Conceptualizing and defining romantic love

Abstract

Two studies investigated how individuals conceptualize romantic love using the Love Word Conceptualization Survey to examine how strongly 119 emotions, behaviors, and attitudes were associated with romantic love. Study 1 had 54 participants and study 2 had 320 participants. The results of both studies suggest that individuals mainly associate positive attributes with romantic love and are less likely to associate negative attributes with it. Furthermore, quality communication and nurturing physical behaviors appear to be key components of how individuals conceptualize romantic love. Principal components analyses suggest that there may be a positive emotions factor of romantic love, as well as a negative emotions factor. The results are congruent with the theory that the concept of romantic love is prototypically organized.