Multiple studies throughout recent years have investigated the theory of love that identified six love attitudes: Eros, Ludus, Storge, Mania, Pragma, and Agape. Research found that these love attitudes are associated with many aspects of romantic relationships, individual emotional characteristics, and personalities. However, there are few comprehensive reviews of those findings. This article reports meta-analysis and two empirical studies that explored emotional profiles of people with different love attitudes. Meta-analysis of multiple studies has demonstrated the prevalence of positive emotionality among individuals with Eros love attitudes and negative emotionality among individuals with Ludus and Mania love attitudes. Results of empirical studies showed that individuals with Ludus and Mania tend to experience more negative emotions, while those with Eros – more positive emotions. Pragma, Storge, and Agape love attitudes are characterized by infrequent and less intense positive and negative emotions. The love of individuals with Ludus and Mania types can be interpreted as defensive attitudes related to their experience of negative emotions. Generally, studies showed that Eros love attitude tends to promote an adaptive emotional experience. Individuals with Eros love have a better chance to be happy in their romantic relationships. On the other hand, Ludus and Mania are rather maladaptive love attitudes. Individuals with Ludus and Mania tend to be unhappy in relationship. Pragma, Storge, and Agape are neutral or moderately adaptive love attitudes without intense positive and negative emotions. Due to this, they do not show any salient defensive psychological mechanisms in their relationships.
The studies of love experience throughout recent decades have been widely focused on love attitudes. The Lee’s theory of love styles (
Lee proposed six love styles, or approaches to love, which are divided into three primary (Eros, Ludus, Storge) and three secondary (Mania, Pragma, Agape) styles. Although Lee described love as having primary, secondary, and even tertiary mixes, most of the research based on Lee’s approach has concentrated on six relatively independent love styles.
Based on multiple studies (e.g.,
The six love attitudes are associated with certain personal emotional traits and experiences in relationships (see for review
Research indicates that some love attitudes are accompanied by predominantly positive or negative emotions and better or worse relationship satisfaction. For example, studies on attachment styles and love attitudes have found the relationship between secure attachment and high scores on the variables of Eros and Agape and between insecure attachment and high scores on the variables of Ludus, Pragma, Storge, and Mania (e.g.,
Attitudes have adaptive functions in human mental processes and behavior (
Love can trigger positive, negative, or ambivalent emotions depending on appraisal of situation and context. People hope to experience positive emotions (elation, surprise, joy, happiness), however, they often experience negative emotions (disappointment, frustration, sadness, anger) – sometimes, they experience a mixture of both. Love attitudes as the components of appraisal can predispose men and women to expect and experience certain kind of emotions.
Based on the earlier studies summarized above, we hypothesized that Eros love attitudes being associated with many positive relationship characteristics (i.e., passion, security, commitment, affection, and intimacy) should entail largely positive emotions.
On the other hand, Ludus and Mania love attitudes being associated with many negative relationship characteristics (i.e. insecurity, narcissism, hostility, jealousy, uncertainty, and distrust) should cause the experience of many negative emotions or their mixture with positive ones.
Defense mechanisms evolve to help men and women cope with their emotional experiences. The results of other studies (e.g.,
Therefore, based on those previous studies we hypothesized that Ludus and Mania love attitudes, as the consequences of insecure attachment and negative emotional experience, play their defensive role in love relationships. On the other hand, the Eros love attitude, as the consequence of secure attachment and positive emotional experience, is conducive to adaptive approach to relationships.
Two psychological theories explain the relations between emotions and defense mechanisms. According to the
Psychological defense mechanisms are mental processes that protect an individual from emotional conflicts and unpleasant emotions, such as anxiety, fear, and frustration. Such defense mechanisms mediate negative emotional reactions of the individual to external and internal stressors (
Individual defense mechanisms in their typology characterize defense or coping styles, which can be more or less adaptive – from optimal to maladaptive (
Defense styles are characterized by specific sets of defense mechanisms. The
Based on the studies cited above and other findings (e.g.,
Assess emotional experience of individuals with different love attitudes. The hypothesis was that Ludus and Mania love attitudes are accompanied by prevalent negative emotions, while Eros – by positive ones.
Assess attachment experience of individuals with different love attitudes. The hypothesis was that Ludus and Mania love attitudes are associated with insecure attachment, while Eros – with secure attachment.
Demonstrate that the prevalent experience of negative emotions and insecure attachment (as manifestations of maladaptive experience according to
Identify the defense styles associated with these love attitudes. I hypothesized that people possessing high Ludus and Mania love attitudes employ maladaptive defense style, while those with Eros possess an adaptive style.
