The One-and-Only Script

The study rests on a broad background. Expectations about intimacy are shaped by cultural norms, gender roles, and media portrayals. Films, television series, and social platforms often present romance in polished form, and that polish can reinforce unrealistic expectations. Cultivation theory gives the mechanism: repeated exposure can shape how people see reality, including what they expect from love. Social media may be especially potent because users share selected, flattering pictures of their partnerships. The feed is not a window. It is a portfolio. [1]

Earlier work has examined several unrealistic beliefs, including love that lasts forever, one perfect partner, and love that conquers any obstacle. Those beliefs have been tied to lower satisfaction, harder conflict, and greater risk of psychological dating violence. Sancak Aydın notes that most existing research has relied on Western samples and quantitative methods. She argues that culture plays a central role in romantic relationships, and that the experiences of Turkish heterosexual women university students remain underexplored. Her study therefore uses in-depth, face-to-face interviews and treats participants’ meanings as the material. That choice fits the question: how traditional and social media figure in the romantic beliefs these women describe. It does not let the study measure media dose or prove cause. [1]

Participants described a media climate that rarely went quiet. They saw traditional media and social platforms as carriers of romantic messages and said romantic stories surrounded them. They saw Turkish TV series and films as selling the idea that love surmounts obstacles and that a partner is destined. Social media was seen as stronger on idealization: curated posts of apparently perfect couples and advice from relationship influencers. Some mentioned influencers who claimed that manifestation had delivered the right person. The messages did not agree with one another. [1]

The same environment supplied counter-stories. News about violence against women and daytime programs built around relationship conflict led some participants to doubt that love clears every hurdle. Some influencers told stories that undercut love at first sight. So the cultural air was less a single doctrine than a noisy argument carried in a pocket. That noise matters. It means a woman can reject one script while still absorbing another. [1]

Most participants did not say they simply adopted what they saw. Many called social-media relationships staged and unrealistic. Many also said the portrayals influenced them. One described seeing other couples’ romantic gestures and wondering whether something was wrong with her, even while knowing the images were selected. The study does not treat that as hypocrisy. Under cultivation theory, repeated exposure does not need full consent to become part of the weather. [1]

The study noticed a relationship-stage pattern, with a caveat. Women with no committed relationship history leaned more often toward the destined-partner belief. Several spoke of standards so high that they postponed or sidestepped relationships. But the design was not built to compare groups. The study cannot say whether inexperience produces the belief, the belief produces delay, or something else links them. The pattern is a clue, not a verdict. [1]

Women with relationship experience more often described expectations colliding with reality. They mentioned wanting frequent gifts, compliments, and surprises, then feeling conflict or disappointment when partners did not deliver. Many expected romantic gestures to come from men, a reflection of traditional gender roles. This is where the study becomes less about screens and more about ordinary friction between a script and a person. A surprise can be lovely. A surprise you feel owed becomes an appointment. [1]

Some participants linked the destined-partner belief to religious faith. One cited a verse from the Quran stating that people are created with their spouses. The study reports that connection as part of the interview material. The belief can arrive through a source other than a screen, and the paper lets that sit alongside the media accounts rather than forcing them into a single ranking. [1]

The author concludes that repeated media exposure helps construct romance as a relational necessity and may shape expectations in dysfunctional ways. That is a claim about cultural atmosphere, not a diagnosis of any individual heart. The study did not measure how much media participants consumed. It relied on their accounts of media influence. So it cannot show that exposure caused their beliefs. It can show how these women described the connection. [1]

The sample was small and specific: twenty students at one university in a smaller city, most preparing for counseling or teaching. The article notes that research with bigger, more varied samples—men, LGBTQ+ people—could yield other patterns. That is not false modesty; it is a boundary line around the evidence. A keyhole can teach you something. It is not a panoramic window. [1]

Would the destined-partner belief look as strong in a larger sample, in other Turkish cities, or among students in other fields? Would men describe the same mix of skepticism and susceptibility? Would LGBTQ+ participants describe different media scripts, family pressures, and ideals? The study cannot answer. The article notes that larger and more diverse groups may produce different results. The design also cannot say whether the pattern holds outside a campus where many students study counseling or teaching. These are questions worth carrying forward, not findings already in hand. [1]

Measurement is another open question. If researchers tracked media consumption directly instead of asking participants how influenced they felt, would the picture change? Would heavy viewers of curated couple content show stronger idealization? Would people who watch more Turkish television series endorse the idea that love overcomes all? These are scenarios for future research, not results from this paper. The current study cannot establish dose or direction. [1]

Relationship stage remains another puzzle. The design was not set up to compare people who had never been in a relationship with those currently in one or previously in one. So it cannot say whether experience weakens the destined-partner belief, strengthens it, or simply changes the vocabulary people use. That question deserves the same dignity as any other. People at every stage are trying to make sense of the same scripts. [1]

What to watch next is not a forecast. It is a list of questions. Watch for studies that measure media use directly, include more diverse samples, and separate religious faith from media scripts. Watch for work that asks whether relationship experience changes endorsement over time. Watch for research with men and LGBTQ+ participants, not as an afterthought but as a real test of whether the pattern is about women, Türkiye, media, or something broader in how people learn to want. [1]

A longitudinal design following the same people across relationship stages could help. A media-literacy study asking whether naming a script changes how much it pulls could help. Neither is promised by the current paper. Both are reasonable questions raised by its limits. The study does not tell you what will happen. It tells you where the evidence stops and where curiosity can start. [1]

Sources

PsyPost: Relationships

Prepared with AI assistance from the cited sources.