eunice
Link: 05035-fbe39e5969c1ae14dad8dd0591a7723a.html
shooting the messenger
john, l. k et al. 2019
http://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/xge0000586
Bringing bad news to the king used could have easily gotten you killed — at least, that’s what we’ve learned from movies. But is there any shred of truth to the scene of an ill-tempered ruler who summarily executes the lackey who serves bad news? We often cry “Don’t shoot the messenger” when one of our friends suddenly becomes antagonistic after we share some bad news, and according to a new study, this behavior is rooted in a psychological effect. The study suggests that we tend to view those who share bad news with us as less likable, even though they clearly are innocent.
Psychologists at Harvard University conducted a series of eleven experiments that investigated how people responded to various situations in which they were delivered good and bad news. In one experiment, the participants could win $2 when a research assistant picked an odd or even number from a hat. After picking the number, the researcher handed it to a colleague acting as the “messenger” to read it out loud. Those who were told they hadn’t won later rated the messenger as less likable than those who had won or received good news.
Subsequent experiments found that the “shoot the messenger” effect was specific to individuals delivering bad news. Those who were present at the same time as the announcement were not affected. For instance, in one scenario, participants had to imagine that they were either to receive a positive or negative result for a skin biopsy for cancer. Two nurses would be present: one delivering the news, the second simply there to schedule a follow-up examination. Only the messenger nurse was rated as less likable when the bad news broke.
When bad news was particularly unexpected, the effect was even more pronounced. During one experiment, the participants had to imagine they were waiting at the airport for their flight when suddenly a staff member announced that their flight was delayed by three hours. Half of the participants were told that they could leave on another plane at the scheduled time, while the rest were told they would have to wait. When they had to suffer a delay, the participants rated the staff member very poorly in terms of likeability.
Sometimes, the participants thought that the harbinger of bad news also had a hand to play, even though there was no apparent motive to do so. In one experiment, participants could win 50 cents if they predicted correctly whether the number of words in the main headline of the next edition of the Wall Street Journal was odd or even. Those who were told by a research assistant that they had guessed incorrectly rated the researcher as less likable, but also indicated that they were under the impression that the research assistant had been rooting against them. That’s even though there was no indication that the research assistant had any control over the situation.
“We suggest that people’s tendency to deem bearers of bad news as unlikeable stems in part from their desire to make sense of chance processes. Consistent with this account, receiving bad news activates the desire to sense-make, and in turn, activating this desire enhances the tendency to dislike bearers of bad news,” the authors wrote in their study.
These findings suggest that “shooting the messenger” is genuine psychological effect — and its implications could have dramatic implications for day to day life. For instance, in a medical context when often doctors and hospital staff share bad news with patients, this effect can erode doctor-patient relationships. And when this happens, patients might be reluctant to receive help from the “unlikeable” doctor. So, next time you receive some bad news, remember: don’t shoot the messenger.
abstract Eleven experiments provide evidence that people have a tendency to “shoot the messenger,” deeming innocent bearers of bad news unlikeable. In a preregistered lab experiment, participants rated messengers who delivered bad news from a random drawing as relatively unlikeable (Study 1). A second set of studies points to the specificity of the effect: Study 2A shows that it is unique to the (innocent) messenger, and not mere bystanders. Study 2B shows that it is distinct from merely receiving information with which one disagrees. We suggest that people’s tendency to deem bearers of bad news as unlikeable stems in part from their desire to make sense of chance processes. Consistent with this account, receiving bad news activates the desire to sense-make (Study 3A), and in turn, activating this desire enhances the tendency to dislike bearers of bad news (Study 3B). Next, stemming from the idea that unexpected outcomes heighten the desire to sense-make, Study 4 shows that when bad news is unexpected, messenger dislike is pronounced. Finally, consistent with the notion that people fulfill the desire to sense-make by attributing agency to entities adjacent to chance events, messenger dislike is correlated with the erroneous belief that the messenger had malevolent motives (Studies 5A, 5B, and 5C). Studies 6A and 6B go further, manipulating messenger motives independently from news valence to suggest their causal role in our process account: the tendency to dislike bearers of bad news is mitigated when recipients are made aware of the benevolence of the messenger’s motives.
from “love actually” to love, actually: the sociometer takes every kind of fuel
elaine paravati et al. 2020
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15298868.2020.1743750
"I don't think people realize that these non-traditional connections are as beneficial as we found in our research," says Gabriel, an expert in social psychology. "Don't feel guilty, because we found that these strategies are fine as long as they work for you."
And these non-traditional strategies all predict positive outcomes, according to Elaine Paravati, a UB graduate and co-author of the paper.
"People can feel connected through all sorts of means. We found that more traditional strategies, like spending time with a friend in person, doesn't necessarily work better for people than non-traditional strategies, like listening to a favorite musician," says Paravati. "In fact, using a combination of both of these types of strategies predicted the best outcomes, so it might be especially helpful to have a variety of things you do in your life to help you feel connected to others."
For over a decade, Gabriel has studied in her lab the importance of non-traditional social strategies. These include everything from getting lost in pulp fiction page-turners to preparing and enjoying comfort foods. Volumes of research also exist on the importance of traditional social strategies, like interpersonal relationships or group memberships.
But no one had ever empirically combined the traditional and non-traditional for comparative purposes to simultaneously test their relative effectiveness.
The results published in the journal Self and Identity represent the first evidence that not only reinforces the utility of non-traditional social strategies, but also suggest that doing something like binge watching a favorite television drama is as useful as other traditional means of fulfillment.
The research team, which also included graduate student Esha Naidu, recruited 173 participants who were asked questions about their well-being and their social connections. Their responses provided a measurement inspired by previous research, which the team calls the "social fuel tank."
"There's a basic need for social connections, just as we have a basic need for food," says Gabriel. "The longer you go without those sorts of connections, the lower the fuel tank, and that's when people start to get anxious, nervous or depressed, because they lack needed resources.
"What's important is not how you're filling the social fuel tank, but that your social fuel tank is getting filled."
Participants filled their tanks as many as 17 different ways (with a median of seven), using a variety of strategies in their lives to fill their social needs, with a majority of participants reporting both traditional and non-traditional social strategies.
"This is especially relevant now, with social distancing guidelines changing the ways people connect with others," says Paravati. "We can utilize these non-traditional strategies to help us feel connected, fulfilled, and find more meaning in our lives, even as we safely practice social distancing."
At a time when pandemic-related restrictions have motivated questions about how to be social, Gabriel notes how these findings differ from cultural perceptions regarding the unwritten rules for what's appropriate for creating a sense of belonging.
"We live in a society where people are questioned if they're not in a romantic relationship, if they decide not to have children, or they don't like attending parties," says Gabriel. "There are implicit messages that these people are doing something wrong. That can be detrimental to them.
"The message we want to give to people, and that our data suggest, is that that's just not true."
And even before Gabriel had data to support these conclusions, her previous research had raised the very questions addressed in the current study.
"People had assumed these non-traditional connections weren't valuable. In fact, we used to call them 'social surrogates,' as if they were a surrogate for a real social connection," says Gabriel. "But after researching these connections for so long, we never found evidence that they weren't valuable. Nothing suggested that people using non-traditional strategies were lonelier, or less happy, less socially skilled, or feeling any less fulfilled.
"These aren't surrogates for real social connections; these are real ways of feeling connected that are very important to people."
"Symbolic social bonds don't function as a second-place option to traditional means.They are an effective way of reaping positive mental benefits," says Paravati. "It's not about only using them when you can't access 'better' options- these options are helpful to use any time."
So listen to music, follow the gossip column, pet the dog, or play a game.
"We have evidence that as long as you feel like you're fulfilling your belongingness needs, it doesn't really matter how you're doing it," says Paravati.
abstract Belongingness needs have generally been thought to be filled through traditional strategies, but recent research suggests that nontraditional strategies (e.g., parasocial relationship partners, TV shows) may work as well. No work has yet examined the comparative importance of these different social behaviors in contributing to social need fulfillment. The current work utilized a visual measure to assess frequency, variety, and degree of contribution to social fulfillment of 17 social behaviors. Overall, the conceptualization of the need to belong as flexible and able to be satisfied by a variety of social behaviors was supported; both traditional and nontraditional social strategies were related to positive outcomes. Results suggest that nontraditional strategies may contribute an added layer of vibrancy to our social lives.
love 2.0: how our supreme emotion affects everything we feel, think, do, and become
barbara fredrickson 2013 9781101609842
touch me just enough: the intersection of adult attachment, intimate touch, and marital satisfaction
samantha a. wagner et al. 2020
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0265407520910791
the effects of non-sexual intimate touch -- for example, hugging, holding hands or cuddling on the couch, rather than actions intended to lead to sex. Attachment style refers to human social bonds and exists on a spectrum; avoidant individuals prefer more interpersonal distance, while anxious individuals seek greater closeness. This style develops in childhood, but can change over time and vary with the individual in question.
"It all depends on how open, close and secure you feel with that person, which is impacted by many, many factors," Wagner said.
To determine the connection of attachment style, touch satisfaction and marital satisfaction, researchers used a sample of 184 couples over the age of 18, consisting of husbands and wives; same-sex couples were excluded. Because the study protocol included hormonal sampling, individuals on hormonal therapy were also excluded, as well as postmenopausal, pregnant or breastfeeding women. They were interviewed separately on their attachment tendencies, the amount of touch and routine affection in their relationships, and their relationship satisfaction.
Researchers expected to find that avoidant individuals preferred less touch, while anxious people prefer more. What they found was more nuanced.
The more routine affection that couples experienced, the more they felt satisfied with their partners' touch, even if they had avoidant attachment styles. With low levels of physical affection, anxious husbands were less satisfied with the touch they received, but not anxious wives, who may instead choose to solicit the missing affection.
For men, higher levels of routine affection are associated with relationship satisfaction; in other words, touch is a positive, the icing on the marriage cake. For women, lower levels of routine affection correlated with relationship dissatisfaction, meaning that touch is an essential ingredient and its absence is a negative. It's a subtle distinction.
"There's something specific about touch satisfaction that interplays with relationship satisfaction but not dissatisfaction for wives," said Wagner, who noted that further research studies may be able to clarify the distinction.
Whatever a couple's attachment insecurities, the perception of how their partner touches them has the greatest association with "touch satisfaction." In other words, more is better because they can more easily see that their partner is trying to engage with them.
Overall, the study shows an association between non-sexual physical affection and solid marriages, although the current data can't establish cause and effect.
"Interestingly, there's some evidence that holding your partner's hand while you're arguing de-escalates the argument and makes it more productive," said Wagner, who has used the technique with clients.
However, Wagner emphasized that the study focused only on healthy, consensual touch -- not manipulation or abuse. Touch holds different meanings for people, she pointed out; someone with autism spectrum disorder may be overwhelmed by tactile sensitivity, and someone with a history of trauma may experience touch as averse.
Wagner is, by her own admission, a hugger and has long been fascinated by the healing possibilities of touch; she wrote her senior thesis as a qualitative review of the uses and benefit of touch across the lifespan. But questions continued to arise: Why do some people enjoy touch more than others? And do they benefit more as a result?
As the coronavirus pandemic continues, couples may want to consider adding more affection to decrease stress -- as long as their partners are receptive and willing.
"Feel free to give some extra snugs on the couch. There's plenty of evidence that suggests touch as a way to decrease stress," she said.
But she notes that the coronavirus pandemic also may lead to touch deprivation, as social distancing keeps us physically apart from one another. Consider, for example, healthcare workers who are quarantining themselves from their own families when they return home, to keep the virus from spreading to their loved ones.
