Sacrifice Study, 2013

130 romantic couples (N 260) from Amsterdam and surrounding, Netherlands. All participants were required to speak Dutch. Couples could participate in the study if they were together for longer than 4 months, if they had no children, and if they had a smartphone (for the experience sampling and diary parts). All couples were heterosexual, except for one homosexual couple. Participants’ age ranged from 18 to 43 years (M = 23.33, SD = 3.65). Over half of the participants (63.6%) were students, 34% were working full time, and 2.4% were both working and studying. Couples’ romantic involvement ranged from 4 months to 17 years (M = 34.13, SD = 29.01 months) and 34.8% of the couples were living together, of which a minority (2.4%) was married. Couples came to the laboratory for an intake session, they were separated and asked to fill in some questionnaires. After this they were videotaped while discussing a situation of divergence of interests between them. We also assessed cortisol and testosterone before and after the conversation. After the conversation they watched the video of their conversation and provided some ratings about it. At the end of the intake session they were given instructions about the experience sampling procedure. Each couple started the experience sampling on the Saturday following the intake session. For eight days (two Saturdays, two Sundays, one Monday, one Tuesday, one Thursday and one Friday), participants received six signals per day, approximately one signal every two hours, to ask them some questions (many of them regarding sacrifices – see also variables list) Furthermore, each day, after 9.00 pm. participants performed a daily diary survey with general questions about their day. Finally, one year later, couples were contacted again for a follow-up in which they replied to few questions. The study was approved by the ethical board of the faculty of Behavioral and Movement Sciences of the VU Amsterdam.