Merging in Close Relationships

Abstract

As people come together in romantic relationships, they tend to merge —to integrate aspects of each other and even create a new unit or entity. This phenomenon has inspired several robust literatures within the field of relationship science, but they have developed within relative isolation of one another. In this article, we put four of those literatures into conversation: merging in the context of selves, goals, processing, and reality. We review each of these topics in turn before discussing the commonalities and differences between them, including shared antecedents and consequences of merging. Merging, we conclude, is typically associated with better relationship functioning, with a few noted exceptions (e.g., too much closeness can dampen desire). We then propose an agenda for the future of research on the theme of merging in close relationships.