La Experiencia del Amor: La Evolucion de la Relacion Amorosa A Lo Largo del Tiempo

by Robert J. Sternberg

En este absorbente libro, el prestigioso especialista Robert J. Sternberg presenta un enfoque psicológico de las relaciones humanas que revela cómo y por qué se enamoran y desenamoran las personas. La experiencia del amor, una obra de fascinante lectura para quienes deseen saberlo todo sobre este tema, aborda una gran diversidad de campos al respecto, desde la historia hasta el folclore, pasando por la ciencia del conocimiento, para acabar ofreciendo un retrato global del amor en sus múltiples formas. Estos conceptos ya se habían apuntado en un libro anterior de Sternberg, El triángulo del amor, pero aquí no se limitan a la exposición de una teoría. Y a diferencia de otra obra del autor sobre la cuestión, El amor es como una historia, no se aborda el modo en que los seres humanos modelamos nuestras historias personales a través de ideas preconcebidas sobre lo que debería ser el amor, sino que se exploran sus innumerables variedades a partir de las distintas combinaciones entre la intimidad, la pasión y el compromiso, los tres componentes del «triángulo». Podría decirse, pues, que ésta es la obra definitiva de Sternberg sobre el amor, un impresionante fresco sobre la experiencia amorosa contemplada a lo largo de la vida del individuo y, en consecuencia, una minuciosa historia del amor a través de los tiempos.

Genres: Psychology

216 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

Robert J. Sternberg's spectacular research career in psychology had a rather inauspicious beginning. In elementary school he performed poorly on IQ tests, and his teachers' actions conveyed their low expectations for his future progress. Everything changed when his fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Alexa, saw that he had potential and challenged him to do better. With her encouragement, he became a high-achieving student, eventually graduating summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Yale University. In a gesture of gratitude, Dr. Sternberg dedicated his book, Successful Intelligence to Mrs. Alexa.

Dr. Sternberg's personal experiences with intelligence testing in elementary school lead him to create his own intelligence test for a 7 th grade science project. He happened to find the Stanford-Binet scales in the local library, and with unintentional impertinence, began administering the test to his classmates; his own test, the Sternberg Test of Mental Abilities (STOMA) appeared shortly thereafter. In subsequent years he distinguished himself in many domains of psychology, having published influential theories relating to intelligence, creativity, wisdom, thinking styles, love and hate.

Dr. Sternberg's Triarchic Theory of (Successful) Intelligence contends that intelligent behavior arises from a balance between analytical, creative and practical abilities, and that these abilities function collectively to allow individuals to achieve success within particular sociocultural contexts. Analytical abilities enable the individual to evaluate, analyze, compare and contrast information. Creative abilities generate invention, discovery, and other creative endeavors. Practical abilities tie everything together by allowing individuals to apply what they have learned in the appropriate setting. To be successful in life the individual must make the best use of his or her analytical, creative and practical strengths, while at the same time compensating for weaknesses in any of these areas. This might involve working on improving weak areas to become better adapted to the needs of a particular environment, or choosing to work in an environment that values the individual's particular strengths. For example, a person with highly developed analytical and practical abilities, but with less well-developed creative abilities, might choose to work in a field that values technical expertise but does not require a great deal of imaginative thinking. Conversely, if the chosen career does value creative abilities, the individual can use his or her analytical strengths to come up with strategies for improving this weakness. Thus, a central feature of the triarchic theory of successful intelligence is adaptability-both within the individual and within the individual's sociocultural context.

Reviews

[Nathan Albright · Rating 4 out of 5]

After spending a lot of time writing about creativity, the author made a mid-career sort of switch into writing about love.  The results were mixed and this book certainly is evidence of that.  This book certainly had some influence in the study of love, but not to the extent that the author was thinking and was undertaken in such a way that the author himself later gently made fun of the work in later writings as an example of the way that he thought of everything in terms of triangles and three-factor theories, not as creative as he would have thought it to be.  Even though this work has been frequently compared to other work in the field and considered not particularly creative, it offers at least a somewhat conventional view of love that many of us who have seen love in psychology have seen.  If there are aspects of love that this book does not get right or at least not completely, this book certainly provides insight and is a perspective worth arguing about and debating, and that is certainly a successful sign for a book of this nature.

This book is a bit less than 200 pages and is divided into five parts and thirteen chapters.  The author begins with a preface.  After that there are four chapters that examine the definition of love in the eyes of the author (I), including a three-component view of love (1), the author's comments of seven types of love (2), and examining both different triangles of love (3) as well as the measurement of the triangle of love (4).  The author then discusses the issue of love over many lifetimes (II), with chapters on the prehistory of love (5), the history of love revealed through culture (6), and the history of love revealed through literature (7), the latter two chapters of which include collaborative work with two women.  There are three sections on love in our lifetimes, focusing on beginnings (III), middles (IV), and ends (V).  First, we have two chapters that discuss the role of childhood and adolescence (8) as well as adulthood (9) in our relationships.  After that there are two chapters that discuss the role of reward (10) in love as well as the course of relationships (11).  Finally, the last two chapters of the book discuss the decay of relationships (12) and the dissolution of and new beginnings for relationships (13), after which there are notes and an index.

Does the author have some understanding of the course of love through time?  Absolutely.  Is this understanding complete?  Not necessarily.  Does it have blind spots and is the view of the author decisive in selecting and choosing among the elements of love that are brought to the attention of the reader?  Certainly.  Even more than in most areas of research, the research into love is highly difficult to accomplish, not least because it has such high stakes for the author that they are nearly always going to infuse their own views about what sorts of love are to be favored over others or not even considered to be love at all into what they view as an objective view.  In few areas of research is subjectivity so common and are essential definitions as to what love can be considered so elusive.  If the author often fails to appreciate the subjectivity in his analysis, the book is by no means offensive in its discussion of love but is at least something that will resonate partly with the experience of many readers and encourage their own thinking and reflection on these subjects with the awareness that they are part of a complex conversation about the subject.

[Irza Fidah]

[Note: I read the Indonesian translated version, so I am writing some of the quotes from this book in Indonesian.]

Cinta dapat dipahami seperti sebuah segitiga yang masing-masing sudutnya merupakan komponen cinta: keintiman, hasrat, dan komitmen. Banyak aspek cinta lainnya yang terbukti merupakan bagian atau manifestasi dari 3 komponen tersebut. [pp. 6]

Setiap komponen cinta umumnya memiliki tingkat kepentingan yang bervariasi. [pp.21]

Jenis cinta: bukan cinta, suka, cinta nafsu, cinta hampa, cinta romantik, cinta persahabatann, dan cinta sejati/sempurna. [pp. 24]

Teori evolusioner merupakan usaha yang bagus untuk menempatkan cinta dalam kerangka biologi. [pp. 80]

Oleh karena teori cinta merupakan teori tentang manusia, maka cinta sangat berkaitan dengan gagasan tentang sifat kemanusiaan dan sifat diri. [pp. 100]

Rasa sakit adalah suatu hal penting dalam cinta. [pp. 130]

Menurut teori penguatan, menyukai seseorang akan terjadi ketika orang mengalami penghargaan dengan kehadiran orang itu. [pp. 207]

Orang menciptakan skenario untuk membuat konflik masuk akal dan apa yang terjadi tidak hanya selama hubungan tapi juga sesudah hubungan berakhir. [pp. 256]

[Pamela H · Rating 3 out of 5]

Este libro me gustó, expone las teorías sobre el amor. Ideal para los que se interesan en las investigaciones de pareja así como entendimiento del funcionamiento de las mismas. Aunque la perspectiva constructivismo social, me parece reduccionista.