Category: Relationships

These relationships can help us stave off loneliness.

People who value their friendships are healthier and happier, research finds.

As we get older, relationships with friends can become more important for health and happiness than relationships with family members.

With age, friends can play a stronger role in predicting how long we will live than our families.

It may be partly because we choose our friends and not our families (well, not most of them, anyway).

Friends who have stood the test of time are particularly valuable.

Dr William Chopik, the study’s author, said:

“Friendships become even more important as we age.

Keeping a few really good friends around can make a world of difference for our health and well-being.

So it’s smart to invest in the friendships that make you happiest.”

A first study surveyed 271,053 from almost 100 countries.

This found both friends and family were linked to people’s happiness and health.

However, the benefits of friendship became stronger with age.

Dr Chopik said:

“There are now a few studies starting to show just how important friendships can be for older adults.

Summaries of these studies show that friendships predict day-to-day happiness more and ultimately how long we’ll live, more so than spousal and family relationships.”

A second study of 7,481 older adults found friendships could be both a significant source of strain as well as happiness.

However, friends may help to fight against loneliness, Dr Chopik said:

“Friendships help us stave off loneliness but are often harder to maintain across the lifespan.

If a friendship has survived the test of time, you know it must be a good one – a person you turn to for help and advice often and a person you wanted in your life.”

The study was published in the journal Personal Relationships (Chopik, 2017).

Four things that kill a relationship stone dead.

When someone has contempt for their partner, this is the single greatest predictor of divorce.

The conclusion comes from psychologist Professor John Gottman, who has been analysing relationships, both good and bad for over 40 years.

He’s followed couples across decades in many psychological studies to see what kinds of behaviours predict whether they would stay together in the long-term or were soon destined for the divorce courts.

Amongst the factors he identified, four have stood out, time and time again.

When Gottman sees a couple’s communication overrun with these, the chances are they will divorce in an average of around six years from their marriage.

1. Contempt

Contempt can involve sarcasm, name-calling, mimicking and eye-rolling.

Whatever form it takes, contempt makes the other person feel worthless.

Contempt is also bad for your health, as Gottman found that couples who were contemptuous of each other suffered from more infectious diseases like colds and flu.

Alternatively: build respect by appreciating the positive, e.g. “Love your taste in music!” (NOT “The sound of your laughter makes me want to vomit.”)

2. Criticism

Of course we all complain to each other—married couples more than most—but it’s a particular type of corrosive criticism that Gottman identified as being so destructive.

This is when one criticises the other’s core being, their personality.

For example: “You’re late because you don’t care about me“.

We all make mistakes, but notice that here it’s all about how those mistakes are interpreted.

At their worst, criticisms have the implication that the other person is bad or wrong at some deeper level.

Repeated criticisms that strike at the heart of the other person’s being signal the end of the relationship will be sooner rather than later.

Alternatively: voice the concern and make a request, e.g. “I’m bored, let’s have a game of cards.” (NOT: “You’re ignoring me you selfish @#$%!”)

3. Defensiveness

A person is too defensive when they are always trying to make excuses for their failures or slip-ups.

People do this automatically from time-to-time, but when it becomes a persistent theme in a relationship, this can signal the end.

It’s an even worse signal when partners are also trying to score points off the other on top of being defensive.

After all, people who live together are supposed to be in partnership, supporting each other.

Life is difficult enough without being attacked from within as well as from without.

Alternatively: take your share of the blame and suggest a solution, e.g. “I guess I should have put it on my list, OK let’s do it now.” (NOT: No, I didn’t pay the gas bill because you forgot to remind me.”)

4. Stonewalling

Stonewalling is when a person metaphorically raises the drawbridge and cuts off communication.

There are no nods of encouragement to their partner when they speak, no attempt to empathise and no effort to respond or connect.

It’s like talking to a brick wall.

Stonewalling can often be a result of a prolonged period of criticism, contempt and defensiveness.

It may feel like the only response to a worsening situation, but lack of communication will not solve the problems at the heart of the relationship.

Alternatively: speak, move, respond, blink, move a muscle, anything! (NOT: here’s my impression of a brick wall.)

