When the Honeymoon Is Over: A Theory of Relationship Liabilities and Evolutionary Processes

Abstract

The authors draw on the sociological theories of the “liability of newness” and the “liability of adolescence” to generate new insights into relationship evolution. First, they show how a new relationship in its “honeymoon” phase exhibits a unique constellation of two conditions, namely information asymmetry and forbearance. Next, they explain how a relationship evolves along two processes that involve passive learning and decay, respectively. In themselves, these processes will move a relationship toward a long-term “transactional” state and possibly termination, but the processes can also be actively shaped using various governance mechanisms. Doing so, however, requires a nuanced account of types of governance mechanisms and the particular conditions they are intended to induce. The authors consider how the general mechanisms of (1) incentives and (2) information sharing can be deployed in standardized or customized fashions, respectively. Next, they suggest how different manifestation of governance mechanisms impact a relationship's underlying evolutionary processes and evolved relationship states. In general, their framework represents a new perspective on relationship evolution—one that involves the purposeful management of initial conditions and their related evolutionary processes.