HAPPY COUPLES
Love may not really be blind. But if you're lucky, it may affect your vision.
According to a trio of Canadian researchers, couples are most satisfied with their relationship when partners see one another through rose-colored glasses.
While common sense suggests that relationships work best when each partner accurately sees the other's strengths and weaknesses, psychologists at the University of Waterloo found just the opposite.
They asked 180 couples a series of questions about themselves, their partner, their ideal partner, and their satisfaction with the relationship. For the most part, they discovered, individuals viewed their partners in a more positive light than their partners saw themselves. And in the happiest relationships, there was an outright frenzy of mutual delusion: Each partner saw the absolute best in his or her significant other, regardless of the person's actual attributes.
"A certain degree of self-deception appears to be a critical feature of satisfying romantic relationships," conclude Sandra Murray, Ph.D., and colleagues in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (Vol. 70, No. 1).
