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New study claims women would rather stay single than compromise on this major relationship issue

Home> News> Sex & Relationships

Updated 15:15 6 Oct 2025 GMT+1Published 15:14 6 Oct 2025 GMT+1

New study claims women would rather stay single than compromise on this major relationship issue

Researchers discovered that women find one thing to be a dealbreaker that even outweighs romance

Joe Yates

Joe Yates

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Featured Image Credit: Getty Images/Witthaya Prasongsin

Topics: Sex and Relationships, Life, Politics

Joe Yates
Joe Yates

Joe is a journalist for UNILAD, who particularly enjoys writing about crime. He has worked in journalism for five years, and has covered everything from murder trials to celeb news.

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A new study has underlined the shocking reality of modern world dating, as one thing in particular can apparently turn Prince Charming into a frog.

We've all got our own 'icks' - something that partners and potential suitors do that would turn you off from them almost immediately.

Personally, I don't necessarily agree with them as we're all human at the end of the day... but that being said, if I ever caught my fiancée picking her nose and eating it, that could be enough for me to pull the plug eight years in.

But according to a new study, published in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, there's a more pressing reason to call quits on a relationship.

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Researchers from the University of Göttingen and the University of Jena, both in Germany, analysed data from over 13,000 heterosexual single women across 144 countries, using responses from the 'Ideal Partner Survey'.

It's a major dealbreaker for some women (Getty Stock Image)
It's a major dealbreaker for some women (Getty Stock Image)

Their findings show that women with strong political views are far more likely to prioritise political alignment over romance.

Women on the far-left were the pickiest, with 47 percent saying they’d prefer to remain single rather than date someone whose political beliefs clash with their own.

While on the opposite end of the spectrum, 41 percent of right-leaning women said the same, with only 22 percent of politically moderate women - an ideological for people who are against radical or extreme political and religious views - viewed politics as a dealbreaker.

"Political orientation is related to many aspects of our lives," the authors of the study wrote.

"Women holding more extreme political views showed the strongest preferences for political similarity."

The researchers also found that conservative women leaned heavily on tradition, valuing religion, shared ethnicity, financial stability, and career success in a partner.

Almost half of left-leaning women would rather stay single than date someone whose political beliefs differ to theirs (Getty Stock Image)
Almost half of left-leaning women would rather stay single than date someone whose political beliefs differ to theirs (Getty Stock Image)

However, those on the left placed far less emphasis on these traditional values.

That said, kindness and supportiveness were universally non-negotiable traits - politics aside.

Height was another surprising point of contention, as the research found that most women seemed to prefer taller partners, but conservatives were more likely to rank height as especially important - a finding that the team linked to attraction toward 'a masculine, male breadwinner stereotype'.

Penn State political scientist Pete Hatemi noted that 'couples assort on politics more than any other trait in the last 20 years'.

Per the New York Post, he added: "You’re more likely to have a long-term partner that you don’t find very attractive than one that has opposite political views on highly important topics."

Meanwhile, Laura Nelson, a sociology professor at the University of British Columbia, said: "Left vs. right is not just about who you will vote for.

"It’s tied to different - and competing - conceptions of morality. When you think about who you want to build a life with … it would be shocking if political beliefs were not correlated with partner preferences."

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