Love styles and developmental stages in romantic love

Abstract

In this study, the interrelational structure of the six love styles based on J. A. Lee's theory (1973, 1974) was analyzed, and developmental changes in the structure at distinct behavioral stages of romantic love (Matsui, 1991) were examined. One thousand and ninety-two undergraduates from six universities in the Tokyo Metropolitan area responded to a questionnaire asking about (1) their behavior and experience in romantic love, (2) love and liking scales (Rubin, 1970), and (3) love style scale developed by Matsui, Tokusa, Tachizawa, Okubo, Omae, Okamura, and Yoneda (LETS-2; 1990) based on Lee's theory. Principal component analysis and multidimensional scaling of LETS-2 scores of 738 students who had an intimate heterosexual friend indicated that their Eros, Mania, and Agape scores clustered together. Analyses of variance showed that Eros, Mania, and Agape scores increased as love developed, but the Ludus score peaked at the kissing stage, and the Storge score was high at an early stage. All the analyses suggested that the interrelational structure of the six love styles is perhaps square or triangular pyramid, and not circular as Lee hypothesized. © 1993, The Japanese Psychological Association. All rights reserved.