The New Science of Romantic Relationships

Reviewing the book ‘Love Sense’ by Sue Johnson

I’m a bit skeptical of relationship books. They often feel overly psychoanalytic, almost blending into self-help, where anyone can simply give their own advice and act as an authority, often with little to back it up.

That’s why I was determined to find a book with solid science behind it. Relationships and human connections are completed. It's certainly not something easy to grasp with the scientific method, but insights can be learned. Even if a scientific approach can be a bit reductionist, at least it gives me some confidence that what I am reading isn’t completely bollocks.

This book seemed to fit the bill the best out of all of them that I found. Sue Johnson is a clinical psychologist and couple therapist with many years of experience as both a therapist and researcher. She developed emotionally focused couples and family therapy (EFT), a psychotherapeutic approach for couples based on attachment theory. This is mostly what the book focuses on.

It is centered on trust and intimacy between the couple, and broken relationships often arise due that being broken. It may seem like it is something else, but that is a symptom and not a cause. What ultimately binds us together is knowing that our partner can be relied on, and having confidence and trust to deal with our vulnerability.

Something that struck me immediately was how well the book was written. Beyond the content itself, it expresses its ideas incredibly well. It is very easy to read but even more impressive to me, at times it felt almost poetic. The descriptions of love and attachment were beautiful to read.

What I most wanted was science, and I got science. It’s not a textbook, and it doesn’t just throw a bunch of studies at you. It builds a narrative and uses studies to support it along the way. Some of them were authored by Sue herself. For example, it mentions a study where 73 people were studied, and two years later, they found that among those who had problems with insecurity, the relationships were stronger if the partner could come back from an argument. In another study, 168 couples were questioned over a long period in their relationship, from 8 weeks to 14 years. Many variables were addressed, hoping to see what seemed to affect a relationship’s success the most. What did they find?

What predicted a long-term relationship was not how often the couple fought but rather how much affection and emotional responsiveness were shown. These show that it is positive and deep engagement that matters, not so much avoiding conflict. It’s not that this is a revolutionary insight, but at least you know it is based on data from actual relationships, not just a person’s opinion or common sense of what a relationship should be.

In addition to science, it also provided many anecdotes from Sue’s practice, which I found incredibly helpful. At first, some of what she was saying felt a bit too abstract and hard to pin down. But after a few stories of how these problems show up in real-life relationships, it really changed my perspective. Its articulation of emotional attunement between couples and how it is both lost and gained was incredibly helpful.

It covered many topics that weren’t strictly about romantic relationships as well, and I highly appreciated it. How communities are built, the role of technology in human connection, the importance of maternity leave, the role of pornography, and even how botox affects emotional expression are covered. They were all enjoyable to read and with important takeaways.

There were a few things I disliked, however. First, the experiments. There are many experiments the author proposes you do, often so that you understand an idea better. I hated them. Many are unrealistic, and I doubt anyone does them. They are easily skippable so they don’t ruin the book or anything, but I found it annoying.

While I did praise the science of the book, it should have had more of it. A lot of the book was the author’s commentary, and I understand why. But more studies should have been referenced, like the ones I mentioned. They were there, but they were few.

Lastly, EFT heavily uses the framework of attachment styles influenced by Bowlby. These include a secure attachment (autonomous and confident), avoidant (dismissing), and anxious (overly preoccupied). There is also a 4th attachment called “disorganized”, which for whatever reason was never mentioned in the book. These are supposed categories of human attachment, and the author applies them to relationships. There is a fair bit of science on them, so I don’t dismiss them. But it felt like an overly consuming schema that reduced relationships to these attachment styles. It certainly feels like an oversimplification needing nuance, and that made me a bit more skeptical.

But taken as a whole, it’s a wonderful book about relationships. Everyone knows love is important, but we are quick to forget. And everyone also knows that love is hard to maintain, but easily get distracted and don’t pay as much attention to our relationships as we should.

This book provides a very useful overview of what relationships are, what drives their success, and what makes them crumble. It’s not a magical potion that will make every relationship perfect, but I’m sure that everyone can find insight into how it explores the role of emotional connection, trust, and vulnerability.

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