Eliciting Short-Term Closeness in Couple Relationships With Ecological Momentary Interventions

Relationship closeness is considered an important psychological variable for studying couple relationships, and often postulated as cause relationship outcomes. The current study evaluates four micro-interventions their suitability to experimentally elicit feelings of towards one’s partner. Using participants’ smartphones, a combination experience sampling, event ecological momentary interventions, individuals reported week on experiences before after completing daily either neutral task or meant enhance closeness. tasks included showing physical affection, sharing childhood memory, looking each other in the eyes five minutes, discussing shared life achievements. Results intention-to-treat analyses within-person level showed that increased from pre- post-measurement average more strongly days any examined conditions than control conditions. Interindividual variability this effect was observed, emphasizing relevance using designs evaluate such interventions. Exploratory sizes declined across time within day. This provides instruments research causal effects everyday life, evidence basis smartphone-delivered interventions practitioner settings.