Meta-analysis of multiple publications reporting emotional correlates of love attitudes intended to support the Hypotheses 1 and 2. The empirical Studies 1 and 2 intended to ensure the additional convergent validity in support of these two hypotheses. These two studies also aimed to corroborate the validity of theory that certain qualities of emotional experience (positive versus negative) and different love attitudes are closely related to adaptive or maladaptive defense styles. These two empirical studies investigated these hypotheses (3 and 4) demonstrating adaptive and maladaptive functions of certain love attitudes.
Meta-analysis of findings intended to compile the constellations of emotional characteristics typical for individuals with six distinctive love attitudes. Results from multiple sources (
Emotional Characteristics | Love Attitudes |
|||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Eros | Ludus | Storge | Pragma | Mania | Agape | |
Commitment | .58 | -.32 | .14(M) | .22 | .38 | |
.46(M) | -.41 | .20(M) | .54 | |||
.49(F) | -.40(M) | .54(F) | ||||
-.34(F) | .49(F) | |||||
Responsibility | .19(M) | .19(F) | .20(M) | .21(M) | ||
.25(F) | .24(F) | |||||
Predictability | .305 | |||||
Dependability | .368 | |||||
Faith | .463 | .206 | .222 | |||
Trust | .427 | |||||
Secure Attachment | .20 | -.33 | -.24 | -.35 | .20 | |
-.16 | .13 | |||||
Anxious attachment | .52 | |||||
Avoidant attachment | -.20 | .25 | .13 | -.16 | ||
Passion | .27 | -.38 | -.34 | .36 | .53 | |
.64 |
-.28 |
.44 |
.43 |
|||
.53 | -.26(F) | .35(F) | .31(F) | |||
.42(F) | -.27(M) | .25(M) | .23(M) | |||
.46(M) | .355 | .271 | ||||
.429 | ||||||
Cognitive Love | .426 | .238 | .399 | .274 | ||
Emotional Love | .411 | .341 | .250 | |||
Behavioral Love | .324 | .216 | .357 | .386 | ||
Affection | .38(M) | -.18(M) | -.16(F) | .56(M) | .47(M) | |
.62(F) | -.29(F) | .73(F) | .56(F) | |||
Intimacy | .53 | -.38 | .39 | -.14 | .17 | .54 |
.42 | -.45 | .20 | .13 | .40 | ||
.22(F) | -.32 | .10 | .27(F) | |||
.29(M) | .40(M) | |||||
Jealousy | .34(M) | .23(F) | ||||
.43(F) | .34(F) | |||||
Narcissism | .28 | |||||
Envy | .25 | .31(M) | ||||
.33(F) | ||||||
Hostility | .17(M) | .26(M) | ||||
.21(F) | .17(F) | |||||
Ambivalence | -.24(M) | .27(F) | ||||
Uncertainty | .23(M) | .24(F) | .24(F) | |||
Viability | .37 | -.39 | .10 | -.14 | .43 | |
.22(F) | -.30(F) | .27(F) | ||||
.31(M) | ||||||
Caring | .46 | -.40 | .16 | .18 | .56 | |
.25(F) | -.32(M) | .33(F) | ||||
.34(M) | .16(M) | |||||
Kindness | .21(M) | .16(M) | .19(M) | |||
.35(F) | .17(F) | .36(F) | ||||
Politeness | .28(M) | |||||
Social Interest | -.50 | .39 | ||||
Satisfaction | .56 | -.31 | -.12 | .15 | .44 | |
.49(M) | -.60(M) | .28(F) | ||||
.51(F) | -.42(F) | .32(F) | ||||
.31(F) | -.22(F) | .21(M) | ||||
.43(M) | -.28(M) | |||||
Self-esteem | -.28(M) | |||||
-.27(F) | ||||||
Relationship contingent Self-esteem (RCSE) | .08 | -.10 | .48 | .27 | ||
Confidence | .27(M) | .21(F) | .19(M) | .17(F) | ||
.36(F) | ||||||
Shyness | .27 | .21 | ||||
Relaxation | .34(M) | .17(M) | ||||
.46(F) | ||||||
Liveliness | .23(M) | .18(F) | .24(M) | .17(M) | ||
.49(F) | .38(F) | .33(F) | ||||
Loneliness | -.19 | .19(M) | .19(F) | |||
-.44 | .25 |
Eros is a positive, secure love attitude. Individuals with this attitude are committed, responsible, affectionate, intimate, viable, caring, kind, confident, and relaxed. They are lively and satisfied with their romantic relationships and usually do not experience ambivalence and loneliness. Individuals with this love attitude have secure attachment and usually do not display avoidance behaviors. They are highly passionate and trustful.
