Tue Feb 1, 2:56 pm ET
NEW YORK (Reuters) American researchers have found a new way to predict the
success of a relationship -- compare the speaking style of a couple.
In a study of college students they found that couples whose language was in
sync were almost four times more likely to want to see each other again than
those who did not use similar language.
"We are able to predict this at higher rates than the people themselves," said
Professor James Pennebaker, of the University of Texas, who headed the research
team.
The researchers, who reported their findings in the journal Psychological
Science, focused on function words -- which are not nouns or verbs but the
words that show how those words relate. For example: a, be, anything, that,
will, him.
"Function words are highly social and they require social skills to use,"
Pennebaker explained. "For example, if I'm talking about the article that's
coming out, and in a few minutes I make some reference to 'the article', you
and I both know what that article means."
As part of the experiment, about 40 pairs of college students participated in
four-minute speed dates and had their conversations recorded.
"We found that function words are a powerful reflection of somebody's
psychological state," Pennebaker said. "You can tell when people are in the
same state or are on the same page."
A second part of the study examined the everyday instant message conversations
between already dating couples over a 10-day period. The conversations were
analyzed by a computer for words and conversational patterns.
Pennebaker said that researchers were once again able to fairly accurately
predict which couples would continue dating.
They found that the speaking and writing styles couples use during interactions
are a good indicator of whether or not a relationship will be successful.
"The higher their style matching scores, the more likely they were to still be
dating later on," Pennebaker said.
About 80 percent of the couples whose conversational styles were similar were
still dating three months after the experiment, compared with just 54 percent
of couples whose styles were markedly different.
Pennebaker said that the results were notable because they occur during
everyday conversations, even though most people don't notice.
"None of us pay attention to these words," Pennebaker said. "What's wonderful
about this is we don't really make that decision; it just comes out of our
mouths."
(Reporting by Bernd Debusmann Jr., editing by Patricia Reaney)