The Clark Relationship Science Laboratory, directed by Dr. Margaret S. Clark, conducts research on how romantic relationships and friendships unfold over time and the reciprocal influences between such relationships and cognition, emotion, behavior, and personality. 

Recent research in the Clark Relationship Science Laboratory has investigated how expressing negative emotions can promote relationships, how optimal relationship-maintenance behaviors change over the course of a relationship, and how merely being with a familiar person (in the absence of any overt interaction) can amplify a person’s reaction to pleasant and unpleasant stimuli.