Understanding Love, Falling in Love, and Partnership
Falling in love, being in love, love, and partnership
What actually lies behind the terms love, falling in love, being in love, infatuation, and partnership? Does online dating always lead through falling in love and infatuation to love and partnership?
Psychological studies show that this is a possible and certainly common course, but there are definitely also other developmental paths to love and partnership.
Falling in love and being in love / infatuation are processes characterized by passion. They are accompanied by idealization, unconditional devotion, excitement, and positivity. Falling in love and being in love / infatuation are characterized by an up-regulation of positive emotionality, which also leads to the idealization tendencies typical of infatuation in thinking. The attention of the person in love is selectively focused on the positive, and the commonality with the object of infatuation is experienced as unconditionally valuable. Processes of falling in love and infatuation know no boredom and no disillusionment. Falling in love and being in love are strongly emotionally anchored. Differentiated intellectual consideration or behavior-based commitment has little to do with infatuation. Falling in love means being enthusiastic, not critically analyzing. In extreme cases, people in love can even act irrationally, thereby even risking their love, which may not be directed at each other but at others.
Falling in love and infatuation make life appear in rosy colors. But this is usually only for a short time. Because the hot cognition of infatuation soon cools down, and then analytical-thoughtful processes of reflection, contemplation, and reasoning come more strongly into play again. Falling in love does not yet mean finding love. Someone who is in love has not yet found love. On the contrary, not infrequently, the end of infatuation also means the end of love before it has even begun.
But what is love? There is no simple definition of love. From a psychological perspective, love is more than a feeling. Love exists where feelings, thoughts, and actions are in congruence. Love means feeling positively for each other with high intensity, also intellectually evaluating the other person positively as a person, and deciding for them within the framework of a bond. Only when all three components are given can one speak of mature love. Falling in love and infatuation, on the other hand, only know the emotional component; in mature love, the cognitive component and the bonding component are added.
In individual cases, however, the way people love differs. The extent and intensity of their participation in the three components vary. Styles of love are diverse. However, they can be distinguished according to how strongly and consistently the emotional, cognitive, and bonding components are pronounced.
Playful love is accompanied by positive feelings and positive evaluations. However, their intensity is rather moderate, and the bonding component is lacking. A separation can therefore occur quickly. Playful love is flirtatious; infatuation and being in love may be present, but they are experienced as rather light and carefree. Their intensity is comparatively low.
Pragmatic love is based on a commitment decision and a pragmatic evaluation of a relationship as sensible. However, the emotional component is rather low. Passion does not exist.
Companionate love knows all three components, but the intensity of the love feeling is not quite as high, the cognitive evaluation is rather realistic and less idealizing, and the bonding component is not quite as strong. A pragmatically based partnership does not necessarily begin with falling in love and infatuation but can also be entered into for reasons of expediency.
In possessive love, the emotional and cognitive evaluation components fluctuate; a love-hate relationship can be the result. Strong fluctuations occur in feelings, thoughts, and regarding the security of the commitment decision. Passion can alternate with despair. Jealousy is the main characteristic of the mania of possessive love.
In self-sacrificing love, all three components are strongly pronounced, but especially the bonding component, which dominates. Here, bonding can lead to self-abandonment.
Romantic love, with its strong emotional involvement, resembles falling in love and infatuation. In the ideal case, it approaches an integrated love that, in addition to emotional life, equally includes cognition and bonding action.
Ultimately, there are no good and bad styles of love. However, relationship quality strongly depends on the individual styles of love of those involved (see also: Factors of relationship satisfaction). Incompatibilities in the way love is wanted and lived can quickly lead to partner disputes and separations. In contrast, compatibility of love styles often enables a partnership based on equal acceptance and appreciation.
Against this background, Consonance supports online dating with its psychologically based matchmaking through a matching of love styles. This way, you can find a partner who harmonizes with you regarding their way of loving, making relationship happiness possible.
