Mutually Beneficial?

Not as passionate as pure lovers. Less traditional than the plain old "boyfriend/girlfriend" story. Certainly not as dangerous as "office romances" but definitely more tactual than "internet romances."

The infamous "Friends with Benefits" arrangement. There's a recent study and the guys seem to have found gold:

The research, conducted among Michigan State University students, confirmed previous findings that most college students report having had at least one such relationship. Although that is undoubtedly true of many couples throughout history, “friends with benefits” have become a cultural signature of today’s college and postcollege experience.

“The study really adds to the little we know about these relationships,” said Paul Mongeau, a professor of communications at Arizona State University who was not involved in the research. “One of the most interesting things I get from it,” he said, “is this sense that people in these relationships are afraid to develop feelings for the other person, because those feelings might be unreciprocated.”

In the study, appearing in the current issue of Archives of Sexual Behavior, Melissa Bisson, a former graduate student at Michigan State, and Timothy Levine, a professor in the communications department, surveyed 125 young men and women and found that 60 percent reported having had at least one friend with benefits.

One-tenth of these relationships went on to become full-scale romances, the study found. About a third stopped the sex and remained friends, and one in four eventually broke it off — the sex and the friendship. The rest continued as friends-with-benefits relationships.

I can understand the appeal of FWB. First, you already know the person so there are no awkward "making acquaintances" period. Second, because (initially) neither side desires a full-blown relationship, you're more prone to set some ground rules. Third, (kinda related to #1) because you know the person you also know their bad habits so the surprises are typically far and few between.

The downside? Other than the aforementioned "I didn't want to fall in love, but it happened anyway" factor there's the desire to keep the relationship secret amongst your circle of friends, the dreaded "first argument," and...well, the discovery that the physical "benefits" weren't as beneficial as first expected.

I don't think this practice is for everyone, but it's definitely not something to be looked down upon. After all, if the stats above are any indication, the arrangement worked for about less than a third of the people who participated in the study.