Introduction
Social psychology is a special branch of mentality study because it deals with how we think, believe, and act. Indeed, many beliefs have been propagated by some individuals in matters of intimate relationships. Few of the beliefs are right, but innumerable of such principles may emerge as insufficient in countless ways. For instance, there is a popular belief among diverse writers and some psychologists that love is a requirement for stable intimate relationships such as marriage (Daniel, 2020). To such individuals, it is love that brings two people together in such a way that they feel the exigency to commit to each other for an eternity. In addition, the affection itself is used as a measure of the strength of the marital relationship (Daniel, 2020). The existing emotional disposition at the beginning of the marriage sets the expectations for both couples so high that when trouble rocks their future marital life, stability becomes problematic (Daniel, 2020). Without a doubt, people who believe in love as a precondition for marriage have no regard for arranged marriages.
Critique of the ‘Significance of Romantic Love for Marriage’
In the article “The significance of romantic love for marriage,” research was conducted to establish the relationship between love and marriage. The study was conducted on 605 subjects who were grouped as married or single, stable or divorced partners, among many other aspects (Willi, 1997, p.171). The author continues to explain why he was inspired to do the investigation. He writes, “It continues to be mysterious why certain marriages are successful and others are not” (Willi, 1997, p.171). The author summarizes the context particulars with key hypotheses that his exploration intended to address. Analytically, the details presented by the writer gives are clear and devoid of ambiguity that some researches on relationship science may contain (Miller, 2018). In essence, the introductory facts that the author has provided are specified and give any reader who is not a psychologist a rough idea of what the research is all about.
The article has also elaborated on the research method that was used to achieve its main objective. Specifically, questionnaires are used in the research, and each questionnaire consists of fifty-eight questions, which are subdivided into four distinctive parts (Willi, 1997, p.171). Sociodemographic statements are extracted from the subjects and their partners. Respondents’ extent of happiness and satisfaction in eleven areas of their relationships is then explored (Willi, 1997). The ratings for satisfaction in all the areas are given at a scale of between 1 to 7, with 1 denoting the lowest level and 7 – the highest.
The most important aspect is then investigated by the respondents, on when they did fall in love with their current partners, whether it was love at first sight or not (Willi, 1997). Therefore the questionnaires were administered in an orderly manner, and they rotated around the topic of love as the research had indicated. This shows that the researcher was determined to obtain accurate results from the subjects with the least, and that is the strength of the research.
After the questionnaires were administered to the specific subjects in the research, several results were obtained. The author, Willi, gives the summary of his results under four subtopics with respect to the category in which the results were obtained. According to Willi (1997), the investigation had a total of 418 women and 187 men as the main subjects (p. 172). Other results have been tabulated, and the descriptive statistics are well indicated in the article. Here again, lies the strength of the research as it systematically presents the key results without interpretation, in an orderly and logical sequence using illustrative materials such as tables (Miller, 2018). The statistical test results have also been included in the results section, and to a large extent, this shows how the research is organized.
However, the research has its share of weaknesses that need to be addressed by future researchers. The type of research that Willi has employed in this case is descriptive research because he uses some numbers to quantify the parameters which he investigates (Miller, 2018). From a psychological point of view, it is very difficult to determine a cause and an effect from descriptive research (Miller, 2018). For instance, the research talks of having a happy marriage as a result of love between the partners. Even if the respondents who attribute their stable marriage life to love explain their case, the researchers cannot determine any truth. As such, no conclusion can be made that a stable marriage emanated from love. In essence, the research that was conducted is susceptible to errors because it relied heavily on descriptive research only.
Additionally, the article has some weaknesses in the discussion section that the author either intentionally or accidentally omitted. Instead of clarifying several issues relating to the results, the author discusses the selection of his sample and why it represents a whole lot of the Swiss population (Willi, 1997). More precisely, the research article should have talked about the potential limitations and weaknesses of his study because he has not clearly stated the conclusion (Miller, 2018). Evidently, the omission of the weaknesses and limitations in the discussion of the research article does not give a relative importance to the interpretation of the results that the researcher has indicated. Nonetheless, the results that are obtained from the research show that love is significant to a happy marriage or partnership.
