Dear Economist,

All your advice about finding the right person sounds very upbeat. But sometimes things just don’t work out. More often than not, you happen to love a person that doesn’t love you back. Then what?  – I have been wallowing in heartache for a week now and am quite fed up. I have even written a song for my lost love! What can I do?

Yours sincerely, Morris

Dear Morris,

You are absolutely right – until we find the right person, chances are that we go through more than one phase of heartache. We’ve been there.

The good news is – you can make this phase very productive for you! Sounds hard to believe, and in order to explain, I will leave the territory of economics, and enter that of psychology. (But as the psychologists entered our territory, and got a Nobel Prize there to boot, I have no qualms whatsoever.)

The secret is called ‘ego-defenses’. Ego-defenses help us cope with reality when the going gets tough. Anna Freud identified more than twenty defenses. Not all of which are healthy. The unhealthy ones include psychoses (think paranoia), and immature defenses (e.g. projecting one’s feelings into another person). Neurotic defenses, such as intellectualizing the problem (only thinking about it in logical terms) or simply repressing it, are actually quite common in ‘normal’ people. The winner are the ‘mature’ defenses. This is what you want. Mature defenses include: humor – laughing about it, anticipation – planning ahead to deal with future problems.

And the queen of them all: SUBLIMATION, i.e. turning the strong feeling such as sadness or anger into a productive activity. If you are angry, run or go boxing. If you are sad…write a song! Quite right. You are exactly on the right track. Write a song, a poem, or…an entire novel! Some of history’s greatest poets and composers had a string of unlucky loves which they turned into remarkable creativity – think Beethoven, Tchaikovsky or Droste. Even Picasso, not exactly unlucky in love, is said to have used painting “to wipe heavy dust off the soul”.

And the best thing is, ego defenses help you both cope with the current sadness and prepare you for success in the future: the recently revealed 70-year longitudinal GRANT study found out that acquiring mature ego-defenses is the best preparation to form happy relationships.

So savor your melancholic creativity as long as it lasts! It’s good for you.

Best wishes

Dr de Bergerac

Dear Economist,

how can you tell if a guy likes you? Each time I have a soft spot for a guy, I am utterly puzzled by his behavior. I seem to be getting a lot of contradicting signals. As a girl, I have a a grasp on how we would signal our interest, but how do guys do it? I need some scientific advice.

Many thanks, Janna

Dear Janna

thanks for consulting us! Your question is one we hear more frequently, and for good reason.  There are no official ‘do’s’ and ‘don’ts’ on this in the dating worlds, and in theory, everyone can show their affection as they like.

But in practice, there are unconscious, but well established ways of showing if you like somebody.  Some capable scientists recently found out what they are, and how they differ for guys and girls. The amazing results are the following:

If a guy is thinking about you as a potential mate, he will

• buy more prestigious objects and make sure you notice them (such as a nice car, designer sunglasses or a fancy gadget),
• he will spend money in ways that signals generosity, such as donating to charity (in ways that you can notice..),
• he will be more prepared to engage in heroic acts of helping, such as saving people from fire or other disasters. (In case no fire is at hand, one could imagine him carrying heavy stuff or clearing driveways of snow..)
• engage in benevolent activities that appear ‘socially dominant’, such as giving a speech to a difficult crowd, or helping in a risky project.
• He will also develop a wish to earn more, and earn it quickly. Probably so that he can do more of the above for you..

These wonderful actions, especially if visibly displayed to you, are likely to mean that the guy likes you.

Sadly, they don’t necessarily mean that he is serious in the long term. While both men with short-term (i.e. one-night stands) and long-term (i.e. relationship and marriage) interests display these behaviors, guys with a short-term interest do it even more. In other words, if your man exaggerates at any of the above, have a closer look before you give in. Men with long-term perspectives have a tendency to invest more in useful things rather than things that are showy only (i.e. the fancy gadget rather than  the designer sunglasses) while the short-term guys do the opposite.

Our advice is: give a chance to the guy who likes to show himself as the big and generous spender, and heroic helper. Do check what he spends his money on though – those with the slightly more boring and useful taste will last longer.

Best wishes,

Dr de Bergerac

Dear Economist,
thanks for your dating advice. Here’s my question: how will I know if I found the right person? How can I be sure that the person I am dating will be my soulmate?
Sincerely, Paul

The One

Dear Paul,

your question is a tough one indeed and I am not sure that economists have a satisfying answer. But here’s trying. Let’s structure the problem into pieces we can deal with. ‘Finding the One’ chiefly has three elements: (i) a set of selection criteria against which you evaluate potential mates, (ii) a set of selection criteria against which your favourite mate evaluates you, and (iii) factors of long-term compatibility.

Suprisingly, working on (i) is treated with negligence by many searching singles. It is important, however, that you know what you are looking for, before you look. Economists usually assume this as a given, in their language “people know their individual utility function”. In reality, that is not often the case. As a first step, I therefore advise that you sit down and figure out your utility function. What makes you happy? What are the characteristics that your future wife needs to have? –  It is ok to have a long list, as long as you prioritize it. In addition, I would advise to stick to criteria that are somehow measurable, or you have an idea about how to evaluate them. You also need to be aware of obvious trade-offs. I heard from a few young men that they want a mate that is both a successful go-getter in business and a meek stay-at-home mum. Needless to say, most of them are still searching. 

Once you have a complete wishlist, which is free of mutually exclusive items, we can move to issue (ii). This is a bit more tricky, as you don’t know The One yet. But you can explore the dating market and learn what the women that typically meet your criteria tend to fancy. If the dating market is a bit thin where you live, don’t hesitate to call on female friends and relatives who might have a good judgement of these preferences. In addition, there are some attributes nearly all women like. Unfortunately, some of them are discriminatory, such as ‘height’. But there’s nothing wrong with wearing (hidden) high soles. For example, Nicolas Sarkozy and Gerhard Schroeder are both guilty, I’ve been told. Women also often prefer a man that is more or less close to their own age. (For an overview of the general preferences of women, see Belot and Francesconi: “Can anyone be the one? Evidence on mate selection from Speed Dating”, Essex University, 2006).

If you have a grasp of both (i) and (ii), let’s explore issue (iii). What kind of persons do usually end up together, and it works?  – The answer to this has actually changed over time. The empirical literature has found that differences do no longer attract.  With the rise in women’s education and access to the labor market, marriages have increasingly been concluded between partners who are very much alike in terms of diplomas and earnings. Whereas in our granny’s generation the dominant model was the combination of earning and educated man with non-earning and less educated woman. In those times, the woman scientist, or poet, stayed often single. But the world has changed. Stable marriages usually involve equals. Think The Obamas rather than The Beckers.

As Fernandez, Guner and Knowles show (in “Love and Money: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis of Household Sorting and Inequality”, U of Pennsylvania, 2001), there is ‘positive assortative mating’ in marriages along the variables of education and income.  I.e. spouses are usually equally educated and equally rich. – It is likely that they are also ‘equal’ on a series of other attributes and habits, i.e.  taste for travels or sports, a talent for music, religious devotion….but these are usually not easily measured or reflected in publicly available data. But you can still check them out on a date.

In summary, we won’t be able to decide who is ‘The One’ for you. But we hope we’ve made your search a little more hopeful. Do let us know how it’s going.

Your Economist