"I think we should all hold the loved ones we can a little closer and be thoughtful of the struggles that others might be having because they can't do just that," she said. "If anything is true for me, a hug has become even more precious than it was before."
abstract Nonsexual physical affection plays an important role in marital functioning, but not all individuals are satisfied with the intimate touch they receive from their partner. Differences in adult attachment tendencies may be one way to understand the individual differences in touch satisfaction. Using a sample of 180 different-sex married couples, we explored how attachment associates with touch satisfaction in marriage in a cross-sectional investigation. Consistent with predictions, we found that husbands with greater attachment anxiety were less satisfied with touch, except when engagement in routine affection was relatively high, but especially when low. Lower routine affection diminished touch satisfaction regardless of attachment style, but greater avoidance appeared to buffer this effect for wives. However, wives with greater avoidance had husbands who reported lower touch satisfaction. We also explored the interplay of touch satisfaction and marital quality, finding that they associated positively, even when routine affection is statistically controlled. Lastly, our exploratory analyses suggest that touch satisfaction may serve as a mediating link between anxiety and marital quality. Overall, our findings support that attachment insecurities associate with engagement in and satisfaction with touch and that these processes are relevant to the overall marital quality.
the experimental generation of interpersonal closeness: a procedure and some preliminary findings
arthur aron et al. 1997
doi.org/10.1177/0146167297234003
pdf
Link: journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0146167297234003
36 questions nytimes article
Link: mobile.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/fashion/no-37-big-wedding-or-small.html
A practical methodology is presented for creating closeness in an experimental context. Whether or not an individual is in a relationship, particular pairings of individuals in the relationship, and circumstances of relationship development become manipulated variables. Over a 45-min period subject pairs carry out self-disclosure and relationship-building tasks that gradually escalate in intensity. Study 1 found greater postinteraction closeness with these tasks versus comparable small-talk tasks. Studies 2 and 3 found no significant closeness effects, in spite of adequate power for (a) whether pairs were matched for nondisagreement on important attitudes, (b) whether pairs were led to expect mutual liking, or (c) whether getting close was made an explicit goal. These studies also illustrated applications for addressing theoretical issues, yielding provocative tentative findings relating to attachment style and introversion/extraversion.
closeness discrepancies in romantic relationships: implications for relational well-being, stability, and mental health
frost and forrester 2012
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0146167213476896
close friendship strength and broader peer group desirability as differential predictors of adult mental health
rachel narr et al. 2017
dx.doi.org/10.1111/cdev.12905
to love and laugh: testing actor-, partner-, and similarity effects of dispositions towards ridicule and being laughed at on relationship satisfaction
kay brauer, rené t. proyer 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jrp.2018.08.008
Laughter plays an important role for people: “Earlier studies have shown that people are looking for a partner with a sense of humour and who enjoys a laugh,” says psychologist Professor René Proyer from MLU, who conducted the new study together with Kay Brauer.
How people react to being laughed at differs widely: some people are afraid of being laughed at. “They tend to interpret the laughter as something negative or derogative,” Proyer explains, and goes on to say that others enjoy being the centre of attention and intentionally provoke situations that make others laugh about them. For many people, being laughed at is an expression of appreciation. Another characteristic is enjoying laughing about others and intentionally making them the butt of jokes, for example. “These three characteristics are personality traits that can occur at the same time, to varying degrees and in different combinations. They can range, for example, from making harmless jokes to ridiculing others. All of these characteristics are normal, up to a certain point — including being afraid of being laughed at,” Proyer continues. Profiles can be concluded from the combination of the individual traits — for example someone who likes to laugh about others but does not like it when others laugh about them.
For their current study, the psychologists from MLU conducted online interviews with 154 heterosexual couples. The participants separately answered questions about their relationship, for example about how satisfied the partners were with their relationship overall, whether the couple often argued and how satisfied both partners were with their sex life. The researchers also investigated how the study participants handle being laughed at and whether they like to laugh at others.
For the subsequent analysis, the researchers first of all compared the statements made by each person: “We found that partners are often alike with regard to their individual characteristics and also their profiles,” Kay Brauer summarises. If these matched, the couples were usually more content in their relationship than others.
The researchers observed that provoking others to laugh at you primarily has positive effects: “Women reported more often that they tended to be satisfied with their relationship and felt more attracted to their partner. They and their partners also tended to be equally satisfied with their sex life,” Brauer continues. Being afraid of being laughed at, on the other hand, tended to have negative effects: people who have this fear are less content in their relationship and also tend to mistrust their partner. This also has consequences for the partner: men said more frequently that they did not really feel satisfied with their sex life if their partner was afraid of being laughed at.
The psychologists did not find this kind of interdependence with regard to relationship contentment when it came to people who like to ridicule others. However, the couples tended to argue more often. “That is hardly surprising, considering that these people often go too far and make derisive comments which can then lead to an argument,” says Brauer.
Irrespectively, both researchers state that handling laughter and being laughed at in a similar way alone does not suffice to assess whether a relationship is a “good” one. Of course, there is more to a successful relationship in which partners experience happiness. However, knowing whether one of the two partners in a relationship is afraid of being laughed at could be useful information for couples therapy or relationship counselling. In follow-up studies, the psychologists aim to combine their current results with statements made by singles on how they handle laughter.
abstract •APIM analyses of laughter-related dispositions and relationship satisfaction (RS).
•Fear of being laughed at is negatively related with relationship satisfaction.
•Joy of being laughed at shows positive associations with RS (mainly in females).
•Joy of laughing at others is independent from RS (exception: Disagreement).
•Trait- and profile similarity is weakly associated with RS beyond main effects.
People differ in how they deal with ridicule and being laughed at along three individual differences variables; namely, the fear (gelotophobia) and joy (gelotophilia) of being laughed at and joy of laughing at others (katagelasticism). This study examines their associations with facets of relationship satisfaction (RS). Actor-Partner-Interdependence Model analyses of 154 heterosexual couples showed that gelotophobia was negatively associated with RS while gelotophilia (mainly in females) was positively related. Katagelasticism existed independently from RS, except for higher levels of disagreement. Further, romantic partners were robustly similar in their traits and profiles (overall and distinctive). The unique similarity-RS associations were positive but of small size. Overall, our findings support the notion that the dispositions are differentially related with facets of RS.
the signal-burying game can explain why we obscure positive traits and good deeds
moshe hoffman et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41562-018-0354-z
thanking, apologizing, bragging, and blaming: responsibility exchange theory and the currency of communication
shereen j. chaudhry, george loewenstein 2019
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/rev0000139
a framework, "Responsibility Exchange Theory," for understanding why thanking and apologizing, as well as bragging and blaming, matter so much, and presents novel experimental studies that reveal the psychology underlying these communications.
"All four of these communications are tools used to transfer responsibility from one person to another," said Shereen J. Chaudhry, who conducted the research while a Ph.D. student in CMU's Department of Social and Decision Sciences. "They relay information about credit or blame, and they involve image-based trade-offs between appearing competent and appearing warm."
"Our framework helps to make sense of diverse body of research documenting the importance of these forms of communications," said co-author George Loewenstein, the Herbert A. Simon University Professor of Economics and Psychology at CMU's Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences. "Research has shown that these communications -- and their absence -- can make or break relationships and affect material outcomes ranging from restaurant tips to medical malpractice settlements."
The researchers proposed that, for the communicator, all four types of communications involve a trade-off between projecting competence and projecting warmth. Thanking and apologizing make the speaker appear caring or generous, but usually at the cost of seeming incompetent or weak. The opposite is true of bragging and blaming, which can bolster the speaker's perceived competence and status, but at the cost of seeming selfish or inconsiderate. The recipient of the communication experiences a different impact on their image: Thanking and apologizing elevate both perceived competence and warmth for the recipient, while bragging and blaming decrease both.
"These dynamics capture why thanking and apologizing are touchstones of 'polite' speech in our culture, while blaming and bragging are often considered taboo," Chaudhry said.
The researchers' framework makes predictions about whether, when and how people will engage in these critical forms of communication. One key prediction is that regardless of whether a person is the favor-doer (transgressor) or favor-recipient (victim), the person will prefer thanking (apologizing) to occur rather than bragging (blaming). As a result, most conversations over credit and blame should result in thanking and apologizing, while bragging and blaming should be relatively rare.
Another prediction focuses on conversational patterns. To facilitate their desired conversational outcomes, people are predicted to engage in techniques that lead the conversation toward thanking and apologizing and away from the other two.
To test these predictions, the researchers conducted a live chat study involving 207 pairs of experimental subjects. The goal was to examine what happens in a conversation between two people where one person receives a favor from the other person. Participants in the study were paired, and partners were informed that they would each work on a task for five minutes. Whoever earned the higher score on the task would determine earnings for both participants, which would be equal.
Unbeknownst to the subjects, one subject was randomly assigned a much easier task and, in most cases, ended up achieving a higher score that raised payoffs for both players. After completing the tasks and revealing the winner, partners had a live chat for two minutes. The researchers coded these chats for predicted conversational patterns, looking for instances of thanking (of the high scorer by the low scorer), bragging (by the high scorer to the low scorer), and a phenomenon called "prompting," which is when the high scorer attempts to elicit thanks from the low scorer.
The key prediction was confirmed: The majority of chats involved thanking (68 percent) whereas bragging appeared in only a minority (14 percent). While the researchers predict that this will almost always be the conversational result, they also predict that thankers will do so more begrudgingly in some cases compared to others. In a separate scenario-based study, participants reported being more reluctant to thank and apologize when they were in an environment in which it was more important to appear competent. In these cases, participants preferred neither person say anything about the credit or blame at stake.
The researchers also found support for subtle conversational phenomena such as prompting. When losers in the chat study weren't forthcoming with gratitude for the winners, 59 percent of those winners steered the conversation in a way to elicit a "thank you."
Chaudhry explains prompting in the context of taking time to provide a colleague with feedback on their report: "If you are a person who wants to be acknowledged for your effort, and if you haven't heard back from that colleague, you might ask, 'Did you find my feedback useful?'"
The chats also had downstream consequences. After chatting, participants were confronted with a similar second task that they could decide to work on with the same or a different partner. There was a second set of pairs doing the experiment that did not get to chat. When compared to those who did not chat, those given an opportunity to chat were much more likely to choose to work together again. This positive effect of chatting is likely related to what happened during the chats: almost all of the chats involved instances of thanking and very few involved bragging. Although it was a competence-based task, a low-scoring partner was more likely to be chosen for the team again if they projected a warmer image.
Responsibility Exchange Theory can help to explain a wide range of commonly observed phenomena. It helps to explain why some communications that might appear to be apologies, but which don't accept responsibility -- "I'm sorry you feel that I hurt you" -- are not accepted as authentic. In addition, it explains why thanking and apologizing are much less likely to occur after the other side has bragged or blamed.
"Our theory also can shed light on why, as previous research has found, women tend to apologize more than men. Society often imposes a 'warmth premium' on women, making it more important for them to be perceived of as warm as opposed to competent," Chaudhry said.
abstract From the time we are children, we are taught to say “thank you” and “I’m sorry.” These communications are central to many social interactions, and the failure to say them often leads to conflict in relationships. Research has documented that, alongside the impact they can have on relationships, apologies and thanks can also impact material outcomes as small as restaurant tips and as significant as settlements of medical malpractice lawsuits. But, it is trivial to utter the words; how can such “cheap talk” carry so much value? In this article, we propose a “responsibility exchange theory” that explains why these communications are not costless, and which draws connections between four forms of communication that have not previously been connected: thanking, apologizing, bragging, and blaming. All four of these communications relay information about credit or blame, and thus introduce image-based costs and benefits for both the communicator and the recipient of communication: Each of the four communications involves a tradeoff between appearing competent and appearing warm. By formalizing these social psychological insights with a utility-based approach to modeling communication, and by applying game theoretic analysis, we offer new insights about social communication. We test several of the model’s novel predictions about strategic communication in two experiments: The first involves hypothetical choices in a scenario study, and the second involves real choices in a live interaction. We end with a discussion of the theory’s place in the literature and consider extended predictions and applications as examples of future directions for research
sexual frequency is associated with age of natural menopause: results from the study of women’s health across the nation
megan arnot, ruth mace 2020
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.191020
The researchers observed that women, who reported engaging in sexual activity weekly, were 28% less likely to have experienced menopause at any given age than women who engaged in sexual activity less than monthly. Sexual activity includes sexual intercourse, oral sex, sexual touching and caressing or self-stimulation.
