Human relationship is one of the main needs within the life of human beings (Adler, 2004). While interpersonal relationships are the source of joy and fellowship, they can sometimes make individuals stressful and unhappy (Ng & Tong, 2013). Griffin (1986) proposes that deep personal relationships sustain a healthy life for people. A romantic relationship is a type of relations in which partners experience love and affection via close ties and they bring positive and negative features of their characteristics to the relationship (Huston, 2009). Forgiveness, which is a process of accepting negative feelings and changing them with the positive one, is very beneficial because it helps individuals to live in a harmony in social context (Roberts, 1995). Individuals are prone to forgive significant others who are socially closer rather than the others in socially distant to them (Wenzel & Okimoto, 2012). Rotter (2001) introduces that consciousness of all personal experiences, religional beliefs, culture, gender and social dimensions of the individual affects forgiveness. In addition, forgiveness can show some differences according to cognitive distortions of an individual experienced a negative event (e.g. Braithwaite, Fincham, & Lambert, 2009; Bugay & Demir, 2011). Cognitive approach focuses on how the individual interprets reality in the relationship and according to cognitive behavioral approach, individuals have some unrealistic and nonfunctional believes about own, others and life. These beliefs, the interpretations made in the relationship, and meanings attributed to the relationship affect relationships, emotions and behaviors of the individuals and the individual behave in dysfunctional way to the partner (Epstein, 1986; Hamamcı, 2002). The empirical studies show that forgiveness interventions decrease cognitive distortions within a relationship and this leads to an increase in marital satisfaction (Navidian & Bahari, 2013). This shows that cognitive components are essential parts of forgiveness process. The purpose of the present study is to find out the relationship between cognitive distortions in predicting forgiveness in romantic relationships of college students. The present study aims at increasing the attention to the forgiveness issue in romantic relationships in early ages and the results of the study is beneficial for counselors working with college students since young adults mostly have difficulty in forgiving wrong behaviors of their couples after the wrong behaviors of their family members (Bugay & Demir, 2011). The study is significant to support college students' psychological development. The present study explores this question:

What is the relationship between interpersonal cognitive distortions (interpersonal rejection, unrealistic relationship expectation, and interpersonal misperception) in predicting forgiveness (forgiveness of self, forgiveness of others, and forgiveness of situations) of college students having a romantic relationship? 

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