Arora|1

Kanav Arora

Instructor Andrea Corona

Ling 3C

11/20/2022

Prompt: What does love mean in today’s world, and how has it changed over the years?

“My bounty is as boundless as the sea, my love as deep, the more I give to thee ,the more

I have, for both are infinite.” By William Shakespeare. In the Era of Shakespeare, love was seen

as something so powerful that it could transform, change personalities, take risks and make

sacrifices that would otherwise be unthinkable. Love is a concept that is hard to analyze,

quantify, and describe. But the big question is : has love changed over the years?

Brad Troeger in his ted talk, “What is Love?” claims that love is often regarded as

maybe the most intensely contemplated feeling in all of human history and is an emotion which

is extremely hard to define or describe.Troeger examines how different people interpret love

differently. He further states that for many people love, like a drug, may be a temporary or

permanent addiction for a person; alternatively for some, it is a beautiful emotion, a feeling for

someone that has never been felt before. Perhaps for people love is just human DNA's best

technique for causing its own replication; or it might just be one of the many different

interpretations of love that individuals have. As a result, Troeger questions that if love can be

defined, how can it mean so many different things to so many different individuals?

According to me, the concept love is indefinable, and the way it is expressed has constantly

evolved throughout time, with social media and technology playing a significant part.
 Arora|2

To fully comprehend the essence of love, it is essential to understand how the most vital

element of the human body, the brain, responds to love. In the article ,”The Brain of Love”

Dianne Ackerman elaborates on how love has a significant influence on the brain and how

personal attachments that develop or fail us, modify the fragile circuits that build memories,

emotions, and the ultimate souvenir, the self. Ackerman goes on to say that as the most social

apes, humans live in a mirror-world in which every meaningful interaction, whether with a

spouse, a friend, or a kid, molds the brain. She claims when two individuals get together as a

couple, the brain expands the concept of self to include the other; instead of the singular pronoun

"I," a plural self that can borrow on the qualities and abilities of the other. The U.C.L.A.

neurologist Naomi Eisenberger's research, which demonstrates that the same brain regions that

record physical pain are active when someone feels socially rejected, are also discussed by

Ackerman. Because of this, being rejected by a partner hurts everywhere throughout the body,

yet nowhere in particular. She further states people utilize the same physical pain pictures to

express a shattered heart, which they experience to be crushing and paralyzing, whether they

speak Armenian or Mandarin. It's more than simply a metaphor for a hit in the gut. Similar

suffering can be brought on by social pain as by a stomachache or a broken bone. Ackerman

therefore compares love to a top school with expensive tuition and painful assignments. She also

discusses the role that love plays in the healing process in medicine. When you are with someone

you can trust, your brain doesn't have to use up valuable resources to deal with worry or danger.

Instead, it can use its vitality to improve the healing process or learn new things. Therefore, one

thing that cannot be disputed is that love has a significant influence on individuals, whether we

are in the 21st Century or the 17th Century and despite the increase of technology love still

remains as important as ever.

 Arora|3

As we've seen, the value of love and relationships hasn't changed much over time, but

how that love is shown to one another and the outside world has changed unmistakably. As the

psychology researchers detail in their article “Why People post ‘Couple Photos’ as their Social

Media profile pictures”, how sharing "couple photographs" are a dyadic display that gives them

major insights about a pair's relationship. They claim choosing their partner is in their profile

photographs, declaring their relationship status, and mentioning them in updates may all be

indications of how someone feels about their relationship and might send a powerful message to

potential rivals. They go on to say couple profile images and other social media representations

of romantic partnerships, are more common among those who are particularly dedicated to or

pleased with their relationships. A dyadic profile photo is more common among people with

anxious attachment styles, who worry about their spouse rejecting or leaving them. People with

an avoidant attachment style, on the other hand, are less inclined to display their relationship in

these ways, since they feel uncomfortable depending on others and value independence. These

people often face more problems in their relationships than others.

