This is how the most intelligent manage love relationships

Intelligence is one of the most important psychological characteristics, since it has a great impact on our lives. And this, naturally, also includes the affective and loving facet of each one. Now, curiously, and despite the fact that statistically the most intelligent people tend to be physically more attractive and in better shape than the rest of the population, that does not mean that they are always more likely to find a partner.

For example, evidence has been found that women with more and better training and possibilities of opting for more qualified jobs, a population group with many more people with high IQs, show a tendency to stay single. On the other hand, regardless of their gender, gifted or close to intellectually gifted people are more sensitive to criticism and have greater difficulty finding someone to fit in with, as they prefer to be with people who can be learned from and whose company is stimulating intellectually.

However... once a mate has been found, What is the degree of health of these love relationships?

Are they of the same quality as those of the rest of the population? From what has been verified, in courtships and marriages formed by highly intelligent people there are interesting singularities.

• Related article: "Types of intelligence tests"

Conflict management styles in love

A recent investigation led by the Dutch psychologist Pieternel Dijkstra has proposed study the way in which high intelligence and love are related.

To do this, they started from the referential framework of the attachment theory, according to which the attachment bonds formed during childhood (usually with fathers and mothers) define the way in which in adult life we ​​manage our relationships with others. For example, in cases where parents mistreat their children, they tend to adopt a relational style based on avoidance, fear, and mistrust, while those who have had plenty of space to express your emotions and preferences They have a much more open attitude.

These relational styles are also expressed in the way we manage conflicts. Thus, 5 ways of dealing with problems with others have been defined, taking into account the degree of the one in which one's own preferences and conflicts are valued and the way in which those of others are valued the rest:

• integrative styleHigh dedication to one's own needs and those of others.
• Domineering style: high dedication to one's own needs and low to those of others.
• helpful style: low dedication to one's own needs and high dedication to those of others.
• avoidance style: low dedication to their own needs and those of others.
• compromise styleModerate dedication to one's own needs and those of others.

It is clear that in principle the best styles of managing clashes of interest They are the integrative and the compromise. The rest of them can cause problems to fester and generate even more negative consequences. What relationship modes do the smartest people use in their love lives, and why?

Intelligence: the ingredient of mature relationships?

To carry out the research, Dijkstra and his team had the collaboration of 196 heterosexual people from the Mensa organization in the Netherlands. Mensa is an entity that brings together gifted people from around the world, people who have obtained a score of at least 140 points on intelligence tests and that they represent less than 3% of the population.

To detect the peculiarities of these volunteers, the scientists collected data from these gifted individuals, and also from another group made up of 146 non-Mensa adults.

The results show something curious: although the most intelligent individuals did not manifest being especially dissatisfied with their affective relationships as if they were characterized by being of poor quality, they showed a greater tendency to adopt the avoidant style when managing conflicts with the other person.

• You may be interested in: "Mature love: why is the second love better than the first?"

A possible explanation

Pieternel Dijkstra and his team hypothesize that the reason why more intelligent people tend to use conflict avoidance in their love lives without suffering the negative consequences that this has is that, on the one hand, they maintain love relationships with people with a similar level of intelligence and personality type, and on the other other experience life from a more rational perspective.

This is something that corresponds with many things we know, such as that the idea that opposites bring each other is just a myth and what really happens On the contrary, and that less intelligent people are more impulsive and their disorganization and problems to control themselves make conflicts more frequent.

This can contribute to the fact that their conflicts occur rarely and that they can be resolved by distancing themselves from the situation; since intelligence makes you learn quickly and better, these people would be able to do this without dwelling on the fear of abandonment by your partner sentimental.

Bibliographic references:

• Dijkstra, P., Barelds, D. H., Ronner, S., & Nauta, A. Q. (2017). Intimate relationships of the intellectually gifted: Attachment style, conflict style, and relationship satisfaction among members of the Mensa society. Marriage & Family Review, 53(3), 262-280.