Projection of attraction to alternative partners predicts anger and negative behavior in romantic relationships

The wandering eye perceives more threats: Projection of attraction to alternative partners predicts anger and negative behavior in romantic relationships. Angela Neal & Edward Lemay. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, https://doi.org/10.1177/0265407517734398

Abstract: The current study tested the predictions that (a) people project their own attraction to alternative romantic or sexual partners onto their romantic partners and (b) this projection shapes anger and negative behavior toward romantic partners. These predictions were supported in a dyadic daily experiences study of 96 heterosexual romantic couples. Participants’ self-reported attraction to alternative partners predicted perceptions of the partner’s interest independently of, and more strongly than, the partner’s own self-reported attraction, suggesting that participants projected their own extradyadic attraction onto their partners. Furthermore, this projection predicted perceivers’ own anger and negative behaviors directed at their partners more strongly than did the partner’s self-reported attraction. Results suggest that participants were angry and antagonistic when they thought their partners were interested in alternative partners, but that this suspicion was a projection of their own attraction to alternatives more than it was an accurate reflection of their partner’s attraction. Results suggest that projection of extradyadic attraction has an important influence on relationship quality and may exacerbate the negative relationship consequences of attraction to alternative partners.

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Why would people project their own extradyadic attraction? This projection may occur as a result of people’s own extradyadic attraction being readily able to come to mind when they are trying to discern partner’s attraction, which then may bias subsequent judgments (Tversky & Kahneman, 1973). Or, as research has also suggested (for discussion, see Lemay & Clark, 2015), this projection may be a result of motivated cognition, in that people particularly interested in alternatives may exaggerate their partner’s interests in order to alleviate their own guilt, justify their own extradyadic attraction, or, in the case of projecting lack of extradyadic attraction, create a desired sense of security in a mutually monogamous relationship. Future research should examine these possible motivations for projecting one’s level of extradyadic attraction.

The current research suggests that detecting infidelity may be more complex than previously thought. Prior research suggests that people tend to believe that certain cues are diagnostic of a partner’s interest in alternative partners or engagement in infidelity, such as the partner’s anger, critical or argumentative behavior, emotional disengagement, change in sexual behavior or appearance, sexual disinterest, reluctance to spend time with the partner, and increased time spent with another person (Shackelford & Buss, 1997). Perhaps the current participants relied on these sorts of cues to accurately detect fluctuations in their partner’s extradyadic attraction, a possibility that should be directly examined in future research. However, in the current research, perception of partners’ extradyadic attraction depended more on the perceiver’s own attraction, suggesting that projection typically overpowers the use of valid cues in discerning partners’ attraction.  This may be the case, because people generally believe their partners are similar to them (Kenny & Acitelli, 2001), the cues to infidelity may often be ambiguous, and because of the motivations to see partners as similarly described above. Future research should examine whether particular cues are so diagnostic of the partner’s level of attraction that they can override projection biases. Furthermore, the very interpretation of cues to infidelity may vary as a function of desires to see partners’ extradyadic attraction as similar to one’s own. For example, a person who is, himself, not attracted to extradyadic partners may be motivated to interpret his partner’s lack of sexual interest as a result of his partner’s stressful career. His partner, in contrast, may falsely perceive his anxiety as an indicator that his own extradyadic attraction is just as high as her own. Indeed, effects of gender, threat, and anxiety about relationships on interpretation of infidelity cues (Kruger, Fisher, Edelstein, Chopik, Fitzgerald, & Strout, 2013; Schutzwohl & Koch, 2004) suggest that use of these cues interacts with perceivers’ beliefs and motivations.  The current results suggest that projection is an additional important source of these interpretations. As suggested by interdependence theory (e.g., Agnew et al., 1998; Aron & Aron, 1997), as people become more and more dependent on their partners, they tend to view themselves and their partners as intertwined and the partner as part of oneself.  This growing sense of connection and similarity may increase people’s tendencies to rely on projection as heuristic in discerning their partner’s qualities, resulting in increasing tendencies to project extradyadic attraction. These considerations underscore that a complete understanding of perceptions of infidelity and related perceptions of extradyadic attraction must go beyond identifying cues to infidelity to also account for the forces that lead people to assume that their partner is just as (un)trustworthy as themselves.