ABSTRACT
This chapter explores how the Internet is having an impact on couples with regard to attachment, on the process by which couples find each other and form relationships, on the longer-term development and maintenance of an exclusive relationship, and on the ways that adult relationships might end. There are many positive ways in which digital technology supports established couple relationships. Digital technology can provide a channel for communication between them, keeping them accessible and “logged on” to the relationship while apart. Couples will vary in the degree to which they see sexual media as problematic. Contemporary western culture is unusual in relying largely on romance to settle the critical question of finding a life partner; in previous centuries and in other cultures, the family held more power and the individual, particularly the woman, rather less. Perhaps matchmaking by Internet site has proved so popular because the romantic solution has not been particularly successful in producing satisfactory long-term partnerships.
