With great power comes great responsibility… have the dynamics of the relationship changed more? It is not uncommon to see the romanticization of influential people, portraying them with fierce passion in literature and film. Whether it’s the brooding billionaire CEO in your favorite K-drama or the smug captain of the football team in a romance book, these fictional characters easily garner a large fan base.
But power in reality is much darker and not everything is rosy and romantic. Power transforms a person, increasing confidence and power. This increases the likelihood of cheating influential people. A study published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found out how influential people can get away from their relationships and cheat. Fidelity to one’s spouse is related to one’s well-being. And the power in their self-perception outweighs everything, even love and respect.
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The relationship between power and loyalty
Psychologists from Reichmann University in Herzliya, Israel, and the American University of Rochester tried to find out how power changes the game in the dynamics of relationships and loyalty. Power makes a person not only self-confident, but also more impulsive with a superiority complex, acting on their whims to assert themselves. And with such resources, they can easily mitigate any potential consequences.
This becomes particularly ominous in a relationship when this exaggerated self-perception of power develops a dynamic where the powerful partner may feel they bring more value and substance and think they can do better.
Lead author Gurit Birnbaum, a psychology professor at Reichmann University, said: “In romantic relationships, this power dynamic can make the more powerful partner think they have more to gain than the less powerful partner. The more powerful may see this as a sign that they have more options outside of the relationship and are more desirable partners in general.”
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The dark side of power in relationships
The researchers conducted a series of tests to understand how power can cause upheaval in relationships. They were able to reveal a clear pattern in all four tests that the power changed the way they perceived other potential partners, including sexual fantasies, desires and interactions in real life. People who saw themselves as more powerful were interested in other potential matches outside of their relationship.
Co-author Harry Reiss, a professor in the University of Rochester’s Department of Psychology and Dean’s Professor at the University of Rochester, explained: “Those with a higher sense of power may feel motivated to neglect their commitment to a relationship and act on their desire for short-term relationships or potentially other, newer partners when they become available. such an opportunity.”
The most destructive thing is when people who think they are strong think that they are more valuable and better than their partner. This belief weakens the commitment. It also goes beyond loyalty and becomes bitter with outright disrespect depending on who has more access to resources.
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