When Does Familiarity Promote Versus Undermine Interpersonal Attraction? A Proposed Integrative Model From Erstwhile Adversaries

This article began as an adversarial collaboration between two groups of researchers with competing views on a longstanding question: Does familiarity promote or undermine interpersonal attraction? As we explored our respective positions, it became clear that the limitations of our conceptualizations of the familiarity–attraction link, as well as the limitations of prior research, were masking a set of higher order principles capable of integrating these diverse conceptualizations. This realization led us to adopt a broader perspective, which focuses on three distinct relationship stages—awareness, surface contact, and mutuality—and suggests that the influence of familiarity on attraction depends on both the nature and the stage of the relationship between perceivers and targets. This article introduces the framework that emerged from our discussions and suggests directions for research to investigate its validity.