Vocabulary influenced partner selection.

The connection between vocabulary and socio-demographic factors has been repeatedly confirmed by research. According to a recent study, during financial hardships, parents engage in far less communication with their children and utilize a poorer vocabulary compared to times of economic stability. Moreover, if children are born and raised in a bilingual family, their brains differ from those of monolinguals even before they begin to speak.

Experts from the University of Reading and Swansea University in the UK proposed that a similar vocabulary between spouses is not merely a result of living together and daily communication, but rather one of the reasons they initially began dating. The scientific article confirming this hypothesis was published in the journal Languages.

The study involved 83 Turkish-English bilingual couples aged 27 to 57, who lived in the UK and had been together for anywhere from nine to 23 years. All participants underwent a test designed to assess their vocabulary size in both English and Turkish. The testing included both real words (common and rare) as well as invented ones.

Participants with a larger vocabulary in English generally knew fewer Turkish words, and vice versa. Notably, both men and women were married to partners whose vocabulary size matched their own.

The research also revealed that after several years of living together, partners maintained a strong similarity in their vocabulary. The authors concluded that this similarity did not arise from "adaptation" during marriage, but played a significant role in partner selection.

“Intelligence, education, and financial status are significant factors that determine a person's value as a future partner. These psychological and economic characteristics cannot be assessed directly, but must be inferred through indirect data, such as vocabulary size. Vocabulary size cannot be manipulated at will, which allows for fairly accurate conclusions about intelligence, education, and financial status.”

According to the article's authors, the study made a valuable contribution to understanding how people choose their romantic partners. However, decisions based on the results should be made with caution, as the participants belonged to a small group of Anglo-Turkish bilinguals, and conclusions might differ in other cultural and linguistic contexts.