Detectability and desirability of fear of being single in online dating profiles.

OBJECTIVE: Those who fear being single generally do not have difficulty attracting prospective partners. The present research explores whether this is because daters cannot detect fear of being single, or because detected fear of being single does not hinder desirability. METHOD: In Study 1 (N = 235, 60% women, Mage  = 36.9), participants created dating profiles then rated the desirability of profiles depicting high versus low fear of being single (high narcissism control). In Study 2 (N = 176, 69% women, Mage  = 21.4), participants evaluated fear of being single and desirability of actual profiles. RESULTS: Differences in fear of being single were detectable. Furthermore, detecting higher fear of being single predicted lower romantic desirability. Desirability ratings were due, in part, to estimating lower physical attractiveness (Study 2). Perceivers' own fear of being single moderated effects, such that those higher in fear of being single were not deterred by higher fear of being single. CONCLUSIONS: Fear of being single may be detectable when online dating, but desirability of detected fear of being single varies depending on perceiver traits and may be driven in part by misperceptions of physical attractiveness. This research sheds light on challenges for those who fear being single as they attempt to attract mates.

Pursuing Sex with an Ex: Does It Hinder Breakup Recovery?

The present research used longitudinal methods to test whether pursuing sex with an ex-partner hinders breakup recovery. Participants completed a month-long daily diary immediately following a breakup, as well as a two-month follow-up (Study 1). Daily analyses revealed positive associations between trying to have sex with an ex-partner and emotional attachment to the ex-partner, but not other aspects of breakup recovery, such as distress, intrusive thoughts, or negative affect. Longitudinal changes from day to day, and over 2 months, revealed that pursuing sex with an ex was not a predictor of breakup recovery over time. To address the limitation that Study 1 only assessed attempted sexual pursuits, Study 2 explored associations between pursuit of, and actual engagement in, sexual activities with ex-partners. Results revealed that most sexual pursuits were successful, and success rates were not associated with breakup recovery. Findings challenge common beliefs about potential harm of pursuing sex with an ex.

Repetitive neonatal pain and reduced maternal care alter brain neurochemistry.

Preterm infants are exposed to many stressors while in the neonatal intensive care unit including pain and reduced maternal care. Both stressors can have a profound negative impact on brain development, and the present study sought to investigate some of the biological mechanisms underlying this phenomenon. Rat pups underwent a series of repetitive needle pokes and/or reduced maternal care through a novel tea-ball infuser encapsulation model during the first four days of life. On postnatal day four, pups were sacrificed and serum was analyzed for corticosterone, while brains were tested for various neurotransmitters and brain metabolites through magnetic resonance spectroscopy. We found that exposure to maternal isolation and neonatal pain produced an increase in serum corticosterone but decreased glutamate levels in the hippocampus and frontal cortex. These alterations in stress responding and neurochemistry in response to the early-life stressors may help explain some of the negative outcomes seen in preterm infants.

How interdependent are stay/leave decisions? On staying in the relationship for the sake of the romantic partner.

The decision to end a romantic relationship can have a life-changing impact on the partner as well as the self. Research on close relationships has thus far focused on self-interested reasons why people choose to stay in their relationship versus leave. However, a growing body of research on decision-making and prosociality shows that when people make decisions that impact others, they take those others' feelings and perspectives into consideration. In the present research, we tested the prediction that people make stay/leave decisions prosocially, such that consideration for their romantic partner's feelings can discourage people from ending their relationships. In Study 1, a total of 1,348 participants in romantic relationships were tracked over a 10-week period. Study 2 was a preregistered replication and extension of Study 1, in which 500 participants contemplating a breakup were followed over a 2-month period. Both studies showed that the more dependent people believed their partner was on the relationship, the less likely they were to initiate a breakup. These findings held above and beyond a variety of self-focused variables (e.g., investment model components; Rusbult, Martz, & Agnew, 1998). These results suggest that people can be motivated to stay in relatively unfulfilling relationships for the sake of their romantic partner. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2018 APA, all rights reserved).

Motivated Use of Numerical Anchors for Judgments Relevant to the Self.

The anchoring effect has been replicated so extensively that it is generally thought to be ubiquitous. However, anchoring has primarily been tested in domains in which people are motivated to reach accurate conclusions rather than biased conclusions. Is the anchoring effect robust even when the anchors are threatening? In three studies, participants made a series of probability judgments about their own futures paired with either optimistic anchors (e.g., "Do you think that the chances that your current relationship will last a lifetime are more or less than 95%?"), pessimistic anchors (e.g., "more or less than 10%?"), or no anchors. A fourth study experimentally manipulated motivation to ignore the anchor with financial incentives. Across studies, anchors that implied high probabilities of unwanted events occurring were ineffective. Together, these studies suggest that anchoring has an important boundary condition: Personally threatening anchors are ignored as a result of motivated reasoning processes.

Longing for Ex-Partners out of Fear of Being Single.

