section a day, in a timely manner to finish on time, and (6) DON’T PROCRASTINATE!

Kaysha Blow’s Report One:

http://www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2007/blow/blow-409b-g26-report1.htm

Like Annette, Kaysha started with the ennead chart, and then went into a summary of the movie Prime. She then went over three examples of conversation that the couple (David and Rafi) had. In the first conversation, David talk about Carp, a traditional Jewish food. He complains about the food, and then Rafi tries to explain to him why it’s a popular Jewish dish. However, he acts completely turned off and says “Are you trying to kill this for me?” This conversation fit into the first three zones – sensorimotor, cognitive, and affective dominance.

Another conversation that Kaysha quotes was when Rafi was sick, Dave brings her soup. Rafi tells him to come in, and they have “intense eye contact” and David replies “it’s chicken noodle.” This was supposed to be a conversation of sensorimotor and cognitive equity – afterwards they both had fun and apparently when Rafi said “come in” they were both thinking the same thing. The final conversation she quotes is cognitive and affective dominance, where Dave starts talking about Rafi to his friend. Dave starts talking about how he could really be falling for Rafi, but his friend says it’s only because he hasn’t slept with her. Dave then said that he thinks he loves her, and then Dave’s friend points out she’s old. Dave responds by saying “she’s so fine, bro”.

She then sent into a summary of the movie Save the Last Dance for Me. Which apparently was about an ex-ballerina, Sara, who meets a guy in Chicago, Derek, who rekindles her passion for dance, and romance. One example Kaysha gave of sensorimotor, cognitive, and affective unity was a time when Derek insisted on walking Sara home because she lived in a bad neighbhorhood. Then he offers to help her practice hip hop dancing, so that she can become comfortable in her new surroundings.

In another example of cognitive and affective unity, Sara said she didn’t want to talk about why she no longer practices ballet. Sara says it’s no big deal, but Derek realizes it is – however he doesn’t push her to talk about it when it’ll make her uncomfortable. And finally, in the final example of sensorimotor, cognitive, and affective unity, Derek takes Sara out for a surprise to celebrate his acceptance into Georgetown University. In a bit of dialogue, Sara asks why is it a surprise for her when Derek is the one they are celebrating. Derek replies that they’ll celebrate together.

Next, she contrasted between the two movies. She says that in Prime there was never any interactions in the unity phase. David was too concerned about himself, and not enough about how Rafi was feeling. However, in Save the Last Dance, Derek was very focused on Sara, instead of himself.

Kaysha believes that the media does have a huge effect on society, and that there are many statistics to show this. For instance, after the movie “The Fast and the Furious” came out, there was a lot more drag racing incidents. She uses this information when she says that the same things occur in relationships. The only problem is that these things are so constant, that it’s hard to recognize it’s effects.

Kaysha then summarized the effects of gender portrayal on the younger generation that the previous generation had done. Next, she gave her reactions to these opinions. She stated that she found many similarities in the reports. All agreed that gender portrayals and anti-unity values in the media do affect the younger generation and society, and she agreed with that as well. She also agreed with a few things that weren’t s so common, like when Katie Ide mentioned that it was our responsibility to educate the younger generation about how a relationship should work. Christine then said that it was important to grow up in a family with high morals so that the children have good role models to learn from. Kaysha agreed and said that without strong role models, children will just imitate everything they see.

Kaysha then talked about the many examples of gender portrayals and anti-unity values that she has seen in her life. She says that teenage preganancies are a result of young girls feeling like they have to put out for the boy to love her – two examples of this were two of Kaysha’s friends. Kaysha then tackles pornography, stating that it can become addictive, and that can create self-esteem problems in the wife, as well as destroy the marriage. She further states that these effects would be even worse in younger girls, and that being subjected to that can make a girl lose her self-worth and do things that she doesn’t want to do. This makes it degrading to women and terrible for a healthy relationship. Finally, she talks about how the media has made divorce a common thing – on and off screen. Because there is so little good role models on TV, it makes it hard for kids to learn from them and have successful relationships of their own.

Kaysha then went into her research findings on gender portrayal. She looked at a number of articles, the first being “Who wants to marry a millionaire? Reality dating television programs, attitudes towards sex and sexual behaviors.” The conclusion to this research was that people who watch these programs are usually less sexually experienced, and are using these programs as a way to learn. She also talked about “The effects of sexually violent rock music on males’ acceptance of violence against women.”, which concluded that heavy metal music, regardless of sexually violent lyrics, increased male-stereotyping and negative attitudes towards women. And in the final article investigated what contribution watching TV had on the gender role attitudes of Latino adolescents. The results were that it did have an impact on those adolescents who were high school students.

In conclusion, Kaysha stated that these three research articles show “ample evidence” for the theory that the media affects society and gender portrayals. She then says that the media shouldn’t be sending out this male-dominant message. She states that most of the programs on TV portray a male-dominant relationship, and the rest portray equity. She says that it’s important for other ways, such as the unity model, to get out there and become known so that the younger generation can see the difference.

