Yesterday, I was at a wedding in the glorious countryside of Cheshire. It was a super sunny day, and we all had a great time wishing the bride and groom well. The couple clearly love each other, and there were loads of adoring glances between them. All say, “Aaah”.
However, even though the number of marriages has increased slightly in recent years, the rate at which we are getting married has plummeted. Back in the 1970s, the marriage rate was 85 per 1,000 individuals for men. Now it is 20. It has dropped similarly for women. The loving couple we celebrated yesterday are unusual. Not only did they decide to get married, but they did so at a relatively young age. Both are in their late 20s. The average age of marriage in the UK is now 33 for men and 31 for women, according to the Office for National Statistics.
It’s not just people who are reluctant to get hitched. Data on business mergers show a significant fall, too. The current number of mergers is 40% lower than its pre-pandemic peak. We are back to the levels of activity that took place in the 1990s. Businesses, too, appear to be falling out of love with each other.
This all ties in with an increasing amount of individualism in the world. Even collectivist cultures, such as Japan, are becoming much more individualistic in their approach to life. Other studies in China and India have found similar results. Those Asian collectivist cultures are becoming more individualistic.
I blame the Internet.
The Internet has changed the way we think, and much of what it has done to us is to make us more selfish. Indeed, over ten years ago, a BBC documentary suggested that the Internet was increasing self-focus. More recent research confirms this with evidence that social media activity makes us more narcissistic. In short, it turns us into people who think “it’s all about me”. That’s reflected in behaviours such as people being more likely to want to buy a house alone these days than with a partner.
Similarly, in the business world, there have been changes in behaviour showing a greater desire for it all to be “about me”. In the UK, the number of sole traders has increased significantly since 2010. Also, the number of businesses without employees has risen to provide 80% of the growth in the 15 years of the Government’s research. We clearly have a preference to be on our own in business these days. This is backed up by a range of studies that show we don’t want open-plan offices as much as we did previously. We now prefer our individual, private office space.
Wherever you look, there is a growing trend for being alone, more individualism and less togetherness. Indeed, recent data suggests that we are even starting to give up being social online.
Yet we know that working with others, and not being so self-interested, is good for us. That loving couple at the wedding yesterday can look forward to a long life of togetherness. That’s because married couples have a longer life expectancy than those who remain single. Yet, as any married person will tell you, relationships need “work”.
A decade ago, researchers in Texas found that there is a clear link between the success of a relationship and the “self-efficacy” of the members. In the workplace, this means being able to correctly assess your individual ability to accomplish what you are asked. And therein lies the problem with the Internet again. The more we use it, the lower our self-efficacy. No wonder we prefer to be alone these days, as we increasingly believe that we cannot achieve things.However, we can improve our self-efficacy, and with it boost our relationships with others, thereby reducing the onward march of narcissism. All you need to do is challenge yourself and get out of your “comfort zone”. You will soon realise you are capable of more than you believe. Also, try to think more about the “big picture” and focus less on small details. This will also help ensure you see things in a different light. When you do that, your self-efficacy increases and, in turn, so will your ability to relate to others. We live in an online world which has several ways that make us more self-centred. The way out of that is relatively straightforward, though.
