Special Issue: Relationship Research in India and South Asia - Interpersona 2(2) Editorial
Editorial

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This first special issue of Interpersona: An International Journal on Personal Relationships has a deep historical meaning as the beginning of a new series on relationship research around the world. This issue on Relationship Research in India and South Asia brings papers about one of the most fascinating areas in the world, in social and cultural terms. This was possible thanks to the cooperation of authors who submitted papers and reviewers who evaluated these contributions. I am grateful to all those who made this issue possible, especially to Dr. Leemamol Mathew. Authors from India and South Asia are encouraged to continue to submit manuscripts. Finally, we should remind authors from all over the world that Interpersona also publishes regular issues and submissions from any country are welcome at any time.

Agnaldo Garcia
Editor


This special issue of Interpersona: An International Journal on Personal Relationships exclusively focuses, for the first time, on the nature of relationship research in India and other South Asian countries.

South Asia is home to a population of about 1.4 billion, which is 21% of world population. India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Nepal, Afghanistan and the Maldives are termed the South Asian countries. Besides the history of the experience of colonialism, the countries in this region have certain common identities in culture, traditional hierarchical family structure and societal practices. Therefore, it is quite unnatural to anticipate that the interpersonal relationships among the people of this region vary substantially. The familial composition and societal linkages in South Asian countries are oriented on interpersonal relationships at various levels. This special issue of Interpersona attempts comprehensively to bring out this unique nature of relationships in South Asian countries. Of the 1.4 billion South Asians, 1.1 billion (16.93% of world population) are in India, which is substantially huge percent compared to other countries in this region. Therefore, the special issue particularly focus on relationship research in India.

The contents of this special issue consist of six articles covering a wide array of topics related to interpersonal relationships, but all of them taking the society and culture in South Asian countries into consideration. These papers present relationships of people at various ages and stages in India and South Asia. Special focus is on infant-mother relationships, adult-child relationships, marital relationships, diasporic relationships, and relationships of elderly. The first five articles are specifically on Indian sample and the last one on South Asians in Canada.

The first article by Sony Pellissery provides an overview of the nature of relationships in India and other South Asian countries. Collective identity and the consequent social hierarchies in India are given pivotal importance to delineate the structure of relationships. Rachita Bisth’s article attempts to bring out an indigenous representation of childhood in Indian culture from the perspective of adult-child relationship. The classification of childhood across ages in this study positions children in the Indian society. The article by Anjali Ghosh explores the significance of shared memory schemas of people in close relationships on a sample of Indian urban couple. The study looks at how their constellation of thoughts, feelings and actions shape their cognition, expression and experience of emotion. In the context of rising elderly population and old age homes in India, the article by Kalavar and Jamuna examines the extent and nature of interpersonal relationships of elderly in old age homes. Based on extensive fieldwork in a special school, the article by Leemamol Mathew examines the importance of cultural and social factors to develop attachment relationships among people with intellectual disability from a relationship-oriented country, India. Finally, Saunia Ahmad and David Reid take the readers to the traditional marriage relationships of Indo-Pakistanis living in Canada. The authors explored the relationship between styles of interpersonal listening and marital satisfaction.

All these papers indicate the importance of relationship in the context of culture and society. However, more in depth studies on relationship from an interdisciplinary perspective is required to disseminate relationship research in India and South Asia.

Leemamol Mathew
Associate Editor

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