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Annotated Bibliography

How and Why We Cheat Ourselves into Cheating on Each Other

Gissel Rojas

Professor Malcolm Campbell

Honors English 1103

October 18, 2012

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Annotated Bibliography Williams, Lela, and Kristine Hickle. "He cheated on me, I cheated on him back: Mexican American and White adolescents perceptions of cheating in romantic relationships"." Journal of Adolescence. Volume 34.Issue 5 (2012): 1005-1006. Print. The authors, Lela Williams and Kristine Hickle, are researchers in Arizona State University and work in the department of social work. Through their expository writings, they use experiments from different age groups and ethnicities to find an abstract approach in exploring the meaning of cheating in a romantic relationship. To build the support of the experiment, the authors break down the concept of cheating into various subtopics: Age, gender, ethnicity, developmental perspectives, and perceptions of cheating. The difficulty in associating cheating with many subtopics going off in different tangents became more concise and apparent when the author makes the distinctive point that cheating is an attempt of balance in life rather than a mistake. Cheating is the unbalance of identity formation and intimacy formation. To prove this, the authors collected a group of men and women of different age groups and did a group discussion of the topic. When conducting the experiments, the random groups of people would describe experiences of cheating and relate it to themselves. Some of the candidates described infidelity in a relationship as being inevitable. Although this perspective is false, the candidates being experimented on discussed this perception as rather a fact that most adolescents their age had to accept. The experiment ties in all aspects of cheating by

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reinforcing the idea that all ethnicities and genders feel the same when it comes to being the victim and the reasoning for being the inflictor. The authors made their main idea credible through the structure of their objective to first inform the audience all the factors that makes people cheat and then make the audience believe their stated points through running an experiment from random sampling. What made the audience believe the concepts that the authors are trying to prove is the authors diversified sources. The source consists of interviews, books, academic journals, and even psychological theories. By these various different sources, the authors are able to effectively communicate with the audience their explanation and reasoning behind it. The intended audiences are people who are interested in the psychology of infidelity as well as those who cheat and have been cheated on. This source was extremely helpful to me because it took so many things into consideration that many people would look past. The fact that the authors extensively analyzed each subtopic made me understand which categories are more important in a relationship than others. It hasnt changed how I think about my topic. Instead, it promoted my flow of thoughts and ideas for my paper to cover. The experiment was a nice touch, but I will definitely be using this source for its way to propose their objective, as well as their many analyzed subtopics. Nalini, Ambady, et al. "The Physical Burdens Of Secrecy." Journal Of Experimental Psychology: General (2012): PsycARTICLES. Web. 20 Sept. 2012. This academic journal analyzes the effects of four experiments, each to prove the authors hypothesis that infidelity can impact daily activities such as vacuuming, throwing a ball, carrying a weight, and helping others. Each experiment gathers a random group of participants, two groups of either admitting to have cheated or informed the experimenter

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that he or she is hiding an important secret and the other group of regular individuals who have nothing to hide. By separating the experiments into four divisions, the author is able to explain the outcome of the experiment and use it as reinforcement to the next experiment. For example, when conducting the experiment, the first group of participants were given a task to carry a heavy weight over a hill. The participants who had something to hide found the exercise more tiresome because they had physical weight to pull as well as the mental weight they already had. This helped reinforce the second experiment, which was the throwing ball exercise to prove that those who are hiding a secret will not be able to effectively measure the distance needed to throw the ball. In the end, the experiments did support the hypothesis that daily activities are shown as impacted negatively when cheating or hiding a secret of importance. The purpose of this experiment was to explain to the audience the effects of cheating from a day to day basis. Because this source was filled with experiments and explanation, it is easy to identify the goal of the author as objectivity. The source gets its credibility through the authors use of mathematical graphs and formulas to calculate the predictions of distances of the thrown ball, the amount of weight that the sufferers will carry, and the statistics that the participants will help others. The intended audience is directed towards people who interested in mathematics in relation to everyday tasks. This source is helpful to me because it is very different than any of my other sources. It puts math into cheating, which I thought was impossible. I will be using this source as backup data to show cheating as a drastic choice in life and the negative effects that will make the audience gasp and make cheating not even a consideration. It is a different direction than my first source because the first source

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exemplifies cheating as a way to discover your inner self. Both sides of the topic will make the essay a lot more interesting to write and more information to include. Oppenheimer, Mark. "Married, with Infidelities." New York Times. 03 Jun 2011, Weekend ed. MM22. Web. 18 Oct. 2012. Mark Oppenheimer, columnist of New York Times, decided to write about Congressman Anthony Weiner and his moment of truth on Twitter that he was having an affair and the prevalence of many people in marriages today that have affairs. The storyline starts off when Anthony Weiner had posted a picture on his Twitter account of his exposed man part that was meant to be sent to a random woman. Weiner defended himself immediately after seeing his mistake of a post, and saying his account was hacked. Shortly after, he admitted to the twitter world that he, in fact, was not hacked and was having an affair. Although the story uses Weiner as an introduction, Oppenheimer defends Weiners affair as an affair is at least a normal human thing. Oppenheimer goes more in depth of affairs as the false attempt of true communication and honesty in a relationship, where many feel insecure to fully be honest with their desires and therefore are left to cheat. Oppenheimer does not come off as biased but does make his article argumentative, stating affairs start off as lack of communication of both parties in the relationship. Because the writer is a columnist in New York Times, the writer has credentials of several articles in New York Times, as well as previous writings. Although New York Times is considered a popular source, I personally would not consider it reliable. This source for me was more of opinion-based source that will help add on details to the side I will focus on. This source did make me think that affairs can sometimes be due to the

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relationship rather than the person doing it, which is a different stance than any of the other sources. Smith, Brendan. "Are Internet Affairs Different?" American Psychological Association Vol. 42. No. 3 (2011): 48. APA. Web. 18 Oct 2012. <http://www.apa.org/monitor/2011/03/internet.asp&xgt ;> This source discusses the advancement of technology in relation to the fundamentals of an affair back in the day. The author hits his or her idea by stating that because of the advancement of technology, affairs have become easier in terms of the decreasing trend of face-to-face interaction. Over the past decade, the internet has become an excruciating horror story to many happy couples. With the growth of the internet, many online dating sites, chat rooms, and social networks have developed and created affairs as no longer physical but emotional infidelity. The question arises on whether or not emotional infidelity is considered an affair. To Smith, the answer is yes. Smith continues her stance by stating trends over years as an increasing trend of concern. Many Americans today perceive online chatting with others while in a relationship as not a form of cheating because it lacks the physical connection. Through the article provided, the source seemed biased due to the outbreak of social affairs which may have caused the author to hyperbolize the objective. The author is a writer for the American Psychological Association, which makes her credible, as well as using outside sources within her research, such as doctors and studies. The purpose of this source is to mainly inform the reader that the internet should be a considerable threat to many existing relationships. The intended audience would be everyone in a relationship as well as those suffering from problems in a relationship due to the internet. The source is helpful because it takes on a

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different factor that none of my other sources have thought of. The source did make me think about including more social environmental factors into my paper because the act of infidelity has become more complicated than just psychology. This will be in my paper because it has raised an issue that has become more popular as the years have come.