{"id":108,"date":"2020-10-24T00:27:37","date_gmt":"2020-10-24T00:27:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/?p=108"},"modified":"2020-10-24T00:27:37","modified_gmt":"2020-10-24T00:27:37","slug":"how-to-be-or-not-to-be-in-a-relationship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/2020\/10\/24\/how-to-be-or-not-to-be-in-a-relationship\/","title":{"rendered":"(How) To be, or not to be (in a relationship)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Have you ever gone on Instagram or Facebook on Valentine\u2019s Day (while you yourself were single) and had your feelings hurt by the fact that everyone and their mom seems to be in a relationship? <\/span>Pls it can\u2019t be just me<\/span><\/i>. Or maybe you\u2019ve had your entire extended family grill you at Thanksgiving dinner about whether you got a bae, and if not, why you don\u2019t got a bae? If so, I bet (after wishing to be a smol amoeba floating away into the abyss), you\u2019ve at least asked yourself \u201cwhy?\u201d Why do we care ~SO MUCH~ about being in relationships? How does one,,, relationship? And how do you do it well (or not so well)? Read and learn, young grasshopper, read and learn.<\/span><\/p>\n

– \u2022 – \u2022 – \u2022 –<\/span><\/p>\n

Why do we fall in love?<\/span>: (reason #3512458045 why humans are weird) <\/span><\/span>-Gaby<\/b><\/p>\n

WHAT\u2019S UP GUYS welcome to your very own crash course on <\/span>Human Monogamy<\/b>\u2122:<\/b><\/p>\n

A long<\/span><\/p>\n

long<\/span><\/p>\n

long<\/span><\/p>\n

long time ago (~5-7 million years ago, to be exact-<\/span>ish<\/span><\/i>), human apes would diverge from our last common ancestor (LCA) shared with bonobos and chimpanzees (Stoneking, 2008, pp. S46-S47). And so began the <\/span>Story of U<\/i><\/b>s<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

For context, the LCA looked and behaved NOTHING like modern humans and rather is hypothesized by many in the field (including Harvard\u2019s very own Dr. Daniel Lieberman) to have more closely resembled chimpanzees (Lieberman, 2013). As such, in our initial splitting off from African apes it was easiest to keep a lot of key chimp-like characteristics, which meant that ancient humans had a very, very spicy and promiscuous mating structure in which both males and females had multiple mates. This. Makes. Sense. For males\u2192 you maximize the amount of offspring while minimizing responsibility to care for each one, essentially nullifying paternal load. For females \u2192 you maximize the diversity of male genetic contribution to your offspring, thereby increasing your chances of producing evolutionarily fit babies. Boom. You\u2019ve now got selection wrapped around your finger.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cUnless???\u201d –<\/span>our ultra-social human nature.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

As it turns out, somewhere along the course of our evolutionary history, humans started to live longer than the average chimp. As such, we could spend a longer time developing during childhood, giving us time to grow bigger brains and bodies (Chapis, 2017). Bigger brains and bodies required a whole lot more energy though, which made baby-making a pretty expensive investment given heightened parental responsibility to supply so much food (energy) and resources for each kid. Moms no longer wanted so many mates to keep track of due to paternal uncertainty (males are more likely to invest in their offspring if they are sure that it\u2019s his genetic material he\u2019s protecting), and Dads now wanted to keep it to one mate so as to minimize paternal cost and maximize investment to a select group of offspring. Who would\u2019ve thought big headed babies could bring people together ugh <3<\/span><\/p>\n

And so, just like our brains evolved to prefer to be in groups and care about what others think, we also evolved psychological \u201cfail-safes\u201d (i.e. norm psychology, jealousy, oxytocin release that gives you those warm fuzzy feelings when you\u2019re around your partner) to make sure that we engage in monogamous relationships through the universal acceptance of social constructs such as dating and marriage and #cuffingszn.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

P.S. <\/span>Did you know!<\/span><\/i> Though not as ~unique~ as it is in humans, pair bonding can also be found in other species! My all-time favorite example is of the <\/span>Titi monkeys<\/span><\/a>, who intertwine their tails together when sitting next to each other or when sleeping :\u2019))\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

How do we stay in love?: Ingredients for a long-lasting relationship<\/span><\/span> -Suyeon<\/b><\/p>\n

So now that you know <\/span>why<\/span><\/i> we fall in love, let\u2019s talk about <\/span>how <\/span><\/i>we <\/span>stay<\/span> in love<\/span>\u2014 starting with the fact that dating <\/span>someone does not mean that that person will stay with you forever. You may find out that you are not compatible with each other or have conflicts so often that lead you to think about breaking up with your partner. Although I love my boyfriend, I sometimes give up everything and declare <\/span>freedom<\/span><\/i> when we have conflicts over and over.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Then the question is, how do we maintain our romantic relationships? There are two important ingredients that could enable your relationship to last long as you want: Perceived understanding and gratitude. According to Gordon and Chen (2016) conflict becomes detrimental only when there is an absence of perceived understanding between two partners. Once your partner seems to understand what you are upset about, solving a conflict becomes an easy problem. Surely, it is hard to try to understand another person\u2019s mind when I am upset\u2014which is why conflicts, in most cases, are detrimental. One quick solution I suggest is to <\/span>sleep<\/span><\/i>! Whenever a conflict arises, don\u2019t try to argue with your partner at the moment\u2014I would sleep and think about what I would say after I wake up. It becomes much easier to understand from the other\u2019s perspective after you sleep tight.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Another ingredient for a long-lasting relationship is gratitude. Gordon et al. (2012) demonstrate that people who feel they are appreciated by their partner tend to feel more gratitude towards their partner. Indeed, feeling appreciated could be a reward in a relationship. We feel valued as our partners express gratitude towards us. Therefore, feeling appreciated promotes desirable behaviors within humans since we perceive the feeling as a reward followed by those behaviors. We never get tired of hearing \u201cThank you\u201d, right?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Why is it so hard to say \u201cno\u201d ?<\/span><\/span> – Anna<\/b><\/p>\n

