BY CHOICE OR BY CIRCUMSTANCE?: STEREOTYPES OF AND FEELINGS ABOUT SINGLE PEOPLE

Abstract

Abstract: The study examines stereotypes of and emotional reactions to singles by choice and singles not by choice. Participants (N = 480 ) read a scenario describing persons, who were either by choice or not by choice and rated their thoughts and feelings about these persons. Singles by choice are perceived as more lonely and miserable, and as less warm and sociable, than singles not by choice. However, they are perceived as more successful and potent. Anger and sympathy mediate the relations between choosing singlehood and stereotyping levels. These findings extend the way in which the Attribution Theory explains activation of stereotypes.Key words: singles, singlism, stereotypes, emotions, a ttribution theoryIn recent years, researchers have increasingly used the term socially single, which suggests that what matters most in everyday life is whether a person is in a significant romantic relationship or not, regardless of his or her legal marital status (DePaulo & Morris, 2006). The goal of our study was to examine whether socially single people are perceived differently than coupled people, and to determine whether a choice to remain affected the intensity of stereotypes. In addition, we examined whether the emoFu tions experienced regarding people who are by choice and people who are not by choice mediate the activation of stereotypes.The Increasing Phenomenon of SinglehoodThe rate of people in the Western world is constantly increasing. In the United States, 50.2% of the adult population - 124.6 million people - were in August 2014. For comparison, the rate of adult people in the US was 37.4% in 1976 (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2014). Israel has also witnessed such a trend: since 1970, the rate of men has doubled, and the rate of women has tripled (Israel Central Bureau of Statistics, 2012).Stereotypes of Single PeopleWhile the rate of people is increasing, negative stereotyping of and discrimination against people (i.e., singlism; DePaulo & Morris, 2006) has been well-documented in the United States (DePaulo & Morris, 2005a, 2005b, 2006; Morris, DePaulo, Hertel, & Taylor, 2008) and in Germany (Greitemeyer, 2009; Hertel, Schutz, DePaulo, Morris, & Stucke, 2007).When American students were asked to list traits describing married or people, they described married people as more mature, stable, honest, happy, kind, and loving than people. In contrast, they described people as more immature, insecure, self-centered, sad, lonely, and ugly than married people (Morris, DePaulo, Hertel, & Taylor, 2008). Greitemeyer (2009) reported that targets were perceived as less extraverted, conscientious, agreeable, sociable, physically attractive and satisfied with their lives than coupled targets. In his study, targets were also perceived as lonelier and as having a lower self-esteem than partnered targets. In another study, German participants rated people higher than married people on measures of loneliness and misery, and lower on measures of warmth and concern for others (Hertel et al., 2007).What Moderates Stereotypes of Singles?Age and gender were tested in previous research as potential moderators of stereo-types of singles. Young, 25-year-old singles are perceived less negatively than older, 40-year-old singles (Hertel et al., 2007; Morris, DePaulo, Hertel, & Taylor, 2008). One explanation for this finding is that, according to the Developmental Life Tasks Model (Morris, DePaulo, Hertel & Taylor, 2008), getting married (or at least taking steps toward marriage by becoming coupled) is considered an important developmental milestone, and that mission should be accomplished by a certain age. Younger singles might be perceived as able to eventually find a partner, whereas the probability of finding a partner decreases with age. …