This new guy I've been dating said he wants to keep things casual. I'm bummed because I've caught some pretty intense feelings for him. Is it possible he just needs to get to know me better and once he does, he'll feel differently?

--Wishful

Pursuing a relationship with this guy is like sentencing yourself to live out the rest of your days stuck in that "distracted boyfriend" meme.

Understanding your situation starts with a peek into book publishing. Unbeknownst to most people, the most profitable area in publishing is the romance and erotica genre. Most romance novels have pretty much the same theme: a high-status man, often wildly wealthy, who has shown he can't be tamed but who, nevertheless, eventually is -- by the irresistible beauty and specialness of one particular woman. This genre is literary catnip for the ladies, earning $1.5 billion in 2015, while the next best-earning book genre, mystery and crime, brought in a measly $730 million.

It turns out art reflects life -- or rather, how women wish their romantic lives would play out. Evolutionary psychologist Catherine Salmon explains that, in romance novels, "in the end, the heroine is typically the one in control," while the hero is "a slave to his passion/love for her." She references romance novel bloggers Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan, who, hilariously, refer to the heroine's hold over the hero as the power of the "magic hoo hoo." Once the hero has this particular hoo, "he desires no other," writes Salmon. Or, as some researchers put it, a "dad" is being molded out of the ashes of a confirmed "cad."

Salmon explains that women's longing to be irresistibly desired emerges from evolution's effect on female emotions, pushing women -- who, unlike men, can get pregnant from sex -- to be commitment-centric. This "female desire to be irresistible" is ultimately a desire by a woman "to be secure in the belief that her choice of mate is the right one and that he will never stray." As for the power and prevalence of this desire, Salmon notes previous research finds that more than half of female sexual fantasies revolve around "the desire to be sexually irresistible," and this desire seems to be "at the heart of the bodice-ripper style of romance and fantasies of submission."

Now, it's within the realm of possibility that this guy only thinks he wants to keep it casual, and he'll come around and become your Mr. One And Only. Research suggests men can sometimes be triggered into committing when they sense they have competition, like through your dating other guys. It's likewise possible this wouldn't change anything; he might simply be in the thick of his sexual safari years. So, applying the old 80/20 equation to your situation, 80 percent of success in love is showing up; however, the other 20 percent is making sure you aren't showing up to hookup hell in a wedding dress.

For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.

I'm seeing this new guy, but his ex-girlfriend is absolutely awful: rude, unfriendly, and less-than-intelligent. It makes me question his judgment. If he's interested in a girl like that, I'm not sure I want to be with him.

--Legitimate Fear?

Really good sex can keep a man from seeing the romantic hellshow he's in, especially when the thinking cap he automatically reaches for comes from a small square package marked "Trojan."

We assume someone's romantic partners are a result of carefully reasoned choices. In fact, many people meet someone, have sex with them, want more sex, and end up in a relationship -- totally bypassing any assessment of whether this might be a ruinous idea. Eventually, the initial hot-sex fog recedes a little, and their partner's terrible qualities become increasingly apparent. Time to break up, right? Well, there's a problem.

Psychologist Daniel Kahneman explains that we tend to be "loss aversive": deeply disturbed by potential losses (more than we're excited by possible gains). We often succumb to the "sunk cost fallacy": irrationally deciding to continue investing time, money, and/or energy in what we know is a losing gambit, based on the investment we've already made (that is, "sunk" into it in the past). However, that prior investment is gone. The rational approach is seeing whether future investment would pay off sufficiently and, if not, cutting our losses (perhaps while waving a forlorn goodbye to all the days, months, or -- gulp! -- years we wasted).

To determine how active a role your man's judgment played in his previous entanglement, ask him about what he values, in general and in a partner, and then ask what draws him to you. You should see whether he's with you for reasons you respect or whether you're just a random variation on the nasty, kitten-eating sexbots of what might be called "Cinder" (Tinder when a guy's penis repeatedly picks emotional arsonists who'll burn his mental wellness to the ground).

