Lifelong singles face greater life satisfaction challenges

Although being married or in a long-term relationship is often seen as the norm, more people are staying single for life. But singlehood can bring economic and medical disadvantages, especially as people get older and may become more reliant on others. 

New research in Psychological Science reveals that lifelong singles have lower scores on life satisfaction measures and different personality traits compared to partnered people, findings that point to the need for both helpful networks and ways to create such networks that are better catered to single people. 

“When there are differences, they might be especially important in elderly people who face more health issues and financial issues,” said Julia Stern, one of the lead authors and a senior researcher at the University of Bremen in Germany, in an interview with APS. “They need more help, and the help is usually the partner.” 

Stern and colleagues compared single people and partnered individuals on life satisfaction ratings and the Big Five personality traits (openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism). The study used a survey of more than 77,000 Europeans over the age of 50 and was the first of its kind to look across cultures and at people who had been single their entire lives. The findings revealed that, in addition to lower life satisfaction scores, lifelong singles are less extraverted, less conscientious, and less open to experience, compared to partnered people. 

Previous studies used different definitions of being single, sometimes considering only current status and other times drawing the line at having never married or, alternatively, at never living with a partner. But people who have been in a serious relationship in the past-;even if it has ended-;might have different personality traits than those who have never been that committed. To investigate this, Stern and colleagues grouped respondents by the different definitions: currently partnered, never living with a partner, never married, or never being in any long-term relationship. People who had never been in a serious long-term relationship scored lower on extraversion, openness, and life satisfaction than those who were currently single but had lived with a partner or been married in the past. All singles scored lower on these measures than people in current relationships. 

Although this study cannot definitively decipher if personality differences are due to selection-;people with certain personality types may be more likely to start relationships-;or socialization-;long-term relationships could change personalities-;the evidence points to the former. Stern said that changes to personality from being in a relationship are small and temporary. For instance, although an extraverted person beginning a new relationship may be keen to stay in with their partner, eventually their extraversion comes back. 

It’s more likely you have these selection effects: For example, people who are more extraverted are more likely to enter a relationship.”

Julia Stern, senior researcher at the University of Bremen

But she warned that the results are average effects and not necessarily descriptive of everyone; of course, there are single extraverts and introverts in committed relationships. 

For singles, living in a society where marriage is the expectation may affect their life satisfaction. Because the large sample included people from 27 European countries, the researchers were able to ask whether there were any cultural differences. In countries with higher marriage rates (such as southern European countries), singlehood resulted in even lower life satisfaction scores, but the effects were small. The religiosity of the country did not seem to matter, however. 

When comparing across gender and age, single women scored higher on life satisfaction than single men, and older people tended to be happier with their singlehood status than middle-aged singles. Stern speculated that, with the era of their peers getting married and starting families behind them, older singles may accept their circumstances and be happier. 

Singles may grow happier with age, but their lower scores compared to partnered people are still worrying. Previous research has shown life satisfaction and particular personality traits (including extraversion and conscientiousness) can predict health and mortality, emphasizing the need to find ways to promote the well-being of older singles. 

“There are differences between people who stay single their entire lives and people who get partnered, and for me this means that we have to take extra care of these people,” Stern said. She suggested developing new kinds of programs to prevent loneliness that take these personality traits into consideration and help older singles meet like-minded people. “If they have people who care for them or look out for them regularly, this might help.”