The primary factor in the researchers' theories on why couples behave in this way is their level of

security or insecurity. People who are really content with their relationships and are fond of

their partners, for instance, frequently utilize dyadic displays because they perceive their partner

as an integral part of who they are, whereas those who are insecure frequently do not. This is a

specific illustration of how social media has a big impact on relationships, these days. Love was

a lot simpler and people were relatively less insecure when social media didn't exist, in earlier

times.

While the ways in which love is expressed and demonstrated may have changed over

time, however its significance hasn't changed. Helen Fisher in her ted talk, “Technology hasn't
 Arora|4

changed love. Here’s why” discusses how technology is altering the way we show our love, but

it doesn't alter who we choose to love or the importance of it. According to Fisher and her

colleagues, over 100 people, were put into a brain scanner to assess their levels of sex drive,

feelings of intense romantic love and feelings of deep cosmic attachment to a long-term partner.

These three brain systems work in tandem to plan our sexual, romantic, and familial life, along

with many other brain regions. The regions are connected to energy, concentration, hunger,

drive, and motivation. The desire to obtain the greatest reward in life—a mate.Fisher, who has

served as Chief Scientific Advisor to Match.com for 11 years, claims that in today's age of speed

dating and dating websites, meeting new people and establishing connections are the primary

purposes of dating websites.Technology undoubtedly alters the way we fall in love and the

course of our relationships, but it won't affect the people we choose to love or their significance

in our lives. Like two sides of a coin , while there are few adverse effects of technology on love ,

there are also positive effects which Fisher talks about. She states one modern tendency that

technology is creating, in her opinion, that is really significant is the idea of the paradox of

choice. Humans have been living in small hunting and gathering communities for millions of

years. On a dating site, there weren't a thousand individuals for you to pick from . She says that

humans for thousands of years have had to marry the right person from the right background and

right kin connection. Now people can look for somebody that appreciates them, somebody they

can trust and confide in, somebody who makes them laugh, somebody who makes enough time

for them and somebody who they find physically attractive. Earlier where marriage used to be

the beginning of a relationship, now it's the finale. She contends that if people can end toxic

relationships before getting married, perhaps there will be an increase in successful unions. She

recounts her research of 1,100 married Americans in which she questioned them extensively.
 Arora|5

'Would you remarry the person you are now married to?' was one of the inquiries, nevertheless.

And 81% said "Yes." Just this research demonstrates how much love has advanced in a

favourable way throughout time.

While in the 21st there’s no dragon to slay for your lady love, no evil stepmothers and

witches to rescue her from. No spells to wake her from the kiss but, the essence of love hasn’t

changed. Love is a universal theme throughout literature from past to modern day. Love has

evolved over the centuries in the way people feel it and show it, but the meaning of true love is

timeless. True love always has been something that cannot be defined in any means. It was

earlier and it continues to be a cluster of adjectives: it’s crazy, passionate, complicated, painful

but most importantly true love is real. Where you care for another person’s happiness more than

your own, no matter how painful the choices you face might be. As Rumi says “Love is from the

infinite and will remain until eternity”.

 Arora|6

Works Cited

Ackerman, Diane. “The Brain on Love.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 24 Mar.

2012, https://archive.nytimes.com/opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/24/the-brain-

on-love/?mtrref=www.google.com&assetType=PAYWALL. 

Fisher, Helen. “Technology Hasn't Changed Love. Here's Why.” Helen Fisher: Technology

Hasn't Changed Love. Here's Why | TED Talk,

https://www.ted.com/talks/helen_fisher_technology_hasn_t_changed_love_here_s_why?

referrer=playlist-love_technology&autoplay=true. 

Forest, Amanda L, and Kori Krueger . “Why People Post 'Couple Photos' as Their Social Media

Profile Pictures.” The Conversation, 16 Oct. 2022, https://theconversation.com/why-

people-post-couple-photos-as-their-social-media-profile-pictures-130661. 

Troeger, Brad. What Is Love? TED-Ed, 9 Sept. 2013, https://www.youtube.com/watch?

v=5sY4rhvB9LE. Accessed 20 Nov. 2022. 

Arora|7