What Makes Love Crazy and Stupid?
Admittedly, I was rather late to the game when seeing Crazy Stupid Love for the first time in January 2021. Of course, in my opinion, it’s a great movie with a stacked cast. It paints a picture of love, heartbreak, stages in relationships, and how irrational love makes us feel. Most of us can relate to the euphoria and misery love has in store by its complex disposition. Empathic by nature, humans are hardwired for connection therefore attuned to emotional states others endure. Love has been studied through the contexts of science, stories, states, philosophy, anthropology, and history. So many words, so many questions, and experiences that provide us with our own data to what love means for us.
Love and Biology. Love is chemically made up of oxytocin, dopamine, serotonin, and vasopressin. Love also has an internal and external components that result in morphinergic (morphine like) mechanisms. This is why heartbreak mirrors symptoms of withdrawing from opioids. With all of these components it is no wonder love is often compared to drugs. Dopamine is a hormone that motivates us to seek out things such as food, sex, work achievements, exercise, etc. Dopamine is not necessarily all about pleasure, it also gets us through difficulties such as enduring a long run, a hard math problem, or conflict resolution. These biological mechanisms allow us to attune to others wants and needs while being attentive to our own.
Attachment Styles. Recently attachment styles have been getting a lot of buzz on the internet. Attachment Theory has a longstanding history worthy of delving into the nuances behind the science. Mary Ainsworth is the psychologist who began running the “Strange Situation” (1969) study to examine if infants were attached to their caregivers. This study has been replicated cross-culturally, and has shown to have universal implications. Attachment theory examines how our upbringing within the parent-child relationship context. The attachment styles would indicate if an infant has a secure base would they be able to explore the world freely. In contrast, is the infant exhibiting a lack of confidence in the caregiver’s ability to provide a sense of security. The four attachment styles include: insecure-avoidant, insecure-resistant, secure, and disorganized. Here is a breakdown of what each one looks like:
Insecure-Resistant:
Hard crying during separation
Unresponsive when mother returns to child
Angry slapping of toys
May not engage in quality play
Insecure-avoidant:
Less likely to cry when separated from parent
Ignore mother’s return
May look at mother and turn away
Continue playing without acknowledging caregiver
Elevated heart rate
Disorganized:
Wide range of out of context behaviors
Secure:
May or may not cry
Acknowledges mother’s return
Returns to play when comforted
The origins of this study was done with children, and now there is a vast amount of literature with adult attachment styles in the romantic context. John Bowlby is a pioneer of attachment theory, which enmphasizes the importance of relational/environmental factors for emotional wellbeing. The book Attached examines how these attachment styles influence romantic relationships, exhibiting there is a correlation with attachment styles as an infant and attachment styles as adults. Attachment styles appear as the following:
Anxious:
Over dependence on others
Seeks others to emotionally regulate
More likely to feel distress from a breakup
Low self component, often struggles with unworthiness/unlovability
Avoidant:
Minimizes importance of relationships
Sabotages relationship through less need of intimacy
Independent, higher self regard
Avoids intimacy
Higher levels of infidelity
Secure:
Higher satisfaction of romantic relationships
Highlights benefits of a relationship
Effective communicator
Positive self regard, can maintain independence outside of relationship
Disorganized:
Avoids intimacy
Regard depends on others ongoing acceptance
People are generally untrustworthy
Mixed emotional responses
Attachment styles are informative to our patterns, but don’t necessarily define how we need to be. All of these patterns are often exhibited on a spectrum. We may gravitate towards one category, but context matters. For example, avoidant person will feel anxiety if they don’t hear from a person they’re interested in dating. Various research is examining how these styles evolve and change overtime (going to therapy can definitely help!). Relationships often offer opportunities to transcend our patterns in feeling more secure within ourselves and our relationships. This is a dance of independence and togetherness. Freedom occurs within the security relationships often enable. All of these factors can make love complicated, messy, beautiful, poetic, and indeed drive us “crazy.”
