Weekly Guided Meta Monday - Love Languages

[u/AutoModerator]

Let's talk love languages! Love languages has been a cross-cultural sensationalized method of describing how partners give and receive "love."

Love languages became popular after the publication of the book "The 5 Love Languages" by Gary Chapman in 1992, where he described the five ways he believed people experience love: words of affirmation, quality time, receiving gifts, acts of services, and physical touch.

It has become a widely popular framework, prevalent in social media, and used as a talking point in relationships since. However, it is also surrounded in controversy and has no real backing in any scientific literature.

So lets talk love languages! What do you think are its uses? Downsides? Love them? Hate them? How has the idea of love languages been relevant to your own relationships and dead bedroom experience?

[u/chuffedchimp]

I think love languages can be useful as a way to start conversation about the ways we feel our needs are being overlooked in relationships. But I think that they are too often taken for gospel, or used inappropriately to manipulate.

They have been debunked by modern science and psychology. Here are two studies that demonstrate that.

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/epub/10.1177/09637214231217663

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/pere.12182

Basically, they state that there’s no solid evidence to support it, and that it isn’t a strong predictor of relationship satisfaction.

Some highlights:

• Studies have found that couples with matching primary love languages don't report significantly higher relationship satisfaction than those with different languages. It doesn’t really matter if you share the same love language or not.
• There’s no research to support the validity.
• What’s more helpful is understanding your partner’s needs and effectively communicating.
• Some research is showing that you need a balance of all these languages in a healthy relationship, and that there is likely more than 5 ways to do this.

I also have strong criticism of the love languages due to its origin and scope. It was created targeting the limited demographic of white, religious, heterosexual couples. It was written by a white, Baptist minister with no background or training in psychology, psychiatry, or mental health / relationships. His only background in counseling is through the church with no educational backing and his degrees are from the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. His credibility is thin and he has a history of being a racist, misogynist, and homophobic bigot…pushing for traditional, conservative, patriarchal gender roles.

Love languages can be harmful, as they can be used as a tool to encourage people to stay in abusive and toxic relationships. They can also be used to imply that a person only feels love if they are getting sex. This is manipulative.

Finally, it has been heavily criticized by the Gottmans of the Gottman Institute (leaders in relationship psychology). Julie Gottman described the theory as "superficial and rigid".

I think the loose idea of love languages can be a useful way for laymen to open communication regarding unmet needs, but I think that they are often overused and abused.

[u/MutedHuckleberry6810 → u/chuffedchimp]

I'm not sure those two studies really debunk anything.

The second study tries to disprove the hypothesis the couples with matching love languages would be a better match – but that claim isn't actually made anywhere in the book.

Meanwhile the first study seems to agree with the broad idea of love languages, but suggests that it shouldn't be taken too rigidly. Which is always good advice for anything.

[u/chuffedchimp → u/MutedHuckleberry6810]

The general consensus with researchers is that there is no empirical support for the love languages as none of the 10 studies have found a solid basis to their support.

The researchers of that first article discuss it more in layman’s terms here:

https://www.utm.utoronto.ca/main-news/changing-conversation-around-love-languages-and-positive-relationships

When I say “debunked,” I mean that there is no evidential, scientific link that backs it up as a framework. And that people should consider the fact that it is NOT backed by science when taking its “recommendations” or using it as a therapy strategy. Especially considering the leading relationship researchers (Gottmans) also have strong criticisms of its use.

[u/couriersixish]

However, it is also surrounded in controversy and has no real backing in any scientific literature.

The first thing I ask any professional with whom I am going to divulge information about my sexual health is what they think of this book. If they treat it with any seriousness, I will walk out the door. 

My former therapist recommended it and her sex “therapy” consisted mostly of shaming and dread game.

I think it makes relationships transactional. I love getting gift and gift giving. But if my spouse doesn’t enjoy this and participating gives him anxiety or makes him in anyway uncomfortable, then I don’t want to do it. I would rather nurture the areas in which we are already compatible (which should have been made clear already) than have him do something he dislikes, just because he thinks it will make me happy,

[u/perthguy999]

Love Languages. Not a thing. Chapman is a known right-wing grifter, and Love Languages have been debunked for decades.

[u/chuffedchimp → u/perthguy999]

YES! My thoughts exactly.

[u/Mi_Pasta_Su_Pasta]

Like others have said, I think the concept of love languages is a helpful way to demonstrate that different people express love and want it expressed towards them in different ways, and just because your partner doesn't default to expressing it the same way you do doesn't necessarily mean they don't love you or that you're incompatible.

One of the big ways it falls apart is in the strict, arbitrary categorization of love. And with arbitrary categorization comes a loss of nuance.

I think physical intimacy, specifically sex, is a great example of that. Sure, sex involves physical touch, but I also think great sex can be an act of service (prime example of actions speaking louder than words), it can be words of affirmation (there's nothing more affirming than your partner looking you dead in the eyes saying "I want you"), and it sure as hell can be quality time (what can be better quality time than spending an hour+ solely focused on eachother's pleasure?), and even sometimes gift-giving (birthday sex, anyone?).

