From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- For the 1984 movie with
Meryl Streep and
Robert De Niro, see
Falling in Love (film)
"Falling in love" is a mainly
Western term used to describe the process of moving from a feeling of
neutrality towards someone, to one of
love. The
usage of the term "fall" implies many things: that the process may have
been in some way inevitable or uncontrollable, risky or putting the lover
in a state of
vulnerability, that the process is irreversible, or all of these
things. The term is generally used to describe an (eventual) love that is
strong, although not necessarily permanent.
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Alberoni Theory
In his
socio-psychological theory
Francesco Alberoni states that falling in love is a process of the
same nature as religious or political
conversion.
People fall in love when they are ready to change, or
to start a new life.
According to Alberoni, falling in love is a rapid
process of destructuration-reorganization called the nascent state. In the
nascent state, the individual becomes capable of merging with another
person and creating a new collectivity with a very high degree of
solidarity. Hence the definition: falling in love is the nascent state
of a collective movement formed of two people only.
In order to understand if someone is truly in love,
the individual must be put to
truth tests
and, in order to find out if he or she is loved in return, the
beloved
is also put to reciprocal tests. The incandescent process of the nascent
state through these tests gives way to certainty and produces a stable
love relationship. According to Alberoni, the
phenomenology of falling in love is the same for young people and
adults, for
men and
women and
for
homosexuals and
heterosexuals: this is because the structure of the nascent state is
always the same.
Unlike the theories consolidated by
psychoanalysis, the
sociologist does not consider falling in love as a
regression, but instead sees it as launching oneself towards the
future and change, and thus as fundamental to the formation of a couple in
love.
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See also
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References
