There may be yet another reason to tie the knot.
A new study suggests that marriage changes you forever, by helping to hone your levels of forgiveness and self-control.
The researchers suggest that these traits improve over the first four years of marriage to not only help the relationship to flourish, but also to increase individual health and well-being.
After the excitement of the wedding, married life can take some adjusting to. And a new study suggests that marriage changes you forever, by helping to hone your levels of forgiveness and self-control (stock image)
The study was highlighted in a new feature by the BBC.
Researchers from Tilburg University in the Netherlands suggest that two of the most important skills in a marriage are self-control and forgiveness.
In their study, the team recruited 199 newlywed couples, and measured how forgiving each partner was, by asking participants to rate their agreement with phrases like ‘When my partner wrongs me, my approach is just to forgive and forget.’
The researchers also measured each partner’s self-control, by asking them to rate their agreement with phrases like ‘I am good at resisting temptation.’
The study was then repeated each year for four years.
The results showed that over the course of the study, the participants’ forgiveness and self-control levels increased.
Interestingly, the developments of self-control and forgiveness were unrelated, so while people become more self-controlled and forgiving over the course of a marriage, these developments do not coincide.
In their study, published in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, the researchers, led by Dr Tila Pronk, wrote: ‘Having a high level of self-control is a desirable attribute: It helps one to prosper in almost all domains in life, including close relationships.
‘Similarly, being forgiving toward one’s spouse not only benefits the relationship but also contributes to individual health and well-being.
‘It would thus make sense for people to strive to improve their levels of self-control and forgiveness, especially when they recently committed to their relationship.’
Researchers from Tilburg University in the Netherlands suggest that two of the most important skills in a marriage are self-control and forgiveness (stock image)
This isn’t the first study to suggest that marriage changes you forever.
In 2012, researchers from the University of Münster looked at personality changes in nearly 15,000 people over a four year period – 664 of which had recently married.
Their analysis showed that married people showed decreases in both extroversion and openness to experience compared to the single participants.
And a study in 2000 by researchers from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health backed up this pattern, at least among women.
Researchers looked at the personalities of 2,274 middle-aged participants twice over a period of six to nine years.
During that time, 20 of the women got married and 29 got divorced.
An analysis of the results showed that the divorced women showed increased extroversion and openness, compared to the married women.
In contrast, married men were found to improve in conscientiousness and decrease their level of neuroticism, compared to divorced men.