How You Tune Out Your Spouse—and Why

TIME:

Spouses have always had a funny way of both hearing and not hearing each other. On the one hand, the person you married is the person with whom you conduct the most intimate business of your life, and on a day to day, moment to moment basis, you must always be in communication. On the other hand, that constant stream of talk can become something of a hum—the conversational equivalent of the buzz of a fan or the thrum of an air conditioner that you hear so much you stop hearing at all.

At least that’s the faintly scientific excuse I, and I suspect a lot of other husbands and wives, inwardly make when we’re caught not listening. Now, that excuse has gone from faintly to very scientific, thanks to a study just published in the journal Psychological Science.