For section C, Kaysha looked over disjunctive and conjunctive verbal interactions. She goes over the lectures notes, 17a, by talking about the sexy versus unsexy conversation style of husbands, the spiritual dynamics between the husband and wife, conversation rules for husbands in conjugial interactions, characteristics of a husband’s threefold self during discourse, and monitoring disjunctive VS conjunctive discourse.

First off, she defines the sexy conversation style as conversation where the husband pays attention to the wife. In reference to the spiritual dynamics between husband and wife, she says the husband’s job is to have a good time with your wife. This type of conversation that makes her happy also makes her feel sexy and agreeable. Of course, to keep her this way, the husband mustn’t upset the wife by refusing to do something that she thinks is important, because it shows her that he loves himself more than he loves her.

Then she goes into listing the conversational rules a husband must follow for conjugial interactions with his wife. The first one is that the man must pretend he’s on a permanent date with his wife – he needs to treat her as special as he did when they were first going out. The other rule is that the husband must give up his right to disagree with the wife on ANY topic. Denying the wife something that makes her happy, or that she deems important is “unfriendly, hostile, and rude.” The third rule is that the husband should make sure the wife feels cherished, and allow her to speak in an “un-oppressed” atmosphere. And finally, the husband must use conversation to make the wife feel better. By doing this he’ll “enhance his wife’s mood, stimulate her mind, and make her feel young at heart”.

She then briefly mentions that in a conversation, a person’s three-fold self is involved. Thus, how the husband speaks and how he moves conveys what he is thinking and feeling. Because of this, the wife can determine what he is thinking and feeling, and whether his thoughts are more important to him, than the wife’s thoughts, or vice versa. She finishes the section by saying that she thinks couples fall into disjunctive interactions because they don’t feel they can trust each other, and thus don’t want to put their heart on the line. She believes that this is especially true of men, and says that in order for them to achieve unity, there must fist be a high level of trust between the husband and wife. She also found reference to this in her own life and marriage – her husband is a Marine, and trained not to show emotions, however she says that proper communication is the key to a fruitful marriage.

Kaysha then looks into two snippets of conversation in Deborah Tanner’s Gender and Discourse. The first conversation she analyzed was the same one that Annette did – where the wife is upset that her she doesn’t want as much sex anymore, but the husband wants more of it. Unlike Annette, Kaysha said that the husband isn’t being kind and supportive, and that by telling her not to get upset, he’s saying that the way she’s feeling is wrong or unnecessary. She also says that it is extremely disjunctive for the husband to be making a joke when she’s feeling so bad. She said that although the intention behind the joke may have been to make her feel better, he didn’t do it right.

In the second example, Kaysha quotes from a conversation where this little boy, Max, is getting upset at the two girls, Steph and Dara, because they “keep interrupting” him. However, Kaysha believes that this isn’t a disjunctive conversation because interrupting in a supportive way is conjunctive. Kaysha goes on to say that if Steph and Dara interrupted Max with something other than what he was going to say, then it would be disjunctive – however, this is not the case.

Finally, she concludes by saying that she has learned a lot about the different phases of marriage, and given a little time, the concept isn’t too difficult to understand. She then says that she uses what she has learned in her own marriage, and finds that the progress they are making (upper equity phases) is good considering that they’ve been married only four and a half years.

And to top things off, she gives the same advice that Annette gave, and that even I gave in my Report 1: don’t procrastinate! It isn’t possible to finish this paper quickly. She also said that it’s important that you keep an open mind when you’re delving into the subject. It seems like a harder idea to grasp in the beginning, but as you go through it slowly, bit by bit, it starts to make sense.

C. Advice to Future Generations

As I have said before, and as others have said before me: Do not procrastinate. The worst thing you can do in this class is to get behind. And actually, that is especially true for this paper over Report 1. I found that this report took me nearly twice as long as the other one, because of all the referencing of material in the lectures notes , and summarizing the unity model, and then summarizing reports! Although I knew this report would take a while because of Report 1, I wasn’t prepared for this report to take even longer. Because I had midterms every week up to the week of the paper being due, I figured that there would always be enough time after my midterms were over, and that I could do my paper then. I was wrong. Do not underestimate the scope of this report.

The second bit of advice I have is: if you ever have problems understanding a topic, ask about it in class. Not only do you get an answer from the man who wrote your lecture notes, but the class discussions we have every time a question is brought up really straightens out any problems you have understanding the concepts. Many of the difficult questions actually spark even more questions that you hadn’t thought of, which is great, because it gives you a better understanding of the material.

The last bit of advice I will leave you with, is that if you’re having trouble with this class because of the things that come up in the Swedenborg report, and after a class discussion you still can’t get it, you should simply try to put it out of your mind until you’ve learned more about the unity model. Swedenborg’s data and information contributed to the making of the unity model of marriage, but the most important thing you need to understand is the unity model of marriage itself. Once you have mastered that, I have no doubt that if you go back to the Swedenborg report, you’ll be able to understand it fully.

D. Links

My Home Page: www.soc.hawaii.edu/leon/409bs2007/mosier/mosier-home.htm

Class Home Page: www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/classhome-g26.htm