Thursday, June 27, 2019

Ghosting, or avoiding technologically-mediated contact with a partner instead of providing an explanation for a breakup, is a relatively new breakup strategy in modern romantic relationships

Koessler, R. B., Kohut, T., & Campbell, L. (2019). When Your Boo Becomes a Ghost: The Association Between Breakup Strategy and Breakup Role in Experiences of Relationship Dissolution. Collabra: Psychology, 5(1), 29. http://doi.org/10.1525/collabra.230

Abstract: Ghosting, or avoiding technologically-mediated contact with a partner instead of providing an explanation for a breakup, has emerged as a relatively new breakup strategy in modern romantic relationships. The current study investigated differences in the process of relationship dissolution and post-breakup outcomes as a function of breakup role (disengager or recipient) and breakup strategy (ghosting or direct conversation) using a cross-validation design. A large sample of participants who recently experienced a breakup was collected and randomly split into two halves. Exploratory analyses were conducted in Sample A and used to inform the construction of specific hypotheses which were pre-registered and tested in Sample B. Analyses indicated relationships that ended through ghosting were shorter and characterized by lower commitment than relationships that ended directly. Recipients experienced greater distress and negative affect than disengagers, and ghosting disengagers reported less distress than direct disengagers. Ghosting breakups were characterized by greater use of avoidance/withdrawal and distant/mediated communication breakup tactics and less open confrontation and positive tone/self-blame breakup tactics. Distinct differences between ghosting and direct strategies suggest developments in technology have influenced traditional processes of relationship dissolution.

Keywords: relationship dissolution ,   breakup strategy ,   ghosting ,   breakup distress


Assortative mating shaped patters of inheritance throughout human evolution such that mate value is not distributed randomly across individuals: Desired traits covary around mate value

Assortative mating and the evolution of desirability covariation. Daniel Conroy-Beam et al. Evolution and Human Behavior, June 27 2019. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2019.06.003

Abstract: Mate choice lies close to differential reproduction, the engine of evolution. Patterns of mate choice consequently have power to direct the course of evolution. Here we provide evidence suggesting one pattern of human mate choice—the tendency for mates to be similar in overall desirability—caused the evolution of a structure of correlations that we call the d factor. We use agent-based models to demonstrate that assortative mating causes the evolution of a positive manifold of desirability, d, such that an individual who is desirable as a mate along any one dimension tends to be desirable across all other dimensions. Further, we use a large cross-cultural sample with n = 14,478 from 45 countries around the world to show that this d-factor emerges in human samples, is a cross-cultural universal, and is patterned in a way consistent with an evolutionary history of assortative mating. Our results suggest that assortative mating can explain the evolution of a broad structure of human trait covariation.

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Some guys have a disproportionate share of desirability, across many of the parameters we look for.

Poland: The estimated number of people viewing pornography on the Internet increased over three times (310%) between Oct 2004 & Oct 2016; 25% of Internet users aged 7 to 12 saw online pornography during a monthly period

Lewczuk, Karol, Adrian Wojcik, and Mateusz Gola. 2019. “Increase in the Prevalence of Online Pornography Use – Objective Data Analysis from the Period Between 2004 and 2016 in Poland.” PsyArXiv. June 27. doi:10.31234/osf.io/tmn4r

Abstract: Despite the considerable amount of attention presently devoted to the high accessibility of online pornography, very little formal analyses have been carried out to show how the advent and proliferation of Internet technology has changed the prevalence of pornography use in populations. We conducted an analysis based on objective website traffic data, representing the changes in the number of (1) Internet users generally, and (2) online pornography users specifically, between the years 2004 and 2016 in Poland. We observed a clear increase in the estimated number of people using online pornography in the analyzed period. The observed increase was much faster than, for example, the change indicated in similar analyses based on General Social Survey data. The estimated number of people viewing pornography on the Internet increased over three times (310%) between October 2004 and October 2016 – starting from an estimated 2.76 million in the first period, to 8.54 million in the last. Additionally, pornography viewership on the Internet was almost 2 times more prevalent among male (47%) than female Internet users (27%), and most popular in the 18-27 age group. Importantly, based on our data, a relatively high percentage (25%) of young Internet users aged 7 to 12 accessed online pornography during a distinct monthly period. Interestingly for this single age group, we did not obtain a strong difference in the prevalence of online pornography use between sexes – viewing pornographic websites was as frequent among young girls as young boys. Since our analysis is based on objective data, it does not share the limitations inherent of self-reports. However, our approach also has a few important limitations (e.g. the analysis does not include online activity generated on mobile devices and under the private browsing mode) which may lead to the underestimation of pornography use indices.