Initial impressions of compatibility and mate value predict later dating and romantic interest.

Romantic first impressions seem to linger, but why? Few studies have investigated how romantic desire during initial interactions predicts later relational outcomes (e.g., later romantic interest, contact attempts) using a design that can tease apart different possible mechanisms (e.g., mate value, selectivity, compatibility). Across three speed-dating studies (n = 559) with longitudinal follow-ups (including college and community samples, and a sample of men who date men), we investigated whether different components of initial romantic impressions predicted later romantic outcomes and relationship initiation. Using the social relations model, we partitioned initial desire at speed dating (determined from 6,600+ total dates) into partner effects (a date's consensual desirability, e.g., mate value), actor effects (a participant's general desirousness, e.g., selectivity), and relationship effects (a participant's unique liking for a date over and beyond partner and actor effects, e.g., compatibility) to predict later evaluations (romantic interest, physical attraction, and desire to know better) and behaviors (direct messaging and going on dates). Meta-analyses across the three studies showed that, across 6,100+ follow-up reports, partner and relationship effects were especially strong predictors of relationship initiation variables. Consistent with evolutionary models of human pair bonding, these findings suggest that both consensually desirable traits and unique impressions of compatibility have lingering effects on relationship development, even from the moment that two potential partners meet.

Machine learning uncovers the most robust self-report predictors of relationship quality across 43 longitudinal couples studies.

Given the powerful implications of relationship quality for health and well-being, a central mission of relationship science is explaining why some romantic relationships thrive more than others. This large-scale project used machine learning (i.e., Random Forests) to 1) quantify the extent to which relationship quality is predictable and 2) identify which constructs reliably predict relationship quality. Across 43 dyadic longitudinal datasets from 29 laboratories, the top relationship-specific predictors of relationship quality were perceived-partner commitment, appreciation, sexual satisfaction, perceived-partner satisfaction, and conflict. The top individual-difference predictors were life satisfaction, negative affect, depression, attachment avoidance, and attachment anxiety. Overall, relationship-specific variables predicted up to 45% of variance at baseline, and up to 18% of variance at the end of each study. Individual differences also performed well (21% and 12%, respectively). Actor-reported variables (i.e., own relationship-specific and individual-difference variables) predicted two to four times more variance than partner-reported variables (i.e., the partner's ratings on those variables). Importantly, individual differences and partner reports had no predictive effects beyond actor-reported relationship-specific variables alone. These findings imply that the sum of all individual differences and partner experiences exert their influence on relationship quality via a person's own relationship-specific experiences, and effects due to moderation by individual differences and moderation by partner-reports may be quite small. Finally, relationship-quality change (i.e., increases or decreases in relationship quality over the course of a study) was largely unpredictable from any combination of self-report variables. This collective effort should guide future models of relationships.

Experiences of liking versus ideas about liking.

We leverage the notion that abstraction enables prediction to generate novel insights and hypotheses for the literatures on attitudes and mate preferences. We suggest that ideas about liking (e.g., evaluations of categories or overall traits) are more abstract than experiences of liking (e.g., evaluations of particular exemplars), and that ideas about liking may facilitate mental travel beyond the here-and-now.

Explaining illness with evil: pathogen prevalence fosters moral vitalism.

Pathogens represent a significant threat to human health leading to the emergence of strategies designed to help manage their negative impact. We examined how spiritual beliefs developed to explain and predict the devastating effects of pathogens and spread of infectious disease. Analysis of existing data in studies 1 and 2 suggests that moral vitalism (beliefs about spiritual forces of evil) is higher in geographical regions characterized by historical higher levels of pathogens. Furthermore, drawing on a sample of 3140 participants from 28 countries in study 3, we found that historical higher levels of pathogens were associated with stronger endorsement of moral vitalistic beliefs. Furthermore, endorsement of moral vitalistic beliefs statistically mediated the previously reported relationship between pathogen prevalence and conservative ideologies, suggesting these beliefs reinforce behavioural strategies which function to prevent infection. We conclude that moral vitalism may be adaptive: by emphasizing concerns over contagion, it provided an explanatory model that enabled human groups to reduce rates of contagious disease.