We\u2019ve talked about what might make us fall in love and how to maintain that love, but what happens when a suitor makes unwanted advances & the person being pursued reluctantly accepts it? Has this ever happened to you? Coming from NYC, I can relate to these unwanted advances, where my responses are rarely made based on my own wants and desires, but rather on how I think the person talking to me will react. Let\u2019s imagine someone approaches you in the subway and asks for your number. You look ahead and try not to make eye contact, but the more you ignore them, the more aggravated they become, and they begin to speak more loudly and get closer to you to elicit a reaction. You decide to look at them and smile, and tell them you have a significant other already, but you are flattered by their advance. All the while, you don\u2019t have a significant other and you\u2019re utterly disgusted by this person. Why sugarcoat it?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Bohns and Devincent\u2019s article \u201cRejecting Unwanted Advances Is More Difficult Than Suitors Realize\u201d attribute this response to the fact that rejecting someone is fundamentally \u201cawkward and uncomfortable\u201d because of the egocentric dynamics at play (2019). A suitor is much more likely to underestimate their target\u2019s discomfort in an advance, both because of rationalizations that might protect their ego & the tendency for targets to sugarcoat their rejections, such as by laughing it off or ignoring it rather than outright rejecting them. Revisiting the subway, you may have decided to lie about having a significant other out of fear or guilt. You know it\u2019s easier to defend rejection when you have a significant other, so the rejection will seem as though you had no choice but to reject them, making it easier for the suitor to accept it without taking a huge hit to their ego. Even further, this sugarcoating may have been due to genuine fear of getting hurt or harassed by an aggravated suitor who\u2019s ego might get easily bruised.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Overall, we see two things going on. You, the target of the unwanted advance, are more aware of the other, what their intentions may be, and how they may react to rejection. Meanwhile, your suitor is less aware of your discomfort and is guided by their confidence that you\u2019ll reciprocate. If this is the case, what should you do in cases of unwanted advances? As a psychologist, I\u2019d say tell your suitor about the discomfort you feel, and let them get a better understanding of your feelings in the self-other model that could guide their actions. But, as a city girl, I\u2019d say, smile, nod, and get the heck out of there.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

– \u2022 – \u2022 – \u2022 –<\/span><\/p>\n

When it comes to love, you never know. Maybe the road to finding your soulmate will be completely by chance or an uphill battle of \u201cnot the ones\u201d. We\u2019re here to tell you not to sweat it <\/span>too <\/span><\/i>much, since there\u2019s actually a lot of psychology behind why you fall for someone and why you might not. So, the next time you find yourself crushin\u2019 hard on someone, just hoping that you don\u2019t or that they don\u2019t mess it up, relax a little bit! Have faith in yourself and the fact that it\u2019s literally in our nature to gravitate towards others. Take a deep breath, read up on our do\u2019s and don\u2019ts on finding love, and the rest should be history \ud83d\ude42<\/span><\/p>\n

xoxo,<\/span><\/p>\n

Anna, Gaby, & Suyeon\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

References:<\/b><\/p>\n

Bohns, V. K., & DeVincent, L. A. (2019). Rejecting unwanted romantic advances is more difficult than suitors realize. <\/span>Social Psychological and Personality Science, 10<\/span><\/i>(8), 1102-1110<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

Chapais, B. (2017). From Chimpanzee Society to Human Society: Bridging the Human Gap. <\/span>Chimpanzees and human evolution <\/span><\/i>(427-463). Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.<\/span><\/p>\n

Gordon, Amie M, & Chen, Serena. (2016). Do You Get Where I’m Coming From?: Perceived Understanding Buffers Against the Negative Impact of Conflict on Relationship Satisfaction. <\/span>Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 110<\/span><\/i>(2), 239-260.<\/span><\/p>\n

Gordon, A.M., Impett, E.A., Kogan, A., Oveis, C., & Keltner, D. (2012). To have and to hold: Gratitude promotes relationship maintenance in intimate bonds. <\/span>Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 103<\/span><\/i>, 257-274.<\/span><\/p>\n

Lieberman, D.E. (2013). The Story of the Human Body. New York, Pantheon Books.<\/span>
\nStoneking, M. (2008). Human origins. <\/span>EMBO Reports,<\/span><\/i> 9<\/span><\/i>(1S), S46-S50.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Have you ever gone on Instagram or Facebook on Valentine\u2019s Day (while you yourself were single) and had your feelings hurt by the fact that everyone and their mom seems to be in a relationship? Pls it can\u2019t be just me. Or maybe you\u2019ve had your entire extended family grill you at Thanksgiving dinner about […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9877,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9877"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":109,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108\/revisions\/109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/socialconnection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}