being in love

221 Pages·2017·2.29 MB·English

‘B L ’:
EING IN OVE
An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis of
Young Australians’ Romantic Experiences

Ler Ping Wee (Levan)

orcid.org/0000-0001-6840-8561

Submitted in total fulfilment of the requirements of
the degree of Doctor of Philosophy

September 2017

School of Social and Political Sciences
UNIVERSITY OF MELBOURNE
Abstract

Romantic love touches and guides the intimate worlds of people every day. My thesis seeks to
examine a popular experiential substrate of many Western romantic relationships – specifically,
the feeling of ‘being in love’. Using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA), this small-
scale idiographic study focuses on the lives of four young Australians – all of whom profess to be
in ‘truly loving’ partnerships with their ongoing beloveds. Multiple in-depth face-to-face
interviews conducted over three years are the prime source of experiential data collection. My
main research goal is to discover the shared qualities / meanings that interviewees themselves
regard as defining facets of ‘being in love’. Inductive questions concerning their self-experiences,
orientations towards partners, and other related existential enquiries are also explored.
Key findings suggest interviewees’ ‘ideal’ or optimal states of loving are primarily composed of
coalescing perceptions of self-growth, friendship, attraction, altruism, and reciprocity. By contrast,
‘unideal’ or impoverished states of ‘being in love’ occur amidst sustained declines in one or more
of these thematic experiences. Both ideal and unideal conditions are crucial to shaping their overall
impressions of ‘real love’.
As per the directives of IPA research, all the above discoveries are examined in richly hermeneutic
and phenomenological terms. Mark Johnson’s philosophy of embodiment is also applied – in
particular, his notions of image schemas and non-dualistic processes of meaning-making.
Together, this combination of IPA / Johnson allows me to uniquely explore interviewees’ senses
of ‘being in love’ in corporeally-grounded, empathetic, and experientially nuanced ways that
counteract current trends occurring in the social scientific literature.

i
Declaration

This is to certify that
I. the thesis comprises only my original work towards the PhD,
II. due acknowledgement has been made in the text to all other material used,
III. the thesis is less than 100,000 words in length, exclusive of tables and bibliographies.

Ler Ping Wee (Levan)

ii
Acknowledgements

This thesis would not have been possible without the guiding force of my chief supervisor, Prof.
Andrew Dawson. Thank you for your incredible support and insights over these four years, and
for believing in my research from the very start. Your wisdom is unmatched. I would also like to
thank my co-supervisor, Dr. Paul Green, for his wonderful assistance and invaluable input along
the way. My appreciation goes out to Dr. Lauren Rosewarne. Thank you for being an amazing
Committee Chairperson who never failed to offer her best encouragements. I want to moreover
express my deepest gratitude to the four interviewees of my study. Your love stories are the life
and heart of these pages.
Many thanks to my family and all my friends. Your steadfast faith in me inspired me to keep
working harder, even on the toughest days. I am who I am because of all of you. I think it’s time
to grab a coffee together after months of neglect.
A scholar on love should surely be in love. Olivia, your boundless affection and care imbue
personal meaning to what I was trying to discover about others. You are my flame.
I would also like to thank Bobby. Your whinging was, oddly enough, greatly welcomed. Big hugs
to my four cats Richard Parker, Bingo, Pudding, and Ebichu – felines who endured my erratic
behaviours but love me anyway. Kind of.

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Dedicated to my father.
Wish you were here.
Table of Contents

Abstract i

Declaration ii

Acknowledgements iii

1. Introduction 1
1.1. Research Aims 2
1.2. Thesis Structure 3

PART A

2. Literature Review 6
2.1. Constructionist Accounts of ‘Disembodied Love’ 7
2.2. Social Scientists’ Intellectualist Bias Towards Love 12
2.3. Macrosociological Theories on Love 16
2.4. Conclusion 20

3. Mark Johnson’s Philosophy of Embodiment 21
3.1. Misrecognitions of Western ‘Mind / Body’ Dualism: Towards 21
Embodiment
3.2. Exploring ‘Being in Love’ as Embodied Meaning 28

4. Methodology 31
4.1. An Overview of Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) 31
4.2. Using IPA to Meet Research Aims and Redress Literature Trends 34
4.3. Research Design 36
4.3.1. Sampling Strategy and Frame 36
4.3.2. Sampling Size 38
4.3.3. Data Collection 40
4.3.4. Data Analysis 42
4.3.5. Writing the Thesis 44