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This attachment style can be damaging to relationships.

Anxiously attached people are more likely to be unfaithful to their partner, suggesting this is one of the worst attachment styles, research finds.

High levels of attachment anxiety are linked to a fear of abandonment.

People who are anxiously attached are extremely ‘needy’.

If an anxiously attached person does not get the reassurance they seek in their current relationship, they are likely to look elsewhere.

Around one in five people has an anxious attachment style.

A classic sign is having wildly varying feelings about the relationship from one day to the next.

People experiencing attachment anxiety spend a lot of time thinking about what the other person wants.

They can easily move from feeling strongly attached, to wanting independence.

The conclusions come from a study of over 200 newlywed couples who were followed for almost five years.

They were given tests of their personality, attachment style and relationship satisfaction.

The results showed that if either partner was anxiously attached, then they had a higher chance of being unfaithful.

Dealing with the worst attachment style

One answer to the issues that anxiously attached people face may be therapy:

“…interventions such as attachment based family therapy and attachment-focused group intervention have been effective at reducing attachment anxiety and thus may help prevent infidelity among anxiously attached intimates.”

Another is for a partner of an anxiously attached person to work on being more responsive:

“…intimates report reduced attachment insecurity when they are with responsive partners than when they are with unresponsive partners.”

In contrast to anxiously attached people, those who were avoidantly attached were less likely to be unfaithful.

People who are avoidant want to avoid getting too attached to the other person.

Around one in four people has an avoidant attachment style.

Both avoidant and anxious attachment are both insecure types of attachment.

Just over 50% of people are securely attached to their partner.

The securely attached are the least likely to be unfaithful as they do not worry about their partner straying or the strength of the relationship.

The study was published in the Journal of Family Psychology (Russell et al., 2013).

Empathy for certain emotions helps couples have difficult discussions about change, research finds.

Direct communication is the best way to get your partner to change, research finds.

Whether it is getting them to lose weight, spend less money or change life goals, being more direct is the best approach.

Naturally, these sorts of discussions are fraught with difficulty.

The emotional tone of the communication is vital.

Be empathetic

One key to having difficult discussions is empathy.

Research shows that people with stronger relationships tend to be better at reading the emotions of embarrassment, shame and sadness in their partner.

Couples who perceived these softer negative emotions more clearly tended to be more satisfied with their relationships.

In contrast, those who were better at spotting stronger negative emotions, like anger and contempt, had weaker relationships.

Dr Bonnie Le, the study’s first author, explained the reason:

“If you are appeasing with your partner — or feel embarrassed or bashful — and your partner accurately picks up on this, it can signal to your partner that you care about their feelings and recognize a change request might be hurtful.

Or if your partner is angry or contemptuous — what we call dominance emotions — that signals very different, negative information that may hurt a partner if they accurately perceive it.”

Reading embarrassment and shame

The study included 11 couples who had dated for an average of three years.

They were asked to discuss what aspects of their partner they wanted to change.

Naturally, this raised some strong emotions which the researchers asked the couples about after the discussion.

This procedure simulates a common way of dealing with relationship conflict: by asking your partner to change.

The results showed that couples able to read emotions like sadness, embarrassment and shame had stronger relationships.

This is probably because being able to read these emotions helps difficult discussions — like those requesting change — to go more smoothly.

However, reacting more strongly to anger and contempt likely derails difficult discussions early on.

Professor Stéphane Côté, study co-author, said:

“We think reading emotions allows partners to coordinate what they do and say to each other, and perhaps that is helpful when appeasement emotions are read, but not when anger emotions are read.

Anger seems to overpower any effect of reading emotions, which is consistent with lots of research findings on how anger harms relationships.”

Direct communication is the best way to get a partner to change.

It must be done sensitively, though, said Dr Le:

“It’s not bad to feel a little bashful or embarrassed when raising these issues because it signals to the partner that you care and it’s valuable for your partner to see that.

You acknowledge that what you raise may hurt their feelings.

It shows that you are invested, that you are committed to having this conversation, and committed to not hurting them.

And the extent to which this is noted by your partner may foster a more positive relationship.”

The study was published in the journal Psychological Science (Le et al., 2020).