The meaning and effects of one’s ecology should change across life. But how, and why? The target article offers novel and compelling answers to both questions. This is laudable. Yet, this raises a deeper question: what does it mean to think about “ecology”? We offer a potential substitute concept. And perhaps shoot our own foot in the process.

Ko and Neuberg conceptualize ecological affordances as life-stage-dependent opportunities and threats for goal attainment. We extend their framework by highlighting the role of personality traits in affordance enactment, showing that enduring dispositions shape how individuals respond to affordances, even as developmental goals change. Integrating trait development and life-history processes reveals complementary pathways for person-environment interactions across the life span. This perspective advances Ko and Neuberg’s framework by linking functional, goal-driven accounts with systematic individual differences.

Ko and Neuberg introduce a framework for understanding how ecological affordances are perceived. I suggest that a broad conception of “perception” conflates distinct phenomena in a way that can limit our understanding of ecological affordances. Distinguishing between these phenomena can prevent a conceptual jingle fallacy and facilitate our understanding of how the mind evolved to represent and manage ecological challenges.

Ko and Neuberg usefully integrate ecological affordance management with life history theory into a framework for goal prioritization across life stages. Here, I draw on some of my earlier work on life history complexity and extend their framework beyond humans to animal life histories, where similar trade-offs and adaptations occur.

I argue that personality may serve as a viable mediator for Ko & Neuberg’s adaptive ecological affordances theory. HEXACO data shows that there are reliable differences in personality that match different adaptive goals and affordances across the lifespan. Personality can help test and explain adaptive links between environmental factors and individual differences in perception, motivation, and behavior across the lifespan.

Ko and Neuberg’s proposed framework – that ecological affordances depend on life-stage and sex-specific goals of the individual – has implications for life stages beyond those discussed in the target article. We extend this framework to older adults, illustrating how this life stage may display different patterns of between-sex variation in the ecological affordances posed by physical violence, pathogen prevalence, and sex-age ratio.

Twenty-nine commentaries suggest refinements offering greater conceptual granularity; empirical extensions across additional life stages/phases, ecologies, and species; mechanistic proposals; and meta-theoretical reflections. Collectively, they underscore broad consensus on the value of an affordance management approach grounded in life-history logic for understanding human–environment interaction, and they highlight the importance of lifelong flexibility in how individuals perceive and manage ecological affordances.

Recent research challenges the common belief that romantic relationships matter more to women than men. Using insights from the interdisciplinary literature on mixed-gender relationships, we propose that relative to women, men (a) expect more benefits from relationships and strive for a partner more strongly, (b) gain more mental and physical health benefits from romantic involvement, (c) are less likely to initiate breakups, and (d) suffer more from relationship dissolution. We argue that these differences largely stem from differences between men and women in available intimacy and emotional support. We discuss implications for friendships, emphasizing the importance of cross-gender friendships.

Through placing emotional dependency within the framework of gendered social roles, structural injustices, and disparities in mental health, this commentary critically examines the assertion that romantic relationships are more significant to men than to women. In order to improve the psychological and cultural depth of the findings, it questions the target article’s Western-centric orientation and promotes the inclusion of non-Western and socioeconomically diverse perspectives.

Romantic relationships may matter more to men on average, but such gender differences are far from static. We commend Wahring et al. for their integrative framework and urge future research to consider age-graded, history-graded, and individually graded factors. Taking these contextual factors into account will improve our understanding of how romantic relationships matter across diverse life courses.

Wahring et al. demonstrate that men depend more on romantic relationships than women, contradicting conventional wisdom. The Tie-Up Theory explains this through fundamental asymmetries in bonding systems: men’s receptive emotional area channels emotional needs primarily toward romantic partners, while women’s active emotional area enables spontaneous emotional connections across multiple relationships. This biobehavioral architecture, not mere socialization, explains men’s greater relationship striving, health benefits from partnership, reluctance to initiate breakups, and severe post-dissolution suffering.

Wahring et al. argue relationships matter more to men than women due to cultural and biological evolutionary pressures, though the latter may benefit from incorporating Error Management Theory. This predicts (i) men evolved to overperceive female sexual interest and (ii) women evolved to be skeptical of male commitment; potentially explaining why men likely form relationships and women likely terminate them.

The important empirical claims provided by the authors do not support their conclusion that men are more romantic than women. Contrarily, these features make men’s attitude toward love more superficial and less romantic than the female approach. Being romantic does not involve merely intense sexual desire, but more so, calmness and the ability to act slowly and profoundly.

Wahring, Simpson, and Van Lange’s model is well-argued but underspecifies the psychological processes contributing to men’s relationship maintenance behaviors. Extending their model to the realm of moral cognition, we propose that men utilize partner-serving moral double standards to excuse their female partners’ everyday relationship transgressions. Such hypercrisy helps men to sustain romantic relationships from which they benefit more than women do.

The target article suggests that romantic relationships matter more to men than women. I discuss the work of West, Popp, and Kenny (2008), suggesting that properly testing for hypothesized sex differences requires gay and lesbian couples to serve as reference groups. A modified actor-partner interdependence model (APIM) can then test if relationships matter more to men in relationships (i.e., straight and gay) or matter more to people in relationships with women (i.e., straight men or lesbians).

In their target article, Wahring et al. present compelling evidence that romantic relationships may matter more to men than women, but their explanations remain largely proximate. We offer alternative evolutionary interpretations of the observed sex differences in falling in love, breakup initiation, remarriage, and mortality outside of relationships. We argue that these patterns better reflect sex-differentiated mating strategies, social alliance formation, vulnerabilities to singlehood, and the greater importance of female survival for offspring survival and hence for their reproductive success.

We argue that early parenthood temporarily reverses the relationship interdependence patterns described by Wahring et al. Western mothers typically rely on partner support as new caregiving demands restrict their access to external support networks. What begins as heightened maternal dependence sets in motion gendered role divisions that crystallize over time, ultimately allowing men to derive greater benefits from romantic relationships.

Heterogeneity in romantic relationship research highlights the need for research exploring how factors such as cultural contexts and socialized norms influence benefits differentially experienced by people of any gender: Both benefits and costs should be assessed. Understanding the burdens of roles generally assumed by women can promote social change to decrease gendered disparities and to improve romantic relationships.

Men’s support deficits explain gender differences classically associated with parental investment theory. That is, men may have sex on their minds not because the costs are low, but because sex is a primary route for constructing something profound that they lack: an emotionally fulfilling relationship. The breadth of findings consistent with the support-deficit explanation has made it the parsimonious one.

Wahring et al. highlight gender differences in romantic relationships, attributing them to disparities in social support. We propose that cognitive mechanisms – particularly autobiographical memory – also contribute. Superior emotional memory in women may not only foster relational insight but also facilitate emotional detachment, whereas weaker emotional memory in men may hinder processing, exacerbating distress post-breakup. Integrating memory research offers a complementary lens on romantic attachment and dissolution.