An interpretive framework of the interplay of competition and cooperation

Considering, for instance, marriage or, more generally, mate-selection; i.e., the selection process of the partner within a given population. It is acknowledged that the way marriage is conceived is mainly cultural. In Western countries (such as Western Europe and United States), the mate-selection criterion is mainly based on “love”. When people are in love, they stay together and, eventually, consider the possibility of marrying each other, which may also justify the fact that when deep conflicts between the couple occur and love seems to vanish, the relationship might be broken and the marriage may fail. Divorce may occur once people’s feelings change and they want to break their legal relationship. In these cultural contexts, the underlying assumptions for marriage and mate-selection are love and voluntary commitment, whereas marrying for money or other material reasons may be subject to social disapproval (Winch 1958). On the contrary, in other societies and cultural contexts (such as the Asian ones), women may marry to improve their social status and not only for love. In such cases, the main assumptions that shape the way people “see and understand marriage” is that mate-selection is not driven only by feelings but also includes societal status drivers. As a result, it might happen that, initially, people are not committed to relationships, but family duties and cultural obligations may cause them to marry. In these contexts, divorce seems to occur quite seldom since it does not seem to be an option. As we can see from this example, reality is usually constructed based on “logics” or “points of view”.