Eco-friendly decorations adorn parts of the Quezon Memorial Circle in Quezon City ahead of Valentine's Day. The decorations are made using cut wood from previous storms. Mark Demayo, ABS-CBN News/File

MANILA — "Time heals all wounds," as the saying goes — but just how long does it really take to move on from a former romantic partner? 

A new study suggests that for some people, it could take anywhere from four to eight years to let go of a past relationship.

Such was the finding that emerged in a study conducted by Jia Chong and R. Chris Fraley of the University of Illinois, which was published in the journal "Social Psychological and Personality Science" last March.

"Results indicate that, for the average person, attachment bonds are gradually (4.18 years as a mid-point) relinquished after relationship termination," the authors wrote in the study's abstract. "People’s former partners simply become someone they used to know."

This means that for some people, it can take around four years to reach "a point at which they are halfway to relinquishing" their attachment to a former partner, indicating that emotional bonds with past partners do not immediately fade completely.

The study challenges the idea that emotional recovery from a romantic split is a quick process, the authors noted, highlighting that it can can take several years for individuals to fully detach from their former partners.

"It has been commonly assumed that people recover relatively quickly after a romantic loss such that they are expected to return to their usual daily functioning soon afterward," they said. 

"But these data suggest that the ex-partner still plays a significant role in attachment dynamics, even if a subtle one, long after the relationship ends."

In conducting their study, Chong and Fraley sought to look into what happens to an individual's "attachment bond" after the end of a relationship. 

The researchers recruited 328 participants who had been with their ex-partner for about 4.6 years and broke up around five years prior to answering the study's survey, which asked them to rate certain characteristics or feelings about both their ex-partner and a stranger.

The authors also identified several factors that contribute to continued attachment to former partners, including ongoing contact and shared parenthood.

"Overall, people who were in contact with their ex-partners were more likely to continue using that person for attachment-related functions," they wrote.

"We also examined whether people had children with their ex-partners. Those who had children with their ex-partners tended to start with higher levels of attachment to their ex-partners, but those levels decayed faster compared with people who did not have children with their ex-partners," they added.

The research also found that gender did not play a role in continued attachment to former partners. Moreover, individuals who "desire to continue the relationship" were more likely to remain emotionally attached.