Instead of attempting to describe different patterns or types of love, John Allan Lee (1974, 1988, 1998) proposed a theory that uses terms derived from ancient Greek words to describe six different styles of loving that characterize intimate human relationships: romantic, game playing, possessive, companionate, altruistic, and pragmatic.
■ People with a romantic love style (eros) tend to place their emphasis on physical beauty as they search for ideal mates. Romantic, erotic lovers delight in the visual beauty and tactile and sensual pleasures provided by their lover’s body, and they tend to be very affectionate and openly communicative with their partner.
■ People with a game-playing love style (ludus) like to play the field and acquire many sexual "conquests" with little or no commitment. Love is for fun, the act of seduction is to be enjoyed, and relationships are to remain casual and transitory.
■ People with a possessive love style (mania) tend to seek obsessive love relationships, which are often characterized by turmoil and jealousy. These people live a roller-coaster style of love, in which each display of affection from the lover brings ecstasy and the mildest slight produces painful agitation.
■ People with a companionate love style (storge [STOR-gay]) are slow to develop affection and commitment but tend to experience relationships that endure. This style is love without fever or turmoil, a peaceful and quiet kind of relating that usually begins as friendship and develops over time into affection and love.
■ People with an altruistic love style (agape) are characterized by selflessness and a caring, compassionate desire to give to another without expectation of reciprocity. Such love is patient and never demanding or jealous.
■ People with a pragmatic love style (pragma) tend to select lovers based on rational, practical criteria (such as shared interests) that are likely to lead to mutual satisfaction. These individuals approach love in a businesslike fashion, trying to get the best "romantic deal" by seeking partners with social, educational, religious, and interest patterns that are compatible with their own.
What happens when two different people in a relationship naturally tend toward different styles of loving? For Lee this is a critical question. He suggests that loving relationships frequently fail to thrive over time because "too often people are speaking different languages when they speak of love" (Lee, 1974, p. 44). Even though both partners try to build a lasting involvement, their efforts can be undermined by a losing struggle to integrate incompatible loving styles. In contrast, satisfaction and success in loving relationships often depend on finding a mate who "shares the same approach to loving, the same definition of love" (Lee, 1974, p. 44).
An inventory called the Love Attitude Scale has been developed to measure Lee’s six loving styles (Hendrick & Hendrick, 1986, 2003), and this research tool has generated some empirical studies of his theory. Studies that have used this scale provide some support for Lee’s hypothesis that relationship success is influenced by compatibility in styles of loving (Davis & Latty-Mann, 1987; Hendrick & Hendrick, 2003). College students prefer to date people with love styles similar to their own (Hahn & Blass, 1997; Hendrick & Hendrick, 2003). Evidence also exists of sex differences in college students’ styles of love. One investigation revealed that college women are more likely than men to embrace companionate, pragmatic, and possessive love styles, whereas college men are more likely to manifest romantic or game-playing love styles (Hendrick & Hendrick, 2003). Another study also found sex differences in love styles among college students, with women more likely to manifest companionate, pragmatic, and romantic styles, and men more likely to embrace game-playing and altruistic styles (Lacey et al., 2004).