14 DAY TRIAL // If you have ever been curious about how much time you and your partner spend not speaking to each other following an argument, a survey conducted by OnePoll comes to answer your question. Couples usually pass about 10 days a year on not-speaking terms because they’re either too angry or too proud to admit they have been in the wrong about a fight, the British publication the Daily Mail reveals.
The poll has included over 3,000 British couples and the conclusion is that partners (be they spouses or just lovers) spend an average of 2 hours and 14 minutes not speaking to each other after a fight. With a mean of two arguments a week (as volunteers themselves admitted), the time passed sulking amounts to 9 days, 16 hours and 16 minutes, the same media outlet unveils, which is roughly about 10 days people spend next to their loved one just being in a huff.
The same survey also shows that the causes of this can vary from not being able to stop sulking to not wanting to admit any mistake one might have made. Six of ten individuals refuse to kiss and make up, a fifth of all the queried simply won’t say that they’re sorry (even when they’re wrong), while 14 percent admit to storming out of the house even before the argument is over. The bright side to this is that, “If you keep up the silence long enough, you almost start missing each other and long to tell your partner something,” as a spokesperson for OnePull puts it for the Daily Mail.
As for the causes that can spark an argument, almost 50 percent of people admit that it’s often what they say that gets their partner steaming mad, since they tend to be insensitive or too critical. At the same time, for 36 percent of the couples, fights start because they have taken each other for granted, with a similar percentage (34%) fighting weekly over money. Losing the car keys, favorite clothing items, or misplacing the remote control are reasons good enough to fight over for 24 percent of the couples. Bringing up the children, not going out in town, bedroom issues, the time spent in front of the TV and jealousy over friends also make the cut on the list of reasons worth fighting over.
With all this, more than half of the queried couples say that a simple “I’m sorry” is enough to make things well again, while an overwhelming 76 percent believe that the occasional spat only comes to spice up the relationship, thus preventing it from slipping into routine and, ultimately, boredom.