Ludus is a negative, insecure love attitude. Individuals with this attitude are not committed, affectionate, intimate, viable, and caring. They are often not satisfied with their relationships and have low social interest. Narcissism, hostility, ambivalence (in females), and loneliness are traits that characterize these lovers. Their self-esteem is not contingent on the state of the relationship. They generally have an avoidant attachment and low feeling of security. Ludus is neither passionate nor trustful.
Storge is a positive, yet insecure love attitude. Individuals with this attitude are committed (in males), responsible (in females), intimate, viable, caring, kind, confident (in females), and relaxed (in females). These lovers are lively, with social interest, but shy. They have insecure attachment, low passion and trust.
Pragma is also a negative, insecure love attitude. Individuals with this attitude have low affection, intimacy, and viability. They are not satisfied in their relationships and may be uncertain and lonely. Despite this, men are polite and confident. Avoidant attachment style dominates this love attitude which implies insecurity. These individuals are moderately passionate, but not emotional, and they possess moderate faith.
Mania is an insecure love attitude characterized by both positive and negative emotional characteristics. Individuals with this attitude are committed, responsible (in males), lively, affectionate, intimate, and caring. They are generally satisfied with their relationships, but shy, jealous, envious, and uncertain (in females) about their partner and/or relationship. They have low self-esteem which is often contingent on the state of the relationship. These individuals are anxiously attached, indicating insecurity. They are highly passionate, but not trustful.
Agape is a relatively positive, secure love attitude, except of a few traits. Individuals with this attitude are committed, responsible, affectionate, viable, caring, kind, and lively. They are confident and satisfied in their relationship. Despite all these positive characteristics, these individuals can be jealous and uncertain (in females), and envious (in males). Their self-esteem is dependent on the relationship. These individuals with an agape love attitude feel secure in their relationship and do not display avoidant behaviors. They are passionate and moderately trustful in terms of faith, but not predictable or dependable.
Thus, the review of emotional characteristics associated with six love attitudes have shown their typical combinations. Specifically, Ludus and Mania love attitudes may be considered maladaptive because they are associated with many negative emotional characteristics (i.e. insecurity, narcissism, hostility and jealousy, uncertainty, and distrust, respectively). However, the Eros love attitude may be considered adaptive because it is associated with many positive emotional characteristics, including security, commitment, affection, and intimacy.
For further support of this assumption drawn from the literature, we conducted two empirical studies. The aims and hypotheses of these studies were as follow:
Study 1 investigated the relations between attachment-related avoidance and anxiety and the six love attitudes. The aim was to demonstrate empirically—with dimensional measurement of attachment-related emotions, that some love attitudes—due to negative emotional experience—predispose individuals to maladaptive defense style. According to previous sources, it was expected that high avoidance and anxiety are typical for Ludus love attitude, high anxiety, but low avoidance—for Mania, high avoidance but low anxiety for Pragma, and low avoidance and anxiety of individuals with Eros, Storge, and Agape love attitudes.
Study 2 assessed the typical emotions of people with six love attitudes. It was expected that Ludus and Mania love attitudes are accompanied by prevalent negative emotions and emotionality characteristics, while Eros—by positive. No prevalence of positive or negative emotions was expected for Storge, Pragma, and Agape, because according to their theoretical definitions they should be calm and balanced without expression of extreme emotions.
In addition, Study 2 explored connections between prevalent negative emotions and maladaptive defense styles as manifestations of maladaptive experience. It was hypothesized that prevalence of negative emotional experience predicts formation of maladaptive defense mechanisms that can be exhibited in relationship.
The last task of the Study 2 was to discover which defense styles are associated with the six love attitudes. It was hypothesized that individuals with Ludus and Mania love attitudes—with prevalence of negative emotions—tend to employ maladaptive defense style, while those with Eros—with prevalence of positive emotions—have an adaptive style. Since individuals with Storge, Pragma, and Agape love attitudes are emotionally balanced, they do not use maladaptive defense styles.
Earlier studies revealed (see references above) that secure or insecure attachment is associated with love attitudes, however, the results were incomplete. They investigated the types of attachment and did not explore dimensionality. Therefore, the Study 1 intended to replicate and rectify the findings according to our goals. We focused on anxiety and avoidance as attachment dimensions using the Relationship Structures (RS) scale, which was specifically constructed for measurement of these variables.
We hypothesized that Eros, Storge, and Agape would be secure-attachment love styles with low avoidance and anxiety dimensions. On the other hand, Ludus and Mania would be characterized by high attachment-related avoidance and anxiety. We hypothesized that Mania might be low in avoidance due to the strong tendency to be possessive. Pragma should be low in anxiety, but high in avoidance resulting in keeping distance from the partner.
