Everybody knows at least one of the synonyms for the word “soulmate”: androgynous, soulmate, destined, mate, ‘true love’, ‘one's promised’... But there’s only one definition: a special affinity, understanding, or powerful bond that exists between one person and another. For example, we see Jacob Black (one of the principal characters of the movie “Twilight”) in the penultimate movie of the saga finding out that Bella and Edward’s daughter, Reneesmé, is his soulmate.
As I thought about this, I became very curious about one thing... How many people believed in having a soulmate? Well, according to a Marist poll, 73% of Americans believe in soulmates; more men than women believe in the ‘soulmate’ theory (males: 74%, females: 71%); and 79% of people younger than 45 believe in soulmates, while only 69% of those over 45 do. Now, that’s a lot of people! And again, thinking about this, how would this theory, believing in a ‘soulmate’ affect their minds?
Luckily for me, I found some scientific papers explaining just that. And let me tell you, it is not as happy as in fairytales... In 2002, Renae Franiuk and her colleagues, distinguished between two implicit theories of relationships (or as they call them, ITRs): a soulmate theory and a work-it-out theory.
People with the soulmate theory, or that had ‘destiny beliefs’, are generally known to have passionate, intense, fire-y short-term relationships, but that often become disillusioned and frustrated when something inevitably goes wrong. They believe in ‘deal-breakers’ and are constantly looking for the ‘perfect’ person. When something negative happens in the relationship they think, “Better move on and find my person.”
On the counterpart, people believing the work-it-out theory, or growth believers, take a bit longer to commit. Even early in the relationship they are more motivated to find solutions, compromise or explore new ideas. They often view compromising as growth, and when something negative happens in the relationship, they are willing to work it out.
With the last two paragraphs, we can visualize that the first one seems a little uglier than the second, but that’s not all: it is proven that looking for your soulmate decreases the motivation to make relationships work. To this we can add that, for those with the soulmate theory, it was also proven that the relationship between the couple was typically one including violence.
So, what do you believe? Are you a ‘soulmate’ person, or a ‘work-it-out’ person?
If you wish to see the full paper from Franiuk, you can see it here.