The Best Way to Solve a Relationship Conflict

Isn't it strange how you can offer your friend sage advice when they're fighting with their spouse, but when it comes to your own relationship struggles, you're way less rational? That might be because people who mentally distance themselves from a situation (their own or another person's) are better at thinking things through, according to new research to be published in the journal Psychological Science.

Researchers recruited nearly 700 people for a three-part study. In each phase, participants were split into groups and asked to describe how they would handle certain situations (like if a partner cheated) from different perspectives. Some were asked to analyze this imaginary event as if it happened to themselves or to a friend from either the first person point of view ("why am I feeling this way?") or the third person angle ("why is she/he feeling this way?"). The goal was to see which mindset would get people to pause and really think about a problem instead of just acting irrationally.