The research, published in Royal Society Open Science, is based on data from the USA’s Study of Women’s Health Across the Nation (SWAN). It’s the largest, most diverse and most representative longitudinal cohort study available to research aspects of the menopause transition.
First author on the study, PhD candidate Megan Arnot (UCL Anthropology), said: “The findings of our study suggest that if a woman is not having sex, and there is no chance of pregnancy, then the body ‘chooses’ not to invest in ovulation, as it would be pointless. There may be a biological energetic trade-off between investing energy into ovulation and investing elsewhere, such as keeping active by looking after grandchildren.
“The idea that women cease fertility in order to invest more time in their family is known as the Grandmother Hypothesis, which predicts that the menopause originally evolved in humans to reduce reproductive conflict between different generations of females, and allow women to increase their inclusive fitness through investing in their grandchildren.”
During ovulation, the woman’s immune function is impaired, making the body more susceptible to disease. Given a pregnancy is unlikely due to a lack of sexual activity, then it would not be beneficial to allocate energy to a costly process, especially if there is the option to invest resources into existing kin.
The research is based on data collected from 2,936 women, recruited as the baseline cohort for the SWAN study in 1996/1997.
The mean age at first interview was 45 years old. Non-Hispanic Caucasian women were most represented in the sample (48%), and the majority of women were educated to above a high school level. On average they had two children, were mostly married or in a relationship (78%), and living with their partner (68%).
The women were asked to respond to several questions, including whether they had engaged in sex with their partner in the past six months, the frequency of sex including whether they engaged in sexual intercourse, oral sex, sexual touching or caressing in the last six months and whether they had engaged in self-stimulation in the past six months. The most frequent pattern of sexual activity was weekly (64%).
None of the women had yet entered menopause, but 46% were in early peri-menopause (starting to experience menopause symptoms, such as changes in period cycle and hot flashes) and 54% were pre-menopausal (having regular cycles and showing no symptoms of peri-menopause or menopause).
Interviews were carried out over a ten-year follow-up period, during which 1,324 (45%) of the 2,936 women experienced a natural menopause at an average age of 52.
By modelling the relationship between sexual frequency and the age of natural menopause, women of any age who had sex weekly had a hazard ratio of 0.72, whereas women of any age who had sex monthly had a hazard ratio of 0.81.
This provided a likelihood whereby women of any age who had sex weekly were 28% less likely to experience the menopause compared to those who had sex less than monthly. Likewise, those who had sex monthly were 19% less likely to experience menopause at any given age compared to those who had sex less than monthly.
The researchers controlled for characteristics including oestrogen level, education, BMI, race, smoking habits, age at first occurrence of menstruation, age at first interview and overall health.
The study also tested whether living with a male partner affected menopause as a proxy to test whether exposure to male pheromones delayed menopause. The researchers found no correlation, regardless of whether the male was present in the household or not. Last author, Professor Ruth Mace (UCL Anthropology), added: “The menopause is, of course, an inevitability for women, and there is no behavioural intervention that will prevent reproductive cessation. Nonetheless, these results are an initial indication that menopause timing may be adaptive in response to the likelihood of becoming pregnant.”
abstract It is often observed that married women have a later age of natural menopause (ANM) than unmarried women; however, the reason for this association is unknown. We test an original hypothesis that sexual frequency acts as a bio-behavioural mediator between marital status and ANM. We hypothesize that there is a trade-off between continued ovulation and menopause based on the woman’s chances of becoming pregnant. If a woman is sexually inactive, then pregnancy is impossible, and continued investment in ovulation would not be adaptive. In addition, we test an existing hypothesis that the observed relationship is because of the exposure to male pheromones. Data from 2936 women were drawn from 11 waves of the Study of Women’s Health Across the Nation, which is a longitudinal study conducted in the United States. Using time-varying Cox regression, we found no evidence for the pheromone hypothesis. However, we did observe that women who reported to have sex weekly during the study period were 28% less likely to experience menopause than women who had sex less than monthly. This is an indication that ANM may be somewhat facultative in response to the likelihood of pregnancy.
life in the balance: are women’s possible selves constrained by men’s domestic involvement?
alyssa croft et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0146167218797294
"This shows how dependent women's role choices can be on their expectations of their future male partners," said lead study author Alyssa Croft, an assistant professor in the UA Department of Psychology. "Those expectations could have implications for what women are willing and able to do in their own lives."
Croft's findings are based on a series of experiments conducted in the United States and Canada, in which she and her collaborators asked single female college students, ages 18 to 25, to write about how they imagine their lives 15 years in the future. The researchers focused on young women who plan on one day getting married and having children.
Participants were told they were part of a study on how people are affected by statistics in everyday life. They were presented a fact sheet that included a series of graphs on a range of topics, such as smoking rates, precipitation trends, fruit and vegetable consumption, and how the percentage of stay-at-home dads has increased over time.
Participants in each experiment saw the same data -- either from the U.S. Census Bureau or Statistics Canada, depending on where the experiment was conducted. However, the graphs on stay-at-home dads were presented differently to different participants.
Some saw the increase in stay-at-home dads represented as a steep line on a graph, which gave the appearance of a more rapid and dramatic shift. Others saw a flatter line, suggesting a more gradual change. Researchers merely tweaked the y-axis of the graph to get two different visual representations of the same data.
The researchers also manipulated the text accompanying the graphs. In the U.S. versions of the graphs, which showed that the percentage of stay-at-home dads in America increased from 4 to 12 percent over two-and-a-half decades, the graph was titled either "Rapidly increasing prevalence of stay-at-home dads" or "Low prevalence of stay-at-home dads." Text beneath the graphs either read, "These numbers are projected to continue increasing at a similarly rapid rate over the next two decades" or "These numbers are projected to remain relatively low in the next two decades."
After seeing the graphs, each study participant was asked to provide responses to a series of questions about how they imagine their lives in 15 years, including whether they see themselves as being the primary financial provider or primary caregiver for their family.
In both the U.S. and Canada, young women who saw the graph depicting a sharper increase in stay-at-home fathers were more likely to see themselves as breadwinners, while those who saw the flatter line were more likely to imagine themselves as caregivers. The researchers replicated the findings across a series of similar experiments.
The fact that this effect was seen in college students -- whom one might assume are particularly career-oriented -- is especially interesting, Croft said.
"These are the individuals who we would think might be most likely to balk at traditional gender stereotypes, and yet they're still showing this pattern of role expectations that is in direct response to what they believe men will be or will not be doing," Croft said.
Croft said the research was motivated by the fact that although gender roles have changed significantly, that change has been asymmetrical. An estimated 70 percent of U.S. families today have two working parents, and women are increasingly more likely to be the primary economic providers for their families. However, family responsibilities continue to fall disproportionately to women, Croft said.
"Women's roles are changing much more quickly than men's, but we wondered, could it be that there is a still a sense in which women's roles are restricted because of the way gender roles are intertwined with one another?" she said. "Could it be that women are picturing, before they're even in a relationship, a very stereotypic division of labor in their future families? And does that affect the education and career decisions they make when they're young?"
More research is needed to understand how and to what extent women's perceptions of men's roles affect the education and career choices they make early on, but the fact that those perceptions are shaping their future visions of themselves at all is significant, Croft said.
"This may be one reason we should care about the degree to which men's roles aren't changing as much as women's," she said.
More research also is needed to understand whether men's visions for their futures are similarly influenced by their perception of women's roles. Some men, for example, might welcome relief from the stereotypical expectation that men should be the financial providers, Croft said.
"Perhaps thinking about women changing their roles to relinquish some of the caregiving control would be appealing to men who want to be more involved with their children," she said. "But that's an open question at this point."
abstract Do young women’s expectations about potential romantic partners’ likelihood of adopting caregiving roles in the future contribute to whether they imagine themselves in nontraditional future roles? Meta-analyzed effect sizes of five experiments (total N = 645) supported this complementarity hypothesis. Women who were primed with family-focused (vs. career-focused) male exemplars (Preliminary Study) or information that men are rapidly (vs. slowly) assuming greater caregiving responsibilities (Studies 1-4) were more likely to envision becoming the primary economic provider and less likely to envision becoming the primary caregiver of their future families. A meta-analysis across studies revealed that gender role complementarity has a small-to-medium effect on both women’s abstract expectations of becoming the primary economic provider (d = .27) and the primary caregiver (d = −.26). These patterns suggest that women’s stereotypes about men’s stagnant or changing gender roles might subtly constrain women’s own expected work and family roles.
gender, flexibility stigma and the perceived negative consequences of flexible working in the uk
heejung chung et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11205-018-2036-7
This is the main finding from Dr Heejung Chung from the University of Kent who set out to analyse data from the 2011 Work-Life Balance Survey conducted by the government. Specifically she wanted to examine whether stigma against flexible workers exists, who is most likely to hold such beliefs and who is most likely to suffer from it.
The research also found that the majority of respondents that held negative views against flexible workers were male, while women and especially mothers were the ones who were most likely to suffer from such stereotypes.
Furthermore, one out of five workers (18%) said they had experienced direct negative career consequence as a result of working flexibly. This perhaps accounts for the very low uptake of the right to request flexible working since it was made law in 2003 and expanded to cover all workers as of 2014.
It was women, especially mothers who worked part-time and on reduced hours, rather than full-time workers who work flexibly -- i.e. teleworking or on flexitime -- that reported that their careers were negatively impacted by working flexibly. On the other hand, men, especially fathers (almost half of respondents), were likely to have reported that their own jobs was negatively impacted due to others working flexibly.
Commentating on the research Dr Chung, from the School of Social Policy, Sociology and Social Research at Kent, said: 'It is clear there are still many people who view flexible working as a negative and for different reasons. This has major implications for how employers introduce and offer flexible working arrangements in their organisation, especially as the government looks to increase the rights of workers to request flexible working.'