For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.

Whenever I go out with someone I like at all, I fall for them right away. How can I stop from jumping headfirst into wanting to be with a guy just because we have a nice evening together? I know some witty banter doesn't equal a soul mate, but good luck telling my heart.

--Leap First

If your grandma was like mine, her advice was to find "the one" -- as opposed to "the anyone."

There's a term for your "Speed Racer" approach to getting into relationships, and it's "emophilia." Emophilia is the "tendency to fall in love fast and often," explains psychologist Daniel Nelson Jones, who coined the term (perhaps not noticing that "emophilia" sounds like the Cockney version of a blood-clotting disorder).

Emophiliacs aren't the only ones who dive into "I'm in love." People who are "anxiously attached" -- those who lack emotional security in respect to their interpersonal relationships -- are also leap first-ers. However, research by psychologist Jacqueline Lechuga and Jones finds that the motivation is different in anxious attachment versus emophilia: For the anxiously attached, it's the avoidance of being alone as opposed to the excitement of being in love (in emophilia).

Emophiliacs aren't without standards; for example: "A man needs a pulse. At least a weak one." But Lechuga and Jones found that emophiliacs are often especially attracted to flashy, charismatic manipulators with the antisocial funpack of "Dark Triad" personality traits: Machiavellianism, psychopathy, and narcissism. Machiavellianism reflects callous self-interest: deceiving and exploiting others for one's own gain. Psychopathy involves impulsivity, selfishness, remorselessness, and a lack of empathy. And narcissism, of course, involves being egotistical, entitled, and lacking in empathy, with an inflated sense of one's own greatness.

It's hard even for people who aren't emophiliacs to see the Dark Triad traits behind the charisma storm -- well, at least until they notice their life savings have grown digital wings and flown off to the Grand Caymans. It'll likely be impossible for you to spot a charismatic creep's ethical shortcomings when your eyes are doing that flashing cartoon heart thing at 1,000 rpm. The same goes for relationship deal-breakers with less sociopathic suitors that you're blinded to at first but that eventually reveal themselves -- maybe after you've been "all in" for months or more.

You may have work to do in the self-acceptance department and related areas, but you don't have to be all psychologically "fixed" to behave in healthy ways. Just understand that your emotions will likely be your sabotage staff, not your support staff. That's okay because, as I write in "Unf*ckology," "Your feelings are not the boss of you." Because you have a feeling, a longing to do something, doesn't mean you should let it drag you down Emo Lane.

What you can control are your actions, especially through "precommitment," psychologists' term for making advance preparation to limit your ability to duck your goal in the heat of the moment. To slow down and get to know a guy, change the length of your dates from marathon to mini: dates as hors d'oeuvres rather than three-day banquets. In this column, I often advise keeping first dates "cheap, short, and local." This keeps them from leading to big outlays of cash, effort, or premature feelings of being perfect for each other.

The essential bit of that for you is "short." Schedule dates for a limited time -- an hour or hour-and-a-half at most -- and have someplace to be afterward. And, so you can't throw that plan over in the moment, have a friend pick you up at your date to take you somewhere else. By the way, this could very well be your couch, which you sit on with said friend, giving yourself props for changing your emo-maniac ways.

Your second date should be a week later (and so on), with minimal talk on the phone or texting with the guy in between. For times when you do chat on the phone, again dip into the precommitment well by setting a silent timer (for, say, 20 minutes) and getting off when it hits zero. Ration the number of texts you can send per day and calls you can take per week, and have a friend monitor you on all of this to keep you from cheating.

Because habits are created on a neural level through repetition of behavior, in time, if you keep repeating your more measured dating MO, it should become your default behavior. As a bonus, the "slow-it-down" steps I've laid out will make you seem a little out of reach to a guy, amping up your desirability. Slowing it down is also better on a personal safety level than falling fast for your idea of a person, which is how a number of people have ended up not just going on dates but being dismembered and eaten on them.

