If romantic comedies are anything to go by, then it seems relationships end in one of two extremes.
Either you block your former flame on all forms of social media, assassinate their character in your mutual friendship circles and move on to bigger and better things.
Alternatively (and preferably), you part ways amicably, making sure to thank them for the memories in a soppy Facebook status and maybe you even meet up for coffee every now and again.
While we’re well aware there are far more shades of grey when it comes to how ex-partners deal with a breakup, the reasons why one might choose to maintain contact with an ex lover can be narrowed down into six scientific reasons.
In a bid to find out just why the uncoupled might preserve a connection, researchers asked around 350 participants to list their potential reasons for doing so. Of the whopping 2302 given, just 153 were shortlisted before volunteers were then asked to rank them by importance.
The research, along with the seven key motivators were then published in the journal Personality and Individual Differences.
They are as followed:
1. Reliability/sentimentality:
“They were a great listener”
“They made me a better person”
“We shared a lot of good memories”
2. Pragmatism:
“They had a lot of money”
“They were a fallback plan”
“They would buy me nice gifts or food”
3. Continued romantic attraction:
“I still had feelings for them”
“I thought we might get back together later”
“I didn’t want them to forget me”
4. Children and shared resources:
“We had children together”
“We had shared property”
“We worked together professionally”
5. Diminished romantic attraction:
“I realised I was no longer in love with them”
“I lost sexual interest in them”
“We both cheated on each other”
6. Social relationship maintenance:
“To maintain good relations with their friends”
“To prevent awkwardness in our friend group”
“We saw each other frequently”
7. Sexual access:
“To keep having sex with them”
“The sex was good”
“We still had sex from time to time”
Of course, there were some gender discrepancies – men rated the practical and sexual reasons higher than women did – but when personality traits were taken into account, the differences were slight.
“Although a breakup nominally marks the end of a romantic relationship, the current research suggests that resource exchange [read: love, status, information, money or sex] between ex-partners can extend beyond relationship dissolution,” the paper concludes.
In layman’s terms: If an ex is willing to buy you food, listen to you whine about work and give you an orgasm from time to time, you’re more likely to want to keep them around.