A Critique of ‘Marriage in the Eleven Cultures’
Another article that is of great importance to social psychologists is “Love and marriage in the eleven cultures.” The research was intended to demystify the common stereotypic thought that American society considered love as a necessary precondition for marriage (Levine et al., 1995). According to the article, there have been few studies to conclude that indeed the American society views love as a prerequisite for marriage. More interestingly, the authors give background information by stating the loopholes which were in the previous studies that showed that actually love was significantly associated with marriage (Levine et al., 1995). In order to bring more generality to the issue of love and marriage, the authors cross-examine the cross-cultural preponderance of the importance that is placed on marriages (Levine et al., 1995). Simply put, the study tries to explain the relationship that exists between cultural differences and the importance of love to marital decisions (Miller, 2018). This is the best article because it compares relatively many countries’ subjects as compared to other studies before. As a matter of fact, the background information of the article is its strength.
More explicitly, the study was conducted on some students who were doing liberal arts studies from eleven different countries. Though not clear which method was used, it was probably the questionnaire or the interview method because the article states that the subjects were asked certain questions. Certainly, this was a strength for the research studies as it guarantees the accuracy of the data that has been collected and from the students (Miller, 2018). On the other hand, the fact that the students were all doing liberal arts makes the information to be skewed since their field of studies is associated with the exploration of social arts in some ways. Substantially, this can make the study have some form of predetermined outcome, which can affect the reliability of the investigation.
The results of the study also show the systematic way in which the information is categorized. From the results, many students agreed, regardless of their country of origin, that if love completely disappears from marriage, then it would be better if couples make a clean break and start their lives over (Levine et al., 1995). Strikingly though, quite a number of students agreed to the question that the disappearance of love should not be a sufficient decision for ending a relationship (Levine et al., 1995). Some would argue that the research was confusing to the students, but the truth is that the results are rigorous, and therefore that alone guarantees the quality of the collected data. Therefore, the organization of the study results and the conciseness of the questions which were addressed to the students make the research possess the required strengths of a good research article.
In as much as the article has a well-structured discussion section, it has some inadequacies. Firstly, the study shows that there existed strong cross-cultural differences in beliefs about love as a precondition for establishing a marriage (Levine et al., 1995). Secondly, the study also postulates that there were substantial cross-cultural differences in beliefs on love to sustain relationships (Levine et al., 1995). All the arguments that the research advances are premised on the hypothesis that was initially established. Nevertheless, the discussion section does not give any comparison to any similar study that has been done before but rather complements such studies. The study is in support of the idea that prior findings for the US, indicating relatively few sex differences in credence in the necessity of romantic love in marriage as also accurate for other countries (Levine et al., 1995). Apparently, the article was propagating the ideas of other researches that were conducted before and did not actually compare. In point of fact, this is a great weakness on the part of the article as it does not provide alternatives for further interpretations of the earlier studies.
Conclusion
In summary, I find the two articles that talk about the relationship between love and marriage as appealing texts in view of psychosocial analysis. While “The significance of romantic love for marriage” posits that love is a prerequisite in maintaining a stable marriage, “Love and marriage in the eleven cultures” brings a new dimension to the discussion. As clearly evident through analysis of the second article, love itself is a precondition for marriage in most Westernized countries such as the US, followed closely by the Latin American countries such as Brazil. Based on the article “Love and marriage in the eleven cultures,” I find the argument that love is a prerequisite for a stable marriage to be partially true. An important reason why I base my conclusions on the article is that it posits that the thought of love as a precondition to marriage was an idea that many thought to be American only. It is only after the research, was when it was realized that the idea was widespread all over the world.
References
Daniel, S. (2020). How important is love in a marriage?. Professor’s House. Web.
Levine, R., Sato, S., Hashimoto, T., & Verma, J. (1995). Love and marriage in eleven cultures. Journal of Cross Cultural Psychology, 26, 554-571. Web.
Miller, R. (2018). Intimate Relationships (8th ed.). Mc Graw Hill education.
Willi, J. (1997). The significance of romantic love for marriage. Family Process, 36(2), 171-182. Web.