Journal article
Addicted to love what is love addiction and when should it be treated?
BD Earp, OA Wudarczyk, B Foddy, J Savulescu
Philosophy Psychiatry and Psychology | JOHNS HOPKINS UNIV PRESS | Published : 2017
Abstract
Recent research suggests that romantic love may sometimes be literally addictive. Although the exact nature of the relationship between love and addiction has been described in inconsistent terms throughout the literature, we offer a framework that distinguishes between a narrow view and a broad view of love addiction. The narrow view counts only the most extreme, harmful forms of love or love-related behaviors as being potentially addictive in nature. The broad view, by contrast, counts even basic social attachment as being on a spectrum of addictive motivations, underwritten by similar neurochemical processes as more conventional addictions. We argue that on either understanding of love-as..
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Awarded by Wellcome Trust
Funding Acknowledgements
The authors thank Allan McKennna, Sven Nyholm, Maia Szalavitz, Michael Mascolo, Matthew Broome, and two anonymous reviewers for feedback on an earlier draft of this manuscript. Although we could not incorporate all of their important insights, we do think that the paper is much improved by the ones we did incorporate, and we have certainly been inspired to think more deeply about these complex issues. Work on this manuscript was supported by a Wellcome Trust grant #08604/Z/08/Z.