attempts to describe relationships as series of exchanges between partners, aiming at balancing the rewards and costs

claim partners in relationships strive to maximise rewards and minimise costs

propose people use levels of comparison to assess how profitable their relationships are

concerns a persons perception of whether other different potential relationships would be more rewarding than their current relationship.

based on persons idea of how much reward they expect to receive in relationships

based on previous romantic experiences and cultural norms of what is appropriate to expect from relationships

people will stay in their current relationship as long as they find them to be more profitable than the alternatives

the more profitable a comparable alternative relationship may seem, the less likely an individual is to remain in their current relationship

limitation- confusion of what constitutes a cost and a benefit within a relationship. what might be considered rewarding to one person may be punishing to another (eg.constant attention). SET subjective and its concepts are difficult to accurately quantify so hard to produce valid research support

supporting research- found CLalt were a strong predictor of commitment in a relationship, whilst rewards were important as a predictor of satisfaction especially for women.. can be concluded that some people base their evaluation of relationships on rewards and costs. so, would appear some people do stay in current relationship while it remains more profitable than alts

emphasises need for each partner to experience a balance between the effort they put into the relationship and the benefit they receive

means people get out of the relationship should be roughly equal to what they put into the relationship

developed in response to the signifiant criticism of social exchange theory that suggested being in profit state was the reason why people stayed in relationships

if one partner perceives a relationship as unfair because they are either over-benefitting or under-benefitting they are going to be dissatisfied with the relationship.

the longer the feeling of unfairness (lack of equity) goes on, the more likely a couple is likely to break up

research support by investigating role of equity in marriage satisfaction. found satisfaction was higher in relationships which couples believed were equitable- shows appears to be a positive relationship between relationship satisfaction and equity

limitation- individual differences in the perception of equity. researcher discovered there are people who are less sensitive to inequity and are prepared to give more in the relationships, termed benevolents whereas other people, entitleds, believe they deserve to over-benefit from relationships and don’t feel too guilty about this. means ET cannot be reliably applied to all people

doesn't explain all relationships- suggests that nature and impact of social phase experienced during breakup depends on the sort of relationship that is involved especially in relation to age of the partners. For example, for teenagers and young adults, relationships are seen as more unstable than long-term adult relationships, and are largely recognised by others as being 'testing grounds 'for future long-term commitments. shows that model cannot be applied to all couples and suggests that the model is unable to accurately predict breakdown in different types of relationship.