E-Paper
Heartbreak cues: Is it time to read between the lines?
An analysis of 7,000 Reddit users’ posts has shown that the use of terms such as ‘I’ and ‘we’ shoots up just before, during and after a break-up.
Are you spelling relationship with too many “I”s? New research indicates that there could be hidden cues in a person’s verbal and written communication, signalling when a relationship is headed for trouble.
A team of researchers at the University of Texas, Austin (UTA), analysed over 1 million posts by about 7,000 users writing about their relationship on the social media platform Reddit, and found that the use of the pronoun “I” shot up just before a break-up.
“When people are in emotional distress such as before and during a break-up, they tend to use more self-referential language,” says Sarah Seraj, a doctoral student of social and personality psychology at UTA and lead author of the study. “The use of the term “we” also increases, because people are talking about their relationship more, and thinking and talking about their shared identity as a couple.”
The UTA study was published in the American journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, in February. It found that the change in linguistic cues typically occurred three months before the split, and did not ease back to the person’s norm until about six months after.
Does that mean you can tell when your significant other has just had it? Unlikely, says Seraj.
Use of language can say a lot about an individual’s emotional and psychological state and the cognitive load that they are carrying, but the changes are so subtle, Seraj adds, that it would typically take a computer program to detect them.
If you’re looking for signs, perhaps consider that a sign. If you need more, look for disengagement from your partner, and a general difficulty in communication. These could be signs that you need to make more quality time for yourselves and return to the core tenets of affection and empathy. Relationships have suffered on all three fronts — more than usual — in a pandemic year of longer work hours, working from home, schooling from home, little recreation and almost no time away from it all. But these are all factors that can be alleviated by a conscious return to kindness and consideration.
The worst sign easily detectable by humans is if you feel alone when you’re together. If that sounds like you and the person you love, get started on damage repair. But prepare yourself for the possibility, Seraj says in a rather dire note, that it may already be too late.
