Science shows there are six key behaviors that kill relationships

Have you ever wondered what leads to the end of a relationship? Well, science might be able to give you an answer after an October 2022 study revealed there are six key behaviors that can ruin your relationships.

Published in the peer-reviewed journal Evolutionary Psychology, the research was gathered by University of Nicosia Professor and Psychologist Menelaos Apostolou in an attempt to answer why some people stayed in their relationships and why others didn’t.

In order to answer his question, Apostolou first asked a group of 233 Greek-speaking students from Cyprus to identify some of the things their partners could do that would negatively impact their willingness to stay in a relationship with that partner for the long term.

According to Apostolou, the first group of students was split almost equally between male and female respondents and had an average age of 30 to 31 years old. Roughly 39.1% were in relationships, 26.4% were married, and 27.2% were single. 

Once the necessary information was gathered, Apostolou synthesized the results into data points and then presented them to a second group of 536 adult students, asking them to identify the ones that were most likely to end their willingness to continue a relationship.

The makeup of the second group of students was similar to the first, though women did make up a larger percentage of the 321 participants. 

The average age of the participants was again somewhere around 31 years old with 40.3% in relationships, 36.6% single, and 17% married.

More importantly, 28% of people in the second group of respondents were identified as having children, something that would be very important once all the results were in. 

After completing the second study, Apostolou was able to identify 88 acts that could harm a relationship and further divided them into six easily discernible categories to better understand the major factors that can lead others to end a relationship. 

The six factors most likely to end a relationship were as follows: Does not care about me; Does not treat our children well; Tries to control me; Shows interest in other men/ women; Exhibits abusive behavior; Has undesirable traits.

The most important factor to the overwhelming majority of respondents was the “Does not care about me” category, which was marked by acts of indifference “including neglecting, not showing interest, not having time, ignoring, and being distant from a partner.”

Not showing care for your partner and not treating their children well were the next two most important factors that could lead to the end of a relationship, though the study noted that all factors were rather close in their overall final scores.

Interestingly, age played an important role in factors like “Tries to control me” while gender played an important role in factors like “Does not care about me” or “Has undesirable traits.”

Psychology Today’s Arash Emamzadeh reported on Apostolou’s findings and wrote the importance of the “Does not care about me” factor to young adults could be the result of a perceived lack of long-term commitment, something that would be important for their age cohort. 

Emamzadeh also noted that among the top three most important factors, women were found to score them the most negatively, something that could be a result of women being “more selective in choosing partners, especially long-term mates.” 

“Singles, compared to individuals in a relationship, also rated these factors more negatively. Why? Possibly because people who are seriously dating or married have… a greater tendency to overlook unpleasant behaviors,” Emamzadeh wrote.

According to Emamzadeh, singles tend to have zero investment so they could afford to be pickier when determining their mates since they have more options available to them.