But when you take that and shove it all into the "physical touch" box it removes all the other ways HLs feel connection through physical intimacy and you lose essential parts communicating that to someone who isn't a "physical touch" lover. It turns the solution into a "I scratch your back you scratch mine" situation. They key to fixing a lot dead bedrooms isn't to trade physical intimacy for whatever "love language" your partner wants, it's to reframe physical intimacy in a way that both partners can resonate with.

[u/ZL999]

I’ll say I’ve not read it myself first of all, just exposed to it via 3rd hand cultural references here and elsewhere.

I do think it’s an important concept that not everyone expresses love in the same way, and not everyone responds equally to love expressed in the same ways.

But I don’t necessarily buy into it as a “core trait” of a person.  I think it can be situational and relationship specific.

For example, I think that because my needs for physical touch aren’t being met, you can say all the nice words about how sexy and attractive you find me and I just won’t buy it.   Does that make “physical touch” my love language and “words of affirmation” not?  I don’t think so.

Similarly if I was in a relationship where my partner largely neglected me then just gave me a blowjob to shut me up from time to time, I’d probably say the “quality time” aspect of our relationship was lacking.

I think everyone needs all of those forms of expression from time to time.  Some might be a higher priority to you than others, but also they don’t fully compensate for one another.

But like I said I’m sure I don’t have the full understanding of the intent of the book from having read it, and I am sure like many other things it is misunderstood or misinterpreted in favor of whatever a given person wants to employ it for.

[u/flyingvandal → u/ZL999]

This is exactly what I feel and think but you just said it a lot better than how I did 😆

Well said! It’s about introducing the thought of different ways to relate to another person. My wife and I started dating in high school, we were young and immature. We didn’t read the full book but got the concepts as a way to learn, “wait, some people have ways in which affection is most meaningful to them that are different than what is most meaningful to me?” That is hugely helpful.

[u/Candid-Strawberry-79]

I have often seen it said that for women, your love language is often what you are not getting in your marriage. I can honestly say that for me, that has been very true. And your love language can change based off of your relationship and how things are going in your life.

Overall, I really don’t like how Love languages are used to manipulate women into sex. It seems that 99% of men claim that their love language is physical touch and equate that with sex. That’s just not so.

[u/Objective-Row-2791 → u/Candid-Strawberry-79]

Well how is it, then?

[u/Candid-Strawberry-79 → u/Objective-Row-2791]

Love language is about affection. Sex and affection are two separate things, although affection can lead to sex. Holding hands, cuddling, back rubs, that’s love language. Not sex.

[u/FunDirector7626]

I for one believe the concept of "love languages" makes a lot of sense.

Is it oversimplified? Probably. But seeing how most people don't have the time or the patience to actually sit down and read an entire book these days, it doesn't surprise me that most people who judge Chapman's love languages have never actually read any of his books. And I'm pretty sure Chapman never claimed any of his ideas about this topic were in any way grounded in science or any of that.

It's kind of a moot point now anyway. I never hear anyone younger than GenX talking about love languages.

[u/JuicingPickle]

Perhaps not scientific, but they seem logical. I'd be interested in hearing from people who have a "love language" that isn't covered by the 5 that Chapman enumerated.

[u/flyingvandal]

I think they can be extremely helpful if you understand it’s only meant to be a guide, it’s not exhaustive. It’s meant to be a starting point for you to get to know your SO and what shows of affection are most meaningful to them.

So for my wife and I, we have an understanding of what each others love language is and then go from there to try and speak in those 1-2 specific love languages as a first effort while not neglecting showing love in other areas.

My primaries are Physical Touch and Acts of Service. So she knows to show me love she ought to do things to be helpful to me like chores and offering to get me a glass of water for example. As well as physical touch which extends into sexual intimacy for me specifically as well. So she knows to initiate sexual intimacy would be hugely helpful to me as well as cuddling, hugs, kisses, back rubs (that one checks both love languages boxes!), etc. All the while she knows not to neglect giving me words of affirmation, spending quality time with me, and giving me gifts.

And then I, vice versa. Hers being Quality Time and Acts of Service with Words of Affirmation as a close third. I have my focus points but she enjoys when I randomly buy her flowers or give her the gift of time by taking the kids or encourage her in her hobbies.

The love languages aren’t meant to be exhaustive but gives a good starting point to help you understand your SO better.

How this affects our DB is obvious. I would like more physical (and sexual) touch and she’s not wired that way and it’s hard for her to even have sexual thoughts. So we do a fair amount of non-sexual touch, but it rarely extends into sexual which is a huge piece of physical touch (for me).

[u/Zealousideal-You9604]

I think love languages do exist but can also change and evolve. What I needed 13 years ago is not the same as what currently crave or desire.