Why Your Neighbor is Your Next True Love
Sunday, May 23, 2010 at 01:44PM Matchmakers know their best shot at success is to pair people up based on attitudes and preferences. Gathering data for matching purposes is the bread and butter of on-line dating sites, and they have good reason to be confident in their approach. Decades of attraction research prove that similarity across a range of interests—favorite authors, politicians, TV shows, restaurants, heavy metal bands, and mullet styles—strongly predicts a couple’s chance of pairing up and shacking up, whether for a few weeks or for a life-time: the greater the similarity, the greater the attraction. Still, there’s another factor you need you know about that can override even the power of similarity. If you don’t know about it, it can wreak havoc in your romantic life.
It’s not who you know, it’s who’s next to you.
Over seventy years of research attest to the power of proximity: we’re attracted to our neighbors. We’re more attracted to people who live within our city block, who sit next to us in class, who work in our office, who frequent our mailroom, our favorite park, coffee shop, or bar.
What’s more, proximity doesn’t just predict closer friendships. It predicts marriage. The shorter the geographical distance between people, the greater the chances they’ll get married. In fact, proximity is a stronger predictor than similarity in age, religion, marital status, ethnicity, and level of education.
This is good news and bad news. It’s good news because being conscious of where you spend your time—the places you frequent, the groups you’re in— greatly enhances your chances of meeting someone who makes you happy. It’s bad news because few if any us make our romantic decisions so intentionally. The research is also pretty clear that our explanations, particularly about why we’re attracted to a given partner, are generally post-hoc—meaning we don’t really know why we felt attracted, but we’re certainly willing to come up with a story if pressed for one. No doubt, this is one of the reasons proximity trumps similarity. Proximity might actually shape your interests. That is, you may convince yourself, after having felt attracted to a date, that his interests are your interests; in reality, your favorite rap-ska band might have become far more important— unbeknownst to you—after you met your partner, who lives and dies by their lyrics.
Likely as not, many of the reasons you fall for someone aren’t in your awareness at all, leaving your romantic fate in the hands of all kinds of unseen forces, including the thoroughly unromantic sounding “proximity.” Picture yourself offering the following explanation next time your friends ask you how you found your true love: “Oh, he happened to be nearby.”
If you don’t want to date the devil, don’t go bar hopping in hell.
Time to turn the bad news into good news. Where do you spend your time? What groups are you in? What special events, bars, and classes do you attend? Due to proximity effects, these choices all become what I call attraction neighborhoods.
You can think of any place you’re apt to run into the same types again and again as an attraction neighborhood. Think about the styles and personalities drawn to these places. If you keep repeating the same romantic mistakes—falling for tall, dark and arrogant; thin, loud and cranky; or frail, quiet, and scary—it might just be in part because of where you’re spending your time.
There are a myriad of other factors pushing you toward and away from certain types (which I’ll get to in other posts), but a good starting point for breaking out of troublesome romantic patterns is to change your scenery. If you really like intellectuals and keep falling for impulsive day traders, here’s a simple fix: set aside some time to explore a few galleries. You won’t find the abstract-expressionist man of your dreams in the financial district (not as often anyway). So why spend all your time there?
In the past you might have told yourself some partners are just your “type” and it’s been hard to break the habit. Bear in mind, though, that you may think you’re drawn to a certain type when it's really proximity shaping your attraction (and you coming up with an explanation later— “I just have a thing for entrepreneurial types”). The neighborhoods you choose help determine your romantic fate. Choose wisely. If you don’t want to date the devil, don’t go bar-hopping in hell.
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Reader Comments (5)
I have to laugh at the line about bar-hopping in hell. I spent years doing just that! And I continued to complain about the lack of good choices when it came to available men. Duh. I wasn't looking in the right place, nor was I thinking carefully about what I wanted. When I sat down and wrote out what I was looking for in a man, I realized it didn't sound at all like the men I had been dating. Thankfully, this little exercise helped me redirect my search, change where I was looking for men, and I eventually found exactly what I was looking for. Good advice, Dr. Malkin.
