ABSTRACT
Psychological attempts to quantify love began to emerge in the 1970s. A theory popularized by the Canadian sociologist John Lee, partly based on classical typologies of love and partly original, identified six main types: eros (romantic), ludus (flirting), mania (obsession), storge (enduring), agape (selfless), and pragma (expedient). Hatfield and Rapson specifically focused on cross-cultural dimensions of love within a two-variable framework. Recent work on love has evolved a more narrative and individualized approach rather than a theoretical-empirical one. Biblical concordances can be a starting point for extending the concept beyond romance. The extensive anthropological and sociological cross-cultural literature on love can be engaged as well—for instance, comparing what is known about the near-universality of romantic love with the more subsistence-oriented factors that kick in after the honeymoon. Arranged marriages and marriages of convenience provide a contrast to relationships in which love is prominent.
