Knowra Romantic love Romantic love Romantic love is affection marked by emotional attachment and romantic desire toward another person. It can involve intimacy, longing, commitment, or idealization in varying combinations.
Attachment theory : A framework explaining how early relationships shape patterns of emotional bonding and security. Attachment patterns can influence how people seek closeness and respond to separation in romantic relationships.
Triangular theory of love : Robert Sternberg’s model describes love through intimacy, passion, and commitment in varying combinations. Its three components offer a direct framework for comparing forms of romantic love.
Courtly love : A medieval European literary convention portraying idealized devotion, often between a knight and an unattainable beloved. It supplied influential themes of longing, service, and idealization in Western romance.
Platonic love : A close affectionate bond understood as nonsexual, though its exact meaning varies across traditions. It contrasts romantic attachment with forms of love not defined by romantic desire.
Romantic relationship : A relationship involving romantic affection or desire, often with shared intimacy or commitment. It is the interpersonal setting in which romantic love is most directly expressed.
Sexual attraction : A desire for sexual contact or erotic involvement with another person. Sexual desire may accompany romantic love, but neither necessarily entails the other.
Limerence : An involuntary state of intense romantic infatuation marked by intrusive thoughts and longing for reciprocation. It isolates the obsessive, uncertainty-driven experience that can accompany romantic desire.
Plato's Symposium : A dialogue by Plato in which speakers offer competing accounts of love, desire, and beauty. Its account of love as a pursuit of beauty shaped later philosophical traditions.
Unrequited love : Romantic love or desire that is not returned by its object. It shows how romantic feeling can persist without mutual attachment or partnership.
Marriage : A socially or legally recognized union between people, with rights and obligations that vary by society. Romantic love has become a central justification for marriage in many modern societies.
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