The Anxiety of Not Finding and Securing a Life Partner

Abstract

The necessity of a romantic or close relationship plays a very significant role in the lives and thought processes of young adults today (Robinson, & Wright, 2013). This study explored, whether college students have an anxiety about finding and securing a life partner. Participants were first presented with the Attachment Style Questionnaire (ASQ), and Existential Isolation scale (EIS). Participants then received false personality feedback about the likelihood of finding and securing a life partner. Explicit anxiety was then measured with the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS-X), and implicitly with a lexical decision task. A between subjects factorial with repeated measures ANOVA, found no significant differences between anxiety and non-anxiety related words in the lexical decision task. PANAS-X scores remained non-significant, demonstrating no noteworthy increase in anxiety following receiving negative feedback. Several exploratory analyses and hypotheses for future research are included.