Do novel, moderately challenging activities together

New and slightly difficult shared experiences restore the self-expansion that keeps closeness alive.

Why it works

When two people do something novel and moderately challenging together, they both expand — acquiring new capabilities and perspectives. The brain associates this expansion experience with the partner who was present, restoring the early-relationship "glow" that came from rapid natural expansion. The key variables are novelty and mild challenge: familiar, easy activities do not produce the same effect even if enjoyable.

How to do it

1. Identify activities that are new to both partners (or new to one and taught by the other).
2. Choose something with mild challenge — not terrifying, but requiring some effort and focus.
3. Schedule a specific date and time; "we should do something new" rarely happens without scheduling.
4. After the activity, spend a few minutes discussing what was new or surprising about the experience.

Evidence

A key series of experiments found that couples who engaged in novel, arousing activities together reported greater relationship satisfaction compared to couples who engaged in pleasant but familiar activities, with the effect attributed to the self-expansion mechanism. (rct)

Studies have primarily used short-term experiments with couples; the long-term sustainability and mechanisms across different relationship types are less studied.

Sources

• Aron, Norman, Aron, McKenna & Heyman (2000), "Couples’s shared participation in novel and arousing activities and experienced relationship quality", Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

Common mistake

Choosing activities that are novel to only one partner (a favourite hobby one person shares), which produces expansion for the learner but not for the teacher, and can create an asymmetry.