A recent article by the eminent relationship theorist Blaine Fowers in the Journal of Personal and Social Relationships has taken on one corner of the enormous question “Is what we believe about relationships based on research within our culture relevant to marriage in other cultures?”

A recent article by a team of researchers showing that the happiest marriages are those in which the male is less attractive than the female has received a lot of attention in the press of late. People appear to be fascinated by the finding that relationships where a panel of objective observers rated the husband as less attractive than the wife appeared to be “happier” than relationships where the spouses were either similar or, even worse, where the husband was more attractive!

As anyone who has even a passing acquaintance with Bridget Jones Diary or any novel by Nick Hornby is no doubt aware, the English have problems with romance. This is somewhat ironic from the “I know this isn’t literally irony, but what else do you call something that seems contrary to what you would expect?” and American male point of view

Staying in a bad relationship isn’t good for anyone. From the standpoint of promoting family cohesion as a panacea for child welfare, there is pretty compelling evidence that it’s the emotional content of a relationship that matters, not the label that can be applied to it.

A recent publication by Terra Schmooker and Krisanne Bursik in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships has highlighted the important role that a belief in the positive value of monogamy may have in predicting relationship success. Too bad no one sent a copy of this to French President Nicolas Sarkozy!

Scientists have long known what your grandchildren-wanting parents and in-laws don’t want to tell you: Having children is hard on your marriage. However, scientists may now have discovered a corollary to this rule that could either help you be the exception, or perhaps warn that you’re likely to suffer this fate so you can prepare accordingly.

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

Dr. Peter Todd has applied cognitive models to what is called the “37% rule” (otherwise known as the “secretary problem” in the world of analytic heuristics) to the task of human mate selection and found that your optimum solution is likely to be found within just 10 first dates.

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.

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!

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?

I’ve noticed something about my favorite blogs: Often the responses are more enlightening, and more entertaining, than the author’s initial comments. With this in mind, I’d like to pose a question in my blog today that I don’t think science can answer, but I’m sure our reader’s will: Is it truly better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?

By 2050, humans will be having sex with, and even marrying, robots. You don’t believe me? Well, just ask Dr. David Levy, chess master, entrepreneur, robot sex researcher and author of “Robots Unlimited: Life In A Virtual Age.”