'A simple introduction and expansion of the right to request flexible working will not be enough. We need to challenge our prevalent organisational cultures which privileges work above everything else, with long hours considered to be synonymous with productivity and commitment. Such change is crucial especially if flexible working is to help reduce the gender wage gap.'
abstract This study examines the prevalence and the gender differences in the perceptions and experiences of flexibility stigma—i.e., the belief that workers who use flexible working arrangements for care purposes are less productive and less committed to the workplace. This is done by using the 4th wave of the Work-Life Balance Survey conducted in 2011 in the UK. The results show that 35% of all workers agree to the statement that those who work flexibly generate more work for others, and 32% believe that those who work flexibly have lower chances for promotion. Although at first glance, men are more likely to agree to both, once other factors are controlled for, women especially mothers are more likely to agree to the latter statement. Similarly, men are more likely to say they experienced negative outcomes due to co-workers working flexibly, while again mothers are more likely to say they experienced negative career consequences due to their own flexible working. The use of working time reducing arrangements, such as part-time, is a major reason why people experience negative career outcomes, and can partially explain why mothers are more likely to suffer from such outcomes when working flexibly. However, this relationship could be reverse, namely, the stigma towards part-time workers may be due to negative perceptions society hold towards mothers’ commitment to work and their productivity. In sum, this paper shows that flexibility stigma is gendered, in that men are more likely to discriminate against flexible workers, while women, especially mothers, are more likely to suffer from such discrimination.
dance me to the end of love
leonard cohen
the civil wars
youtube.com/watch
the civil wars live
youtube.com/watch
flowers in bloom
youtube.com/watch
lyrics
dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
dance me through the panic ‘til i’m gathered safely in
lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove
dance me to the end of love
dance me to the end of love
oh let me see your beauty when the witnesses are gone
let me feel you moving like they do in babylon
show me slowly what i only know the limits of
dance me to the end of love
dance me to the end of love
dance me to the wedding now, dance me on and on
dance me very tenderly and dance me very long
we’re both of us beneath our love, we’re both of us above
dance me to the end of love
dance me to the end of love
dance me to the children who are asking to be born
dance me through the curtains that our kisses have outworn
raise a tent of shelter now, though every thread is torn
dance me to the end of love
speak softly love
parla più piano
katherine jenkins
Link: m.youtube.com/watch
katherine jenkins & julian lloyd webber (live)
Link: m.youtube.com/watch
filippa giordano
Link: m.youtube.com/watch
parla più piano e nessuno sentirà
il nostro amore lo viviamo io e te
nessuno sa la verità
neppure il cielo che ci guarda da lassù
insieme a te io resterò
amore mio, sempre così
parla più piano e vieni più vicino a me
voglio sentire gli occhi miei dentro di te
nessuno sa la verità
è un grande amore e mai più grande esisterà
insieme a te io resterò
amore mio, sempre così
parla più piano e vieni più vicino a me
voglio sentire gli occhi miei dentro di te
nessuno sa la verità
è un grande amore e mai più grande esisterà
speak softly, love and hold me warm against your heart
i feel your words, the tender trembling moments start
we're in a world, our very own
sharing a love that only few have ever known
wine-colored days warmed by the sun
deep velvet nights when we are one
speak softly, love so no one hears us but the sky
the vows of love we make will live until we die
my life is yours and all because
you came into my world with love so softly love
wine-colored days warmed by the sun
deep velvet nights when we are one
speak softly, love so no one hears us but the sky
the vows of love we make will live until we die
my life is yours and all because
you came into my world with love so softly love
the sounds of silence: inferences from the absence of word-of-mouth
kimberlee weaver, anne hamby 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/jcpy.1067
the upper eye bias: rotated faces draw fixations to the upper eye
nicolas davidenko et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0301006618819628
it is very surprising to me (perhaps it shouldn’t be) that the authors of this paper did not consider that some people tilt their heads when listening
"Looking at the eyes allows you to gather much more information," said Davidenko. "It's a real advantage."
By contrast, the inability to make eye contact has causal effects. "It impairs your facial processing abilities and puts you at a real social disadvantage," he said. People who are reluctant to make eye contact may also be misperceived as disinterested, distracted, or aloof, he noted.
Scientists have known for decades that when we look at a face, we tend to focus on the left side of the face we're viewing, from the viewer's perspective. Called the "left-gaze bias," this phenomenon is thought to be rooted in the brain, the right hemisphere of which dominates the face-processing task.
Researchers also know that we have a terrible time "reading" a face that's upside down. It's as if our neural circuits become scrambled, and we are challenged to grasp the most basic information. Much less is known about the middle ground, how we take in faces that are rotated or slightly tilted¬.
"We take in faces holistically, all at once -- not feature by feature," said Davidenko. "But no one had studied where we look on rotated faces."
Davidenko used eye-tracking technology to get the answers, and what he found surprised him: The left-gaze bias completely vanished and an "upper eye bias" emerged, even with a tilt as minor as 11 degrees off center.
"People tend to look first at whichever eye is higher," he said. "A slight tilt kills the left-gaze bias that has been known for so long. That's what's so interesting. I was surprised how strong it was."
Perhaps more importantly for people with autism, Davidenko found that the tilt leads people to look more at the eyes, perhaps because it makes them more approachable and less threatening. "Across species, direct eye contact can be threatening," he said. "When the head is tilted, we look at the upper eye more than either or both eyes when the head is upright. I think this finding could be used therapeutically."
Davidenko is eager to explore two aspects of these findings: whether people with autism are more comfortable engaging with images of rotated faces, and whether tilts help facilitate comprehension during conversation.
The findings may also be of value for people with amblyopia, or "lazy eye," which can be disconcerting to others. "In conversation, they may want to tilt their head so their dominant eye is up," he said. "That taps into our natural tendency to fix our gaze on that eye."
The effect is strongest when the rotation is 45 degrees. The upper-eye bias is much weaker at a 90-degree rotation. "Ninety degrees is too weird," said Davidenko. "People don't know where to look, and it changes their behavior totally."
abstract There is a consistent left-gaze bias when observers fixate upright faces, but it is unknown how this bias manifests in rotated faces, where the two eyes appear at different heights on the face. In two eye-tracking experiments, we measured participants’ first and second fixations, while they judged the expressions of upright and rotated faces. We hypothesized that rotated faces might elicit a bias to fixate the upper eye. Our results strongly confirmed this hypothesis, with the upper eye bias completely dominating the left-gaze bias in ±45° faces in Experiment 1, and across a range of face orientations (±11.25°, ±22.5°, ±33.75°, ±45°, and ±90°) in Experiment 2. In addition, rotated faces elicited more overall eye-directed fixations than upright faces. We consider potential mechanisms of the upper eye bias in rotated faces and discuss some implications for research in social cognition.
wealth, poverty, and happiness: social class is differentially associated with positive emotions
paul k. piff and jake p. moskowitz 2017
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/emo0000387
richer: more individualist
poorer: more collectivist
i’ve always wondeed why the school year started in september…
human sexual cycles are driven by culture and match collective moods
ian b. wood et al. 2017
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-18262-5
hear them roar: a comparison of black-capped chickadee (poecile atricapillus) and human (homo sapiens) perception of arousal in vocalizations across all classes of terrestrial vertebrates
jenna v. congdon et al. 2019
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/com0000187
examined the elements within vocalizations that indicate a level of arousal such as fear or excitement. They found that both humans and black-capped chickadees can detect arousal levels in other species.
"The idea is that some species can understand other species' vocalizations," explained Jenna Congdon, PhD student in the Department of Psychology. "For instance, a songbird is able to understand the call of distress of a different type of songbird when they are in the presence of a predator, like an owl or a hawk. Or, for example, if your friend scared you and you screamed. Both of these are high-arousal vocalizations, and being able to understand what that sounds like in a different species can be very useful."
Sounds like it
Under the supervision of Professor Chris Sturdy, Congdon conducted two experiments, one examining chickadees and another examining humans. In the experiments, participants distinguished between high- and low-arousal vocalizations produced by other species, including alligators, chickadees, elephants, humans, pandas, piglets, ravens, macaques, and tree frogs. Human subjects were able to identify high arousal in different species.
"Black-capped chickadees were also able to identify high arousal in other chickadees, humans, and giant pandas," said Congdon. "This is fascinating, because a chickadee that has never come across a giant panda before is able to categorize high -- and low -- arousal vocalizations."
The scientists suspect that other vocal learners, or species that learn their vocalizations from parents and models in order to survive, have this ability as well. "It is only a small group of species who do this in the world -- humans, songbirds, hummingbirds, parrots, bats, whales and dolphins, and elephants," said Congdon. "If humans and songbirds show an innate ability to understand the vocalizations of other species, would other vocal learners show this same propensity?"
abstract Recently, evidence for acoustic universals in vocal communication was found by demonstrating that humans can identify levels of arousal in vocalizations produced by species across three biological classes (Filippi et al., 2017). Here, we extend this work by testing whether two vocal learning species, humans and chickadees, can discriminate vocalizations of high and low arousal using operant discrimination go/no-go tasks. Stimuli included vocalizations from nine species: giant panda, American alligator, common raven, hourglass treefrog, African elephant, Barbary macaque, domestic pig, black-capped chickadee, and human. Subjects were trained to respond to high or low arousal vocalizations, then tested with additional high and low arousal vocalizations produced by each species. Chickadees (Experiment 1) and humans (Experiment 2) learned to discriminate between high and low arousal stimuli and significantly transferred the discrimination to additional panda, human, and chickadee vocalizations. Finally, we conducted discriminant function analyses using four acoustic measures, finding evidence suggesting that fundamental frequency played a role in responding during the task. However, these analyses also suggest roles for other acoustic factors as well as familiarity. In sum, the results from these studies provide evidence that chickadees and humans are capable of perceiving arousal in vocalizations produced by multiple species.
human listeners can accurately judge strength and height relative to self from aggressive roars and speech
jordan raine et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.isci.2018.05.002
sexually antagonistic male signals manipulate germline and soma of c. elegans hermaphrodites
erin z. aprison, ilya ruvinsky 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2016.08.024
“The male signals trigger the female to ‘go for it’ — to put more effort into reproduction — but then the body suffers,” said Ilya Ruvinsky, of the department of molecular biosciences at Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences. “There is a fine balance between reproduction and body maintenance, and this balance can be tipped by the male. We now are starting to tease apart this complexity.”
Using the tiny transparent roundworm C. elegans, a well-established model for biomedical research, Ruvinsky and Erin Z. Aprison identified two distinct signals produced by males that affect female reproduction. The females sense the signals and respond by altering their physiology.
“We were investigating how animals reproduce under conditions that are closer to natural environments than the cushy life in the laboratory when we found this,” Ruvinsky said. “One signal causes an earlier onset of puberty in juvenile females. The other slows down aging of the reproductive system in mature females, keeping them fertile longer. However, it also speeds up aging of the body.”
A male animal doesn’t even have to be present to cause these changes in a female — a miniscule amount of two male pheromones is enough to affect aging. Pheromones are small molecules produced and released by animals into the environment to alter the physiology or behavior of other members of the species. Although the signals target reproduction, even sterile females — ones without eggs — experience these profound changes.
“Our results regarding puberty onset echo previous findings in mice,” Ruvinsky said. “In mammals, males also produce signals that manipulate the timing of sexual maturation of females. This raises an intriguing possibility that a basic mechanism controlling the rate of sexual development is similar in all animals. Because of this universality, our findings may have implications for humans.”
Fortunately, the research suggests that the effects on sexual maturation, the reproductive system and overall body health can be separated, providing an area for future study. Understanding these basic mechanisms could lead to therapies that delay puberty and prolong fertility in humans as well as combat aging.
The study offers a simple explanation for a curious biological phenomenon: Male signals do not so much aim to harm females, but instead act to maximize females’ readiness for reproduction.
“The harmful effects appear to be collateral damage, rather than the goal,” Ruvinsky said.
Ruvinsky and Aprison used genetics and imaging to characterize female responses to male signals, including prolonged fertility and decreased longevity. They also demonstrated that steroid hormones, which are involved in a wide variety of developmental and physiological processes in all animal species, play a key role in converting a male signal into faster sexual maturation in females.
