Why do people pair up?

Reproduction

Ir’s hardwired, as in making sure one’s genes survive.

Alimony

A guaranteed date for New Year’s Eve.

Social pressure. If it weren’t for that, everyone would be fucking anyone they wanted whenever and wherever they wanted. Society would get rid of all anxiety and mental illnesses in one swell foop. People would be happy. There would be no more need for competition to find a mate.

Essentially we’re a pack animal & so…

Companionship and familiarity.

The basic drive to procreate.

You meet someone you want to spend your life with. You find a person for whom you will release other things, just to be with. You find a person you wish to spend the most time with, and that person is special to you. You gift them promises. Of love and commitment. I think it is more about that.

@wundayatta All anxiety and mental illness is rooted in the pressure to find a mate?

If it’s social pressure, why do many animals “pair up” as well?

Existence trives on the principle called Life,
One becoming many and many becoming one

There is the Stage of division, Where one becomes as two .Female, female combination.
(In the natural world it is seen as death and as a female, male combination).

Then two becoming One which is inclusive of offsprings , many becoming one
( In the natural world it is seen as the Concept marriage and family)

So men will follow the dictates of Life whether they understand it or not.
It is better for you follow willingly rather than unwillingly.
To those who follow willingly, the understanding will come, and these are Life in all the fullness of it
To those who follow unwillingly, no understanding comes and they remain as they are….

Because it is hard wired, I believe.

Men want to make sure that they don’t put effort into raising other men’s offspring. That fight over controlling the female reproductive function is in my opinion at the base of very much misery thrown upon women.

And I understand where @wundayatta is coming from even though I disagree. (We tried that in the seventies.)

Hardwired. But most of all I think its the need to share your happiness or sadness with someone else. Not everyone seems to have the need to reproduce so I would have to guess we simply don’t feel really happy unless we have someone to share it with. Especially if you are a bit of a loner and don’t have any really close friends. Then most people feel compelled to have at least one person in their life.

Happiness is multiplied when you have someone special to share your joys and misery is lessened when you have someone special to share that with too.
So overall I think we are hardwired to survive and this is the backup plan to keep our mental state balanced. Also we have someone to care for us when we are ill. At least the plan is to have someone in your life who cares.

Its not enough you have someone to just physically care. We need someone who cares for us all the way. That is why many people die shortly after going to a retirement home. They can only care for the flesh but depression kills. Take the same old person and put them with a spouse that loves them and can still care for them and they are healthier and live longer.

@livelaughlove21 it’s not the issue to find a mate. It’s the need to be connected.

Animals are all different and have different survival strategies. Some are more similar to us, and some are more different.

Anxiety comes from not being able to do what we are programmed to do.

@wundayatta I’m fairly certain there’s more to mental illness than the need to be connected. That’s all I’m trying to say here.

A hardwired desire to procreate ones own bloodline. Monogamy is the only way for the male of the species to ensure that the offspring he’s raising are his own.

Companionship, social pressure, reproduction, I’d say all those answers are a little bit correct. But it’s worth remembering not everybody pairs up, and variations on the traditional two-person monogamous relationship are becoming more common. You also don’t need to be in a couple to have children anymore.

@livelaughlove21 Well, it’s not scientific, but it is based on what I want and what everyone I’ve talked to about it wants.

Do you have some other idea about what mentally ill people feel like they want that would keep them from killing themselves?

Few people survive well alone. With two people who have different talents and knowledge, you’re twice as likely to get through whatever you have to face. After pairing up, the next step is for pairs to cooperate with one another. In tribes, different tasks are assigned the members according to gender and place in the tribe. It’s all for survival.

Just a note: not everyone pairs up. Partnering comes in numbers other than two.

@wundayatta I think you’re under the impression that mental illness is caused primarily by external forces. I don’t think this is always (or even often) the case.

Pair bonds are motivated by a need for security and for companionship.

But why pair bond? Although it solves the problems of procreation, companionship and security, there are other possible solutions to these problems.

For example just today I learned of one practiced by the Mosuo culture (China).

* This society doesn’t practice marriage.

* Men and women can change partners as they please throughout their lives. Couples that form never live together. The man will visit woman at night, but the rest of the time they generally live separate lives.

* Both men and women continue to live with his or hers extended family’s (including grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews) and be responsible for that family.

* Children are raised by their mothers and the mothers’ families. Everyone in the family, including men, shares in parental duties, so the child ends up having multiple father and mother figures.

Now doesn’t that sound like a more sophisticated solution then depending on just one other person for companionship and security?

