Creating closeness: Discerning and measuring strategies for fostering closer relationships

Abstract This project examined the strategies people use to create closeness in personal relationships and developed a measure of closeness that can be coupled with a measure of distance to provide a measure of affiliation (degree of closeness and distance in a relationship) that incorporates both closeness and distance. Study 1 used a factor analysis of tactics people can utilize to create closeness and found three underlying strategies: openness, attention, and involvement. Studies 2 and 3 tested the items for psychometric adequacy as an index of closeness, using both student and nonstudent samples. The items performed satisfactorily. Together, these studies clarify the strategies people use to enhance closeness in relationships, and they offer a useful measure of affiliation.