5. Vignettes 46
5.1. Dan 46
5.2. Ben 48
5.3. Fiona 49
5.4. Rachel 50
PART B

6. Notes on Key Findings 53

7. Self-Growth 59
7.1. Experiential Themes of Self-Growth 60
7.2. Image Schemas of Self-Growth 64
7.3. Cultural Meaning-Templates of Self-Growth 68
7.4. Conclusion 71

8. Friendship 73
8.1. Experiential Themes of Friendship 74
8.2. Image Schemas of Friendship 81
8.3. Cultural Meaning-Templates of Friendship 84
8.4. Conclusion 88

9. Attraction 89
9.1. Experiential Themes of Physical and Emotional Attraction 89
9.2. Image Schemas of Physical and Emotional Attraction 102
9.3. Cultural Meaning-Templates of Physical and Emotional Attraction 107
9.4. Conclusion 111

10. Altruism 113
10.1. Experiential Themes of Altruism 114
10.2. Image Schemas of Altruism 126
10.3. Cultural Meaning-Templates of Altruism 130
10.4. Conclusion 132

11. Reciprocity 134
11.1. Experiential Themes of Reciprocity 135
11.2. Image Schemas of Reciprocity 144
11.3. Cultural Meaning-Templates of Reciprocity 147
11.4. Conclusion 149

12. Unideal Moments of ‘Being in Love’ 151
12.1. Experiential Themes of Unideal Moments of ‘Being in Love’ 152
12.2. Image Schemas of Unideal Moments of ‘Being in Love’ 163
12.3. Cultural Meaning-Templates of Unideal Moments of ‘Being in Love’ 165
12.4. Conclusion 169
PART C

13. Conclusion 171
13.1. Summary of Key Findings 171
13.2. Literature Trends Redressed: Contributions of this Study 177
13.3. Limitations of this Study: Future Research Directions 181
13.4. Final Words 185

Bibliography 186
List of Figures

Figure 1: CONTAINER image schema 25

Figure 2: Each interviewee’s discernment of ‘truly being in love’ is made up 55
of both his / her ‘ideal’ and ‘unideal’ experiences of the
phenomenon.

Figure 3: PATH image schema 67

Figure 4: ATTRACTION image schema 102

Figure 5: CENTRE-PERIPHERY image schema 127

Figure 6: REMOVAL OF RESTRAINT image schema 128
1. Introduction
“I would like to talk about relationship, about what love is, about human
existence in which is involved our daily living …”
(Krishnamurti 1973, p. 75)

Romantic love is a profound experience that flourishes the everyday lives of millions, if not
billions, of people who believe in its reality. For many, it is key to leading a fulfilling and happy
existence; a cherished yearning to have and to hold their chosen beloveds in an intimate journey
of two. Love is to them a unifying bond that fills their hearts with the wildest of joys – yet, if gone
awry, inflicts existential agonies and insecurities that cut deeper than most. This is a passion that
is at once illuminative as it is elusive; an emotional cauldron of both dramatic and subtle moments.
Amongst couples caught in its midst, to truly love a partner and be loved in return is to embrace
each other’s irreplaceable individualities – a symbiotic cornerstone to a meaningful
companionship.
It is the above vernacular belief in the supposed power of romantic love that spurs my interest –
and I am not alone. Beginning in the mid-twentieth century, the last thirty years in particular has
seen a steady surge of social scientists intrigued by this distinct form of human interaction (Felmlee
& Sprecher 2007, p. 389; Hatfield, Bensman & Rapson 2011, p. 144; Karandashev 2015, p. 3). Of
course, academic approaches to studying this phenomenon have varied. For instance, social
psychologists have over the years tried to construct numerous so-called ‘love scales’ designed to
empirically measure various aspects of people’s romantic feelings (Hatfield, Bensman & Rapson
2011; eds Sternberg & Weis 2006). Others adopt more sociological (Felmlee & Sprecher 2007, p.
397-401), anthropological (Lindholm 2006; Venkatesan et al. 2011), and philosophical methods
(Soble 2008), amongst other disciplines. Yet, whatever the school of thought, one thing is clear:
far from being seen as a luxurious pastime, romantic love is now a lively topic of fascination for
scholars keen on unravelling its many experiential mysteries and intricacies. It is within this
burgeoning field that I, too, shall offer my own contributions.

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