“It allows them to be more forgiving of their partners and close friends, and in the end, that changes how they think about their relationship and their relationship well-being,” he says. “They think the relationship will get better, and (think) of the conflict as a learning experience.”The researchers conducted two studies — one on undergraduate students in Chicago, and another on a broader age range of Americans found through a crowdsourcing website. A new Canadian study, published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science, suggests the ticket to overcoming relationship conflicts is adopting a future-oriented perspective, instead of focusing on the present. If you’re at odds with your wife about family chores, or are having a spat with your boyfriend over who feeds the cat, stop and ask yourself, “Will this fight matter a year from now?” — and you might still be together then. All participants were asked to reflect on a recent conflict with a romantic partner or a close friend, with one group tasked with describing how they felt about it in the moment, and a second group describing how they’d feel about the conflict in a year.

Source: thestar August 09, 2016 10:52 UTC