Seven deadly sins of potential romantic partners
Every relationship has its ups and downs, but initially the focus is typically on the positives. To date, scientists have focused on exploring the positive characteristics, known as dealmakers, in a potential partner. However, dealbreakers, a person’s negative characteristics, also play an important role, but have been neglected in scientific research, even though they are at least as important as dealmakers. Research has yet to determine whether they outweigh the dealmakers and it will be of immense interest to see how men and women approach these two aspects of a potential partner. Therefore, research into specific dealbreakers and their importance was conducted by a team of scientists, including Zsófia Csajbók from the Faculty of Science, Charles University.
In regard to the structure of the study, participants were first asked to list the characteristics that would make them reject a potential partner. The most unwanted personality traits turned out to be: selfish, stupid, purposeless, and aggressive. The main dimensions of these characteristics were then categorised into factors that generally describe the dealbreakers. This was achieved by asking participants to rate their aversion towards these characteristics on a scale. The results were associated with participants’ self-esteem, mate value, and other individual traits, and the principal dealbreaker factors were the following: unambitious, hostile, filthy, arrogant, unattractive, clingy and abusive.
Author: Štěpánka Zbytovská
It was found that for men, those with a higher sociosexual orientation (i.e., had sex more often, exhibited a more open attitude towards sex, and had more desire for sex) were more tolerant of dealbreaker factors in a short-term relationship. It can be said that they are less picky. Also, they consider filthy to be the biggest dealbreaker and clingy to be the least problematic. In simple terms, filthiness is the worst trait a woman could have, but being clingy is not so relevant. Women, like men, do not like filthy partners, but also add the characteristic of abusive as a dealbreaker when considering a long-term relationship. In addition, they find clingy partners the least problematic. In general, clinginess is not a problem in a long-term relationship, but is undesirable in a short-term relationship where an excessive level of attachment is not expected. It was also evident that the more people think of themselves, the stricter they are when it comes to accepting possible dealbreakers.
The research so far has only identified our way of thinking regarding the main dimensions of negative characteristics, but the dealbreakers are not equally important. Therefore, to find out which dealbreakers are crucial and which are just luxuries in a relationship, participants were asked to create their acceptable long-term partner. From the answers, it was clear that the most important dealbreakers turned out to be filthiness, to which men added unattractive and women abusive. When using positive characteristics instead of negative characteristics for a long-term relationship, men find it essential for women to be warm, attractive and intelligent, whereas women do not insist on attractiveness, which they consider a luxury, but also find it important for their partner to be warm and intelligent.
All of these characteristics, however, focus on what the partner is like at present. What do people want to know with regard to what their partner is going to be like in 10 years? In the fourth part of the study, participants provided the answer to this question. Both men and women wanted to know how warm and stable their potential long-term partner is going to be. Furthermore, while women also ask about abusiveness, men are concerned with how attractive their partner is going to be. And what did the participants want to know the least? Men did not want to know how their partner will change in status, abusiveness, and arrogance, while women were least interested in the clinginess, arrogance, and unattractiveness of their partner in the future.
Overall, participants were more interested in dealmakers than in dealbreakers. In other words, people do want to know the good things about someone first. However, it is not yet clear whether the bad things can outweigh the good things, even though they play an important role in perceptions of a partner.
Eliška Leštinová
Published:
May 30, 2022 07:50 PM
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