Oct 26, 2019 10:18 PM
https://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/...utral-ones
EXCERPT: “Single? Well, it is better than being in a bad relationship.” Well-meaning friends and relatives sometimes convey such sentiments to single people. There are even some single people who say the same thing about themselves. But is it true? New research published online in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin shows that such a sentiment may in fact set the bar far too low.
On seven different measures of how people were doing, people in romantic relationships were better off than single people in only one way. On the other six measures, people in romantic relationships did better than single people only if they said their relationships were of the very highest quality. In other words, single people did better than people in bad romantic relationships. But they also did better than people in romantic relationships that were not that bad at all.
In “The Highs and Lows of Love,” Nathan W. Hudson of Southern Methodist University, and Richard E. Lucas and M. Brent Donnellan of Michigan State University, also describe the emotional experiences of people in romantic relationships when their partner was and was not around. Some of the findings were not at all romantic.
Michigan State University conducts a State of the State telephone survey four times a year. Participants who said they were interested in signing up for other studies were sent invitations to take part in this study. The 326 people who answered questions at least two different times were included in the analyses. They ranged in age from 19 to 92; on average, they were 53 years old. Most (86 percent) were white...(MORE)
EXCERPT: “Single? Well, it is better than being in a bad relationship.” Well-meaning friends and relatives sometimes convey such sentiments to single people. There are even some single people who say the same thing about themselves. But is it true? New research published online in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin shows that such a sentiment may in fact set the bar far too low.
On seven different measures of how people were doing, people in romantic relationships were better off than single people in only one way. On the other six measures, people in romantic relationships did better than single people only if they said their relationships were of the very highest quality. In other words, single people did better than people in bad romantic relationships. But they also did better than people in romantic relationships that were not that bad at all.
In “The Highs and Lows of Love,” Nathan W. Hudson of Southern Methodist University, and Richard E. Lucas and M. Brent Donnellan of Michigan State University, also describe the emotional experiences of people in romantic relationships when their partner was and was not around. Some of the findings were not at all romantic.
Michigan State University conducts a State of the State telephone survey four times a year. Participants who said they were interested in signing up for other studies were sent invitations to take part in this study. The 326 people who answered questions at least two different times were included in the analyses. They ranged in age from 19 to 92; on average, they were 53 years old. Most (86 percent) were white...(MORE)