2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44
Ask someone what love is, and he is unlikely to be able to express it in words. The nature of the origin of love is also difficult to comprehend. Why can we experience it for one person, but not for another? Someone believes that it depends on chance or fate, others are sure that the point is in pheromones. And what psychologists think about this - read our article.
What is love made of
Psychologist Robert Sternberg proposes a theory that love has three essential components: intimacy, passion, and commitment.
- Intimacy - this is closeness and mutual support, partnership. It increases as the lovers draw closer and may not manifest itself in a calm, measured life. However, in a crisis situation, when a couple has to overcome difficulties together, it is clearly expressed.
- Passion is a feeling of sexual attraction. It culminates in the beginning of a relationship, but stops growing in long-term relationships. However, this does not mean that passion is absent in a long marriage - it just ceases to be an important motivator for a couple.
- Commitments - willingness to remain faithful to another person. This is the only component of love that grows over time in any relationship - both long-term and short-term - and becomes an increasingly significant aspect.
Kinds of love
Depending on whether these components are present in the relationship, Sternberg identifies seven types of love.
1. Sympathy. Includes only one component - intimacy. There is spiritual closeness, a feeling of tenderness, attachment to a person, but there is no passion and devotion.
2. Obsession. There is passion, but there is no intimacy and commitment. As a rule, passion arises very quickly and passes just as quickly. This is the same love at first sight, which can remain a fleeting passion, or maybe develop into something more.
3. Empty love. There are mutual obligations, but there is no passion and intimacy. This is love by calculation (not monetary, of course), when a person judiciously, having weighed all the pros and cons, decides to remain faithful to his partner. This kind of love is typical for married couples who have lived together for a long time and have lost emotional and physical attraction to each other, but retained a warm relationship.
4. Romantic love. Intimacy and passion are characteristic, but there is no devotion. Relationships are similar to sympathy, however, in addition to emotional closeness, there is a physical attraction to a partner. This kind of love constantly pops up in the form of a plot in literature and cinema (both in the classic play "Romeo and Juliet", and in popular ladies' novels).
5. Companionable love. A combination of intimacy and commitment. Passion is gone or never was. This love binds relatives, friends or spouses when the passion has passed.
6. Pointless love. An unusual combination of passion and devotion to a partner, but there is no spiritual intimacy with him. Such relationships often turn into a hasty marriage when the couple decides to get married on almost a second date. However, if intimacy does not increase over time, such a marriage ends in divorce.
7. Perfect love. Includes all three components: passion, intimacy, dedication. All couples strive for such a relationship. And they can be achieved, but it is very difficult to maintain. This kind of love is never long. This does not mean that the relationship ends in a breakup, it just loses one of the components, and ideal love transforms into another kind, for example, companionable or empty.
What is needed for the emergence of mutual love
Psychologist Elaine Hatfield, as a result of her research, came to the conclusion that in order for love to arise - mutual, bringing joy and satisfaction, or unrequited, leading to despair and depression - there must be three factors:
1. The right time. There must be (ideally, both) a willingness to fall in love with another person.
2. Similarity. It is no secret that people sympathize with those who are similar to themselves, and not only externally, but also internally - they have similar interests, hobbies, attachments.
3. Early attachment style. It depends on the personality traits of each. A calm, balanced person is more capable of long-term relationships than an impulsive and impulsive person.
Psychologists strive to understand the nature of love, but at present it is unlikely that at least one of them will be able to answer the question of why and how this feeling appears. But the phenomenon of love certainly needs to be studied. After all, if you understand the patterns of this feeling, then the reasons for unsuccessful relationships will become clear, which can be avoided in the future.
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