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Psychological
Theories of Love: What is Love?


Psychological Theories of Love: What is Love?

I love you. What does this phase mean? Browning (1845) a great poetess wrote,
How do I love thee, let me count the ways (number 43). Love is the most captivating and fascinating
topic in existence (Huxley, 1960). Are
there multiple secular meanings for this word? There are various
different theories of love by way of Fromm (1956), Rubin (1970),
Hatfield (1978), Sternberg (1987) and (Silberman, 1995).
The greatest barrier to the examination of love is the lack of consensus on a clear definition of the word or concept
(Siberman, p. 17). Unfortunately, love can become subjective in its definition from person to person (Hairston,
2001). If there are indeed multiple definitions for love, then whose description is correct?
Does love have a standard or principle that is universal? Within Christianity "God is Love."
Lee (1973) discusses various types of love, such as philo[1], eros[2], agape[3], and storge[4] (p. 1). The purpose of this paper is to address
various psychological theories of love. Through the discussion of these theories and the theorists who
produce them, definitions that describe what love is are expected to surface.
D. L. Jeffrey, in 14^th
century England, called love the bond that holds society together. He
also states that relationships formalized by verbal bonds create
healthy societies. Social ills and personal sin, are self-directed, and
have societal costs. According to Fromm (1956), there is an "Art of
Loving" that can be broken down into facets specific to the individual
in the relationship. Rubin’s (1970) work, the Measurement of Romantic
Love created a description of love in heterosexual relationships based on the difference that exists between liking and
loving someone. He stresses that liking another individual deals with respect as an approving
assessment, while having similar personality traits. He characterized three elements to describe love,
which are attachment,[5] caring,[6], and intimacy[7](Rubin, 1970). According
to Rubin, what causes liking to be different from loving, is its stress
on appraising the other person. A person likes another only if he or
she perceives the person as cognitively and morally worth his or her
respect. Rubin states there is a difference between liking and loving
someone (Rubin, 1970). This
difference became the catalyst for Rubin’s research. The end result of
his research produced scales measuring the differences between love and
liking, which provided support for his theory. Rubin’s concept focuses on the identification of components that cause specific
labels to emerge in romantic love relationships. While
he was successful with classifying couples relationships (liking vs.
loving), Rubin did not explore the initiation process of how couples
began the process of liking or loving, and he gave no further
information regarding the maintenance of a love relationship.
In Hatfield’s (1978) book, A New Look at Love, she separates passionate love from companionate
love. Hatfield
describes passionate love as a state of intense longing for the union
with another, and companionate love as the affection felt for those
with whom our lives are deeply entwined (Hatfield & Walster, 1978).
Hatfield has dedicated a great deal of her professional career to the investigation of passionate love (Livermore,
1993). Most passionate love situations will end with the couple’s break-up (Hatfield & Walster,
1978). Passion can transform into the companionate love, which means passion turns into friendship. Hatfield
believed that the simultaneous existence of passionate love and companionate love may be impossible. While

she identified how couples possess passionate love, Hatfield did not
seek to understand the beginning or sustenance of this type of love. There is an assumption in
Hatfield’s work that the death of passionate love in relationships is
inevitable. Without research to discover if its survival is possible,
her assumption causes couples to expect the death of passionate love in
the relationship without utilizing tools for its survival and ability
to thrive.
Sternberg
(1987) portrays love from three components: intimacy, commitment, and
passion. In defining these elements, the strength and combination of
these variables describe how the potency, of demonstrated and received
love is given. Intimacy is defined as an emotional investment. Passion
is identified with motivational involvement, the intensity behind the
motivation that encompasses romance, physical attraction, and sexual
consummation. Sternberg identifies decision/commitment as to whether it
is short- or long-term, a cognitive choice made by the individual to
remain committed in the relationship. Below is a chart of Sternberg’s three components to illustrate
the various types of love (Answer.com, 2007):






Sternberg’s description of intimacy, passion, and decision/commitment includes how
each component operates together and separate from one another. He
classifies seven different kinds of love through the separation and
combination of the three components. For example, intimacy and passion
together without decision/commitment is defined as romantic love. The
categorization of the different kind of loves allows individuals to
understand and communicate the types of emotional behaviors that are
being expressed. The last form of love, consummate love[1], is the love that is also called the complete
love. Sternberg gave the components as to what produces a more complete form of love without indicating
how to perpetuate it. He cautions that maintaining a consummate loving relationship can be more difficult
than achieving it. He stresses the importance of translating the components of love into action (1987,
p. 341).
Acker and Davis (1992) wrote Intimacy,
passion, and commitment in adult romantic relationship: A test of the Triangular Theory of Love, to test Sternberg’s
(1986) predictions. At the time this study emerged, there was a major shift in the focus of research that
moved towards heterosexual relationships. Acker and Davis argued that in Sternberg’s study, areas
that were not approached left gaps and important questions unanswered. For
instance, research conducted on love or relationships at a university
uses undergraduate and graduate students whose ages range from 18-28
years of age as the sample population; they are clearly not
representative of the general population. In the Triangular
Theory of Love, it is suggested that commitment speeds up as intimacy grows, and intimacy is suggested to decline over
time; however, the specific time frame that it takes for this process to occur is unidentified.
In
the Acker and Davis’ study, a questionnaire was administered to 204
adults to evaluate several constructs. The constructs characterized by
Sternberg (1986) as reflecting a loving relationship included intimacy,
passion, and commitment. The questionnaire incorporated Sternberg’s Triangular Love Scale and the following four sections:
background, behavioral measures, satisfaction, and love measures. Various
kinds of adult relationships were assessed. The assessment included
couples who were dating, engaged, newlyweds, and in seasoned marriages.
The participants’ ages ranged from 18-68 years with a mean age of 38.3,
and with 65% of them married.
Acker and Davis’ (1992) test results indicated that the self reported levels
of commitment were higher for the respondents in more serious (married vs. unmarried) relationships (p. 24). Sternberg’s

