Ever found yourself attracted to someone who seems to be the complete opposite of you? Or just thought whether or not your relationship was going to work if your interest are completely opposite?
Time and time again you’ll hear the phrase ‘Opposites attract’. But is it actually true? If you search it up, you won’t find a direct answer to the question. You will find studies online that agree with the concept, and then you will find others that completely disagree with it.
Maybe it also has to do with the movies and books we watch that portray all of these relationships with opposing characters. The Notebook with Allie and Noah who are portrayed as star-crossed lovers who come from completely different worlds and fall in love; Tessa and Hardin in the movie series After; Or even childhood stories such as Beauty and the Beast are all relationships at the basis of the concept.
A survey was passed in the newsroom and 66% of people between the ages of 20 and 25 years old responded that they think that opposites do attract. Reasons for this varied.
“You need to have the same values and morals for it to work but different interests don’t change anything”
“Variety is nice but you need to make sure you share the same values”
Others, 34% of respondents disagreed with the idea that opposites attract.
“You can’t be too opposite, because then your vibes won’t match and it will feel off”
Psychology Today took on the role of trying to figure out whether this was true or not.
Well turns out, it may not be as true as people think it is! Stephen J. Betchen, author of Magnetic Partners created his own study to try to answer the question.
He states that opposites could be in many different ways: the main one that comes to mind is the physical attributes that make a couple opposing. But people forget, opposites attract can mean so many things. It includes personality, vibes, values and morals, and interests. Evidently, this makes responding to the question Do opposites attract?
He took two case studies, both painfully different. The first case study he took were different physically and mentally. Their life paths seemed so separate and dividing when in fact they had more in common than they thought. They both share their money issues and insecurities which Betchen says “what brought them together was tearing them apart”.
The second had a more transitional submissive and dominant relationship that changed through the years. Stephen J. Betchen describes both as appearing to be different and opposing but in fact, their power dynamic made them similar and attracted towards each other.
Between the survey conducted and the analysis made by therapist, Stephen J. BetchenOpposites, the overall consensus seems to be that people may attract but only if their personality is similar and interests are different. You probably shouldn’t push something that doesn’t work naturally.