A really good match

What is an intelligent choice, a really "good match"?

In a study several hundred couples were rated as to their present degree of happiness in marriage, and many facts about the life of each individual before marriage were ascertained. It was found that certain of these characteristics were associated with marital happiness; such, for example, was high education. By combining all the variables which did actually correlate with happiness, a "prediction score" was developed by which one could estimate, from known pre-marital facts, the probable future happiness. However, such social prediction scores seldom give more than a certain degree of probability; they never give any certainty as regards any individual case. They are worth having and the intelligent young person will give them some attention, without drawing from them any fatalistic or inevitable conclusions about any single case. Predictions for the mass are more accurate than for the individual. We can predict with some reliability how many divorces will take place in a given city, or in a given large group of people with known characteristics. But we cannot predict reliably which particular persons will be divorced.

Scientific observation dispels at least one popular fallacy. Namely, it is widely believed that opposite types attract each other like the poles of a magnet, and ought normally to marry. Science finds no evidence for this belief. In some respects like tends to mate with like; in other respects people tend to choose at random without regard to likeness or unlikeness.2 Frequently one is attracted by some trait in the partner which fascinates him because of its novelty, or its apparent differences from his own traits or those of other familiar persons. This unlikeness-to-himself, however, is more probably incidental rather than the real reason for the attractiveness. Commonly the trait is one which he himself wants to acquire, and may possibly acquire later. When all traits are considered, the partner is probably more similar to him than she would be to a man chosen purely at random. On the whole one is safer to marry a person near his own age, of his own race, religion, culture, and social background; a person of interests, ideals, and beliefs compatible with his own; such matings in fact are more common than those of opposite or radically unlike backgrounds. It is better for mates to be reasonably similar in physical energy and mental ability, otherwise one may become a drag on the other. It is dangerous to marry in order to uplift somebody, or to be uplifted. In some minor characteristics of temperament, taste and style, it may be safe to choose a so-called opposite. But the only absolute rule of opposites is that one should choose the opposite sex.

Under our American romanticism, cultural differences between mates are not so serious a difficulty as they are in caste societies, where marrying outside the pale is a family disgrace. The romantic ideology lends a special atmosphere of adventure and drama to the intercultural marriage. "True love" supposedly proves its strength by its ability to overcome such handicaps. While this romanticism misleads many into unwise marriages, it also shifts the emphasis away from cultural differences and furthers the assimilation of unlike social elements. When trouble comes to an intercultural marriage, as Mrs. Mowrer points out, the cultural differences are often used as a rationalization, or outward explanation, of the conflict, whereas the real cause may lie in personality incompatibilities. 42 Thus the woman who is dissatisfied with her husband as a love-maker may attribute her annoyance to his plebeian habit of going about in his shirt sleeves whereas her family used to dress for dinner.

Many kinds of differences, including those of cultural background, may be used to enrich and educate the couple who face these differences intelligently. Thus one man values especially in his wife the culturally higher level to which she, through her family, was able to introduce him. One woman, reared in a western, farm, Protestant environment, finds her life enriched by marriage to a New York Jew reared in the midst of sharp business practice and machine politics. In many such cases marital happiness is genuine beyond doubt. "It can be done."

About age differences much the same thing can be said as about cultural differences. What evidence we have indicates that it is somewhat safer if the man is two or three years older than the girl and she is at least twenty-one. But certainly the risks do not differ greatly enough to permit us to say that any given couple, well suited on other grounds, should abstain from marriage merely because of an abnormal age situation. We do find, however, one combination which should be inspected carefully because it appears in divorce or domesticrelations courts much oftener than it would by pure chance. This is the marriage of a girl of nineteen or less to a man five or more years her senior.

The more serious danger to happiness exists where the major life-drives, goals, purposes, values, expectations, of the two partners, are incompatible. In the past, indeed, these major differences of values which distinguished one person from another were to a large extent cultural, that is, they were the product mainly of different religions, national, social backgrounds of the two. Today cultural values are losing their authority and rigidity; persons are becoming mutually tolerant or even similar about many cultural tastes and ideals which once set them apart. At the same time new differences are arising; differences having to do with the chosen pattern and style of the individual life, especially with the ways in which leisure time and money are spent.

A student, writing anonymously her conception of "my ideal man," says: "He should enjoy, mildly at least, nature, sports, books, music, and the theater, and not have any highly absorbing interest to which I was wholly indifferent after making an effort to cultivate such an interest." This girl, instead of being scolded for selfishness or egotism, should be commended for her realistic facing of her own personality. Only by first recognizing this highly exacting desire of hers, can she modify it and adjust herself to realities.

The values upon which it is dangerous to differ are those whose pursuit requires much time, money, mental concentration, physical transportation, or absorbing effort. In general they are values to which one devotes leisure time. Men and women normally expect to spend their working hours apart. Working in the same occupation, or together on the same

specific project, may bring them into closer harmony; in other cases it may cause mutual irritation and perhaps jealous rivalry. Important for harmony is the integration or compatibility of their purposes rather than whether they spend an average or a much greater number of hours together. It is also important, however, that they spend a certain minimum of leisure time together and that this be free from tension. It is during these relaxed hours that love may perpetually renew itself.

It is silly, however, to become alarmed merely because one's partner likes golf while one's self dislikes it, and instead, plays an excellent game of tennis. It is the deeper patterns of enjoyment rather than specific activities which are significant. Suppose, for example, we have a person who fundamentally likes to do a few things and to do them exceedingly well. He sees himself as a specialist in leisure, as well as in work, where everyone must be a specialist. He has already set for himself certain long-run goals in his sphere of interest. He may aspire to a trip around the world, or acquiring a summer home in the country, or becoming the best tennis player in six states. Suppose he (or she) marries a partner who may be equally intelligent, but whose essential satisfaction is to drift with the tide of circumstance, to sample many of life's pleasures, to "putter" now with this hobby and now with that, collecting now some antique furniture, then selling it at a loss and taking up the breeding of dogs, under the shifting influences of fashion and friends. Both patterns of life may be equally worthy. It may be the Puritan component in our culture which causes us to give a certain admiration to the former. The serious problem is the difference in this respect between two persons who must live together, share a limited space for household storage, share the same purse without any authoritative formula for its apportionment between them, and who, to keep their love, need to spend a certain number of pleasurable hours in each other's physical presence.