prediction of the decline of intimacy within females was confirmed,
although intimacy levels did not generally display the predicted
decline for lengthier relationships. An interesting finding emerged in this study concerning
commitment. Commitment was the most influential and reliable predictor of relationship satisfaction, predominately
among more seasoned couples. Other findings from this research were inconclusive and could not discern
more effective or significant answers to unanswered questions through the used psychometric measures.
In Sternberg, Hojjat, & Barnes’s (2001) article, the Empirical tests of aspects of a
theory of love as a story, a theory was developed suggesting that love is based upon an individual’s
personal experience. This
research questions whether love is subjectively defined by the
individual who experiences it through his/her own description; in
addition, if there is a high correlation between the male’s and
female’s definition of love, then, is there an increased probability of
having a more satisfying relationship?
An individual’s definition of love can come from primary and secondary resources. For example,
a primary resource identifies personal encounters in life with parents or an intimate partner of their own. The

definition the individual establishes as a story of love can also stem
from secondary resources such as the movies, television, and fictional
books. These secondary resources combined with the primary resources
eventually produce expectations for the demonstration of love in a
relationship. These demonstrations represent the specific love schema
or love story.
According to this theory of love, people evolve as a result of the interaction between their personality
and their experiences/stories of what they believe loving relationships should be (Rosch, 1978). Twenty-five
archetypes were outlined from a
105 sample size population consisting of 55 females and 50 males
with a mean age of 19. The archetypes that were identified developed into specific narratives of stories
such as: addiction, mystery, police, travel, fantasy, garden, etc. For
example, Sternberg, Hojjat, & Barnes (2001) described an addiction
story as a person who believed that if their partner were to leave
them; their life would be completely empty. Another example is a game story, which is described as a person who viewed the relationship
as a game; the uncertainty of winning or losing is part of the excitement of the game (p. 6).
It
should be noted that some stories had more longevity within the
relationship, based upon the definition of the story. Individuals who
define love through a garden story believe that the relationship is
attainable only if one is willing to spend the time and energy to care
for it, just as you need to care for a garden (p. 6).
A garden love story has a higher probability to have an increased longevity within the relationship in comparison to
a theatre love story (p. 7). The
theatre love story is based upon one of two different types of
individuals who believe that he/she is an actor in a play that creates
their own unique surprise ending, or a fan who has a sense of drama
about themselves, like actors in a play. The theatre love story can have a higher probability to have a
decreased longevity. Regardless of the story, people seek and find the most success through a partner whose
story corresponds more closely with their own.
Sternberg, Hojjat, & Barnes (2001) theory is dedicated to capturing people’s subjective
ways of conceptualizing love. The
emphasis in this theory is on the content of the story; however, this
quantitative research project only measured the attitudes towards the
different story schemas. It did not focus on self-discovery of the
stories. The closer the two individual’s subjective stories are alike,
the more gratification received during the relationship (Byrne, 1971). The satisfaction within the relationship is not based upon whether the
two individuals’ love stories are fantasy or rooted in a game theme, but whether their definition of love agrees or
complement each others. Results
indicated that the more the couples individual and subjective love
stories match each other there is a .65 (p<0.001) significance as
predicted for satisfaction, and depending on the type of story,
increased longevity within the relationship.

D.L. Jeffrey, in 14^th
century England, Fromm (1956), Rubin (1970), Hatfield (1978), and
Sternberg (1987) each describe important principles and ingredients
that are a part of love. Although each theorist has information to
identify love from his/her research, love still remains subjectively
defined from country to country, and from person to person.
Maybe Sternberg, Hojjat, & Barnes’s (2001) said it best: love is a subjective story that is defined by the
people who are involved, through the eyes of their history and how that history collides with today.

References:
Acker, M.,
& Davis, M.H. (1992). Intimacy, passion, and commitment in adult relationship: A test of the Triangular
Theory of Love. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, Vol. 9, 21-50.
Answer.com
(2007). Definition of love. [online] Retrieved on April 17, 2007 at [ندعوك للتسجيل في المنتدى أو التعريف بنفسك لمعاينة هذا الرابط]
Browning, E,B. (1845). Sonnets from the Portuguese: A celebration
of love. Martin: New York.
Byrne, D. (1971). The attraction paradigm.
Academic: New York.
Fromm, E. (1956).
The art of loving. New York: Harper Row.
Hairston, R.E. (2001). Predicting
marital satisfaction among African American couples.


The Science & Engineering, Vol 61(10-B). 5564.
Hatfield,
E., & Walster, G.W. (1978). A new look at love. Chicago: Addison.
Huxley, J.
(1960). Knowledge, morality, and destiny. New York: Ventura Pacific.
Lee, J. (1973). The color wheel model of love. Chicago:
Addison.
Livermore, B. (1993). Lessons of love.
Psychology Today, Mar/Apr 93.
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English spirituality in the age of Wycliffe.

Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans.
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Mooore TE (ed.) Academic:
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Unpublished dissertation, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ.
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of love as a story. European Journal of Personality Vol. 15, 199-218.



[1] Brotherly love

[2] Sexual love-loving an ideal person

[3] Selfless love-God is an example of this type of love

[4] Parental love

[5] the need to be cared for and be with the other person

[6] valuing the other persons happiness and needs as much as your
own

[7] sharing private thoughts, feelings, and desires with
the other person
[1] Love that contains intimacy, commitment,
and passion as defined by Robert Sternberg in his Triangular Theory of Love