For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.

The guy I'm seeing is super attentive and affectionate when we're together, but then he always falls off the grid. He'll wait weeks before texting me to make plans again, and sometimes I have to initiate. What's his deal, and how do I proceed? It's a new relationship, so I'd feel too needy to tell him I want more attention.

--Yearning

We have a term for a pleasant, attentive man who drops by from time to time and then isn't seen for weeks, and no, it is not "boyfriend" but "UPS man."

Some will say you should just ask for what you want: Hit the guy up for increased attention and presence like you'd hit up the Burgers R Us server for another thingie of mustard. However, we modern humans have an antique psychological operating system: psychology adapted for solving recurring mating problems for ancestral humans. So, responding to behavior without considering the underlying evolved motivation could get you in trouble, maybe even nuking your chances with a guy.

Evolutionary psychologists David Buss and David Schmitt find that humans opt for different "sexual strategies": "short-term" (casual) or "long-term" (committed). Which strategy is activated depends on "context," including factors like a person's mate value (relative to their competition) and the stage of life they're in.

Many men eventually want to settle down with a long-term partner. However, because for men, having sex does not lead to ye olde bun in the oven (and the need for a committed partner to help feed and shelter the child that results), they evolved to prioritize sexual variety and commitment-free sex. (All the better to spread more of their genes into future generations!) So, a "short-term sexual strategy" is generally optimal for men in a way it just isn't for women.

Women, just like men, engage in casual sex. However, women's emotions evolved to push them to seek commitment (and freak out and long for it when they perceive it isn't there -- sometimes even when a woman knows she wants nothing more than a one-nighter from a guy). So, a woman might be relieved some himbo she dragged home is sneaking down the tree outside her bedroom window after sex but then wake up in the morning all, "How dare you?!" that he isn't back under it, holding up a speaker attached to his iPhone, and trying to win her heart Cusack in "Say Anything"-style.

In men, a long-term sexual strategy -- being commitment-driven rather than sexual smorgasbord-driven -- can be triggered. Recall that sexual strategies are "context-dependent." Wanting a family is one such context. But men will also commit when that's what it takes to land a woman with high "mate value," who can "afford" to hold out: commitment or goodbye.

Your immediate focus, however, should be on what you potentially have in common with a coke-obsessed lab rat. Psychologists find that "intermittent reinforcement" -- occasional, unpredictable "rewards," like a guy who pops up unexpectedly from time to time -- is the stuff obsessions are made of. (Poor little lab rats that push a bar and only sporadically get a hit of cocaine will often push the thing till they're lying paws up in the corner of their cage.)

Contrast intermittent reinforcement with "regular reinforcement," like a guy who's always there for you. When rewards come reliably and predictably rather than randomly and unpredictably, the suspense is gone. The air goes out of the crazy, and you can relax and maybe even take Mr. Reliable for granted.

Becoming obsessed with a guy -- even if you do your best to hide it -- tends to send a message, and it isn't, "I'm seriously high in mate value!" It also shifts your focus from learning who he is and what you might have together to the chase. All that matters is whether he's called, when he might call, and how you might find a gig-economy sorcerer to cast a spell to make him call.

To avoid taking off on the crazy train, open your life up to other men. This doesn't have to mean swiping a new guy into your bed every night. You could be exploring your prospects in Zoom conversations, taking advantage of how the pandemic has slowed the pace of dating. Adding men on your end changes your emotional context from needy and desperate to "hope you come around, but if you don't, plenty more where you came from."

He may sense he has competition and change his strategy: start calling and coming around on the regular. Of course, maybe with the attention and commitment famine no longer a factor, you'll end up with another guy -- one who makes the relationship you two have feel like a dream as opposed to the last desert mirage you see before you collapse in the sand and are eaten by buzzards.

For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.