Dominant, open nonverbal displays are attractive at zero-acquaintance.

Across two field studies of romantic attraction, we demonstrate that postural expansiveness makes humans more romantically appealing. In a field study (n = 144 speed-dates), we coded nonverbal behaviors associated with liking, love, and dominance. Postural expansiveness-expanding the body in physical space-was most predictive of attraction, with each one-unit increase in coded behavior from the video recordings nearly doubling a person's odds of getting a "yes" response from one's speed-dating partner. In a subsequent field experiment (n = 3,000), we tested the causality of postural expansion (vs. contraction) on attraction using a popular Global Positioning System-based online-dating application. Mate-seekers rapidly flipped through photographs of potential sexual/date partners, selecting those they desired to meet for a date. Mate-seekers were significantly more likely to select partners displaying an expansive (vs. contractive) nonverbal posture. Mediation analyses demonstrate one plausible mechanism through which expansiveness is appealing: Expansiveness makes the dating candidate appear more dominant. In a dating world in which success sometimes is determined by a split-second decision rendered after a brief interaction or exposure to a static photograph, single persons have very little time to make a good impression. Our research suggests that a nonverbal dominance display increases a person's chances of being selected as a potential mate.

The Psychology of Close Relationships: Fourteen Core Principles.

Relationship science is a theory-rich discipline, but there have been no attempts to articulate the broader themes or principles that cut across the theories themselves. We have sought to fill that void by reviewing the psychological literature on close relationships, particularly romantic relationships, to extract its core principles. This review reveals 14 principles, which collectively address four central questions: (a) What is a relationship? (b) How do relationships operate? (c) What tendencies do people bring to their relationships? (d) How does the context affect relationships? The 14 principles paint a cohesive and unified picture of romantic relationships that reflects a strong and maturing discipline. However, the principles afford few of the sorts of conflicting predictions that can be especially helpful in fostering novel theory development. We conclude that relationship science is likely to benefit from simultaneous pushes toward both greater integration across theories (to reduce redundancy) and greater emphasis on the circumstances under which existing (or not-yet-developed) principles conflict with one another.

Toward an Integrative Framework for Studying Human Evaluation: Attitudes Toward Objects and Attributes.

Evaluation is central to human experience, and multiple literatures have studied it. This article pulls from research on attitudes, human and nonhuman mating preferences, consumer behavior, and beyond to build a more comprehensive framework for studying evaluation. First, we distinguish between evaluations of objects (persons, places, things) and evaluations of attributes (dimensions, traits, characteristics). Then, we further distinguish between summarized attribute preferences (a valenced response to a direction on a dimension, such as liking sweetness in desserts) and functional attribute preferences (a valenced response to increasing levels of a dimension in a set of targets, such as the extent to which sweetness predicts liking for desserts). We situate these constructs with respect to existing distinctions in the attitude literature (e.g., specific/general, indirect/direct). Finally, new models address how people translate functional into summarized preferences, as well as how attribute preferences affect (a) subsequent evaluations of objects and (b) situation selection.

Is Romantic Desire Predictable? Machine Learning Applied to Initial Romantic Attraction.

Matchmaking companies and theoretical perspectives on close relationships suggest that initial attraction is, to some extent, a product of two people's self-reported traits and preferences. We used machine learning to test how well such measures predict people's overall tendencies to romantically desire other people (actor variance) and to be desired by other people (partner variance), as well as people's desire for specific partners above and beyond actor and partner variance (relationship variance). In two speed-dating studies, romantically unattached individuals completed more than 100 self-report measures about traits and preferences that past researchers have identified as being relevant to mate selection. Each participant met each opposite-sex participant attending a speed-dating event for a 4-min speed date. Random forests models predicted 4% to 18% of actor variance and 7% to 27% of partner variance; crucially, however, they were unable to predict relationship variance using any combination of traits and preferences reported before the dates. These results suggest that compatibility elements of human mating are challenging to predict before two people meet.