The researchers conducted their work using C. elegans because this simple organism of barely 1,000 cells is easy to manipulate, has a short lifespan and offers a tremendous arsenal of experimental tools. This laboratory workhorse, affectionately called “the worm,” has previously yielded numerous insights into basic biological phenomena that have dramatic implications for human health.
abstract •C. elegans males produce multiple signals that affect hermaphrodite physiology
•Male ascaroside pheromones delay the loss of hermaphrodite germline precursor cells
•Male ascarosides promote somatic aging even in hermaphrodites lacking the germline
•An unknown signal accelerates larval development, specifically the onset of puberty
Males and females pursue different reproductive strategies, which often bring them into conflict—many traits exist that benefit one sex at a cost to another 1. Decreased female survival following mating dramatically demonstrates one aspect of this phenomenon [2, 3, 4, 5]. Particularly intriguing is the evidence that secreted compounds can shorten lifespan of members of the opposite sex in Drosophila 6 and Caenorhabditid nematodes 7 even without copulation taking place. The purpose of such signals is not clear, however. While it is possible that they could limit subsequent mating with competitors or hasten post-reproductive demise, thus decreasing competition for resources, they are also likely to harm unmated individuals. Why would a system exist that reduces the vigor of potential mates prior to mating? Addressing this question could provide insights into mechanisms and evolution of sexual conflict and reveal sensory inputs that regulate aging. Here, we describe two distinct ways in which Caenorhabditis elegans males cause faster somatic aging of hermaphrodites but also manipulate different aspects of their reproductive physiology. The first, mediated by conserved ascaroside pheromones, delays the loss of germline progenitor cells. The second accelerates development, resulting in faster sexual maturation. These signals promote male reproductive strategy and the effects harmful to hermaphrodites appear to be collateral damage rather than the goal.
the book of love
peter gabriel
the book of love is long and boring
no one can lift the damn thing
it's full of charts and facts and figures
and instructions for dancing
but i / i love it when you read to me
and you / you can read me anything
the book of love has music in it
in fact that's where music comes from
some of it is just transcendental
some of it is just really dumb
but i / i love it when you sing to me
and you / you can sing me anything
the book of love is long and boring
and written very long ago
it's full of flowers and heart-shaped boxes
and things we're all too young to know
but i / i love it when you give me things
and you / you ought to give me wedding rings
and i / i love it when you give me things
and you / you ought to give me wedding rings
you ought to give me wedding rings
reasons for sex and relational outcomes in consensually nonmonogamous and monogamous relationships
jessica wood et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0265407517743082
the economic foundations of cohabiting couples’ union transitions
patrick ishizuka 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s13524-018-0651-1
what makes a pair bond in a neotropical primate: female and male contributions
sofya dolotovskaya et al. 2020
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.191489
Less than ten percent of all mammalian species live in pair relationships, although the latter are difficult to define. Do the animals only share a territory or is it a long-term relationship based on mutual contact? And if so, how is this relationship maintained? To find this out, behavioral biologists from the German Primate Centre (DPZ) have studied seven groups of red titi monkeys accustomed to the presence of humans in the Peruvian Amazon rainforest near the DPZ research station Quebrada Blanco. Titi monkeys are a textbook example of pair living in mammals. Pairs stay together for many years and males are intensively involved in raising their young. The young are almost exclusively carried by the father and are given to the mother only for suckling. In addition, the fathers play with their children and share their food more often with them than the mothers do.
The researchers wanted to find out what advantages couple life brings for both males and females and what contribution the respective sexes make to the relationship. To do this, they observed the animals over a time span of two seven-month periods from morning to night and noted which animal was seeking the proximity of its partner, who was grooming whom, and which animals were involved in confrontations with intruders.
Females maintain the relationship, males offer services
“We have observed that the females, especially after giving birth, are increasingly concerned with maintaining relationships, i.e. actively seeking the proximity of their partner and grooming their fur,” says Sofya Dolotovskaya, PhD student at the German Primate Center and first author of the study. The males, on the other hand, have become increasingly involved in conflicts with intruders. “This behavior is in line with the ‘male-services hypothesis’, which states that females are mainly concerned with being close to their partner while the latter provides useful services, such as defense against intruders or rearing the young,” says Eckhard W. Heymann, scientist at the German Primate Center and head of the DPZ research station Estación Biológica Quebrada Blanco in Peru. “Our results support the hypothesis that the commitment of males for rearing their young is an important factor in maintaining pair relationships.” In further investigations it is currently examined whether these pair relationships are accompanied by monogamous mating behavior.
abstract Pair living and pair bonding are rare in mammals, and the mechanisms of their maintenance remain a puzzle. Titi monkeys, a ‘textbook example’ for ‘monogamous’ primates, have strong pair bonds and extensive male care. To investigate mechanisms of pair-bond maintenance, we studied seven wild groups of red titis (Plecturocebus cupreus) in Peruvian Amazonia over a period of 14 months. We analysed pair bonds by measuring proximity, grooming and approaches/leaves within pairs, and collected data on intergroup encounters. Females contributed to grooming more than males, especially during infant dependency, when most of the grooming within pairs was done by females. Females were also more active in controlling proximity between pair mates, making most of the approaches and leaves. Males, on the other hand, invested more in territorial defences. They participated in more intergroup encounters than females and were more active during these encounters. Our data is most consistent with the ‘male-services’ hypothesis for pair-bond maintenance, where a female contributes more to the proximity and affiliation maintenance while a male provides beneficial services.
a developmental perspective on young adult romantic relationships: examining family and individual factors in adolescence
mengya xia et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10964-018-0815-8
how not to hate your husband after kids
jancee dunn 2017 9780316267113
automatic associations between one’s partner and one’s affect as the proximal mechanism of change in relationship satisfaction: evidence from evaluative conditioning
james k. mcnulty, michael a. olson, rachael e. jones, laura m. acosta 2017
dx.doi.org/10.1177/0956797617702014
predicting the pursuit and support of challenging life opportunities
brooke c. feeney et al. 2017
dx.doi.org/10.1177/0146167217708575
love as addiction
lynn stuart parramore 2016
http://www.salon.com/
attached: the new science of adult attachment and how it can help you find — and keep — love
amir levine, rachel heller 2010
communication that is maladaptive for middle-class couples is adaptive for socioeconomically disadvantaged couples
jaclyn m. ross et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/pspi0000158
bonobos respond prosocially toward members of other groups
jingzhi tan et al. 2017
dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-15320-w
cooperation, clustering, and assortative mixing in dynamic networks
david melamed et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1715357115
Understanding the patterns and processes of human cooperation is of central scientific importance. Networks can promote cooperation when their existing or emergent topology allows conditional cooperators in the network to isolate themselves from exploitation by noncooperators. We do not know from prior work whether the emergent structures that promote cooperation are driven by reputation or can emerge purely via dynamics, i.e., the severing of ties to noncooperators and the formation of new ties irrespective of reputational information. Here we demonstrate, experimentally, that dynamic networks yield very high rates of cooperation even without reputational knowledge. Further, we identify realistic conditions under which static networks (where ties cannot be altered) yield cooperation rates as high as those in dynamic networks.
Humans’ propensity to cooperate is driven by our embeddedness in social networks. A key mechanism through which networks promote cooperation is clustering. Within clusters, conditional cooperators are insulated from exploitation by noncooperators, allowing them to reap the benefits of cooperation. Dynamic networks, where ties can be shed and new ties formed, allow for the endogenous emergence of clusters of cooperators. Although past work suggests that either reputation processes or network dynamics can increase clustering and cooperation, existing work on network dynamics conflates reputations and dynamics. Here we report results from a large-scale experiment (total n = 2,675) that embedded participants in clustered or random networks that were static or dynamic, with varying levels of reputational information. Results show that initial network clustering predicts cooperation in static networks, but not in dynamic ones. Further, our experiment shows that while reputations are important for partner choice, cooperation levels are driven purely by dynamics. Supplemental conditions confirmed this lack of a reputation effect. Importantly, we find that when participants make individual choices to cooperate or defect with each partner, as opposed to a single decision that applies to all partners (as is standard in the literature on cooperation in networks), cooperation rates in static networks are as high as cooperation rates in dynamic networks. This finding highlights the importance of structured relations for sustained cooperation, and shows how giving experimental participants more realistic choices has important consequences for whether dynamic networks promote higher levels of cooperation than static networks.
innovation diffusion within large environmental ngos through informal network agents
yuta j. masuda et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41893-018-0045-9
Link: 09035-cdd6993cd34e1bf6255a272dc4dbbc03.html
one hello
randy crawford
consistency between individuals’ past and current romantic partners’ own reports of their personalities
yoobin park, geoff macdonald 2019
http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1902937116
"It's common that when a relationship ends, people attribute the breakup to their ex-partner's personality and decide they need to date a different type of person," says lead author Yoobin Park, a PhD student in the Department of Psychology in the Faculty of Arts & Science at U of T. "Our research suggests there's a strong tendency to nevertheless continue to date a similar personality."
Using data from an ongoing multi-year study on couples and families across several age groups, Park and co-author Geoff MacDonald, a professor in the Department of Psychology at U of T, compared the personalities of current and past partners of 332 people. Their primary finding was the existence of a significant consistency in the personalities of an individual's romantic partners.
"The effect is more than just a tendency to date someone similar to yourself," says Park.
Participants in the study along with a sample of current and past partners, assessed their own personality traits related to agreeableness, conscientiousness, extraversion, neuroticism, and openness to experience. They were polled on how much they identified with a series of statements such as, "I am usually modest and reserved," "I am interested in many different kinds of things" and "I make plans and carry them out." Respondents were asked to rate their disagreement or agreement with each statement on a five-point scale.
Park and MacDonald's analysis of the responses showed that overall, the current partners of individuals described themselves in ways that were similar to past partners.
"The degree of consistency from one relationship to the next suggests that people may indeed have a 'type'," says MacDonald. "And though our data do not make clear why people's partners exhibit similar personalities, it is noteworthy that we found partner similarity above and beyond similarity to oneself."
By examining first-person testimonials of someone's partners rather than relying on someone's own description of them, the work accounts for biases found in other studies.
"Our study was particularly rigorous because we didn't just rely on one person recalling their various partners' personalities," said Park. "We had reports from the partners themselves in real time."
The researchers say the findings offer ways to keep relationships healthy and couples happy.
"In every relationship, people learn strategies for working with their partner's personality," says Park. "If your new partner's personality resembles your ex-partner's personality, transferring the skills you learned might be an effective way to start a new relationship on a good footing."
On the other hand, Park says the strategies people learn to manage their partner's personality can also be negative, and that more research is needed to determine how much meeting someone similar to an ex-partner is a plus, and how much it's a minus when moving to a new relationship.
"So, if you find you're having the same issues in relationship after relationship," says Park, "you may want to think about how gravitating toward the same personality traits in a partner is contributing to the consistency in your problems."
The data for the research comes from the German Family Panel study launched in 2008, an ongoing longitudinal study on couple and family dynamics with a nationally representative sample of adolescents, young adults, and midlife individuals in Germany.
abstract Although a romantic partner’s personality creates an interpersonal environment that can be highly consequential for emotional and physical well-being, little research has examined to what degree romantic partners’ personalities are similar across relationships. In this study, we provide evidence of stability in partner personality, implementing a rigorous analysis using self-reports of personalities from both past and current partners themselves. The significant degree of unique similarity between an individual’s past and current partners could not be explained by important potential confounds. Our results also provided tentative evidence that this similarity is weaker for people who are more extraverted or open to experience.
Do people have a “type” when it comes to their romantic partners’ personalities? In the present research, we used data from a 9-y longitudinal study in Germany and examined the similarity between an individual’s ex- and current partners using the partners’ self-reported personality profiles. Based on the social accuracy model, our analyses distinguished similarity between partners that was attributable to similarity to an average person (normative similarity) and resemblance to the target participant himself/herself (self-partner similarity) to more precisely examine similarity from partner to partner (distinctive similarity). The results revealed a significant degree of distinctive partner similarity, suggesting that there may indeed be a unique type of person each individual ends up with. We also found that distinctive partner similarity was weaker for people high in extraversion or openness to experience, suggesting that these individuals may be less likely to be in a relationship with someone similar to their ex-partner (although the individual difference effects were not mirrored in an alternative analytic approach). These findings provide evidence for stability in distinctive partner personality and have important implications for predicting future partnering behaviors and actions in romantic relationships.
sway
dean martin
when marimba rhythms start to play
dance with me, make me sway
like a lazy ocean hugs the shore
hold me close, sway me more
like a flower bending in the breeze
bend with me, sway with ease
when we dance you have a way with me
stay with me, sway with me
other dancers may be on the floor
dear, but my eyes will see only yours
only you have the magic technique
when we sway i go weak
i can hear the sounds of violins
long before it begins
make me thrill as only you know how
sway me smooth, sway me now
romantic love as drive
what fantasies can do to your relationship: the effects of sexual fantasies on couple interactions
gurit e. birnbaum et al. 2018
https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167218789611
what do short-term and long-term relationships look like? building the relationship coordination and strategic timing (recast) model
paul w. eastwick et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/xge0000428
What is the moment when the two trajectories start to diverge? On average, it happens at about the time that the relationship starts to become sexual.
