title: Sexual kindred spirits: actual and overperceived similarity, complementarity, and partner accuracy in heterosexual couples.
abstract: We examined whether sexual similarity, complementarity, and perceptual accuracy exist within a large sample of heterosexual couples. Partners exhibited similarity and complementarity of sexual preferences, and they perceived each other's preferences with a considerable degree of accuracy; these effects were greater than found in randomly assigned pseudocouples. In addition, people overperceived sexual similarity and complementarity, and they overperceived the accuracy with which their partner knew their preferences. We suggest these three forms of overperception are the result of motivated cognitive processes in service of sexual relationship maintenance. Using actor-partner interdependence modeling (Kenny, Kashy, & Cook, 2006), overperception predicted sexual satisfaction, as did complementarity, but similarity and accuracy did not. These findings indicate that motivated cognition may foster sexual satisfaction, as theories of motivated relationship cognitions suggest.
authors.affiliation: University of Rochester, NY, USA ddejong@psych.rochester.edu.
authors.forename: David C
authors.initials: DC
authors.lastname: de Jong
authors.affiliation: University of Rochester, NY, USA.
authors.forename: Harry T
authors.initials: HT
authors.lastname: Reis
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D020010:Heterosexuality / Q000523:psychology*; D006801:Humans; D007398:Interpersonal Relations; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012725:Sexual Behavior / Q000523:psychology; D012938:Social Perception; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: complementarity; motivated cognition; relationship maintenance; sexual satisfaction; similarity