Research says it’s easy to predict desired romantic partners. It’s not, however,
easy to predict good romantic partners. This suggests that many of us are dating all wrong.
So if YOU want to make better dating choices,
don’t take it from me, take it from the experts, and keep watching.
Samantha Joel wanted to explore the question: can we predict successful relationships?
So she and a big team of scientists conducted 43 studies, looking at more than
11,000 long-term heterosexual couples and how happy each person was in these relationships.
These were the eight traits that they found were the least
predictive in determining romantic happiness:
Physical Attractiveness Height
Occupation Race and Ethnicity
Religious Affiliation Sexual Tastes
Previous Marital Status Similarities to Oneself
What's interesting about that is that these are the traits that are deemed
most desirable according to data from online dating sites, where conventional
attractiveness is the number one predictor of how many messages someone gets on a dating app.
Even having a sexy name, which is subjective, increases the chance of
getting more right-swipes. I hate to admit this, but when someone is already attractive
and their name is Jacob or Hunter, it just does something to a lady’s mind.
But what the data shows is that, although there’s definitely a correlation between
those traits and DESIRABILITY, there’s almost no correlation between those traits and HAPPINESS.
There’s a clear distinction to be made between DESIRE and HAPPINESS.
Now, to give you the abstract of these studies: Basically, research can't tell you whether or
not two people will share a happy life together, only life can tell you that. But, there’s still
some very interesting findings that can absolutely transform the way you pursue romance in your life.
But, before we get into that, the first thing YOU should do is go to therapy. Whether you’re
happily single or happily married, therapy can help you uncover and unfold parts of
yourself and your life that you simply can’t do on your own. I understand myself so much better after
going to therapy, which ultimately has helped me make better, healthier choices for myself.
And that’s why I’m excited to tell you about BetterHelp, who is our sponsor today.
BetterHelp’s mission is to make therapy accessible,
and this is an important mission because finding a therapist can be hard.
BetterHelp is a platform that makes finding a therapist easy because it’s online,
it’s remote, and by filling out a few questions,
BetterHelp can match you to a credentialed therapist in as little as a few days.
It's easy to sign up and get matched with a therapist. There's a link in my description.
It's betterhelp.com/lana Clicking that link helps support this channel, but it also gets
you 10% off your first month of BetterHelp so you can connect with a therapist and see if it helps
you. And because finding a therapist is a little like dating, if you don't really fit with that
therapist, which is a common thing with therapy, you can easily switch to a different therapist.
So if you’re struggling, consider online therapy with BetterHelp. Click the link in the
description or visit Betterhelp.com/lana. Thank you again BetterHelp for supporting this channel.
Now, since having a 6 ft 4 partner whose name is Hunter doesn’t mean
you’ll be happy in your relationship, what does?
Well, there are some things that play a role.
1. How happy you were before the relationship.
One thing that did seem to impact the happiness of each person in a
relationship was how happy they were before the relationship.
So let’s say we have these two people, Louise and Peter. If they both answered
yes to questions like “Were you satisfied in life before you met him/her?”research
showed that they'd be significantly more happy in their relationships,
which supports the age-old saying “nobody can make you happy until you’re happy with yourself first“.
So, you’re more likely to be happy with someone long-term if
they’re already happy in most areas of their life.
2. Growth mindset – basically, being with someone who is interested in
improving themselves and learning new skills.
Now of course, this information is helpful when you’ve gotten to know a person, but you can’t
tell that from an online dating profile.
But what else is there in determining present and future relationship satisfaction?
1. Perceived partner commitment.
What they found was that, in the time leading up to people marrying, ever perceiving one’s partner
to be less committed than oneself—even a little bit—was one of the best predictors of unhappiness
in marriage. Basically, if you feel strongly that you want your relationship to last forever,
but you don’t perceive your partner to feel the same way… you’ve got problems.
2. Appreciation. Feeling lucky to have your partner.
3. Sexual satisfaction: How satisfied are you with the quality of your sex life?
4. Perceived partner satisfaction: How happy you think the relationship makes your partner.
5. Conflict. How much, or little, conflict there is in the relationship.
Now you might be wondering, well, looks don’t seem
to determine much, does that mean we should only be looking at personality?
Actually, personality doesn’t matter very much either. See, what’s far more important is this:
The characteristics of the relationship itself. It’s the dynamic you build with your person. The
findings tell us that the person we choose is not nearly as important as the relationship we
build. Basically, we don’t “find” the perfect person; no, we build a good relationship,
by setting up the conditions that will allow the relationship to flourish.
In Joels own words "The dynamic that you build with someone — the shared norms,
the in-jokes, the shared experiences — is so much
more than the separate individuals who make up that relationship.
Now, they're not claiming that the personalities of the two people involved in the relationship
doesn't play any role in the overall satisfaction--it does. For example,
each person's attachment style matters. If you're not familiar with attachment styles,
I highly recommend you read the book "Attached" by Amir Levine. I will link it down below,
truly one of the greatest books I've read on understanding relationships,
myself, and just people in general. Also, speaking of attachment styles,
therapy really helped me navigate that, because it can be quite complicated.
Key takeaway
Now, the study itself doesn’t say this,
but Joel, when asked what to look for when dating and in those initial stages, said this:
“You want to look for a partner who seems genuinely interested in you,
who is good at perspective-taking with you, and who seems to be responsive to
your needs. Someone who makes you feel understood, validated, and cared for.”
I couldn’t agree more.