The evidence points one way: men invest more in romantic relationships and suffer more when they end, because they outsource all their emotional support to a partner.
From Bacon to Emerson, Western culture has celebrated the man who goes it alone and treated love as a distraction. Byron wrote that love is a small part of a man's life but a woman's whole existence. The data turns this upside down.
Needier when single, worse off after a split
A researcher at the University of Vienna reviewed more than 50 empirical studies. Single men long for a partner more intensely than women do, and fall in love faster and more often.
Once partnered, men gain more in lifespan. An analysis of 7.9 million people found unmarried men had a 46% higher mortality risk than married men; for women the gap was 22%. After divorce, men's suicide risk doubles.
One outlet for emotional support
Why? Boys are taught that vulnerability is weakness. Parents talk about feelings more with daughters than with sons.
As adults, men get less emotional support from friends and family than women do. So a partner becomes the only confidant. When the relationship ends, the whole support system collapses.
It's time to rewrite the script
The fix isn't to make men better at romance. It's to give them people to talk to outside it.
Australia's Men's Shed movement is one model: retired men do woodwork side by side, which makes it easier to open up than face-to-face therapy.
Why it matters
Loading all your emotional needs onto one person is unfair to them and risky for you. Men die younger and take their own lives more often; part of the answer may sit in the rule that boys must never show weakness.
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