Are Romantic Couples Really the Winners?
What studies of the purported deficiencies of single people aren’t telling you.
Updated February 27, 2026 | Reviewed by Lybi Ma
Suppose you read about a study comparing single people to coupled people and supposedly showing that single people are deficient and romantically coupled people are the winners? I’ll start with a hypothetical and then show how it applies to the kinds of studies you really do read about.
In the hypothetical study, the researchers want to know who is better at getting out of boxes, single people or coupled people. A single person starts in one box, and the couple starts in a box right beside the single person. The whistle is blown, and the participants try to get out of their boxes. The researchers are timing them.
They find that the coupled people get out of their boxes more quickly, maybe much more quickly. They publish their study and say that it shows that single people are deficient at getting out of boxes. Maybe it’s a psychological thing, and they should get counseling or therapy . The coupled people, in contrast, have great box-escaping skills. They have no deficiencies that the researchers mention and nothing to work on.
The study gets a lot of attention in the media. Coupled people feel proud of themselves. Single people feel bad because social scientists have shown that they have a box-escaping deficiency, and maybe they should go into therapy to work on whatever is at the root of their problem. What’s more, because of all the media coverage, people everywhere are learning about their deficiency and couples’ superiority.
The researchers think it is fine to tell you only about the time it took each participant to get out of the box. After all, it is a study of box-escaping skill.
Often, there is a highly relevant context to the story that is not mentioned. In my hypothetical example, it looks like this:
The single person is in the box on the left. The door is shut, and there are boulders in front of it. The top of the box is taped shut.
The coupled people are in a box that has no door, just a giant opening that they can walk right through onto a beautiful path strewn with roses on both sides.
That’s the context of the comparison, showing that single people are deficient at getting out of boxes. Do you think single people are “deficient” because there’s something wrong with them that makes them bad at getting out of boxes? Or do you think that it was never an even playing field from the outset?
A More Realistic Example
Singlehood researchers often look at things like how lonely single people are or how satisfied they are with their lives. They might compare single people with romantically coupled people at one point in time (a comparison rife with problems), or, in a better design, they might look at how single people’s experiences of life satisfaction and loneliness change when they become romantically coupled.
Many studies show that when single people marry, they sometimes become a bit happier at first, but eventually go back to being about as happy or as unhappy as they were when they were single.
Suppose, though, that other researchers publish studies suggesting something different—for example, that adolescents or young adults entering their first romantic relationship are more satisfied with their lives and less lonely than those who stay single (no romantic relationship) while they are young. Those researchers claim that they have documented singlehood deficits. The single people in their studies are deficient in satisfaction with their lives, and they are also lonelier, another deficiency. Maybe they suggest that single people get psychological help for their deficiencies.
But the single and coupled people in real published studies are playing on unequal fields, a fact that sometimes goes completely unacknowledged. Here are just a few of the ways that young single people are boxed in, while those who become romantically coupled are given the equivalent of a clear and open path strewn with roses. As you read them, consider how they may contribute to single people feeling lonelier and less satisfied, not because they don’t have a romantic partner but because of how people are treated differently if they do or do not have a romantic partner.
There is no end to this list. As you are reading it, you are probably thinking of other examples. Keep that in mind whenever you read about studies supposedly showing that single people are deficient and deprived.
Then ask yourself: Are single people lonelier and less satisfied with their lives (if they really are) because they are personally deficient and need psychological help? Or are they stereotyped, stigmatized, marginalized, and left out of social events (even by the people who once included them), while their coupled peers are admired, celebrated, routinely included, offered discounts (subsidized by their single peers), and benefited and protected by laws and practices?
Perhaps it is the coupled people who could benefit from some help. Maybe they could be gently encouraged to consider whether becoming romantically coupled really has elevated them into an elite club, The Couples Club, that makes them superior to their single friends. And whether it is appropriate or dignified to treat their single friends as less valuable than their coupled friends.
Maybe a way forward is not to pathologize being single, but to work toward greater fairness for single people. The Singles Bill of Rights , for example, offers a path toward equality for single people.
Every time you read about a study purporting to claim that single people are deficient and romantically coupled people are superior, remember the boxes.
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Bella DePaulo, Ph.D. , an expert on single people, is the author of Single at Heart and other books. She is an Academic Affiliate in Psychological & Brain Sciences, UCSB.
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This article is part of the Bringwise Psychology Journal — daily insights on human behavior, mental health, and personal growth.