Is Love Blind?

David A. Kenny, Ph.D., University of Connecticut

Writers from Chaucer to Shakespeare have stated that “Love is blind,” but is it really? We might think that people would be very highly motivated to truly understand their relationship partners. After all, if they make a poor choice, they suffer the negative consequences. Additionally, romantic partners, especially in the early stages of their relationship, are actively seeking information about their partner. Lovers spend a great deal of time together and they share with each other their most intimate secrets. We might think that lovers have their eyes wide open and they are not so blind.

Various groups of researchers have shown that lovers can be blind. Important research by Sandra Murray and colleagues has consistently shown that idealization of the partner (that is, seeing them as better than they really are) is endemic to close relationships and predictive of relationship satisfaction. Maybe then love is blind?

In my own research, I have shown that people in relationships are accurate to some extent, but they are also biased in how they view their partner. With Linda Acitelli of the University of Houston, we asked married and dating couples various questions, e.g., how much they liked their job and how satisfied they were in their sex life. We also asked them to guess how their partner answered each question. We found that people were both accurate (they could predict how their partner responded), but they were also biased in the sense that they assumed that their partner felt the same as they did. Interestingly, accuracy exceeded bias when the topic was non-threatening (e.g., job satisfaction), but bias exceeded accuracy when the topic was threatening (e.g., satisfaction with sex).

Currently, Tessa West and I are extending this research in three areas. First, we are studying roommates over time and we are especially focusing on inter-racial roommates. Second, we are examining accuracy and bias in family members’ perceptions of each other. Third, we are studying accuracy and bias in romantic relationships. Couples are given an incentive to accurately judge how attracted their romantic partners are to alternative partners, after being told that the alternative partners are highly attracted to their partners. In all three studies, we expect threat to increase bias and reduce accuracy.