This research investigated whether people who fear being single have a more difficult time letting go of ex-partners following a romantic breakup. Data were collected in a cross-sectional study (N = 209, 64% women, Mage = 30 years old) as well as a 1-month daily experience study of individuals who just went through a romantic breakup (N = 117, 44% women, Mage = 27 years old). Findings from both studies revealed that those with stronger fear of being single (Spielmann et al., 2013) reported greater longing for their ex-partners. Pre- to post-breakup analyses revealed that fear of being single increased after a breakup, regardless of who initiated the breakup. Within-day analyses revealed that longing for an ex-partner and attempts to renew the relationship were greater on days with stronger fear of being single. Lagged-day analyses provided support for the conclusion that fear of being single increased longing and renewal attempts over time, but longing and renewal attempts did not influence fear of being single. These findings suggest that fear of being single is a particularly useful construct for understanding the romantic detachment process.

Settling for less out of fear of being single.

The present research demonstrates that fear of being single predicts settling for less in romantic relationships, even accounting for constructs typically examined in relationship research such as anxious attachment. Study 1 explored the content of people's thoughts about being single. Studies 2A and 2B involved the development and validation of the Fear of Being Single Scale. Study 2C provided preliminary support for the hypothesis that fear of being single predicts settling for less in ongoing relationships, as evidenced by greater dependence in unsatisfying relationships. Study 3 replicated this effect in a longitudinal study demonstrating that fear of being single predicts lower likelihood of initiating the dissolution of a less satisfying relationship. Studies 4A and 4B explored the predictive ability of fear of being single for self-reported dating standards. Across both samples, fear of being single was unrelated to self-reported standards for a mate, with the exception of consistently higher standards for parenting. Studies 5 and 6 explored romantic interest in targets that were manipulated to vary in responsiveness and physical attractiveness. These studies found that fear of being single consistently predicted romantic interest in less responsive and less attractive dating targets. Study 7 explored fear of being single during a speed-dating event. We found that fear of being single predicted being less selective in expressing romantic interest but did not predict other daters' romantic interest. Taken together, the present research suggests that fear of being single is a meaningful predictor of settling for less in relationships.

The independent contributions of social reward and threat perceptions to romantic commitment.

Although separate literatures have emerged on effects of social threats (i.e., rejection and negative evaluation) and rewards (i.e., connection and intimacy) on the process of commitment to a romantic relationship, no research has examined the influence of both simultaneously. Using an attachment framework, we examined the relation of social threats and rewards to investment model constructs (i.e., commitment, satisfaction, investment, quality of alternatives) in 3 studies. Study 1 (N = 533) and Study 2 (N = 866) assessed attachment styles, reward and threat perceptions, and investment model constructs, and data were analyzed using structural equation models. In Study 3 (N = 358), reward and threat perceptions were experimentally manipulated followed by measurement of investment model constructs. Results showed that attachment avoidance was uniquely associated with lower perceptions of reward, whereas attachment anxiety was uniquely associated with stronger perceptions of threat. Stronger reward perceptions were associated with higher commitment, investment, and satisfaction, as well as lower quality of alternatives in all studies. Stronger threat perceptions were associated with lower satisfaction in all 3 studies. Stronger threat perceptions were also correlated with higher levels of investment and commitment, although these effects did not replicate in our experimental study. Thus, perceptions of reward appear unambiguously associated with higher levels of all facets of commitment, whereas perceptions of threat are most strongly associated with lower satisfaction. These results underscore the importance of considering the effects of rewards and threats simultaneously in commitment processes.

Don't get your hopes up: avoidantly attached individuals perceive lower social reward when there is potential for intimacy.

We examine whether lower expectations for social reward selectively applied to high intimacy contexts may help avoidantly attached individuals minimize distress from reward loss. Studies 1, 2, and 4 demonstrated that avoidant attachment was negatively associated with perceived intimacy potential in relationships involving approach of closeness (current/future partners), but not for relationships less associated with approach of closeness (ex-partners). Studies 3 and 5 manipulated the potential for intimacy among dating prospects. Avoidant attachment was negatively associated with romantic interest in high intimacy targets but not low intimacy targets. This effect was mediated by perceived responsiveness. Studies 4 and 5 rule out perceived dissimilarity to responsive targets as a mechanism. Study 6 demonstrated that avoidants' lower expectations for connection are associated with less anticipated distress from reward loss. These results suggest that avoidant individuals may circumvent attachment system activation by perceiving lower opportunity for connection when there is potential for intimacy.

On the rebound: focusing on someone new helps anxiously attached individuals let go of ex-partners.

The present research demonstrates that focusing on someone new may help anxiously attached individuals overcome attachment to an ex-romantic partner, suggesting one possible motive behind so-called rebound relationships. A correlational study revealed that the previously demonstrated link between anxious attachment and longing for an ex-partner was disrupted when anxiously attached individuals had new romantic partners. Two experiments demonstrated that this detachment from an ex can be induced by randomly assigning anxiously attached individuals to believe they will easily find a new partner (through bogus feedback in Study 2 and an ease of retrieval task in Study 3). This research suggests that for anxiously attached individuals, focusing on someone new can be an adaptive part of the breakup recovery process.