“People would hook up with some partners for the first time and think ‘wow, this is pretty good.’ People tried to turn those experiences into long-term relationships,” said Eastwick. “Others sparked more of a ‘meh’ reaction. Those were the short-term ones.”
The study offers a new twist on the distinction between the stable, long-term partner and the exciting, short-term partner. In real life, people may end up in short-term relationships when they are “just a little” attracted to the other person — enough to keep having sex, but maybe not for very long. Long-term relationships may be the ones that start especially exciting and sexy and grow into something stable and lasting.
Close relationships research has examined committed couples (e.g., dating relationships, marriages) using intensive methods that plot relationship development over time. But a substantial proportion of people’s real-life sexual experiences take place (a) before committed relationships become “official” and (b) in short-term relationships; methods that document the time course of relationships have rarely been applied to these contexts. We adapted a classic relationship trajectory-plotting technique to generate the first empirical comparisons between the features of people’s real-life short-term and long-term relationships across their entire timespan. Five studies compared long-term and short-term relationships in terms of the timing of relationship milestones (e.g., flirting, first sexual intercourse) and the occurrence/intensity of important relationship experiences (e.g., romantic interest, strong sexual desire, attachment). As romantic interest was rising and partners were becoming acquainted, long-term and short-term relationships were indistinguishable. Eventually, romantic interest in short-term relationships plateaued and declined while romantic interest in long-term relationships continued to rise, ultimately reaching a higher peak. As relationships progressed, participants evidenced more features characteristic of the attachment-behavioral system (e.g., attachment, caregiving) in long-term than short-term relationships but similar levels of other features (e.g., sexual desire, self-promotion, intrasexual competition). These data inform a new synthesis of close relationships and evolutionary psychological perspectives called the Relationship Coordination and Strategic Timing (ReCAST) model. ReCAST depicts short-term and long-term relationships as partially overlapping trajectories (rather than relationships initiated with distinct strategies) that differ in their progression along a normative relationship development sequence.
quantifying the sexual afterglow
andrea l. meltzer et al. 2018 al. 2017
dx.doi.org/10.1177/0956797617691361
post sex affectionate exchanges promote sexual and relationship satisfaction
amy muise et al. 2017
https://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10508-014-0305-3
arching the back (lumbar curvature) as a female sexual proceptivity signal: an eye-tracking study
farid pazhoohi et al. 2017
dx.doi.org/10.1007/s40806-017-0123-7
what is orgasm? a model of sexual trance and climax via rhythmic entrainment
adam safron 2016
differences in orgasm frequency among gay, lesbian, bisexual, and heterosexual men and women in a u.s. national sample
dx.doi.org/
sex and security
Link: ted.com/talks/esther_perel_the_secret_to_desire_in_a_long_term_relationship/transcript
frequent sexual activity predicts specific cognitive abilities in older adults
hayley wright, rebecca a. jenks, nele demeyere 2017
dx.doi.org/10.1093/geronb/gbx065
social games and genic selection drive mammalian mating system evolution and speciation
barry sinervo et al. 2019
http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/706810
compared the predictions generated by this model with published data on the mating behavior of 288 species of rodents.
“By and large, everything in our predictions seems to be borne out in rodents,” said first author Barry Sinervo, professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. “Our model is a universal equation of sorts for mating systems.”
The evolutionary story that emerges from the study goes something like this: An ancestral population of rodents is promiscuous in its mating behavior. Genetic variation within the population results in individuals with distinctive behaviors. Some males are highly aggressive, defend large territories, and mate with as many females as they can. Others are not territorial, but sneak onto the territories of other males for surreptitious mating opportunities. And some are monogamous and defend small territories, cooperating with neighboring males at territorial boundaries.
These three types can coexist, but any imbalance in the relative advantages of different strategies can lead to the elimination of some behaviors and an evolutionary transition to a species that is, for example, entirely monogamous or entirely polygamous. The cooperative behavior of monogamous males, for example, can include paternal care for the young and the ability recognize and affiliate with other cooperative males, making them stronger in the competition with other strategies.
“They are able to find each other and form colonies, and the bigger the colonies get the stronger they are against the barbarians at the gate. Then they split off from the rest of the population as a separate monogamous species,” Sinervo said.
This may sound like little more than storytelling, but in fact it emerges from a set of mathematical equations based on game theory and population genetics, and it is supported by extensive research in animal behavior and genetics.
The new paper builds on Sinervo’s decades-long research on mating behaviors in California’s side-blotched lizards. He showed that three throat colors correspond with different behaviors in the male lizards: blue-throated monogamous males form partnerships and cooperate to protect their territories and their mates; orange-throated males are highly aggressive and usurp territories and mates from other lizards; and yellow-throated males sneak into the territories of other males to mate.
The competition between these strategies takes the form of a rock-paper-scissors game in which orange aggressors defeat blue cooperators, which defeat yellow sneakers, which defeat orange aggressors. Thus, no single type can dominate the population, and the abundance of each rises and falls in cycles. In 2007, Sinervo and his collaborators discovered the same dynamic in the distantly related European common lizard.
“That was when I started thinking that the same thing could be happening in mammals,” Sinervo said.
In the new paper, Sinervo and two of his longtime collaborators — Alexis Chaine at the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) in Moulis, France, and Donald Miles at CNRS and Ohio University — generalized the rock-paper-scissors system and extended it to include additional behaviors such as paternal care for offspring (linked to monogamy). They focused on male strategies to simplify the analysis. Sinervo has documented corresponding female strategies in side-blotched lizards and is currently working to incorporate female strategies into the general model.
The three male behavioral strategies represented in the model are: — Polygyny, characterized by aggression to maintain large territories overlapping with several females, but without paternal care for the offspring, as seen in polygamous mating systems where one male mates with multiple females; — Monogamy, involving lower aggression and smaller territories, with cooperation at territorial boundaries and investment in paternal care; and — Sneak, a non-territorial strategy with no paternal care, resulting in sneaking behavior in otherwise territorial systems.
Using a computer to run a mathematical model of these strategies, the researchers simulated the evolution of mating systems over 1,000 generations, varying the strength of different parameters in each simulation. At the start of the simulations, the genes that determine the different strategies were assumed to be equally abundant in the population.
The results of the simulations revealed four evolutionarily stable outcomes determined by the interactions and payoffs (in terms of reproductive success) of the different behavioral strategies. Which stable outcome emerges depends on how much of an advantage each behavior provides.
One of the key factors influencing the effectiveness of a given strategy is a male’s ability to recognize which behavioral group other males belong to and choose a neighborhood to settle in where his own strategy will have a competitive advantage. Cooperative, monogamous males need to recognize and affiliate with other cooperative males, whereas aggressive, polygynous males want to avoid other aggressive males and find cooperative males whose territories they can take over.
“It all depends on how good you are at finding the right neighborhood, or how good you are at cooperation and paternal care. By varying these parameters in the model, we were able to find the four different evolutionarily stable states,” Sinervo said.
One stable outcome is the rock-paper-scissors dynamic documented in lizards, with the coexistence of all three male strategies. Another stable outcome is the coexistence of polygyny and sneak.
There are two stable outcomes in which only one strategy survives, either polygyny or monogamy. A mix of polygyny and monogamy is rare and unstable, eventually leading to a pure system of one or the other.
Turning to the empirical data, the researchers found evidence in studies of rodent behavior and territoriality of the mating systems and behavioral strategies described in the model. There is even a type of mole rat found in southern Africa that exhibits the rock-paper-scissors combo of all three male strategies that Sinervo discovered in lizards. He noted that, whereas mutual recognition of male strategies is based on throat colors in the lizards, in mammals it is more likely to be mediated by smells. “It’s there, but we don’t see it. We only saw it in lizards because of their bright colors,” he said.
The researchers analyzed the phylogenetic tree of rodents (representing the evolutionary relationships among rodent species) and found the same patterns they had seen in the simulations. Species at the base of the phylogenetic tree, closer to the common ancestor of all rodents, tend to be promiscuous, with multiple mating strategies. Polygyny and monogamy very rarely occur together, but they frequently appear in sister species, suggesting they diverged from an ancestral population of mixed strategies.
The model showed that evolutionary transitions in mating systems are largely driven by increases in the benefits of monogamous behaviors. In rodents, monogamy is the most common evolutionary transition from a promiscuous ancestor, and more rodents are monogamous than polygynous. In the simulations, pure polygyny is a relatively uncommon outcome. “Polygyny is readily invaded by the sneak strategy,” Sinervo explained.
Paternal care for the offspring is found in all monogamous species, supporting a key assumption linking paternal care to the evolution of monogamy.
“Promiscuity is very common, and can involve two or three different strategies. But the neat thing is that cooperation and monogamy are far more common than anyone realized,” Sinervo said. “The frequency of monogamy in rodents is about 26 percent, much higher than for mammals in general and similar to primates.”
The model assumes that these behavioral strategies are genetically based. Evidence in support of this includes research on the role of the hormone vasopressin (and the related hormone oxytocin) in complex social behaviors in numerous species, including rodents and humans. In the monogamous prairie voles, for example, vasopressin has been linked to pair bonding, mate guarding, and paternal care. In some rodent lineages, evolutionary transitions between monogamy and polygyny have been linked to a mutation in a vasopressin receptor gene.
The effects of the genes underlying monogamous behaviors may even drive the evolution of more advanced forms of sociality. Highly social species of rodents — such as mole rats, some of which live in colonies in which only one pair reproduces — originate from monogamous lineages.
Sinervo and his coauthors are not claiming that resources and other external ecological factors have no role in the evolution of mating systems. But the genetic model gives predictions that are consistent with the rodent data and can explain cases where a species’ mating system does not match its resource ecology.
The authors also acknowledged that animal behavior can be very flexible and is not entirely determined by genetics. This is especially true in humans, whose behavior is so strongly influenced by cultural and environmental factors. In terms of mating systems, our species can be described as promiscuous, but with very high rates of monogamy. Sinervo said he sees a connection between monogamy and the deeply cooperative social behaviors that are at the core of the human condition.
“We can see analogues for human behavior in other animals, but there’s really nothing else like humans,” Sinervo said. “There are ‘kneejerk’ behavioral impulses in us that are not far from rodents, but our cultural and social complexity makes us very different from most mammals.”
abstract Mating system theory based on economics of resource defense has been applied to describe social system diversity across taxa. Such models are generally successful but fail to account for stable mating systems across different environments or shifts in mating system without a change in ecological conditions. We propose an alternative approach to resource defense theory based on frequency-dependent competition among genetically determined alternative behavioral strategies characterizing many social systems (polygyny, monogamy, sneak). We modeled payoffs for competition, neighborhood choice, and paternal care to determine evolutionary transitions among mating systems. Our model predicts four stable outcomes driven by the balance between cooperative and agonistic behaviors: promiscuity (two or three strategies), polygyny, and monogamy. Phylogenetic analysis of 288 rodent species supports assumptions of our model and is consistent with patterns of evolutionarily stable states and mating system transitions. Support for model assumptions include that monogamy and polygyny evolve from promiscuity and that paternal care and monogamy are coadapted in rodents. As predicted by our model, monogamy and polygyny occur in sister taxa among rodents more often than by chance. Transitions to monogamy also favor higher speciation rates in subsequent lineages, relative to polygynous sister lineages. Taken together, our results suggest that genetically based neighborhood choice behavior and paternal care can drive transitions in mating system evolution. While our genic mating system theory could complement resource-based theory, it can explain mating system transitions regardless of resource distribution and provides alternative explanations, such as evolutionary inertia, when resource ecology and mating systems do not match.
the state of affairs
esther perel 2017 9780062322609
why we love, why we cheat
helen fisher 2006
http://www.ted.com/talks/helen_fisher_tells_us_why_we_love_cheat/transcript?language=en
simulated hatching failure predicts female plasticity in extra-pair behavior over successive broods
teru yuta et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/beheco/ary124
passion, relational mobility, and proof of commitment: a comparative socio–ecological analysis of an adaptive emotion in a sexual market
junko yamada, mie kito, masaki yuki 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1474704917746056
mating strategy flexibility in the laboratory: preferences for long- and short-term mating change in response to evolutionarily relevant variables
andrew g. thomas, steve stewart-williams 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2017.10.004
demographic causes of adult sex ratio variation and their consequences for parental cooperation
luke j. eberhart-phillips et al. 2018
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-03833-5
sexual conflict drives male manipulation of female postmating responses in drosophila melanogaster
brian hollis et al. 2019
http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1821386116
…
The fundamental biological process of reproduction can differ greatly from animal species to species. Both males and females sometimes evolve creative strategies in pursuing their interests in these mating interactions. This has been studied for quite some time in small species such as the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster, where the female receives proteins through the male's seminal fluid -- which, after the actual mating, leads to radical changes in her behaviour and in the processes occurring inside her body. The proteins increase her activity, reduce her sexual receptivity and stimulate her immune system.
