Deal Makers and Deal Breakers in Partner Preferences
What do Indians want and not want in a romantic partner?
I worked with a start-up and studied the ideal partner preferences & deal breakers of people in India, including review of literature, data collection, data analysis, and report writing. This research was part of five research projects carried out to understand how the relationship formation experience in India can be enriched in order to inform product development in the form of a partner-matching platform.
Who did I cover and where?
303
participants we've sampled
6
research questions we investigated
5
months
A major area of research in romantic relationships centers around partner preferences. Specifically, on what people look for in potential partners before they choose to initiate a relationship with them. Two broad frameworks of preferences are ideal partner preferences and dealbreakers. However, this area of research lacks sufficient insight into the partner preferences of an Indian demographic and how these different frameworks of preferences are related to each other. Notably, there is a lack of evidence as to what predicts these preferences in the Indian context. Therefore, the present study aimed to explore the ideal partner preferences and dealbreakers in India (N = 303,115 males; 118 females). We disseminated relevant questionnaires to participants to understand their most important ideal partner preferences and dealbreakers and how these preferences are related.
We had several research questions that we addressed in the following manner:
1. We used descriptive statistics such as mean, SD, and graphs to explore the most important ideal partner preferences and dealbreakers in the Indian context. We then used T-tests and ANOVAs to understand any difference between groups for demographic variables of gender, employment status, and preference for type of relationship. Other demographic variables were excluded from subgroup analyses due a lack of sufficient data to create respective groups.
2. We used Pearson's bivariate correlation to explore the relationship between the domains of ideal partner preferences and dealbreakers.
3. We used a multivariate multiple regression to explore which demographic variables of gender, age, religiosity, political orientation, and employment status predicted which domains of ideal partner preferences and dealbreakers individually.
4. We used multivariate multiple regression to explore whether past relationship experience and preference for type of relationship predicted the domains of ideal partner preferences and dealbreakers individually.
5. We used multivariate multiple regression to explore whether psychosocial variables of personality, mate value, and authenticity predicted domains of ideal partner preferences and dealbreakers individually.
What did I do?
What did I find?
There were certain key findings.
1. “Caring” and “balanced” were the most important ideal partner preferences, and these preferences were more important for women.
2. “Impassivity-untrustworthiness” was the most important dealbreaker, and was also more important for women.
3. Ideal partner preferences and dealbreakers were related to a degree.
4. Gender and age were the most likely to predict ideal partner preferences and dealbreakers.
5. Negative past relationship experience predicted the preference for balanced partners, and the preference for long-term relationships predicted negligence-unavailability as a dealbreaker.
6. Finally, mate value was the most important psychosocial predictor of both the preferences.
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