Reinventing Date Night for Long-Married Couples<\/a>\u00e2\u20ac\u009d appearing in the New York Times on February 12, 2008, Parker-Pope argues that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153simply spending quality time together is probably not enough to prevent a relationship from getting stale.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Rather than visiting the same familiar haunts,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Parker-Pope writes, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153couples need to tailor their date nights around new and different activities that they both enjoy.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Parker-Pope cites Arthur Agron, a professor of social psychology at the State University of New York: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The goal is to find ways to keep injecting novelty in the relationship. The activity can be as simple as trying a new restaurant or something a little more thrilling, like taking an art class or going to an amusement park.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Or having sushi on a sunset picnic dinner in a local park.<\/p>\n
Reinventing date night is not just new age pseudo-psychology. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s based on serious brain science. New experiences activate the brain\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s reward system, flooding it with dopamine and norepinephrine. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153These are the same brain circuits that are ignited in early romantic love, a time of exhilaration and obsessive thoughts about a new partner,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Parker-Pope writes.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153We don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really know what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going on in the brain,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d comments anthropologist Helen E. Fisher of Rutgers University. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153It seems that as you trigger and amp up this reward system in the brain that is associated with romantic love, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s reasonable to suggest that it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s enabling you to feel more romantic love.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Experiments prove out the theory. In one study, researchers recruited 53 middle-aged couples. Using standard questionnaires, the researchers measured the couples\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 relationship quality and then randomly assigned them to one of three groups.<\/p>\n
The first group was instructed to spend 90 minutes a week doing familiar and pleasant activities like dining out or going to a movie. Couples in the second group were told to spend their 90 minutes on \u00e2\u20ac\u0153exciting\u00e2\u20ac\u009d activities that that the couple didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t usually do, like attending a concert, hiking or dancing. The third group was not assigned any particular activity.<\/p>\n
After 10 weeks, the couples again took tests to gauge the quality of their relationships. Those who had undertaken the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153exciting\u00e2\u20ac\u009d date, Parker-Pope writes, showed a significantly greater increase in marital satisfaction over the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153pleasant\u00e2\u20ac\u009d date night group.<\/p>\n
Our own experience was similar. As we sat under that tree in the park, thoroughly enjoying our elegant take out meal as a warm Jerusalem breeze fluttered around us and the sun slowly sank between the almond trees, both Jody and I commented on how romantic our evening had become. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Much better than sitting in a loud, crowded restaurant,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Jody said to me as we held hands and watched mothers pushing strollers around the park and dogs romping with their owners.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153You don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have to swing from the chandeliers,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d Dr. Fisher told Parker-Pope. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Just go to a new part of town, take a drive in the country or better yet, don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t make plans at all and see what happens to you.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n
Which, however inadvertently our night started out, is exactly what we did.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My wife Jody and I try to go out for a date night once a week. Sometimes we slip to once every two or three weeks. So when we do get out, we want to make sure it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s good. Regular readers will know we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re big fans of sushi. So when we heard that our favorite […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[9],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisnormallife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/738"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisnormallife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisnormallife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisnormallife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisnormallife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=738"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thisnormallife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/738\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":740,"href":"https:\/\/thisnormallife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/738\/revisions\/740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisnormallife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisnormallife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisnormallife.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}