Get Healthing in your inbox with the Morning Checkup and Weekender newsletter! One-night stands and a study of regret, repetition. Researchers looking at one-night stands asked, if regret helped, would not most sinners eventually become saints? By Dave Yasvinski. Published Apr 06, Join the conversation. Does regret actually change behaviour?
Men and women often feel a sense of regret after a one-night stand β for very different reasons β but researchers say that lingering sense of remorse does little to prevent a repeat performance in the near future. The study, published in the journal of Evolutionary Psychology , sought to determine whether sexual regret is functional in a way that leads to behavioural change. The answer, as you may have guessed, is a hard no. While women are more likely to regret engaging in casual copulation, researchers said men mostly mourn the superficial sex they might have missed out on.
With a short interval between the questionable decisions commonly made in pre-pandemic pubs, the team hoped to see evolution in action. People assume it guides them not to repeat what they regretted. What do you regret the most often? Has it changed your behaviour? Feelings of regret are similar to the process of rumination, which causes people β particularly those suffering from depression β to fixate on repetitive thoughts to the detriment of their health.
Not everything people do, think or feel is an evolutionary adaptation β sometimes it is not appropriate either. Share Story. Share This Story One-night stands and a study of regret, repetition Email. Copy Story Link. Related Stories. The risky business of pandemic dating "It goes from your first date, which is like a walk in the park, literally, to skipping to the three-month point.
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