Leveling the Playing Field: Longer Acquaintance Predicts Reduced Assortative Mating on Attractiveness.

Clear empirical demonstrations of the theoretical principles underlying assortative mating remain elusive. This article examines a moderator of assortative mating--how well couple members knew each other before dating--suggested by recent findings related to market-based (i.e., competition) theories. Specifically, competition is pervasive to the extent that people achieve consensus about who possesses desirable qualities (e.g., attractiveness) and who does not. Because consensus is stronger earlier in the acquaintance process, assortative mating based on attractiveness should be stronger among couples who formed a relationship after a short period rather than a long period of acquaintance. A study of 167 couples included measures of how long partners had known each other before dating and whether they had been friends before dating, as well as coders' ratings of physical attractiveness. As predicted, couples revealed stronger evidence of assortative mating to the extent that they knew each other for a short time and were not friends before initiating a romantic relationship.

Mate evaluation theory.

There are two unresolved puzzles in the literature examining how people evaluate mates (i.e., prospective or current romantic/sexual partners). First, compatibility is theoretically crucial, but attempts to explain why certain perceivers are compatible with certain targets have revealed small effects. Second, features of partners (e.g., personality, consensually rated attributes) affect perceivers' evaluations strongly in initial-attraction contexts but weakly in established relationships. Mate Evaluation Theory (MET) addresses these puzzles, beginning with the Social Relations Model postulate that all evaluative constructs (e.g., attraction, relationship satisfaction) consist of target, perceiver, and relationship variance. MET then explains how people draw evaluations from mates' attributes using four information sources: (a) shared evolved mechanisms and cultural scripts (common lens, which produces target variance); (b) individual differences that affect how a perceiver views all targets (perceiver lens, which produces perceiver variance); (c) individual differences that affect how a perceiver views some targets, depending on the targets' features (feature lens, which produces some relationship variance); and (d) narratives about and idiosyncratic reactions to one particular target (target-specific lens, which produces most relationship variance). These two distinct sources of relationship variance (i.e., feature vs. target-specific) address Puzzle #1: Previous attempts to explain compatibility used feature lens information, but relationship variance likely derives primarily from the (understudied) target-specific lens. MET also addresses Puzzle #2 by suggesting that repeated interaction causes the target-specific lens to expand, which reduces perceivers' use of the common lens. We conclude with new predictions and implications at the intersection of the human-mating and person-perception literatures. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Summarized attribute preferences have unique antecedents and consequences.

People have ideas about the attributes (i.e., traits or characteristics that vary along a dimension) that they like in others (e.g., "I like intelligence in a romantic partner"), and these ideas about liking are called summarized attribute preferences (Ledgerwood et al., 2018). But where do summarized preferences come from, and what do they predict? Across four studies, we examined how people form summarized attribute preferences and whether they predict situation selection. We showed participants a series of photographs of faces and assessed both their experienced liking for an attribute (or functional attribute preference) as well as their inference about how much they liked the attribute in the abstract (their summarized attribute preference). Our results suggest that summarized attribute preferences-despite being (weakly) grounded in functional attribute preferences-were affected by incidental aspects of the context in which people learn about them (i.e., the overall likeability of the pool of faces). Furthermore, we observed a double dissociation in the predictive validity of summarized and functional attribute preferences: Whereas summarized attribute preferences predicted situation selection at a distance (e.g., whether to join a new dating website based on a description of it), functional attribute preferences predicted situation selection with experience (e.g., whether to join a new dating website after sampling it). We discuss theoretical and methodological implications for the interdisciplinary science of human evaluation. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Psychological Science in the Wake of COVID-19: Social, Methodological, and Metascientific Considerations.