It has been known for some time that such processes are not always beneficial for both sexes. Researchers from Münster (Germany) and Lausanne (Switzerland) have now taken a closer look at which mechanisms change evolutionarily if there are no conflicts of interest between the sexes, i.e. competition between males is eliminated. The result: male flies produce fewer proteins in their seminal fluid, which changes the behaviour of the females. This means that male flies mainly manipulate their partners in order to increase their own chances in reproductive competition -- as a side effect, females often have health disadvantages. "With the current study we confirm a theory that has existed for a long time," says evolutionary biologist Claudia Fricke, a research group leader at the University of Münster. The study has been published in the journal PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences).
Background and methods:
In order to determine the extent to which the different interests pursued by each sex play a role in the evolution of fruit flies, the researchers arranged for individual pairs of flies to live monogamously over many generations -- contrary to their normal mode of reproduction. Only one male and one female mated with each other, ruling out any opportunity for antagonistic interactions among potential partners. The male only gained as many offspring as the female could lay eggs. In a second group, five males and five females mated freely with one another. This polygamous lifestyle, a perfectly normal one for these insects, naturally created competition -- both between males and between females, with the scope for antagonistic interactions. The total population was, however, of equal size in both groups.
After 150 generations and ten years of sexual selection, the researchers compared the behaviour and physiology of the flies in each group. They found that, in the first days after fertilisation, polygamous females laid one-third more eggs than those flies which had mated in an environment containing only one mating partner. Also, the females which had mated with a polygamous male were noticeably more restless -- as shown in recordings of movement patterns. Both are factors that are influenced by receipt of these male seminal fluid proteins.
Why is that of advantage to the male? Since female flies are able to store the sperm of several partners and use it for more than a week to fertilise their eggs, the first male the female mates with does everything to ensure that she lays as many eggs as she can as quickly as possible and does not reproduce with others. This early investment is to the detriment of the female, which is discouraged from saving her energy and procreating over a longer time period. This was also shown in the study: "Females, which had been with polygamous males died twice as frequently -- within a few hours of mating -- as females in monogamous relationships," says Laurent Keller from the University of Lausanne, who was involved in the study with his colleague Brian Hollis.
In a further step, the scientists read out the expression of genes of female fruit flies after mating. In the female's abdomen and brain -- i.e. in the structures responsible for reproduction and for any changes in behaviour -- the researchers measured the expression of genes important for reproduction. They discovered that these genes are far less expressed in females, which lived monogamously.
This corresponded to what they found in males. Without any competition, the monogamous males had a lower expression of genes coding for male seminal fluid proteins with which females can be manipulated after mating.
In subsequent studies, the researchers hope to identify further genes that play a role in this process in both female and male fruit flies. The general principles of their observation may also be transferable to other insect species with a similar mating system.
In species with males and females, reproduction requires contributions from both sexes and therefore some degree of cooperation. At the same time, antagonistic interactions can evolve because of the differing goals of males and females. We aligned the interests of the sexes in the naturally promiscuous fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster by enforcing randomized monogamy for more than 150 generations. Males repeatedly evolved to manipulate females less, a pattern visible in both the timing of female reproductive effort and gene expression changes after mating. Male investment in expression of genes encoding seminal fluid proteins, which shape the female postmating response, declined concurrently. Our results confirm the presence of sexually antagonistic selection on postcopulatory interactions that can be reversed by monogamy.
Abstract
In many animals, females respond to mating with changes in physiology and behavior that are triggered by molecules transferred by males during mating. In Drosophila melanogaster, proteins in the seminal fluid are responsible for important female postmating responses, including temporal changes in egg production, elevated feeding rates and activity levels, reduced sexual receptivity, and activation of the immune system. It is unclear to what extent these changes are mutually beneficial to females and males or instead represent male manipulation. Here we use an experimental evolution approach in which females are randomly paired with a single male each generation, eliminating any opportunity for competition for mates or mate choice and thereby aligning the evolutionary interests of the sexes. After >150 generations of evolution, males from monogamous populations elicited a weaker postmating stimulation of egg production and activity than males from control populations that evolved with a polygamous mating system. Males from monogamous populations did not differ from males from polygamous populations in their ability to induce refractoriness to remating in females, but they were inferior to polygamous males in sperm competition. Mating-responsive genes in both the female abdomen and head showed a dampened response to mating with males from monogamous populations. Males from monogamous populations also exhibited lower expression of genes encoding seminal fluid proteins, which mediate the female response to mating. Together, these results demonstrate that the female postmating response, and the male molecules involved in eliciting this response, are shaped by ongoing sexual conflict.
it is a good opportunity to practice skepticism of presented “facts”, and he does appear to have useful thoughts to contribute, but the fact is i cannot trust this author
i get the feeling that david buss has little idea about diversity, and is overly interested in competition. he often generalises which implies his work much less valuable than it could be
why women stray: evolutionary theory says men stray to increase offspring, but what motivates women? enter the mate-switching hypothesis
david buss 2017
aeon.co/essays/does-the-mate-switching-hypothesis-explain-female-infidelity
the evolution of desire: strategies in human mating
david buss 2016 9780465093304
not recommended
“Since a person’s self-esteem is, in part, an internal tracking device reflecting self-perceived mate value, these forms of abuse may be functional in mate retention, however morally abhorrent they are.”
men’s benefits came from monopolizing a woman’s reproductive capacity and women’s from monopolizing a man’s investments
women’s preferences for a successful, ambitious, and resource-capable mate coevolved with men’s competitive mating strategies, which include risk taking, status striving, derogation of competitors, coalition formation, and an array of individual efforts aimed at surpassing other men on the dimensions that women desire. The intertwining of these coevolved mechanisms in men and women created the conditions for men to dominate in the domain of resources.
The origins of men’s control over resources is not simply an incidental historical footnote of passing curiosity. Rather, it has a profound bearing on the present, because it reveals some of the primary causes of men’s continuing control of resources. Women today continue to want men who have resources, and they continue to reject men who lack resources.
Men continue to compete with other men to acquire the status and resources that make them desirable to women. The forces that originally caused the resource inequality between the genders—women’s mate preferences and men’s competitive strategies—are the same forces that contribute to maintaining resource inequality today.
men’s efforts to control female sexuality lie at the core of their efforts to control women. Our evolved sexual strategies account for why this occurs, and why control of women’s sexuality is a central preoccupation of men.
Feminist theory sometimes portrays men as being united with all other men in their common purpose of oppressing women.12 But the evolution of human mating suggests that this scenario cannot be true, because men and women compete primarily against members of their own gender. Men strive to control resources mainly at the expense of other men. Men deprive other men of their resources, exclude other men from positions of status and power, and derogate other men in order to make them less desirable to women.
Women do not escape damage inflicted by members of their own sex.14 Women compete with each other for access to high-status men, have sex with other women’s husbands, and lure men away from their wives. Mate poaching is a ubiquitous sexual strategy of our species. Women slander and denigrate their rivals and are especially harsh toward women who pursue short-term sexual strategies. Women and men are both victims of the sexual strategies of their own gender and so can hardly be said to be united with their own gender for some common goal.
Although today men’s sexual strategies contribute to their control over resources, the origins of their strategies cannot be separated from the evolution of women’s desires. This analysis does not imply that we should blame women for the fact that men control resources or blame men for their relentless pursuit of them. Rather, if harmony and equality are to be achieved, women and men both must be recognized as linked together in a spiraling causal chain of this coevolutionary process. This process started long ago with the evolution of desire and continues to operate today through our strategies of mating.
Jay Belsky and his colleagues, for example, argue that harsh, rejecting, and inconsistent child-rearing practices, erratically provided resources, and marital discord foster in children a mating strategy of early reproduction and rapid turnover. In contrast, sensitive, supportive, and responsive child rearing, combined with reliable resources and spousal harmony, foster in children a mating strategy of commitment marked by delayed reproduction and stable marital bonds. Children growing up in uncertain and unpredictable environments, in short, learn that they cannot rely on a single mate. They therefore opt for a sexual life that starts early and that inclines them to switch mates frequently. In contrast, children who grow up in stable homes with predictably investing parents opt for a strategy of permanent mating because they expect to attract a stable, high-investing mate. The evidence from children of divorced homes supports this theory. Such children reach puberty earlier, engage in intercourse earlier, and have more numerous sex partners than their peers from intact homes.
The fact that conflicts between men and women originate from our evolved mating psychology is disturbing to some people, partly because it contradicts widely held beliefs. Many of us have learned the traditional view that these conflicts are reflections of a particular culture whose practices perturb the natural harmony of human nature. But the anger that women feel when sexually coerced and the rage that men feel when cuckolded arise from our evolved mating strategies, not from capitalism, culture, patriarchy, or socialization.
Among the Yanomamö, there are two key motives that spur men to declare war on another tribe—a desire to capture the wives of other men and a desire to recapture wives that were lost in previous raids. When the American anthropologist Napoleon Chagnon explained to his Yanomamö informants that the United States waged war for principles such as freedom and democracy, they were astonished. It seemed absurd to them to risk one’s life for anything other than capturing or recapturing women.
We are empowered now, more than at any time in human evolutionary history, to shape our future. The fact that deception, coercion, and abuse stem from our mating strategies does not justify their perpetuation. By employing the evolved mechanisms that are sensitive to personal costs, such as our sensitivity to reputational damage and our fear of ostracism, we may be able to curtail the expression of the more damaging aspects of our mating strategies.
what are the marital problems of happy couples? a multimethod, two‐sample investigation
amy rauer et al. 2019
http://doi.org/10.1111/famp.12483
serious problems with this study
How couples handle marital conflict may depend on what issues they are facing, as some issues may be more difficult to resolve than others. What is unclear, however, is what issues happy couples face and how these issues may be different for couples depending on their developmental stage. To explore this possibility, the current study used both self‐reports and observations drawn from two separate samples of happily married couples—one early in middle adulthood (N = 57 couples; average marital duration = 9 years) and one in older adulthood (N = 64 couples; average marital duration = 42 years). Results indicated that all issues were relatively minor, but early middle‐aged couples reported more significant problems than did older couples. As to determining the most salient topic for happy couples, it depended on the spouses’ gender, developmental stage, and how salience was assessed (i.e., highest rated issue vs. most discussed issue). Only moderate links were found between what happy couples said was their most serious concern and what they actually tried to resolve during observations of marital problem‐solving, but there were differences in how spouses behaved based on the proportion of their time discussing certain topics. Findings suggest that more attention should be devoted to understanding what marital issues happy couples discuss and why, as doing so may reveal how couples maintain their marital happiness.
SomewhatEnthused • 1h •
Seems like the press-release article, as well as the discussion here, is Survivorship Bias at its finest!
