You don’t need a relationship to be happy, but what single people expect from romantic relationships is related to how satisfied they are with singlehood and partially predicts whether they stay single, according to new research by psychologists at the University of Toronto.
These expectations are also related to how happy single people are with any romantic relationships they start in the future.
“Single people who expected relationships to be more intimate and bring more benefits to their lives reported lower satisfaction with their status as a single person and a higher desire for entering a relationship,” says Tayler Wells, a PhD student affiliated with the MacDonald Lab at the University of Toronto.
Wells, PhD candidate Elaine Hoan, and Geoff MacDonald, a professor of psychology in the Faculty of Arts & Science, analyzed survey data from more than 5,000 single people in Germany over an 11-year period.
Singles who reported higher expectations for intimacy in romantic partnerships—like sharing quality time, support, and affection with a partner—were more likely to enter a relationship over the course of the study and feel satisfied with that new relationship. In other words, higher intimacy expectations as a single person predicted higher relationship satisfaction in a future relationship.
Singles who held more negative relationship expectations had a higher likelihood of remaining single throughout the study. They are more likely to think that a relationship comes with bigger downsides, like more stress or less freedom. If these participants did enter a relationship during the study, they reported lower relationship satisfaction.
Additionally, the evidence that you could make yourself feel better about singlehood by thinking negatively about relationships is weak.
“If your main strategy to feel your best about singlehood is to disparage relationships, that looks only slightly effective at best,” says MacDonald. “That might be because chronically focusing on negatives can affect your ability to enjoy life in general, including your own singlehood. Aside from focusing on the positives of singlehood itself, the perception that partnership isn’t likely to be personally rewarding seems to be associated with more enjoyment of singlehood."
Their findings are detailed in, “Happily Ever After? Singles’ Expectations of Romantic Relationship are Associated with Singlehood Satisfaction and Future Romantic Outcomes,” published in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.
Gender differences in relationship expectations
“Women held significantly higher intimacy expectations for romantic relationships, and higher negative expectations,” says Wells. The latter might be tied to the inequalities women may face in heterosexual relationships, like an unfair share of household and familial duties.
This data suggests that single women may see romantic relationships as a sort of “mixed blessing” that has both costs and benefits, the researchers explain.
“Men may be thinking that a relationship will offer more of a status boost, both socially and financially,” says Wells. The researchers suggest that this may be because single men believe partnered men hold higher social status and, as previous research involving married men has confirmed, greater earning potential.
Single women also reported significantly higher satisfaction with singlehood than men, while single men reported higher desire for a partner. This echoes earlier research from the MacDonald Lab, which found that single women are happier than single men in both the West and in China.
Do expectations shape reality?
More work is needed to fully untangle how relationship expectations shape the lives of single people and those in relationships, but this research suggests that they may play an important role both during singlehood and in new relationships.
“Let's say you really want a partner that's going to spend a lot of time with you, support you, and be affectionate; you might choose a partner that you think will meet those expectations,” says Wells. “So that can help you meet the mark and get what you really want from a relationship.”
Previous research has also shown that expectations can influence what people notice in a relationship.
“When you expect your partner to do more positive things for you, you actually perceive those positive things being done,” says Wells.
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Wells is interested in designing a study the explores the expectations single people have about relationships across additional dimensions, like sexual satisfaction, and examining what people in relationships think about singlehood.
At the MacDonald Lab, researchers are currently studying single people’s goals and whether gendered expectations are influencing how they approach dating.