You CAN Be More Than Just Friends…With Benefits
I can already envision a few specific female friends that might be, at this very moment, clapping their hands in glee. I personally happen to think that male friends make the best boyfriends (unless they get all awkward post-hookup, which annoyingly often happens), and it looks like my beliefs are correct. A new study shows that couple who starts out as ‘sexy friends’ or ‘friends with benefits’ can actually establish a different, more loving relationship down the road. BOOM!
Even better, the study’s lead author even says that “friends with benefits may actually be the new form of dating.”
Did I say BOOM?
University of Louisville psychology professor Jesse Owen led the study along with Frank Fincham from Florida State University. The two researched the behaviors of 764 men and women who were in serious relationships and sought to discover if their Friends With Benefits past impacted their present.
They found that those who start off as friends with a little something-something on the side are no more and no less likely to fail than those who started off in a more conventional way.
“Commitment is a foundation of any relationship,” Owen told the Vancouver Sun. “And friends with benefits are really unstable, almost by definition. We thought that would carry forward but it didn’t happen.”
He adds: ”Just because people start out as friends with benefits, doesn’t necessarily mean a doomsday scenario for their relationship.”
Well, that’s good news. So for all the guys who are afraid to ‘ruin’ your relationship with your friend (do you morons honestly think that sex doesn’t change things?), man up. You could be missing out on the real best thing if you’re waiting for the ‘next best thing’ to come along…and that wouldn’t make you very happy at all, now would it?
