From NPR, this is Hidden Brain, I'm Shankar Vedantan.

If you had to choose a romantic partner,

would you pick someone who was equally wonderful to everyone,

including you, or someone who was especially wonderful to you?

It's a question that fascinates Lalene Anik.

I am an assistant professor at University of Virginia

in the starting school of business.

Lalene and her colleague, Ryan Hauser, ran a set of studies

to figure out if people want a partner whose equal opportunity

in their attention, or someone who reserved special treatment

for them.

What we find in the paper is people want to be treated uniquely.

The urge to be treated special was so strong

that people were willing to pay a price for it.

Take the example of a birthday message.

Imagine that your partner writes a Facebook message

that is long and beautiful.

But there's a catch. Your partner writes this sort of long,

birthday message all the time for everyone.

If this message goes to everybody, people say,

I don't want that beautiful, thoughtful message.

Just tell me one liner that says happy birthday.

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