The Balance Of Power That Makes Couples Happiest (M)
Talking about power in relationships sounds unromantic, but it is essential.
Category: Relationships
Sad Music And Movies Soothe Relationship Problems, Study Finds
Break-ups and rejection make people reach for a downbeat aesthetic experience.
Break-ups and rejection make people reach for a downbeat aesthetic experience.
Sad music and gloomy movies help to soothe the pain of relationship problems, research finds.
People having difficulties in their personal relationships are more likely to choose tearjerker dramas and downbeat music.
This is unusual, because sad people usually prefer fun comedies and upbeat music to turn their mood around.
However, there is something about experiencing relationship problems, such as a break-up, that makes people want similar emotional companionship.
The study’s authors write:
“Consumers seek and experience emotional companionship with music, films, novels, and the fine arts as a substitute for lost and troubled relationships.”
In one experiment, people recalled an experience involving a loss.
For some it was a relationship loss, for others it was an impersonal loss, like losing a competition.
Those who thought about losing a competition wanted to be cheered up with happy music.
But, those who thought about losing a relationship wanted sombre music.
The authors write:
“Emotional experiences of aesthetic products are important to our happiness and well-being.
Music, movies, paintings, or novels that are compatible with our current mood and feelings, akin to an empathic friend, are more appreciated when we experience broken or failing relationships.”
Another experiment showed that people preferred angry music when they were frustrated by being interrupted, or someone being late.
In other words, a personal hassle made people want negatively valenced music.
However, people who experienced impersonal hassles, like a loss of internet connection, wanted upbeat music to take their mind off it.
So, sadness caused by other people makes us yearn for similar aesthetic experiences.
Maybe this is because being rejected by others makes us crave emotional companionship, which sad music and movies provide.
The study was published in the Journal of Consumer Research (Lee et al., 2013).
How To Support A Depressed Partner (M)
Responding to a depressed partner in this way helps maintain the relationship.
An Everyday Way To Improve Your Relationship (M)
Oxytocin, sometimes called the ‘love hormone’, is linked to increased bonding and closeness.
This Emotional Display Makes People More Attractive (M)
Mere ‘virtue signalling’ — saying something morally righteous in order to look good — is not enough to appear more attractive.
Online Dating: These 2 Factors Make People ‘Swipe Right’
Around one-in-ten American adults report they have had a long-term relationship grow from an online dating app meet-up.
Around one-in-ten American adults report they have had a long-term relationship grow from an online dating app meet-up.
The two most important factors in online dating are attractiveness and race, new research finds.
People ‘swipe right’ to indicate liking of a potential partners when they are more attractive and when they are the same race.
Those who believe themselves more attractive tend to be even more picky, rejecting more potential dates overall.
Online daters took very little notice of people’s personality, the type of relationship they were looking for or much else besides.
All that really mattered was appearance.
Despite this, around one-in-ten American adults report they have had a long-term relationship grow from an online dating app meet-up.
Dr William Chopik, the study’s first author, said:
“Despite online dating becoming an increasingly popular way for people to meet one another, there is little research on how people connect with each other on these platforms.
We wanted to understand what makes someone want to swipe left or swipe right, and the process behind how they make those decisions.”
For the research people viewed profiles of men and women and had to swipe left to reject them and swipe right to like them.
The results showed that men swiped right more often than women, but both sexes made their decision quickly.
Dr Chopik said:
“It’s extremely eye-opening that people are willing to make decisions about whether or not they would like to get to another human being, in less than a second and based almost solely on the other person’s looks.
Also surprising was just how little everything beyond attractiveness and race mattered for swiping behavior—your personality didn’t seem to matter, how open you were to hook-ups didn’t matter, or even your style for how you approach relationships or if you were looking short- or long-term didn’t matter.”
People tended to choose others of the same race, although black people were more likely to be rejected, on average.
Dr Chopik said:
“The disparities were rather shocking.
Profiles of Black users were rejected more often than white users, highlighting another way people of color face bias in everyday life.”
People were significantly more likely to swipe right on someone who has already like them, preliminary data shows.
Dr Chopik said:
“We like people who like us.
It makes sense that we want to connect with others who have shown an interest in us, even if they weren’t initially a top choice.”
The study was published in the Journal of Research in Personality (Chopik & Johnson, 2021).
