Getting involved with a new relationship, intimate or not, can be fraught with potential traps. Consider the situation of Nicole. She is venturing back out into the dating world after her last serious relationship ended, more with a whimper than a bang. She’s worried about who or what she may find out there, but she doesn’t want to be lonely either.

A friend introduces Nicole to Steve, a neighbor who also became single recently. It seems as though the two of them should be a good match, at least in theory. After a few dates, Nicole finds herself bothered by a few of Steve’s quirks. He’s made some comments that leave her puzzled, he rarely asks her any questions about her own life, and some of his stories sound too good to be true. On the other hand, she has fun with him, and he’s not too bad looking, either.

The quirks that are making Nicole uncomfortable make her wonder whether these are more than just oddities in Steve’s behavior. He made a few comments that caused her to question whether his worldview and hers are ever going to mesh. She’s been around the block enough to know that everyone has their issues, including herself. But should she worry about this? Maybe his pluses outweigh these minuses.

According to a 2018 study by Bastyr University’s James McDonald and colleagues (2018), Nicole might want to pay attention to the negatives. Basing their work on married heterosexual couples, the authors note the preponderance of evidence supporting alignment in basic values as an important contribution to harmonious relationships. The “interdependent value........

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