Persello, Matthew (2021) Gender and Sexual Identity: Who’s Guilty of Romantic Sabotage? Honours thesis, University of Southern Queensland. (Unpublished)
Abstract
Many adults try to find a strong and secure relationship that makes them happy and can last a lifetime. However, personal struggles such as defensiveness, trust difficulty, lack of relationship skills, along with one’s gender and sexual identity, can negatively affect relationships, possibly resulting in one or all parties engaging in romantic sabotage. There have been multiple studies looking at sabotaging attitudes and behaviours in relationships, but until the current study, there has yet to be a strong focus on gender and sexual identity differences when engaging in these self-defeating behaviours. A total of 742 participants were included in the current study who are, or have been, in a serious relationship and are over the age of 18 years old. A quantitative approach using t-tests analyses was taken to test two proposed hypotheses: sexually diverse individuals and males would report higher engagement in romantic sabotaging behaviours than heterosexual individuals and females. It was found that neither of the two hypotheses was supported. Although surprising, findings from the current study have provided implications and directions for future investigations with specific recommendations. Overall, it is evident that continuing research in this area will have the potential to contribute to models for improving adult romantic relationships in gender and sexually diverse populations.
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| Item Type: | Thesis (Non-Research) (Honours) |
|---|---|
| Item Status: | Live Archive |
| Additional Information: | Current UniSQ staff and students can request access to this thesis. Please email research.repository@unisq.edu.au with a subject line of SEAR thesis request and provide: Name of the thesis requested and Your name and UniSQ email address |
| Faculty/School / Institute/Centre: | Historic - Faculty of Health, Engineering and Sciences - School of Psychology and Counselling (1 Jan 2015 - 31 Dec 2021) |
| Supervisors: | Raquel Peel |
| Qualification: | Bachelor of Science (Honours) |
| Date Deposited: | 31 Jul 2025 23:43 |
| Last Modified: | 31 Jul 2025 23:43 |
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | romantic sabotage ; romantic relationship ; heterosexual ; sexually diverse ; male ; female ; gender identity ; sexual identity ; trust difficulty ; defensiveness ; relationship skills |
| Fields of Research (2008): | 17 Psychology and Cognitive Sciences > 1799 Other Psychology and Cognitive Sciences > 179999 Psychology and Cognitive Sciences not elsewhere classified |
| Fields of Research (2020): | 52 PSYCHOLOGY > 5299 Other psychology > 529999 Other psychology not elsewhere classified |
| URI: | https://sear.unisq.edu.au/id/eprint/52663 |
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