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@livelaughlove21 Well, external forces do contribute to mental illness. There is a genetic and an environmental component. And yes, feeling disconnected and alone can create the stress necessary to trigger mental illness.

But I’m not talking about what causes it. I’m talking about what can fix it. Do you see the difference?

I believe that what some people—maybe even most people—who are mentally ill believe will cure them is love—the kind of truly accepting, magical love that makes everything right with the world. The kind that makes you feel truly understood and connected and accepted and loved in a way that brooks no opposition. It’s just there and it’s right and it’s intense and tight.

Just about everyone I know who is mentally ill feels incredibly alone. Even those in relationships. Something is not getting through. So a pair bond could help alleviate that problem. The right pair bond. Or perhaps multiple pair bonds might be necessary.

@wundayatta I’m sure many mentally ill people do feel lonely, and I’m sure many of them think a relationship may help. However, love does not “cure” mental illness. Simple as that. If it did, no happily married person would be mentally ill. Also, no child would be mentally ill. We all know this is not the case. The definition of clinical depression is not “being sad and lonely because you don’t feel loved” – it’s way more complicated than that.

@livelaughlove21 I think this discussion is off topic for the question, so I don’t want to continue it here. But I hope you will allow for the possibility that there is a lot you don’t know. You are making a lot of assertions, and I don’t know why, but they are completely opposite my experience and that of most mentally ill people I know.

@wundayatta You’ve made a whole lot of assertions as well, and ones that are simply not supported by research or even general knowledge regarding mental health. Perhaps you don’t know it all either. Experience with a few people that are diagnosed with a mental illness does not make you an expert. I’m not claiming to be an expert either, but the assertion that getting rid of the social pressure for pairing up would cure “all anxiety and mental illnesses” is wildly inaccurate.

You are right about one thing – this is getting off topic. I think I’m done here.

I think this is a great question actually. Obviously most us (including myself) have sex drives that motivate us. Most people don’t want to be alone either, but I think that @wundayatta touches on an interesting point here based upon not only my own experiences, but what I’ve seen happen to many others as well. Whether people want to hear this or not, there is immense social pressure put upon us as individuals to be with somebody.

People are looked down upon for remaining single for a great deal of time, and finding and winning over a mate is very comparable to a form of competition. I can’t even begin to describe how many times I’ve dealt with criticisms (many of which I’ve found out about behind my back) for remaining unattached, and immense pressure even from my friends, peers, family to go out to seek and find someone. Of course any person will feel bad about themselves having this pressure rubbed into them, and this feeling becomes even more intensified when that person simply can’t find someone.

This situation becomes a double edged sword for such a person in that not only do they have to deal with their lonliness, but also the ridicule they experience because they simply just suck at the game. I definitely think that social pressures are a major factor here, though not the only one as I’d described above.

It’s not reproduction.

It’s long expensive child care. Small birth canal means small baby head. Unlike many other mammals, a human baby is helpless for many years. Joint care was an evolutionary advantage.

@mattbrowne I think it is more than joint care of babies. The “household” benefits from specialization. There is also some knowledge sharing which would not otherwise occur which allows wisdom from households to merge. They also benefit from incremental costs being lower than initial costs. If one person cooks for for one person the time to cook for 12 people is perhaps only three times as long (making up numbers from personal experience but you get the point). Not as much now as in the past there might also be an aspect of bartering which takes place especially where the union is arranged. Both sides (and the couple) may benefit.

@muhammajelly That doesn’t answer why we pair up. It makes clear that there are advantages from grouping up.

I tend to think that @mattbrowne is right, combined with the notion that men don’t want to put all this effort into raising someone else’s babies.

@whitenoise “pair up” is a subset of “grouping up”. If you understand “grouping up” I think it provides insight into “pair up” which might not be as obvious otherwise. I stand by my answer that “pair up” is a subset of “grouping up” and therefore most “grouping up” explanations also hold for “pairing up”. I am sorry you don’t see it.

@muhammajelly
That’s fine. It was indeed a very nice answer, just one that didn’t answer this question.

It could actually be that pairing up (instead of grouping up on a greater scale) hinders full exploitation of some of the advantages that you describe.

I agree with both of your @muhammajelly and @whitenoise. Kind of ;-)

Pairing up solves a lot of problems including joint care of babies. BUT larger groups (more than two people) solve all of these problems much better—like an extended family or a tribe once did.

So there has to be some other reason behind pairing up. I’m thinking that pair is the final group size that can still hold together under the pressure of the industrialized society, spiced up by the myth of romanticism (“the one”).

Thanks @dianaabend. But why assume one would be lonely without a romantic partner? That would only be so if one would be completely without friends and other family members.