Speed Dating Singles Benefit from Personality and Compatibility Quizzes

(PRWeb) February 14, 2007 -- A recent study published by the American Psychological Association found that personality-related characteristics take longer to express than attitudes, values and beliefs, though personality is often more important to the success of long-term relationships. In a Weekly Whims column on EQSQ.com, Angela Nouvel notes the possible benefit of personality and compatibility quizzes as a precursor to meeting potential partners at speed dating or other dating events (http://eqsq.com/columns/dating-personality-test.html). EQSQ.com, an online personality test resource for education and career choices, gives visitors seeking love an opportunity to take quizzes that reveal their Empathizing Quotient (EQ) and Systemizing Quotient (SQ). These scores are measures of personality traits that may influence education and career choices and impact interpersonal relationships.

Nouvel suggests that singles seeking love might benefit from completing personality tests and quizzes, and asking potential partners to take the same tests, prior to meeting. In her column (http://eqsq.com/columns/dating-personality-test.html), "The Dating Crisis: Personality Test Required?" Nouvel relates her experience of speed dating. It seems that the combination of an older single population with full-time careers and the desire for long-term relationships has resulted in the popularity of organized speed dating events, despite the fact that studies indicate that personality may be a better predictor of long-term relationship success than initial attraction. Nouvel cites one study that used multiple choice questions based on 25 personality factors. The results of this study showed that the closer the answers, the more compatible two people are.

Psychologist Eva C. Klohnen, Ph.D., and graduate student Shanhong Luo, M.A., of the University of Iowa based their relationship attraction study on newlyweds who had dated for various lengths of time prior to marriage. "Once people are in a committed relationship, it is primarily personality similarity that influences marital happiness," explain the authors. "Whereas personality similarity is likely to facilitate this process, personality differences may result in more friction and conflict in daily life."

EQSQ.com centers on the Empathizing-Systemizing theory of the male versus the female brain types. The tests were developed by Professor Simon Baron-Cohen and Sally Wheelwright at the University of Cambridge, England. Systemizers and empathizers can find information and resources for education, educational programs and career-choice.

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