Really interesting article today in the Wall Street Journal: ‘The Math Behind Successful Relationships‘ regarding a study by psychologist John Gottman and mathematician James Murray. I have read about this research previously. It is an interesting study, because from what I can gather, the biggest ENEMY to long-term relationship health, is ‘contempt’. And this quality can be generated when you and your partner have different communication styles in a relationship

To give you some context, the definition of contempt is the feeling that a person or a thing is worthless or beneath consideration.

Indicators of success

The study found that for a relationship to have a chance at long-term success, there need to be five positive emotions for every one negative emotion expressed. In relationships where the ratio was more than 1:1 positive for negative emotions expressed, then there is less chance of the marriage surviving.

I do think it might be a handy tool if you are in a relationship and you are questioning whether it has a future, or if you should proceed.

Healthy relationship styles

The article does suggest that ‘validating‘ is a stable relationship style (there are three stable styles in total).

The article suggested that the way to long-term relationship health is to TURN to the person and to listen to them.

Are you the one?

According to the authors of the study, our communication styles are relatively fixed over time – so unlike personality, which can be changeable (as I will discuss in tomorrow’s post), our communication styles are stable.

I think this is super interesting. If our communication styles don’t change, but people’s personalities can change, then maybe there are some people in the world who are ‘good for you’ and others who are ‘bad for you’, through absolutely no fault of their own, or your own, but just because the way you communicate with each other is laced with negative emotions. In this way, different communication styles in a relationship can make you wonder if your love will survive.

It also makes me realise that what can really make or break a relationship is how you communicate in times of conflict or disagreement. Unfortunately, it seems as though the link to the article is behind a paywall and although I read the article earlier, you may not be able to read the original article – apologies. Perhaps you could search for psychologist John Gottman and mathematician James Murray if you want to read more about this!

Methods of the study

Essentially, couples were filmed during free-flowing conversations of three kinds. The most important conversation in the study was the conversation where there was some form of disagreement. The number of negative emotions expressed during this time-limited conversation turned out to be an excellent indicator of whether the couples would end up divorcing or not. The couples were followed for ten years from memory, perhaps longer.

It is an interesting study, but I don’t think it is all doom and gloom. If you want to improve your relationship with your partner, then as I mentioned, turn to them, listen to them and try to help validate their feelings.

Hope you are having a fantastic Valentine’s Day! Much love 🙂 xx

Image credit:

“dra140601_0233” by dmitryzhkov is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.