Your attachment style predicts which activities boost romantic satisfaction

New research provides evidence that the best way to spend time with a romantic partner depends on their specific emotional needs. A study published in Social Psychological and Personality Science suggests that people with avoidant attachment styles feel more satisfied when engaging in novel and exciting activities, while those with anxious attachment styles benefit more from familiar and comfortable shared experiences.

Psychological science identifies attachment insecurity as a significant barrier to relationship satisfaction. Individuals high in attachment avoidance often fear intimacy and prioritize independence, while those high in attachment anxiety fear abandonment and frequently seek reassurance.

Previous studies have shown that partners can mitigate these insecurities by adjusting their behavior, such as offering autonomy to avoidant partners or reassurance to anxious ones. However, less is known about how specific types of shared leisure activities function in this dynamic.

“This study was motivated by two main gaps. One was a gap in the attachment literature. Although attachment insecurity reliably predicts lower relationship satisfaction, these effects can be buffered, and most prior work has focused on partner behaviors. We wanted to know whether shared, everyday experiences could play a similar role,” said study author Amy Muise, a professor and York Research Chair in the Department of Psychology and director of the Sexual Health and Relationships (SHaRe) Lab at York University.

“We were also interested in testing the idea that novelty and excitement are universally good for relationships. Instead, we asked whether different types of shared experiences are more or less beneficial depending on people’s attachment-related needs.”

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To explore these dynamics, the scientists conducted a meta-analysis across three separate daily diary studies. The total sample consisted of 390 couples from Canada and the United States. Participants were required to be in a committed relationship and living together or seeing each other frequently. The average relationship length varied slightly by study but ranged generally from seven to eight years.

For a period of 21 days, each partner independently completed nightly surveys. They reported their daily relationship satisfaction and the types of activities they shared with their partner that day. The researchers measured two distinct types of shared experiences. “Novel and exciting” experiences were defined as activities that felt new, challenging, or expanding, such as learning a skill or trying a new restaurant.

“Familiar and comfortable” experiences involved routine, calming, and predictable activities. Examples included watching a favorite TV show, cooking a standard meal together, or simply relaxing at home. The participants also rated their levels of attachment avoidance and anxiety at the beginning of the study. This design allowed the researchers to track how fluctuations in daily activities related to fluctuations in relationship satisfaction.

The data revealed that, in general, both types of shared experiences were linked to higher daily relationship satisfaction. “The effects are modest in size, which is typical for daily experience research because they reflect within-person changes in everyday life,” Muise told PsyPost. “These are not dramatic shifts in relationship quality, but small day-to-day effects that may accumulate over time.”

“Overall, both novel and familiar shared experiences were linked to greater relationship satisfaction, but the effect of familiar, comfortable experiences was larger (roughly two to three times larger) than novel, experiences overall.”

Importantly, the benefits differed depending on a person’s attachment style. For individuals high in attachment avoidance, engaging in novel and exciting activities provided a specific benefit.

On days when avoidant individuals reported more novelty and excitement than usual, the typical link between their avoidant style and lower relationship satisfaction was weakened. The researchers found that these exciting activities increased perceptions of “relational reward.” This means the avoidant partners felt a sense of intimacy and connection that did not feel threatening or smothering. Familiar and comfortable activities did not provide this same buffering effect for avoidant individuals.

In contrast, individuals high in attachment anxiety derived the most benefit from familiar and comfortable experiences. On days marked by high levels of familiarity and comfort, the usual association between attachment anxiety and lower relationship satisfaction disappeared entirely. The study suggests that these low-stakes, comforting interactions help reduce negative emotions for anxiously attached people.

Novel and exciting activities did not consistently buffer the relationship satisfaction of anxiously attached individuals. The researchers noted that while novelty is generally positive, it does not address the specific need for security that defines attachment anxiety. The calming nature of routine appears to be the key ingredient for soothing these specific fears.

“One thing that surprised us was how familiar and comfortable activities seemed to help people who are more anxiously attached,” Muise said. “We expected these experiences to work by lowering worries about rejection or judgment, but that wasn’t what we found. Instead, they seemed to help by lowering people’s overall negative mood.”

“This made us think more carefully about what comfort and routine might actually be doing emotionally. It’s possible that for people higher in attachment anxiety, familiar and comfortable time together helps them feel more secure, and that sense of security is what supports relationship satisfaction. We weren’t able to test that directly in this study, but it’s an important direction for future work.”

The researchers also examined how one person’s attachment style affected their partner’s satisfaction. The results showed that when a person had a highly avoidant partner, they reported higher satisfaction on days they shared novel and exciting experiences. Conversely, when a person had a highly anxious partner, they reported higher satisfaction on days filled with familiar and comfortable activities. This indicates that tailoring activities benefits both the insecure individual and their romantic partner.

“The main takeaway is that there is no single ‘right’ way to spend time together that works for all couples,” Muise explained. “What matters is whether shared experiences align with people’s emotional needs. For people who are more avoidantly attached, doing something novel or exciting together (something that feels new and fun rather than overtly intimate) can make the relationship feel more rewarding and satisfying.”

“For people who are more anxiously attached, familiar and comfortable time together seems especially important for maintaining satisfaction. These findings suggest that tailoring shared time, rather than maximizing novelty or excitement per se, may be a more effective way to support relationship well-being.”

While the findings offer practical insights, the study has certain limitations. The research relied on daily diary entries, which are correlational. This means that while the researchers can observe a link between specific activities and higher satisfaction, they cannot definitively prove that the activities caused the satisfaction. It is possible that feeling satisfied makes a couple more likely to engage in fun or comfortable activities.

“Another potential misinterpretation is that novelty is ‘bad’ for anxiously attached people or that comfort is ‘bad’ for avoidantly attached people,” Muise clarified. “That is not what we found. Both types of experiences were generally associated with higher satisfaction; the difference lies in when they are most helpful for buffering insecurity, not whether they are beneficial at all.”

Future research is needed to determine if these daily buffering effects lead to long-term improvements in attachment security. The scientists also hope to investigate who initiates these activities and whether the motivation behind them impacts their effectiveness. For now, the data suggests that checking in on a partner’s emotional needs might be the best guide for planning the next date night.

“One long-term goal is to understand whether these day-to-day buffering effects can lead to longer-term changes in attachment security,” Muise said. “If repeatedly engaging in the ‘right’ kinds of shared experiences could that have implications for how attachment insecurity evolves over time?”

“Another direction is to examine how these experiences are initiated. Who suggests the activity, and whether it feels voluntary or pressured, might matter, for whether certain experiences are associated with satisfaction.”

“One thing I really appreciate about this study is that it allowed us to look at both partners’ experiences,” Muise added. “The partner effects suggest that tailoring shared experiences doesn’t only benefit the person who is more insecure, it is also associated with how their partner feels about the relationship. Overall, engaging in shared experiences that was aligned with one partner’s attachment needs, has benefits for both partners.”

The study, “Novel and Exciting or Tried and True? Tailoring Shared Relationship Experiences to Insecurely Attached Partners,” was authored by Kristina M. Schrage, Emily A. Impett, Mustafa Anil Topal, Cheryl Harasymchuk, and Amy Muise.