What is love
Pro Research Analysisby 
Searched over 200M research papers
Consensus Meter
Understanding Love: A Multifaceted Emotion
Defining Love in Marriage and Family
Love is a complex emotion that plays a crucial role in marriage and family life. It encompasses emotional, cognitive, and behavioral aspects that can be either mature or immature. Mature love is characterized by an environment that fosters growth and development for both partners and their dependents, while immature love includes constructs like infatuation and love addiction. Cultural beliefs about love significantly influence its expression, with dysfunctional beliefs potentially leading to negative outcomes in relationships.
Romantic Love as an Attachment Process
Romantic love can be understood through the lens of attachment theory, which posits that love forms affectional bonds similar to those between infants and their parents. These bonds are categorized into three attachment styles: secure, avoidant, and anxious/ambivalent. These styles, influenced by early childhood relationships, continue into adulthood and shape how individuals experience romantic love. Secure attachment is associated with healthier and more satisfying romantic relationships.
Measuring Romantic Love
Romantic love can be measured as an interpersonal attitude with components such as affiliative and dependent need, a predisposition to help, and an orientation of exclusiveness and absorption. Studies have shown that couples who score high on love scales tend to engage in behaviors like prolonged eye contact, indicating a deeper connection. This measurement helps differentiate love from mere liking, highlighting its unique and profound nature.
Love as a Basic Emotion
Despite its prominence in everyday life, love is often neglected in contemporary emotion theories. However, love meets the criteria for being considered a basic emotion, similar to anger, sadness, happiness, and fear. It can be seen in two forms: momentary surge love, which is a basic emotion, and relational love, which involves a bond that includes various other emotions. This dual perspective helps resolve controversies about the nature of love.
The Triangular Theory of Love
The triangular theory of love proposes that love consists of three components: intimacy, passion, and decision/commitment. The balance and strength of these components determine the type and intensity of love experienced. This theory provides a comprehensive framework for understanding different kinds of love and their impact on relationship satisfaction and stability.
Love as a Physiological Motivation
Love can also be viewed as a physiological motivation, akin to hunger, thirst, sleep, or sex. This perspective emphasizes love's essential role in human survival and development, particularly in childhood. Recognizing love as a motivation rather than an emotion could lead to better understanding and treatment of related disorders, offering new therapeutic approaches.
Love as a Linking Emotion
Romantic love can be conceptualized as a "linking emotion," capturing its multifaceted nature. This concept highlights the various dimensions of love, such as emotional, cognitive, and behavioral aspects, and how they interconnect to form a rich and complex experience. This approach helps in understanding the diverse expressions of love across different cultures and contexts.
Conclusion
Love is a multifaceted emotion that plays a vital role in human relationships. It can be understood through various lenses, including attachment theory, basic emotion theory, and physiological motivation. Each perspective offers unique insights into the nature of love, its measurement, and its impact on human behavior and relationships. Understanding these different dimensions of love can help in fostering healthier and more fulfilling relationships.
Sources and full results
Most relevant research papers on this topic