"If you have spent any significant time as a single adult, you know that the world feels built for couples and that the people around us often assume we want to be partnered. Until recently, researchers have been making the same mistake about singles. In 2020, Nicole Watkins and Jonathon Beckmeyer created a tool for assessing a person's level of relationship desire and dismissal. Together, these two components explain the importance someone places on romantic relationships in their lives."
"In our sample of young adults (ages 18-29), older study participants expressed a greater desire for romantic partnership than younger participants. They were more likely to say that being in a relationship is important to them and something they viewed as a source of satisfaction in life. This makes sense given the enduring cultural messages that suggest people should be moving toward a committed relationship by the end of their 20s or early 30s."
A tool measuring relationship desire and dismissal captures how much importance people place on romantic partnerships. Older young adults (ages 18-29) report greater desire for partnership and view relationships as important sources of satisfaction, likely influenced by cultural expectations to pair up by the late 20s or early 30s. Some singles report low desire for relationships and also report happiness with their love lives. Well-being among singles varies: happiness is highest when individuals' relationship desires align with their actual relationship situations, whether partnered or intentionally single.
Read at Psychology Today
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]