The COVID-19 pandemic has extensively changed the state of psychological science from what research questions psychologists can ask to which methodologies psychologists can use to investigate them. In this article, we offer a perspective on how to optimize new research in the pandemic's wake. Because this pandemic is inherently a social phenomenon-an event that hinges on human-to-human contact-we focus on socially relevant subfields of psychology. We highlight specific psychological phenomena that have likely shifted as a result of the pandemic and discuss theoretical, methodological, and practical considerations of conducting research on these phenomena. After this discussion, we evaluate metascientific issues that have been amplified by the pandemic. We aim to demonstrate how theoretically grounded views on the COVID-19 pandemic can help make psychological science stronger-not weaker-in its wake.

Language style matching predicts relationship initiation and stability.

Previous relationship research has largely ignored the importance of similarity in how people talk with one another. Using natural language samples, we investigated whether similarity in dyads' use of function words, called language style matching (LSM), predicts outcomes for romantic relationships. In Study 1, greater LSM in transcripts of 40 speed dates predicted increased likelihood of mutual romantic interest (odds ratio = 3.05). Overall, 33.3% of pairs with LSM above the median mutually desired future contact, compared with 9.1% of pairs with LSM at or below the median. In Study 2, LSM in 86 couples' instant messages positively predicted relationship stability at a 3-month follow-up (odds ratio = 1.95). Specifically, 76.7% of couples with LSM greater than the median were still dating at the follow-up, compared with 53.5% of couples with LSM at or below the median. LSM appears to reflect implicit interpersonal processes central to romantic relationships.

Beyond the pleistocene: using phylogeny and constraint to inform the evolutionary psychology of human mating.

Evolutionary psychologists explore the adaptive function of traits and behaviors that characterize modern Homo sapiens. However, evolutionary psychologists have yet to incorporate the phylogenetic relationship between modern Homo sapiens and humans' hominid and pongid relatives (both living and extinct) into their theorizing. By considering the specific timing of evolutionary events and the role of evolutionary constraint, researchers using the phylogenetic approach can generate new predictions regarding mating phenomena and derive new explanations for existing evolutionary psychological findings. Especially useful is the concept of the adaptive workaround-an adaptation that manages the maladaptive elements of a pre-existing evolutionary constraint. The current review organizes 7 features of human mating into their phylogenetic context and presents evidence that 2 adaptive workarounds played a critical role as Homo sapiens's mating psychology evolved. These adaptive workarounds function in part to mute or refocus the effects of older, previously evolved adaptations and highlight the layered nature of humans' mating psychology.

Arbitrary social norms influence sex differences in romantic selectivity.

Men tend to be less selective than women when evaluating and pursuing potential romantic partners. The present experiment employed speed-dating procedures to test a novel explanation for this sex difference: The mere act of physically approaching a potential romantic partner (vs. being approached), a behavior that is more characteristic of men than of women, increases one's attraction to that partner. This hypothesis was supported in a sample of speed daters (N = 350) who attended a heterosexual event where either men (eight events) or women (seven events) rotated from one partner to the next while members of the other sex remained seated. Rotators were significantly less selective than were sitters, which meant that the tendency for men to be less selective than women at events where men rotated disappeared at events where women rotated. These effects were mediated by increased self-confidence among rotators relative to sitters.

Possible selves in marital roles: the impact of the anticipated division of labor on the mate preferences of women and men.

In two experiments, female and male participants envisioned themselves as a married person with children who is either a homemaker or a provider. Participants who envisioned themselves as a future homemaker regarded a potential mate's provider qualities as more important and homemaker qualities as less important, compared with participants who envisioned themselves as a future provider. Envisioning oneself as a homemaker also shifted preferences toward an older spouse, compared with envisioning oneself as a provider. In the control conditions of the experiments, in which participants freely envisioned their own future marriage, the less provider responsibility anticipated for the wife, the more traditional were mate preferences. These experiments support the social role theory view that the roles anticipated by men and women influence their choice of mates.

