Does Love Play A Key Role When Choosing A Marriage Partner Essay

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A famous quote by John Lennon saying that “love is the answer and only you know that for sure” was not entirely truthful the fact not realised was that, for the many people in today’s contemporary “dating” grouping, truly knowing what the answer actually is in regards to dating is often easier said than done. Therefore, the answer certainly is not love. According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary (1974), love is defined as a “strong affection, a warm attachment, attraction based on sexual desire, cherish, to feel passion, devotion or tenderness for ~, caress and to take pleasure in ~ “ (p.417). In the modern-day world where the preferences and choices of human mate selection has become a topic of broad exploration, it is highly questionable as to whether or not “love” is the principal influence that leads an individual’s decision of choosing a life-long partner.

The choosing of a marriage partner today seems to be a crucial aspect of life decisions that makes all other choices in one’s life seem to be more or less trivial when comparing accordingly. When you come to a decision as to who you want to marry, share the rest of your life with and become one with, you are changing every aspect of your once single and independent life. For the reason that life changes so significantly when a marriage partner has been chosen, there are countless factors that have an effect on the choices that individuals make.

Firstly, Botwin et al. (1997) insist that “personality plays a critical role in mate selection and marital happiness” (p.128) but many other attributes such as the many dating processes, the many problems that often occur in relationships, and individual preferences all highly motivate, aspire and aim to encourage people in today’s society toward finding their preferred marriage partner.

Society often questions the difficulty involved for an average person to simply decide “who” they desire to marry. What's more is the reality that many people also criticize the individuals who have no idea who they want to marry. Research by Doosje et al. (1999) shows that “both men and women value most in their partner that she/he is kind and considerate, socially exciting, creative and intellectually stimulating” (p.46) which goes to prove that couples want their marriages to work and do not even consider them to eventually fail.

Buying a car or buying a house is a difficult task in comparable to choosing a life long partner, the decision to buy a house and car seems to be insignificant. When someone buys a home, they plan their strategy to pay for the home, they acquire a mortgage for the home and they plan their methods in order to utilize the home for years to come. Comparing dating to the mortgaging of a home, once an individual signs his or her name on the mortgage paper, their stuck with that mortgage for a lengthy amount of time therefore the effort put forth into choosing and buying a home is considerably large. So, the effort and time required in choosing a lifelong partner should be just as thoughtfully planned out as buying a home. Just like buying a home, we are required to choose a partner whom we are suitable with at the present moment just as we will be suitable with the same person in ten, twenty, thirty and fifty years from now. It’s shopping around for the house months on end just as it is shopping around for your life long partner for years on end. People know what they’re looking for but according to Botwin et al. (1997), “not all individuals succeed in getting what they want. Some end up with dating partners or spouses who deviate from their ideals and display personality characteristics that are not desired.” (p.133) and it’s a matter of finding the preferred partner with all the desirable vicinities and with all the preferred costs as well as rewards. People “tend to select mates who are similar to themselves and who embody their ideals” (Botwin et al., 1997, p.134) therefore people set standards of their desired partners even before they meet their marriage partner.

Meeting someone used to be a wonderful, intriguing and exciting experience; now days, there’s no such thing as just “casually” meeting someone. Being set up by a family member or friends with someone whom they think would be a good match for has become nothing out of the ordinary. You are set up on blind dates by family and friends, there are dating services available universally anywhere you go from newspaper ads to telephone personals and the Internet. Males are continuously seeking females and females are continuously seeking males. The dating game never ends and the thought of accidentally bumping into a complete stranger while running about you everyday life tasks and falling instantly in love has become unfashionable, out of date and just plain boring. People are devoting more time to the actual encountering and according to Doosje et al. (1999), “with regard to the importance of physical attractiveness in the preferred partner, the results of our study show that men value physical attractiveness more than women do” (p.57) and therefore less time is being devoted to the actual dating or courtship of the potential marriage partner. It is beyond doubt that not enough time is devoted into deciding just what it is an individual is actually looking for in a their marriage partner.

In contemporary societies, modern mate selection processes do not seem to be working favourably. There are so many different ways to meet people and Nock (1995) believes that it is “the marriage market that unites unmarried people today includes many people whose values and views of marriage are informed by the experience itself” (p.92) and with increased technologies and increased communications, it is often very easy for people to simply choose the wrong marriage partner. This fact is relevant to the idea that today; marital breakdown is often too common of an experience. Marriages are constantly failing in today’s society with the divorce rate being so high yet couples are still making the same mistakes incessantly and Nock strongly insists that “divorce and cohabitation, in short, are not simply the endings and alternatives to conventional marriages. Instead, theses experiences are aspects of individuals’ biographies that are part of what they bring with them to the marriage market” (p.106).

Too often, couples rush the position of their relationship and decide too fast and too soon to get married. Couples “jump into” the relationship and the relationship becomes serious way too fast and way too soon. In order for two people to make an evaluation of how good the match is between them, a tremendous amount of information must be shared and processed. The sharing of this information takes a great deal of time therefore...

Botwin, D., Buss, D., & Shackelford, T. (1997). Personality and Mate
Preferences: Five Factors in Mate Selection and Marital Satisfaction. Journal of Personality, 65(1), 107-136.
Doosje, B., Rojahn, K., & Fisher, A. (1999). Partner Preferences as a
Function of Gender, Age, Political Orientation and Level of Education. Sex Roles, 40 (1/2), 45-163.
Nock, S. (1995). Spouse Preferences of Never-Married, Divorced, and
Cohabitating Americans. Journal of Divorce and Remarriage, 22(3/4), 91-108.
Simpson, J., & Gangestad, S. (1992). Sociosexuality and Romantic Partner
Choice. Journal of Personality, 60(1), 31-51.
Townsend, J., and Levy, G. (1990). Effects of Potential Partners’ Physical
Attractiveness and Socioeconomic Status on Sexuality and Partner Selection. Archives of Sexual Behaviour, 19(2), 149-163.
The Merriam-Webster Dictionary. New York: Pocket Books New York, 1974.
New International Version Youth Walk Devotional Bible. Michigan:
Zondervan Publishing House, 1992. You should cite this paper as follows:

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