I once complained to someone that I never met single men, they asked where I spent my time and I felt so pleased with myself because I thought I was doing exactly the right thing -- I told them that I spent my time pursuing my interests and following my passions, because that's where I'll meet men with whom I share passions. The person asked, so what are those interests? I named French class (all women in class), wine tasting (women and couples), running (solitary) and dog rescue (dogs ... some people, but mostly dogs). They told me to try something where I might actually meet a man, like a sports bar. I stuck with French class and dog rescue. But I never did meet a single man in any of those activities. I met my boyfriend online.
I still think your advice is correct, though: spend your time in ways that are fulfilling, and the people you meet are apt to draw energy from those things too. It can be tough though, for women or men who want to meet other single people but have limited free time. For example, you might be the kind of person who would like someone who reads in a coffee shop or rollerblades through the park, but what if there's just hardly any time for such activities, let alone enough time to make them habits? For many of us most of our time is in the office or performing quotidienne tasks, leaving little time to cultivate habits where we might meet or match. When I was single, I actually felt internal pressure to go out somewhere, do something, when I really just wanted to watch a movie at home. That's why I started dating online, and did that for a pretty long time before meeting someone who clicked.
Dr. Malkin, I'd be interested to know what you think about the statistics produced by people like Richard Florida, showing the "best" cities for singles. "Best" means basically a lot of singles and an active communal life. The stats show generally more single men in cities along the West Coast, and generally more single women in cities along the East Coast (talking age range roughly 25-40). My thought was that stats like that are less important that the demographics around you; for example, what good does it do if there are a bunch of single guys on the West Coast if none are in my field or in areas where I'd cross their path? It might improve my odds in some macro hypothetical sense .... but I'd be interested to know if matching odds are simply a matter of numbers or have more to do with the interest and proximity trends within those numbers .... of course your post certainly would seem to suggest it's the latter! Thanks for the thought-provoking post.
@Harriet B.
Sounds like your figured out a lot. You named the main danger in what I call "mindless" (versus mindful) dating: you have a lot less control over who you end up with. Eventually, you'll find someone attractive (who's also attracted to you). That's how attraction neighborhoods work. But if, as you're describing, you're not paying attention to who's likely to be where, proximity effects can push you in the wrong direction. Way to go getting back your romantic bearings!
@Sarah G.
Hi Sarah,
There are a lot of great points in this post--so much so that they deserve to be addressed at greater length in separate post (which I might do next). For now, though, here are some thoughts.
First, the numbers: It's true that a larger pool of available partners improves the odds. Dating's always a numbers game to some extent. At the same time, despite statistics like Richard Florida's, a number of factors influence the quality of an attraction neighborhood--and you're definitely describing one of them: if the eligible singles proximate to you have very little overlap with your interests (say, you're a member of Susan Sontag International Fan Club and you live next door to 1000 frat boys), the men you run into (if you do) will hardly seem eligible to you. Bear in mind though, proximity effects might still cause you to warm up to a few of them (not all frat boys are alike, and over time, you'll spot the variation in a seemingly homogeneous crowd)
Second, dating is definitely an investment of time and energy. Sometimes you will want to sit at home and watch movies--and probably should. It's just that when you're doing that, you're not dating.
It can be hard work finding experiences and opportunities to meet someone, which is why I always recommend approaching dating as an aspect of building friendship and support networks. The more it feels like you're just dating to reach the goal of not being single, the less fun it becomes. Choosing activities (and therefore attraction neighborhoods) where you not only get to have fun but have a chance to meet people--some of whom you might find attractive--helps makes dating feel a lot less like work in an already work-laden life. If you enjoy running, for example, better to explore running clubs (where at least you're not alone). Internet dating is a great resource, but you still have to invest time and energy (as you not doubt discovered), and mixing it up with other opportunities can make it feel a lot less burdensome.
Thanks again!
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