Lasting relationships boil down to 2 basic traits (Business Insider article)

[valet]

http://www.businessinsider.com/lasting-relationships-rely-on-2-traits-2014-11

Excerpt:

Science says lasting relationships come down to—you guessed it—kindness and generosity.

Every day in June, the most popular wedding month of the year, about 13,000 American couples will say “I do,” committing to a lifelong relationship that will be full of friendship, joy, and love that will carry them forward to their final days on this earth.

Except, of course, it doesn’t work out that way for most people.

The majority of marriages fail, either ending in divorce and separation or devolving into bitterness and dysfunction.

Of all the people who get married, only three in ten remain in healthy, happy marriages, as psychologist Ty Tashiro points out in his book "The Science of Happily Ever After," which was published earlier this year.

Social scientists first started studying marriages by observing them in action in the 1970s in response to a crisis: Married couples were divorcing at unprecedented rates. Worried about the impact these divorces would have on the children of the broken marriages, psychologists decided to cast their scientific net on couples, bringing them into the lab to observe them and determine what the ingredients of a healthy, lasting relationship were.

Was each unhappy family unhappy in its own way, as Tolstoy claimed, or did the miserable marriages all share something toxic in common?

Psychologist John Gottman was one of those researchers. For the past four decades, he has studied thousands of couples in a quest to figure out what makes relationships work. I recently had the chance to interview Gottman and his wife Julie, also a psychologist, in New York City. Together, the renowned experts on marital stability run The Gottman Institute, which is devoted to helping couples build and maintain loving, healthy relationships based on scientific studies.

John Gottman began gathering his most critical findings in 1986, when he set up “The Love Lab” with his colleague Robert Levenson at the University of Washington. Gottman and Levenson brought newlyweds into the lab and watched them interact with each other.

With a team of researchers, they hooked the couples up to electrodes and asked the couples to speak about their relationship, like how they met, a major conflict they were facing together, and a positive memory they had. As they spoke, the electrodes measured the subjects' blood flow, heart rates, and how much they sweat they produced. Then the researchers sent the couples home and followed up with them six years later to see if they were still together.

From the data they gathered, Gottman separated the couples into two major groups: the masters and the disasters. The masters were still happily together after six years. The disasters had either broken up or were chronically unhappy in their marriages.

When the researchers analyzed the data they gathered on the couples, they saw clear differences between the masters and disasters. The disasters looked calm during the interviews, but their physiology, measured by the electrodes, told a different story. Their heart rates were quick, their sweat glands were active, and their blood flow was fast. Following thousands of couples longitudinally, Gottman found that the more physiologically active the couples were in the lab, the quicker their relationships deteriorated over time.

But what does physiology have to do with anything? The problem was that the disasters showed all the signs of arousal — of being in fight-or-flight mode — in their relationships. Having a conversation sitting next to their spouse was, to their bodies, like facing off with a saber-toothed tiger.

Even when they were talking about pleasant or mundane facets of their relationships, they were prepared to attack and be attacked. This sent their heart rates soaring and made them more aggressive toward each other. For example, each member of a couple could be talking about how their days had gone, and a highly aroused husband might say to his wife, “Why don’t you start talking about your day. It won’t take you very long.

Read more: http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/06/happily-ever-after/372573/#ixzz3IiuN70gJ

 

[Remote]

Kindness and Generosity.



It should be noted that Kindness and Generosity can be vague and subject to interpretation.

Go ahead. Ask the coli to define those terms and see if you don't wind up with 32 different answers.

 

[HoustonHeat]

Good article and study. Essentially, acknowledging the little things your partner is interested in or wants you to relate to, and exercising kindness during times when you are stressed and short on energy. I also noticed that when I thank my dude for the little and expected efforts, he feels a lot more appreciated. He never expects acknowledgement (he's a man's man), but a little goes a long way with him so I try to express it genuinely.

Disasters= failed partners
Masters= successful partners

“Disasters will say things differently in a fight. Disasters will say ‘You’re late. What’s wrong with you? You’re just like your mom.’ Masters will say ‘I feel bad for picking on you about your lateness, and I know it’s not your fault, but it’s really annoying that you’re late again.’”

 

[old_timer]

gottman's very good at marketing- got those books to sell
but i'm not convinced his ideas will stand the test of time

 

[Danny Up]

Nah. It's all about being content or generally not giving a fukk one way or the other.

 

[ThatKidBlackHippy]

basically dont be a piece of shyt and try to at least be a decent human being

 

[Humble (Not) Mike Tyson]

Only 7 replies.

 

[Humble (Not) Mike Tyson]

All of this contentious discourse about relationships and no one wants to wax poetic about the solutions?

:smhke:

 

[concise]

All of this contentious discourse about relationships and no one wants to wax poetic about the solutions?

:smhke:

Of course not.

 

[BaggerofTea]

To sum it up, don't be a selfish a$$hole/bytch

 

[Guess Who]

basically dont be a piece of shyt and try to at least be a decent human being

Most people struggle with this concept when emotions get involved, though. A lot of people, when they are not in the best mood, become dismissive, passive-aggressive, or outright demeaning and contemptuous to people around them.

And we live in a society that's increasingly selfish.

 

[Ohene]

Tell that to the tricks and simps

 

[Arishok]

Most people struggle with this concept when emotions get involved, though. A lot of people, when they are not in the best mood, become dismissive, passive-aggressive, or outright demeaning and contemptuous to people around them.

And we live in a society that's increasingly selfish.

I admit I'm one of those passive-aggressive people but I always feel like shyt after treating someone else like shyt who didn't deserve it simply because I'm in a bad mood (my younger brother is a perfect example). I always go and apologize for my attitude after I realize what I've done, I guess some people just can't do that.

 

[Guess Who]

I admit I'm one of those passive-aggressive people but I always feel like shyt after treating someone else like shyt who didn't deserve it simply because I'm in a bad mood (my younger brother is a perfect example). I always go and apologize for my attitude after I realize what I've done, I guess some people just can't do that.

Well we're all humans, which means we're going to be ruled by our emotions at least to some extent, but the key is to do that as little as possible and to acknowledge when it is happening with an apology like you do.

I'd be lying if I said I was always a perfect communicator when angry (or especially, sad) because I'm not. But I do try my best to not let my emotions get the best of me and to acknowledge when they do. Things have been working out better for me when I've done that in the past year or so.

 

[Arishok]

Well we're all humans, which means we're going to be ruled by our emotions at least to some extent, but the key is to do that as little as possible and to acknowledge when it is happening with an apology like you do.

I'd be lying if I said I was always a perfect communicator when angry (or especially, sad) because I'm not. But I do try my best to not let my emotions get the best of me and to acknowledge when they do. Things have been working out better for me when I've done that in the past year or so.

Yeah it takes a lot to make me explode with anger, I'm learning to let things roll of my back and go be by myself to think more.