Content analysis and exploratory factor analysis of relationship goals among young adults:converging data from instagram and offline surveys

This psychoinformatical study aimed at finding out the growing aspirations on the relationship goals based on online and offline data. Three studies in an umbrella of social representation study were conducted involving 155 participants coming from Greater Jakarta and other Indonesia provinces (Study I, a preliminary study for extracting content frames on relationship; Mage = 21.6 years), 610 samples of images captioned with #RelationshipGoals in an online social media - Instagram - originated mostly from Western users (Study II, a content analysis), as well as 367 participants coming from Greater Jakarta (Study III, a survey for Relationship Goals Scale construction; Mage = 22 years). The results showed that there are three main dimensions of relationship goals, namely (1) Psychological Intimacy, (2) Sexual Activity, and (3) Religious Beliefs. It was found that religious belief should be the fourth pillar, not just the influencing factors of the Sternberg's triangular theory of love of romantic relationships. This study was successful in constructing relationship goals scale for the first time in Indonesia, to our best knowledge, which could be used for education and counselling. This present study also empirically indicated that the evolving analyses of Ulrich Beck, Stephanie Coontz, and Eli Finkel, that self-actualization has become the main romantic relationship goal, are perhaps exaggerated, especially in the context of social life of Indonesian. Individualized marriage might not be applicable as the representation of contemporary relationship zeitgeist in Indonesia. This study is pivotal in preventing marital divorce based on salient social meanings on the romantic relationship among young adults.