Introduction: Parental Acceptance-Rejection Theory Studies of Intimate Adult Relationships

The studies in this special issue explore three questions drawn from newly formulated postulates in parental acceptance-rejection theory: (a) To what extent is perceived acceptance or rejection by an intimate partner in adulthood associated with the same form of psychological adjustment or maladjustment that perceived parental acceptance-rejection is known to be in childhood? (b) To what extent do remembrances of maternal or paternal acceptance in childhood mediate or influence in other ways the association between perceived partner acceptance and adults' psychological adjustment? (c) Do statistical relations found in these questions vary by culture, ethnicity, gender of parent, gender of offspring, or other contextual factors? Results of most studies reported here conclude that perceived partner acceptance and remembered parental (both maternal and paternal) acceptance in childhood correlate significantly with men's and women's psychological adjustment. However, gender differences also sometimes appears as significant and independent contributors to the psychological adjustment of men versus that of women.