Is love colorblind? Political orientation and interracial romantic desire.

The present research examined the association of political orientation with ingroup favoritism in two live romantic contexts. In Study 1, White participants had sequential interactions with both a White and Black confederate and reported their romantic desire for each. In Study 2, both White and Black participants speed-dated multiple potential romantic partners and reported whether they would be interested in meeting each speed-dating partner again. In both studies, White participants' political conservatism positively predicted the strength of the ingroup-favoring bias: White conservatives were less likely than White liberals to desire Black (interracial) relative to White potential romantic partners. In contrast, Black participants' political conservatism negatively predicted the strength of the ingroup-favoring bias: Consistent with system-justification theory, Black conservatives were more likely than Black liberals to desire White (interracial) relative to Black potential romantic partners. Political orientation may be a key factor that influences the initiation of interracial romantic relationships.

Best Practices for Testing the Predictive Validity of Ideal Partner Preference-Matching.

Many psychological hypotheses require testing whether the similarity between two variables predicts important outcomes. For example, the ideal standards model posits that the match between (A) a participant's ideal partner preferences, and (B) the traits of a current/potential partner, predicts (C) evaluative outcomes (e.g., the decision to date someone, relationship satisfaction, breakup); tests of the predictive validity of ideal-matching require A × B → C analytic strategies. However, recent articles have incorrectly suggested that documenting a positive samplewide correlation between a participant's ideals and a current partner's traits (an A-B correlation) implies that participants pursued, selected, or desired partners with traits that matched their ideals. There are at least six alternative explanations for the emergence of a samplewide A-B correlation; A-B correlations do not provide evidence that ideals guide the selection/evaluation of specific partners. We review appropriately rigorous A × B → C tests that can aid scholars in identifying the circumstances in which ideal-matching exhibits predictive validity.

Sex differences in mate preferences revisited: do people know what they initially desire in a romantic partner?

In paradigms in which participants state their ideal romantic-partner preferences or examine vignettes and photographs, men value physical attractiveness more than women do, and women value earning prospects more than men do. Yet it remains unclear if these preferences remain sex differentiated in predicting desire for real-life potential partners (i.e., individuals whom one has actually met). In the present study, the authors explored this possibility using speed dating and longitudinal follow-up procedures. Replicating previous research, participants exhibited traditional sex differences when stating the importance of physical attractiveness and earning prospects in an ideal partner and ideal speed date. However, data revealed no sex differences in the associations between participants' romantic interest in real-life potential partners (met during and outside of speed dating) and the attractiveness and earning prospects of those partners. Furthermore, participants' ideal preferences, assessed before the speed-dating event, failed to predict what inspired their actual desire at the event. Results are discussed within the context of R. E. Nisbett and T. D. Wilson's (1977) seminal article: Even regarding such a consequential aspect of mental life as romantic-partner preferences, people may lack introspective awareness of what influences their judgments and behavior.

The attachment system in fledgling relationships: an activating role for attachment anxiety.

Is it sensible to study attachment dynamics between potential romantic partners before they share a full-fledged attachment bond? The present data indicate that such an approach may reveal novel insights about initial attraction processes. Four studies suggest that the state-like experience of attachment anxiety has functional implications within fledgling (i.e., desired or undeveloped) romantic relationships, well before the formation of an attachment bond. Studies 1 and 3 reveal that attachment anxiety directed toward a particular romantic interest is elevated before (in comparison with after) participants report being in an established relationship. Studies 2 and 3 demonstrate that such partner-specific attachment anxiety predicts attachment-relevant outcomes in fledgling relationships, including proximity seeking, safe haven, secure base, passionate love, and other approach behaviors. These associations were reliable above and beyond (and were typically as strong as or stronger than) the effect of sexual desire. Finally, Study 4 presents evidence that partner-specific attachment anxiety may cause several of these attachment-relevant outcomes. Attachment anxiety seems to be a normative experience and may signal the activation of the attachment system during the earliest stages of romantic relationships.