Fatuous love: what it is and how it affects us according to Sternberg

Not only poets and playwrights talk about love. Many researchers in the field of psychology have tried to explain this feeling. In the course of the last century, different theories have appeared that try to explain love in a rational way.

Love is a universal emotion, but it is one of the most complex, it would seem that no two people love in the same way, and these differences are often a source of conflict between people. Although love also causes internal psychic problems.

In 1986, the American psychologist Robert Stenberg proposed the triangular theory of love. According to Stenberg's triangular theory, the three characteristic elements of love are: passion, intimacy and commitment, and the different types of relationships arise from the different combinations that occur between they. In this article we will talk about fatuous love, a type of relationship that arises from passion and commitment, but where there is no intimacy.

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What is fatuous love?

Fatuous love is a form of love that Stenberg describes as immature. In this type of love, commitment and passion occur, but not intimacy. Normally, they are lightning courtships in which passion motivates a commitment, but there is no stabilizing influence of intimacy, so the relationship does not last over time. They are usually very impulsive couples.

The focus in the relationship is on the physical attractiveness of the person you love, which outweighs other personality characteristics. Not having a deep foundation, a person can feel in love this way about different people and at different times. According to Stenberg, fatuous love is a feeling similar to falling in love, which appears as something chemical and irrational and does not respond to the passage of time and the intimacy that arises in the course of the relationship.

Fatuous love, also known as mad love, is the kind of impulsive romance we see in great romantic tragedies. It is the passion that dominates and this cannot be controlled. In this type of love, the other person is treated as a perfect being -almost divine-, but this appreciation is not real. The other is more an object of our love, that a person exists with all the complexities and flaws of it. There is no commitment to last more than a fleeting moment, since it is the infatuation that sustains the relationship.

Fatuous love has no depth or real substance, since it is a frivolous whim of a couple or romance, not there is the concept of commitment, necessary to maintain any type of relationship, be it romantic or not. True love stories have a stability and closeness that is built over time and with will and is not seen in relationships dominated by illusions.

The person involved in this type of relationship dominated by illusions seems to have never experienced the real world - or refuses to do so. There could be different psychological problems, so a person is always involved in relationships unreal, such as Peter Pan syndrome or other conditions characterized by immaturity emotional. Although also the fear of abandonment or other types of consequences derived from past experiences can make us opt for a lack of commitment in relationships.

This type of love is common in adolescents, since they have not grown enough to have a mature judgment and idealization is enhanced by the shot of hormones produced by the person loved.

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The triangle theory of love

As we have seen, psychologist Robert Sternberg's theory describes love types based on three different scales: intimacy, passion and commitment. The interaction of these three elements gives rise to the different forms of love of a romantic nature.

The three components form the triangle-shaped metaphor that is used to describe love and gives the theory its name. The different components display different characteristics of love, and when all are present, true love can exist. Let's see what these features are:

Privacy

Privacy and intimacy are related to the feelings that generate warmth in a love relationship. Privacy relates to the space between people, and intimacy relates to the connection between people.

Passion

Passion is what causes attraction, sexual desire and is responsible for the beginning of love relationships that we know in our culture and time. The passion component of a love relationship encompasses all the motivations and other forms of arousal involved in the experience of passionate romance.

Commitment

Deciding to love someone and committing to a relationship are both parts of the decision/commitment component, but they may not occur together. The decision component has to do with the determination, in the short term or present, that one loves another person. The commitment component has to do with a long-term decision to stay in love..

As we can see, these two aspects of decision/commitment are different things and they do not have to be connected, one can decide to love someone (now) without being committed to a long-term relationship, or one can commit to a relationship without really deciding that she loves her partner.

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The other forms of love according to the triangular theory

The importance of the components of love can change from relationship to relationship, and even over time, within the same relationship. All three parts work together in a relationship: for example, more commitment can lead to more intimacy or passion, and more intimacy can lead to more passion or commitment. Components are generally separate entities, but they influence each other. Different types of love can be generated by focusing on specific combinations of the parts.

On the other hand, there are seven combinations of the three elements of love: passion, intimacy and commitment, the presence of one component or the combination of two or more components create different experiences loving. And although none of them are true cases by themselves, they do serve to describe the type of relationships and their characteristics. In addition to fatuous love, let's see what forms of love exist:

1. Friendship

• Components: Taste

In the kind of love called friendship, intimacy is the main affective component. This means that there is no passion or physical attraction between people, and there is usually no long-term stipulated commitment between the two members of the couple to stay together or make a life together, only affection.

2. infatuation

• Components: Passion

Passion by itself does not indicate the formalization of a relationship. In fact, many people fall in love at first sight, without knowing the other person very well. Infatuation applies when there is passion present, but there is no commitment or intimacy. It is more of a conquest.

3. empty love

• Components: Commitment

When two people commit to being together, but there is no passion between them, no good communication, and sometimes not even intimacy, it is called empty love. Only commitment is present, and sometimes the couple is only interested in being together to comply with social norms or not being alone.

4. Romantic love

• Components: Intimacy and passion

Romantic love is the tragic love we see in the movies, when two people have an intimate connection, there is passion between them, but there is no long-term commitment to be together, either due to circumstances or because one of the two members of the couple does not want to continue with the relationship.

5. Companion or sociable love

• Components: Taste and Intimacy

Some couples have a pleasurable and satisfying relationship because they have been together for a long time, despite no longer having sexual passion or desire for each other. They are engaged, they are intimate, they may even have children, in this case: their love, their history together, is what sustains the relationship. This is called social love and it happens in many marriages.

6. consummate love

• Components: Intimacy, passion and commitment

Only a few people are able to maintain the passion, commitment, and intimacy in their relationship. the consummate love It is the love that arises when these three elements are maintained over time, despite the possible challenges that arise in the course of the relationship.

conclusion

According to the triangular theory of love, there are three essential components: intimacy, passion, and commitment that make up the different forms of romantic relationships. All three components are necessary to form a healthy couple, but the amount of each component What a relationship needs can change from one person to another, or within the same relationship.

Knowing how the three parts work can help identify areas of the couple's relationship that need improvement or also discover internal problems. For example, if you realize that most of your relationships are of the fatuous love type and only are based on the initial spark, there may be an underlying emotional problem that needs attention.