Why do people perform relatively poorly when it comes to their accuracy in assessing the personality attributes of potential mates? Was Kant right?

Why friends may be less forgiving than we are for our partner’s transgressions.

As someone who loves great food, I thought this article in the New York Times was particularly interesting. It discussed how different food choices could be stressful on relationships. Discover what other studies say about why sharing food in your relationships may be important.

One of our Advisory Board Members and professor at UCLA, Dr. Tom Bradbury, is now offering seminars for couples on relationship functioning, and what couples can do to keep their relationship strong. Find out more.

According to research conducted by Andrew Gulledge and his colleagues, daily behaviors can be important in expressing love and affection, and they can also be good for your relationship. Find out how men and women differ in their preferences for certain types of physical affection.

Receiving a gift for Valentine’s Day? Whether that gift comes wrapped in newspaper comics or a turquoise box, your expression of gratitude during this time may contribute to your relationship happiness months down the road. Find out more.

Men and women express different emotions in their Valentine’s Day announcments.

Economists have a funny way of looking at the world. They like to create models where consumers (we can call them “people”) will make decisions based on rational comparisons and decisions. A lot of times, the results are elegantly useless at predicting things on a broad scale (remember the “Laffer Curve?”). However, when it comes to “small” interactions, the calculus of rational thought can be found to be eerily effective at describing human behavior.

A Tokyo-based company offers “heartache leave” after a bad break-up with a partner. Crazy HR staff or appropriate paid time off? New research into using brain imaging techniques show that the areas regulating social and physical pain overlap- meaning experiencing one can lead to feeling the other.

The inability of men and women to get along, most notably within their marriages, may be the longest running source of conflict in human history. Although bickering with your spouse hasn’t been shown to have direct health benefits, new research has shown that husbands and wives who don’t express their anger at each other may actually die at a younger age!

Researchers found a gene variation for rumination.

The general goal of the marketing of products as better, more effective or higher quality is to get us to buy them. However, to what extent do these marketing efforts actually alter our experience to fit our expectations? Does the belief that price and quality are related actually cause people to like things that cost more.. more?

John Helliwell is quoted as saying: “People tend to overestimate the amount of satisfaction they will get from material things and underestimate the satisfaction they derive from human connections. That’s one reason so many people choose a work environment that ends up making them miserable.” Is this why I don’t need an iPhone?

Our current mood may determine when we no longer play to win–but play to lose.