The Key To A Healthy Relationship: A Clean Subconscious?
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Maybe you’re the person in that relationship. It’s not as if you don’t love the other person, but sometimes it just doesn’t feel right. Should you break up? Shouldn’t you?
Dr. Ronald D. Rogge of the University of Rochester may have some answers for you.
In a study released in Psychological Science on July 7, Rogge says he has found a word association psychological test to determine how people really feel about their significant others.
Rogge said he believes many times people think they are happy or that their relationship is working, but this is not always true.
“To make things worse, a lot of people don’t want to tell you if they’re starting to feel less happy in their relationship,” Rogge said in a press release.
The study worked like this: 222 volunteers, all of whom were in committed relationships, were chosen to participate in the test. To begin, each person had to give his or her partner’s name and two specific words he or she associated with that person.
The volunteers were then put through two rounds of testing. In both rounds, there were three types of words, presented one at a time on a slideshow: “good words” (such as peace), “bad words” (such as death), and the two partner-related words or the partner’s name.
In the first round, the volunteers were told to click a button every time they saw a good word. In the second round, they were to click when they saw a bad word. If the person being tested had an easier time with the first round than the second, chances were they had more positive subconscious associations with their partner.
According to Rogge, those who had a difficult time with the test and viewed their partners negatively had a substantially higher risk of breaking up within the next year.
So, why is this important? Well, to state the obvious, knowing how you view your partner and vice versa will help you determine whether or not you are truly “meant to be.”
If this test becomes public or is distributed to psychologists around the world, couples will be jumping at the chance to discover once and for all if their relationship is worth holding onto. This could alleviate months, even years, of heartache.
Years of heartache or a 15-minute test?
Yeah, I’d take the test.
To reach staff reporter Rebecca Buddingh, click here.
Photo credit: mrhayata
