Cultural Differences In Love

In this paper I will be investigating the differences between collective cultures Eros (romantic) love, ludus love and philantia love compared individualistic cultures on the same topic. I decided to look at these two culture types because I felt it would be a very interesting contrast between the two as I feel that this one cultural difference could have a large influence on many types of love. Individualistic cultures are defined as cultures where an individual’s personal interest, happiness and goals are viewed as more important (Triandis).Whereas inversely in collective cultures emphasise the values and goals that serve a group.

I believe that when we consider this very fundamental outlook on life, that it is enviable that it will affect

However it is important to note that though this is an significant concept in individualistic cultures it is not a universally accepted truth either. In a survey carried out by Kephart in 1967 when people were asked “If a boy(girl) had all the other qualities you desired, would you marry this person if you were not in love with him(her)?” and surprisingly only 64.6% of men and 24.3% said no. This same study was repeated in 1976 and 1984 by Simpson et al and they found that more than 80% of men and woman answered no to almost the same question. Therefore this shows that though the phenomenon is very prevalent it is also not true that everyone accepts this as true. Also when we look at the cultures surrounding the concepts of marriage choices we can still see how these difference come into play. For example in a individualistic culture it is of course assumed that the groom and bride have made the choice to marry each other; in collective cultures it makes more sense that group help the individuals decide what is the best decision therefore, often leaving the individuals getting married out of the decision making process altogether. But when we consider Brown’s work carried on in 1991 looking

Campbell, Foster and Finkel (2002) found a relationship between narcissism and ludic love which they theorised is fuelled from the need for power and autonomy. They went on further to say that narcissists are more likely to utilise ludic love due to the game playing, meaning they can get what they want without the commitment and responsibility which, also correlates to narcissists strong focus on self and need for individuality. This same link was verified by Dion and Dion in 1991 confirming that there is a link between individualism and ludic love consequently we can accept the inverse relationship of collective cultures having less ludic