Partners Make People Feel Connected — Not Children, Pets Or Video Calls
Children, pets, video calls with friends and even working outside the house did nothing to increase people’s sense of social connection during the pandemic.
Children, pets, video calls with friends and even working outside the house did nothing to increase people’s sense of social connection during the pandemic.
People’s partners provide the best buffer against social disconnection due to the pandemic, new research finds.
Romantic partners help keep each other’s well-being from taking a knock from social isolation.
In contrast, chatting with friends on Facetime and any number of children and pets have little effect on making people feel socially connected.
In other words, it doesn’t matter how big your household is, it’s all down to the quality of the connection.
The research affirms the importance of romantic partners for mental well-being.
Ms Karynna Okabe-Miyamoto, the study’s first author, said:
“Research prior to the pandemic has long shown that partners are one of the strongest predictors of social connection and well-being.
And our research during the current COVID-19 pandemic has shown the same.
Living with a partner uniquely buffered declines in social connection during the early phases of the pandemic.”
For the study, almost 1,000 people in Canada and the UK answered questions about their feelings of social connectedness both before and during the pandemic.
They rated statements like:
- “I felt close and connected with other people who are important to me.”
- “People are around me, but not with me.”
People living with romantic partners gave higher ratings to their levels of social connection after social distancing measures took hold, the results showed.
However, children, pets, video calls with friends and even working outside the house did nothing to increase people’s sense of social connection.
The authors write:
“Living with a partner — but not how many people or who else one lives with — appeared to confer benefit during these uncertain and unprecedented times.”
How to deal with pandemic stress
The four most common strategies people are using to deal with the pandemic are:
- checking in with loved ones,
- increased exercise,
- limiting news exposure,
- and performing acts of kindness.
→ Read on: the best ways to deal with COVID stress and what social distancing does to brain and body.
The study was published in the journal PLOS ONE (Okabe-Miyamoto et al., 2021).
The Answer To Relationship Strain During The COVID Pandemic
Couples who interfere more with each other’s routines experience greater anger and sadness.
Couples who interfere more with each other’s routines experience greater anger and sadness.
Working from home together during the pandemic has put considerable strain on people’s relationships.
One of the major reasons is the disruption of each other’s routines.
Now, a new study has found that couples who interfere more with each other’s routines experience greater anger and sadness.
This leads to perceiving the relationship as more turbulent.
Greater awareness and consideration of your partner’s routines, though, can help reduce relationship strain.
Mr Kevin Knoster, the study’s first author, explained:
“When you are impeding your significant other from accomplishing their goals or are disrupting their daily routines, there will be emotional responses.
Based on our findings, more interference from your spouse leads to sadness and anger, and that’s independent from one another.
This can lead to perceptions of a turbulent relationship.”
The study included 165 couples who were surveyed during the first peak of the pandemic in April 2020.
They were asked how much their spouse disrupted their routine and how they viewed the relationship.
The researchers interpreted the results using ‘relational turbulence theory’.
This is the idea that periods of instability can easily create problems within the relationship.
Partners can feel more uncertain about their commitment to the relationship and its future.
Like many of those in his study and around the world, Mr Knoster found himself experiencing ‘relationship turbulence’:
“Like a lot of people, we, too, had to adapt on the fly all of a sudden to working from home.
Our routines were in a state of a flux.”
Mr Knoster ended up disrupting his wife’s routines from time-to-time:
“I step on her toes every now and then.
I teach classes from home (on the computer) and her office is through a closed door behind me.
If she needs to go to the restroom, she has to walk behind me so she may be thinking, ‘Do I need to coordinate with his schedule just to wash my hands?’
It’s interesting.
It’s changed our professional lives and personal lives in more ways than we think.”
The answer is to be more considerate, says Mr Knoster:
“…when you and your partner support each other’s goals and accommodate routines, that elicits positive emotional reactions.
We need to remember to catch our breaths for a moment and work together.
It’s more important now that we’re sort of sequestered inside at all hours of the day and starting to feel like rats in a cage.”
The study was published in the journal Communication Research Reports (Knoster et al., 2020).
One Simple Phrase Helps People Stay Positive (M)
This way of responding to upsetting emotions improves people’s mood.
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Fear of rejection is the main barrier to approaching others.
