The scientific method that makes a stranger fall in love with you in 45 minutes

April 5, 2024

Researchers have been trying to decipher love for decades and how we are attracted to each other. In recent times much progress has been made to understand this phenomenon, and as we explained in the article "What is love? (And what is not), "defining this concept is extremely complicated.

One of the most curious studies in this regard is the performed by the psychologist and philosopher Dr. Arthur Aron , professor at the University of Stony Brook (New York), who has spent 40 years studying love, friendship, intimacy. This author considers that it is possible to make other people fall in love in just 45 minutes. In this article we explain your discoveries.

Related article: "The 4 types of love: what different kinds of love are there?"

The ideas of Arthur Aron

For most of us, love is something that happens by magic, when you see a person and you feel a crush , or when you know someone in depth and simply connect, as if the souls fit.

But it may be necessary to want to fall in love and do our part to make it happen, and this fact motivated the New York Times journalist, Mandy Len Catron, to write about Arthur Aron's study that took place during the year at the year 1993.

In his article entitled "To Fall In Love With Anyone, Do This" (to fall in love with this), he talked about how the American psychologist elaborated a questionnaire of 36 questions with which said that it was possible to create such intimacy between two individuals and that they could fall in love in just 45 minutes. Mandy says she applied these questions, and that despite more than 20 years old they had, she worked with a guy she met in a bar.

Maybe you're interested: "45 open questions to know the mind of a person"

The study and its characteristics

The article by the journalist of the New York newspaper tells how Arthur Aaron carried out his investigation, which included a group of subjects who had to sit in pairs, facing each other.

The subjects were instructed to ask some questions previously prepared by the researcher and, after this, the subjects had to stare at each other for 4 minutes . Apparently, there were several couples who felt something special and, in fact, three ended up in marriage.

The journalist put it into practice

Catron decided to test these questions to know if they really were effective or not. So when he met an interesting guy in a bar, he overcame questions, all of them belonged to the questionnaire of 36 questions, and were formulated one after the other. as if it were a job interview . Logically, he asked the boy to look into his eyes for 4 minutes once the questions were completed, to complete his own research.

According to account, and after finishing the test, his degree of intimacy was such that he fell in love with the boy . Apparently the boy too.

The questions to fall in love with someone

Surely many skeptics do not believe it, but both the researcher and the journalist say that there is a greater degree of intimacy after knowing the other person thoroughly. These questions are divided into three sections, vary their privacy gradually and they require increasing confidence to answer them.

For example, the first question is "What person would you invite to dinner if you could choose anyone?", While the last one is formulated as follows: "Share a personal problem with your interlocutor and ask him to give you his opinion on how he would have acted . Ask him how he thinks you feel in relation to the problem you just told him. "

For Arthur Aaron, "one of the most important factors about these questions is self-disclosure. Revealing things about oneself has to occur gradually, and requires confidence. "According to the researcher," if you go too fast, the other person may feel self-conscious and distrustful. But if you start with something that is not too personal and then gradually you come to ask more and more personal questions, both partners will feel comfortable ”

The famous Spanish program "El hormiguero" shared the sociological experiment Arthur Aaron. You can check it in the next video.

If you want to know what are the famous questions of this study, you will find them in the article "The 40 infallible questions to fall in love with someone"

The importance of maintaining the look

But the really effective of these questions and the supposed results of the study is in keeping the look with the other interlocutor during 4 minutes.According to the Mensalus Institute of Barcelona, one of the best psychology clinics in Spain, these minutes are so revealing since exclusivity is offered in only one way, and this can be a powerful amplifier of the interaction. Further, helps to delve into concepts that go beyond words ”.

For the professionals of this center, "the 4 minutes are essential to contemplate the other interlocutor in their fullness and to make a mutual recognition. They are not the classic verbal questions and answers, but they are made from silence. It creates a unique connection, a total complicity. "

You can visualize the consequences of the look in this study below.