{"id":216732,"date":"2017-02-10T11:34:27","date_gmt":"2017-02-10T16:34:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/?p=216732"},"modified":"2017-02-14T11:16:19","modified_gmt":"2017-02-14T16:16:19","slug":"psychologists-research-probes-heart-matters-216732","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/psychologists-research-probes-heart-matters-216732\/","title":{"rendered":"Psychologist’s research probes matters of the heart"},"content":{"rendered":"

Since the 1980s, Harry Reis, who holds the title of Dean’s Professor in the Department of Psychology<\/strong><\/a>, has been investigating relationships as one of the foremost researchers in the field of relationship science. He\u00a0has plenty of insight when it comes to matters of the heart\u2014both figuratively and literally.<\/p>\n

\n

\"illustration<\/p>\n

How do we relate?<\/a><\/h2>\n

For 30 years, psychologist Harry Reis puts human relationships under the microscope.
\n(Rochester Review, January\/February 2017)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Marriage is good for the heart<\/h3>\n

A bad relationship can cause heartache\u2014but a good one can literally help your heart keep ticking.<\/p>\n

A 2011 study by Reis and Kathleen King,<\/strong><\/a> a professor emerita at the School of Nursing, showed that happily married people who underwent coronary bypass surgery were more than three times as likely to be alive 15 years later as unmarried counterparts.<\/p>\n

The effect of marital satisfaction is \u201cevery bit as important to survival after bypass surgery as more traditional risk factors like tobacco use, obesity, and high blood pressure,\u201d says Reis. The research was published in the journal Health Psychology<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Happy marriages increase women\u2019s survival rate after bypass surgery almost fourfold.<\/div>\n

\u201cA good marriage gets under your skin whether you are male or female,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

But the marriage advantage plays out differently for men and women. For men, marriage in general is linked to higher survival rates\u2014and the more satisfying the marriage, the higher the rate of survival.<\/p>\n

But for women, the quality of the relationship is even more important. While unhappy marriages don\u2019t add to longevity for the women who\u2019ve had bypass surgery, happy ones increase women\u2019s survival rate almost fourfold, the study found.<\/p>\n

\u201cWives need to feel satisfied in their relationships to reap a health dividend,\u201d says Reis. \u201cBut the payoff for marital bliss is even greater for women than for men.\u201d<\/p>\n

What\u2019s behind the benefit? The study adjusted for age, sex, education, depressed mood, tobacco use, and other factors known to affect survival rates for cardiovascular disease.<\/p>\n

Supportive spouses most likely help by encouraging healthy behavior, like increased exercise or smoking cessation, which are critical to long-term survival of heart disease. And a nurturing marriage also provides people with motivation to care for themselves and stay around to prolong a happy partnership, the researchers say.<\/p>\n

Understanding and appreciation rekindle desire<\/h3>\n

\"illustrationWhen a relationship has passed a few anniversaries and the spark seems to be flickering, responsiveness could be a pivotal factor in renewing desire, says Reis.<\/p>\n

A study he published with Gurit Birnbaum, a psychology professor at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya in Israel, in a 2016 issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology<\/em> suggests that responsiveness in even mundane interactions may reignite sexual desire<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

The research began as an inquiry into what psychologists call the \u201cintimacy-desire paradox\u201d: while people strive for intimacy in their relationships, such familiarity doesn\u2019t seem to foster desire.<\/p>\n

\u201cAdjusting to married life is a challenge, and many newlyweds don\u2019t do it particularly well,\u201d says Reis. \u201cHere you\u2019ve been dating, and that\u2019s all exciting\u2014but now you\u2019ve got dirty socks to contend with.\u201d As the years tick by, those piles of dirty socks don\u2019t exactly add to the mystery.<\/p>\n

Previous studies hadn\u2019t established whether emotional intimacy promotes or undermines sexual desire. Now Reis and Birnbaum\u2019s research suggests that, at least in certain circumstances, there may not be a paradox at all.<\/p>\n

What they found is that intimacy itself doesn\u2019t fuel or hamper desire\u2014instead, it\u2019s what the intimacy signals that matters.<\/p>\n

Responsive couples are willing to invest in their relationships, and show a deep understanding of a partner. Responsiveness is actually a kind of intimacy\u2014and likely it encourages desire because it conveys the impression that a partner is worth pursuing.<\/p>\n

And they found that women\u2019s perceptions of themselves and others was even more strongly affected by responsiveness than men\u2019s\u2014an effect that translated into higher levels of desire for the responsive partner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Since the 1980s, psychology professor Harry Reis has been putting human relationships under a microscope. Over the years his research has led to insights into matters of the heart\u2014both figuratively and literally.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":752,"featured_media":217522,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[456],"tags":[18592,4626,20302,105,13992,16072],"class_list":["post-216732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-society-culture","tag-department-of-psychology","tag-featured-post","tag-harry-reis","tag-relationships","tag-rochester-review","tag-school-of-arts-and-sciences"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nPsychologist's research probes matters of the heart<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/psychologists-research-probes-heart-matters-216732\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Psychologist's research probes matters of the heart\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Since the 1980s, psychology professor Harry Reis has been putting human relationships under a microscope. 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