Only intact couples were polled, without input from dissolved couples. As OP quotes the article and authors:
The couples rarely chose to argue about issues that are more difficult to resolve. And Rauer suggests that this strategic decision may be one of the keys to their marital success.
The data here also "suggests" that couples with unavoidable, difficult-to-resolve problems simply dissolve before arriving in the data set.
However, Rauer goes on to imply that the data suggests that "strategic decisions" around argumentation make for happier marriages, which is not well supported by this data.
Edit: Clarified that the survivorship bias is in the article and discussion, but not in the abstract provided, which (shots fired) does not seem to say much of anything that is applicable or interesting. Which is why the article and discussion here are off in left-field, logical-fallacy-town.
how the comforting process fails: psychological reactance to support messages
kellie st.cyr brisini et al. 2020
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/joc/jqz040
what are the problems with this study?
messages that validated a person’s feelings were more effective and helpful than ones that were critical or diminished emotions.
The findings were recently published in the keystone paper of a virtual special issue of the Journal of Communication. The researchers said the results could help people provide better support to their friends and families.
“One recommendation is for people to avoid using language that conveys control or uses arguments without sound justification,” said Xi Tian, a graduate assistant in communication arts and sciences. “For example, instead of telling a distressed person how to feel, like ‘don’t take it so hard’ or ‘don’t think about it,’ you could encourage them to talk about their thoughts or feelings so that person can come to their own conclusions about how to change their feelings or behaviors.”
Tian said that previous research has shown that social support can help alleviate emotional distress, increase physical and psychological well-being, and improve personal relationships. But — depending on how support is phrased or worded — it could be counterproductive, such as actually increasing stress or reducing a person’s confidence that they can manage their stressful situation.
Denise Solomon, department head and professor of communication arts and sciences, said they were trying to learn more about why well-intentioned attempts to comfort others are sometimes seen as insensitive or unhelpful.
“We wanted to examine the underlying mechanism that explains why some supportive messages may produce unintended consequences,” Solomon said. “We also wanted to understand how people cognitively and emotionally respond to insensitive social support.”
For the study, the researchers recruited 478 married adults who had recently experienced an argument with their spouse. Before completing an online questionnaire, participants were asked to think about someone with whom they had previously discussed their marriage or spouse. Then, they were presented with one of six possible supportive messages and were asked to imagine that person giving them that message.
Lastly, the participants were asked to rate their given message on a variety of characteristics.
“We manipulated the messages based on how well the support message validates, recognizes, or acknowledges the support recipients’ emotions, feelings, and experiences,” Tian said. “Essentially, the messages were manipulated to exhibit low, moderate, or high levels of person-centeredness, and we created two messages for each level of person-centeredness.”
According to the researchers, a highly person-centered message recognizes the other person’s feelings and helps the person explore why they might be feeling that way. For example, “Disagreeing with someone you care about is always hard. It makes sense that you would be upset about this.” Meanwhile, a low person-centered message is critical and challenges the person’s feelings. For example, “Nobody is worth getting so worked up about. Stop being so depressed.”
After analyzing the data, the researchers found that low person-centered support messages did not help people manage their marital disagreement in a way that reduced emotional distress.
“In fact, those messages were perceived as dominating and lacking argument strength,” Tian said. “Those messages induced more resistance to social support, such that the participants reported feeling angry after receiving the message. They also reported actually criticizing the message while reading it.”
In contrast, high person-centered messages produced more emotional improvement and circumvented reactance to social support.
“Another recommendation that can be taken from this research is that people may want to use moderately to highly person-centered messages when helping others cope with everyday stressors,” said Solomon.
The researchers said people can try using language that expresses sympathy, care and concern. For example, “I’m sorry you are going through this. I’m worried about you and how you must be feeling right now.” Acknowledging the other person’s feelings or offering perspective — like saying “It’s understandable that you are stressed out since it’s something you really care about” — may also be helpful.
abstract This study extends the theory of psychological reactance to the context of social support by examining how supportive communication is associated with psychological reactance and subsequent support outcomes. The final sample included 325 married adults who had experienced a marital disagreement, and were asked to evaluate a hypothetical support message that varied in the level of person-centeredness provided by a social network member. The results indicated that perceptions of support messages as conveying dominance and having weak argument quality were positively associated with psychological reactance. Low person-centered messages corresponded with more dominance and weaker argument quality. Low person-centered messages were associated with more psychological reactance through an indirect effect conveyed by a perceived threat to freedom. There was a significant, indirect effect between person-centeredness and emotional improvement conveyed by a perceived threat to freedom and psychological reactance. The discussion highlights the role of psychological reactance in social support.
not yet read
love in the age of ecological apocalypse: cuptivating the relationships we need to thrive
carolyn baker 2015
how we do it: the evolution and future of human reproduction
robert martin 2013
you’ve got 8 seconds: communication secrets for a distracted world
paul hellman 2018
listen up or lose out: how to avoid miscommunication, improve relationships, and get more done faster
robert bolton, dorothy grover bolton 2018
wired for love: how understanding your partner’s brain and attachment style can help you defuse conflict and build a secure relationship
stan tatkin 2012
the lost art of good conversation: a mindful way to connect with others and enrich everyday life
sakyong mipham 2017
anatomy of love: a natural history of mating, marriage, and why we stray
helen fisher 1994, 2017
mating in captivity: unlocking erotic intelligence
esther perel 2007
how sex works: why we look, smell, taste, feel, and act the way we do
sharon moalem 2010
relationship reset: secrets from a couples therapist that will revolutionize your love for a lifetime
jen elmquist 2017
marriage and lasting relationships with asperger’s syndrome
eva mendes, stephen shore 2015
what do women want? adventures in the science of female desire
daniel bergner 2013
how we talk: the inner workings of conversation
n. j. enfield 2017
performing sex: the making and unmaking of women’s erotic lives
breanne fahs 2011
sex drive: in pursuit of female desire
bella ellwood-clayton 2012
the art of gathering: how we meet and why it matters
priya parker 2018
breakpoint: why the web will implode, search will be obsolete, and everything else you need to know about technology is in your brain
jeff stibel 2013
boundaries in marriage
henry cloud, john townsend 1999
if i understood you, would i have this look on my face?: my adventures in the art and science of relating and communicating
alan alda 2017
female ejaculation and the g-spot: not your mother’s orgasm book!
deborah sundahl, annie sprinkle 2003
naked marriage: how to have a lifetime of love, sex, joy, and happiness
joanneh nagler 2018
five stars: the communication secrets to get from good to great
carmine gallo 2018
compelling people: the hidden qualities that make us influential
john neffinger 2013
love understood: the science of who, how and why we love
laura mucha 2019
fiction
the stars are legion
kameron hurley 2017
podkayne of mars
robert heinlein
podkayne fille de mars
robert heinlein
works of robert heinlein
fiction not yet read
the book of the unnamed midwife
meg elison 2016
the book of etta
meg elison 2017
the book of flora
meg elison 2019
the broken heavens
kameron hurley 2020
not recommended
karen memory
elizabeth bear 2016
scales of empire
kylie chan 2018
stone mad
elizabeth bear 2018
Link: 04035-94e135ee39b7f1e30212ddffaa71abb6.html
似水流年
ci⁵seoi²lau⁴nin⁴
梅艷芳
Link: youtube.com/watch
中文
望著海一片滿懷倦
無淚也無言
望著天一片
只感到情懷亂
我的心又似小木船
遠景不見但仍向著前
誰在命裡主宰我
每天掙扎 人海裡面
心中感嘆
似水流年
不可以留住昨天
留下只有思念
一串串永遠纏
浩瀚煙波裡我懷念
懷念往年
外貌早改變
處境都變
情懷未變
english
望著海一片滿懷倦
mong⁶zoek³hoi²jat¹pin³/mun⁵waai⁴gyun⁶
looking wearily over the sea
無淚也無言
mou⁴leoi⁶jaa⁵mou⁴jin⁴
neither tears nor words
望著天一片
mong⁶zoek³tin¹jat¹pin³
looking up at the sky
只感到情懷亂
zi²gam²dou³*²/cing⁴waai⁴lyun⁶
feeling only confusion
我的心又似小木船
ngo⁵dik¹sam¹/jau⁶ci⁵siu²muk⁶syun⁴
the tiny coracle of my heart
遠景不見但仍向著前
jyun⁶ging²bat¹gin³/daan⁶jing⁴hoeng³zoek⁶cin⁴
drifts on through the mist
誰在命裡主宰我
seoi⁴zoi⁶/ming⁶leoi⁵zyu²zoi²ngo⁵
who binds my life?
每天掙扎 人海裡面
mui⁵tin¹zang¹zaat³/jan⁴hoi²leoi⁵min⁶
struggling each day, through a sea of people
心中感嘆
sam¹zung¹gam²taan³
my heart mourns
似水流年
ci⁵seoi²lau⁴nin⁴
the flow of passing years
不可以留住昨天
bat¹ho²ji⁵lau⁴zyu⁶zok⁶tin¹
yet we cannot hold on to yesterday
☆留下只有思念
lau⁴haa⁶zi²jau⁵si¹nim⁶
leaving only longing
一串串永遠纏
jat¹cyun³cyun³/wing⁵jyun⁵cin⁴
entwined for eternity
★浩瀚煙波裡我懷念
hou⁶hon⁶jin¹bo¹leoi⁵/ngo⁵waai⁴nim⁶
out in the sea mist, i cherish
懷念往年
waai⁴nim⁶wong⁵nin⁴
cherish those passing years
外貌早改變
ngoi⁶maau⁶zou²goi²bin³
husks sloughed off long ago
處境都變
cyu²ging²dou¹bin³
our circumstances too
情懷未變
cing⁴waai⁴mei⁶bin³
yet our feelings stay
☆,★ repeat x2
robynn & kendy
Link: youtube.com/watch
le temps des cerises
jean–baptiste clément, antoine renard
Link: m.soundcloud.com/auroracolson/le-temps-des-cerises
quand nous chanterons le temps des cerises (quand nous en serons au temps des cerises)
et gai rossignol et merle moqueur
seront tous en fête
when we sing of the time of cherries
the cheerful nightingale, and mocking blackbird
will rejoice with us
les belles auront la folie en tête
et les amoureux du soleil au cœur
quand nous chanterons le temps des cerises
sifflera bien mieux le merle moqueur
fillies will swoon
and lovers, be heartsick
when we sing of the time of cherries
even mocking blackbird will cackle his best
mais il est bien court le temps des cerises
où l’on s’en va deux cueillir en rêvant
des pendants d’oreilles…
but it is short, the time of cherries
where one goes to pick them while dreaming
of rings in our ears…
cerises d’amour aux robes pareilles (vermeilles)
tombant sous la feuille (mousse) en gouttes de sang…
mais il est bien court le temps des cerises
pendants de corail qu’on cueille en rêvant
cherries of love on the same dresses
fall on the leaves in drops of blood
but it is so short, the time of cherries
coral pendants that one picks in dreams
(quand vous en serez au temps des cerises
si vous avez peur des chagrins d’amour
évitez les belles
moi qui ne crains pas les peines cruelles
je ne vivrai pas sans souffrir un jour…
quand vous en serez au temps des cerises
vous aurez aussi des peines d’amour)
j’aimerai toujours le temps des cerises
c’est de ce temps–là que je garde au cœur
une plaie ouverte…
et dame fortune, en m’étant offerte
ne pourra jamais calmer(fermer) ma douleur…
j’aimerai toujours le temps des cerises
et le souvenir que je garde au cœur
i will always love the time of the cherries
i keep this time in my heart
an open wound
…
さくらんぼの實る頃
加藤登紀子
kato tokiko
Link: youtube.com/watch
le temps des cerises
mike collins, aurora colson
Link: soundcloud.com/auroracolson/le-temps-des-cerises
history
Link: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Le_Temps_des_cerises
Link: 01035-95c21ecfe08a51f04b99fc6a777c74a0.html