I'm a 54-year-old woman, married for 21 years to a pretty decent guy. When our now-18-year-old son was little, my husband completely ignored Mother's Day for maybe six years. Once, I asked him why, and he simply said, "You aren't my mother." It hurt me SO MUCH because I busted my butt to be a good mom. I told him why I was so upset, and one year, I laid on our bed and cried, but nothing changed. Six years ago, he began giving me a card and flowers on Mother's Day. This year, he and our son got me hanging flower baskets, which was wonderful. The problem is I can't get over his doing nothing in the past, and it's affecting my feelings for him and how I treat him.

--Still Hurting

If your relationship has a spirit animal, it's best if it isn't a dog frozen in time after the volcanic eruption at Pompeii.

The problem between you started with an error in mind-reading. "Mind-reading" sounds like a Vegas magic act, but it's a mental ability we all have (though it's actually mind-predicting rather than -reading). Psychologists call this "theory of mind," referring to our ability to do reasonably well at guessing ("theorizing" about!) the "mental states" of others, meaning the emotions they're experiencing, their beliefs, their desires, and their intentions.

I give an example of theory of mind in action in "Good Manners for Nice People Who Sometimes Say F*ck": "When you see a man looking deep into a woman's eyes, smiling tenderly and then getting down on one knee, your understanding and experience of what this usually means helps you guess that he's about to ask 'Will you marry me?' and not 'Would you mind lending me a pen?'"

Unfortunately, we often do pretty poorly at the everyday swami thing because we tend "to imagine that other minds are much like our own," observes anthropologist Donald Symons. Making matters worse, we tend to assume others' minds should work like our own. So, if something isn't important to us, we assume it isn't (and shouldn't be) important to someone else.

Your husband's view of Mother's Day -- unimportant and only applicable to one's own mother -- led him to conclude it should be unimportant to you and to sneer, "You aren't my mother!" This sort of assumption leads to strife and maybe even divorce through the resentment that builds when one partner consistently doesn't get their needs met (and gets them mocked, to boot).

Happier, lasting relationships are fostered through a different approach: loving acceptance of the crazy. Even when you think your partner's desire is irrational or unbecoming of someone with an IQ surpassing that of a root vegetable, if you won't lose a limb, part company with your ethics, or otherwise seriously put yourself out, why not give them what they want? Again, you don't have to find it reasonable; you do it because it would make them happy.

Though your husband's now coming around on Mother's Day, I would bet my last bra strap he doesn't care in the slightest about Father's Day and still might not get why Mother's Day means so much to you. But you cried and cried, and he eventually got that it was hugely important to you (perhaps through your son's influence), and he's come around -- this year with the hanging flowers of Babylon. That's awesome.

However, you have yet to update your idea of him as mean and selfish, perhaps because, like many people, you see forgiveness as a feeling and wait for it to strike you, lightning on the golf course-style. In fact, forgiveness is a set of actions you choose to take. Evolutionary social psychologist Michael McCullough explains that forgiveness involves deciding to set aside a grievance against a person, expressed in your "thoughts, emotions, and/or behaviors," in order to have a continuing relationship with them.

Consider that your husband, though "pretty decent," might have some continuing limitations in understanding and accepting what you need (even when you tell him). A mediator with a relationships focus would be helpful in facilitating understanding and empathy between you, maybe in a single session. (Find one at Mediate.com.)

If mediation isn't an option, there's still a DIY approach: Explain the science on theory of mind and the notion of doing things simply to make your partner happy (even if you find their desires a bit crackers). This might help your husband be more motivated to come around in ways you need, showing you he's making an effort, best he can. This, in turn, could help you break with the past and the resentful feelings that went with -- releasing them into the wild like Sea World's orcas into the ocean: "Bye, Shamu! Bye, Bruce! Bye, Carla!"

For pages and pages of "science-help" from me, buy my latest book, "Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence." It lays out the PROCESS of transforming to live w/confidence.