Essay should be approximately two or three double space pages
Please answer one of the below questions.
Please use readings assigned.
When using information from the readings, don’t forget to cite them by giving authors and year. With quotes add page number. However, no outside material should be used for this essay.
1) Given your understanding of the research literature on romantic love, provide a definition of what emotions, cognitions, and behaviors should be included in the construct. In other words, what combinations of variables provide the most comprehensive and convincing definition of love? This isn’t what you might want out of love but the full spectrum of variables, that a researcher might use to define it for everyone. How is it superior to the definitions currently being used?
2) Sometimes negative arousal is a facilitator for initiating a relationship, why might this be the case? What does this imply about what we might hope that love and intimacy might provide? How might these facilitators affect partner choice and the course of the relationship? How might they apply and not apply to ‘hooking up”, “friends with benefits’
and “open relationships”?
3) Are we biologically and socially engineered for love and attachment? Why might this be fortunate and sometimes unfortunate for individuals and society in general. (Earlier readings in particularly those on separation and divorce might be helpful.) How might this concept apply to three of the following areas: cohabitations, remarriage, ‘hooking up”, “friends with benefits’ and “open relationships” ?
Hazan, C., & Shaver, P. (1987). Romantic love conceptualized as an attachment process. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52, 511-524.
Acevedo, B. P., Aron, A., Fisher, H. E., & Brown, L. L. (2012). Neural correlates of long-term intense romantic love. Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, 7(2), 145–159. http://doi.org/10.1093/scan/nsq092
Jacobs J. (1992). Facilitators of romantic attraction and their relation to love styles. Social Behavior and
Personality, 25(2) 227-233.
Garcia, J.R., Reiber, C., Massey, S.G., Meriwether, A.M. (2013). Sexual Hookup Culture: A Review. National Library of Medicine. http://doi.org/10.1037/a0027911
Copen CE, Daniels K, Mosher WD. (2013) First premarital cohabitation in the United States: 2006–2010 National Survey of Family Growth. National health statistics reports; no 64. Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics.
