Balinese Adolescents’ Experiences in Romantic Relationship

Abstract

Romantic relationship is an integral part of individual development.The understanding of romantic relationships that has so far been developed is mostly based on the experiences of teenagers in the setting of Western culture, where numerous ideas about romantic relationships have been developed. This study, which is conducted from an ecological point of view, aims to describe the dynamics of romantic relationships in adolescents who grow up in an Eastern cultural setting with its distinctive features in order to support efforts to develop a more thorough understanding of the significant importance of romantic relationships for individual lives. This study is a qualitative phenomenological investigation of the nature of individuals' perceptions of a certain idea or phenomena, in this case, adolescent love relationships. This exploratory study used a survey method by distributing questionnaires with open-ended questions to adolescent respondents aged 13 to 18 years (n=345). A series of coding analysis procedures were carried out to summarize teenagers' romantic relationship experiences which include dimensions of engagement, relationship content, romantic partner selection, relationship quality, as well as cognitive and emotional processes. The results show that each dimension of romantic relationship experiences is related to the age that is considered normal to start a relationship with the opposite sex, the reasons behind their involvement in a relationship while still at school age, the positive and negative experiences they have had. Besides viewing romantic relationships as a process of self-maturation, the respondent also viewed it in the development of cognitive and emotional aspects in adolescents, starting the experience of sexual behavior as a form of expression of feelings, identifying the characteristics of ideal partner, and parents’ influence on the decisions taken by adolescents regarding romantic relationships. The results also highlighted the impact of the influence of social media that brings foreign culture in the aforementioned themes that coexist with traditional style of Balinese adolescence romantic relationship. Thus, it can be concluded that social media shapes relationship styles, where Balinese teenagers use social media as a place to publicize their relationships and gain satisfaction in establishing romantic relationships.