The study utilized two samples recruited from general population of Mid-West of the USA using snowball sampling. In Sample 1,
A short form of the Love Attitude Scale ( The Relationships Structures questionnaire (
Correlations in
Variable | Love Attitude |
|||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Eros | Ludus | Storge | Pragma | Mania | Agape | |
Sample 1 | ||||||
Avoidance | -.40** | .17** | -.25** | -.07* | .05 | -.25** |
Anxiety | -.30** | .23** | -.21** | -.02 | . 24** | -.23* |
Sample 2 | ||||||
Avoidance | -.40** | .14* | -.27** | -.19** | -.09 | -.25** |
Anxiety | -.28** | .17* | -.21** | -.12 | . 19** | -.16* |
*
Two theories on emotions and defense mechanisms have been supported by empirical research and served as a basis for the Study 2. According to the theory of emotions proposed by
Previous research presented above in meta-analysis revealed that people with Ludus and Mania love attitudes possess many emotionally negative relationship characteristics and are characterized by prevalence of negative emotions. Therefore, the Study 2 expected that these love attitudes are associated with frequent negative emotions, which are related to the formation of maladaptive defense styles. Different from this, the Eros love attitude is associated with prevalent positive emotions and adaptive defense styles. Since no prevalence of positive or negative emotions among participants with Storge, Pragma, and Agape love attitudes were expected, then the studies did not anticipate any prevalence of defense styles among those participants.
The same short form of the Love Attitude Scale ( Differential Emotion Scale (DES) assessed discrete emotions and prevalence of positive or negative emotions ( Defense Styles Questionnaire (DSQ), a self-report measure with demonstrated criterion validity and internal consistency, intended to measure 4 styles of defensive functioning: (
Correlations of love attitude variables with prevalent emotional experience, presented in
Emotion | Love Attitude |
|||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Eros | Ludus | Storge | Pragma | Mania | Agape | |
Interest | -.14* | |||||
Joy | .26** | .14** | ||||
Surprise | 26** | |||||
Sadness | -.21** | .22** | ||||
Anger | -.21** | .14** | .20** | |||
Shyness | -.20** | .20** | ||||
Disgust | -.16* | .25** | .14* | |||
Contempt | -.20** | .24** | .20** | |||
Hostility | -.18** | .18** | .20** | |||
Fear | .16** | .30** | ||||
Shame | .20** | .23** | ||||
Guilt | -.22** | .22** | ||||
Positive | .17* | |||||
Negative | -.22** | .21** | .31** |
*
The research supported the assumption that prevalence of negative emotions and lack of positive emotions are the symptoms of maladaptive defense styles. They might be a cause of why individuals use maladaptive defense mechanisms or the consequences of using maladaptive mechanisms. The maladaptive defense style is accompanied by the lack of Positive emotions (
The same emotional profile goes with Image Distorting defense style: lack of Joy (
Self-sacrificing defense style is characterized by a slight degree of manifestation of Shyness (
People with Adaptive style have more chance to have Interest (
The results provide evidence that prevalence of negative emotions and lack of positive emotions have strong accompanying symptoms of maladaptive defense style, in a smaller degree – of Image Distorting style.
Relations of love attitudes and defense styles presented in
Defense Style | Love Attitude |
|||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Eros | Ludus | Storge | Pragma | Mania | Agape | |
Maladaptive | -.19** | .19** | .24** | |||
Image Distorting | .37** | |||||
Self-Sacrificing | .14** | |||||
Adaptive |
*
The article considers defense styles in terms of their adaptive functioning on a continuum from maladaptive, image distorting and self-sacrificing to adaptive. The degree of these maladaptive and adaptive reactions appears in response to negative emotional experience. Some love attitudes can be maladaptive reactions, while others prevent maladaptive reactions. The results of meta-analysis and two empirical studies have supported the hypotheses.
According to the results of two studies,
The results of the studies reported in this article are based largely on correlational analyses and, therefore, have a predictive and prognostic value. They demonstrate how positive and negative emotional experiences intertwine with adaptive and maladaptive defense mechanisms among individuals with different love attitudes. These relations can be bi-, or even three-directional. Negative and positive emotions precipitate formation of psychological defense mechanisms and, consequently, defensive love attitudes. On the other hand, the developed strong love attitudes can contribute to the appraisal of situations, thus, triggering corresponding emotions.
The results of these studies, however, do not show these causational relations. Experimental, practice-based, and longitudinal studies could be useful to investigate these relations, however, they may be ethically not appropriate in this emotionally sensitive theme.
The results of the studies can be useful for family counseling and therapy providing better understanding of maladaptive functioning of individuals and couples in relationships.
The author has no funding to report.
The author has declared that no competing interests exist.
The author has no additional (i.e., non-financial) support to report.