How do I love thee? Which of the nine ways?
UK researchers in the British Journal of Social Psychology in early June claimed to have identified nine varieties of love. Only 9? It sounds all so scientific (after all, it was published in a journal!). …
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I am sure that the UK researchers are not claiming to have established all possible varieties of love. The researchers must have had statistically significant results even in a sample of 50 people to be able to publish in the journal, which points to the fact that there may be a significant pattern worth pursuing in future research. It is clearly a initial study, which merits replication among different samples, including cross-cultural samples. Obviously, the editor of the British journal of social psychology and its reviewers agreed that this study was important enough to publish. It is unnecessary and unprofessional for any writer to demean the hard work of other scientists and use terms such as “supposedly”, especially without due cause. It is sufficient to state that it is a preliminary study meriting further research if you are bothering to write about it at all. Reporting psychological science is not about sharing your subjective pre-conceived notions. It is about sharing the latest developments and FACTS!
Certainly there are varying qualities of studies that get published in journals. Just because a study gets published in a peer-reviewed journal doesn’t mean it’s a quality study (sorry). That’s why critics of meta-analyses complain — comparing poor studies with strong methodological studies muddies the waters and suggests all studies are created equally (nothing could be farther from the truth).
You can’t do a reliable factor analysis with a subject pool of 50. You can do an interesting exploratory study, but the results are insignificant (no matter what the statistics say — poorly design statistics can still give you strong statistical results, a common malady in social science research). If I got another group of 50 subjects, it’s just as likely I would’ve identified a different set of 8, 9, 10 or 20 “varieties of love.” With such a small subject pool, you can’t really say anything about the data you found. Of course, that doesn’t stop researchers making unsupported claims.
Sorry, this is called criticism and researchers can expect it when they publish junk science. I call it like I see it.
Hear! Hear! Doc….junk science it IS…and it is making a mess of our collective ability to think critically and clearly. I suspect it is a function of a “need to be published” and a “need for something to publish”….oh well….just something for us to keep an eye on, eh?
I can’t comment much because I myself am not a psychologist, but from my opinion, first of all, I believe the descriptions of each kind of love can be more specific to how the researchers interpreted it. Also, I don’t believe love has that many varieties; all emotions deriving of the label of “love” all are connected and branched together in a certain way, and not so diversely.
Love is a very hard subject to do “research” upon for everyone has a different interpretation of the word “love” and noone’s going to change that but they themselves for however they think is true to them.
This report is probably best clarified as research done on the different interpretations of love. However, even that can be narrowed down to much less than 9 different categories depending on your method of categorization.
For example: Conditional and Unconditional Love. Love can fit into those two categories just fine for everyone. Don’t know what conditional or unconditional means? Look it up on dictionary.com, you’ll understand just fine.
But if you wanted to be more specific, for example, to categorize by relationships with different kinds of people, (this categorization being more on the interpretation of love than love itself), the following are probably possible:
Paternal/Filial/Fraternal/etc/between close friends kind of love. This kind of love, while not always the same, are very similar. Between two friends, if there were really to be “love”, then it is most likely from a mutual dependence and I can detail on that but I’m a bit too lazy right now to add details. With a Paternal/Filial relationship, it is similar, for the child will be dependent upon the parent, and in a sense, with more deeper psychology of the mind, the parent is also dependent upon the child, but again, I don’t feel like going into details.
With the whole “blind passion” thing where people say “Love at first sight” is definitely a different kind of interpretation, probably better defined as a strong attraction rather than “love”. Love at first sight isn’t impossible, I suppose, but probably highly unlikely, but then again, that is derived from my personal opinion. Well either way, this kind of love is a form of attraction.
Those are only a few examples… but I actually don’t feel like going on considering the last post posted here before mine was in 2005… not to mention I’m very tired, and so, I shall leave you with that… I just felt like I should leave a comment for I felt it was a fascinating subject. For people who actually bothered to read it, I thank you for your courtesy and if you feel like something I said should be criticized, that is warmly welcomed… Thank you =]
I have to say, as an aspiring psychologist, I am impressed with the latest interpretation of the article. I feel you really went deep into the article and ripped it apart! Well done!
For someone who said they are not a psychologist, you seemed to have a complex understanding.
And further more, I have to agree with you!