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| Author(s): |
Eglacy Cristina Sophia
Total Authors: 1
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| Document type: | Doctoral Thesis |
| Press: | São Paulo. |
| Institution: | Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Medicina (FM/SBD) |
| Defense date: | 2014-10-30 |
| Examining board members: |
Monica Levit Zilberman;
Isabel Cristina Gomes;
Francisco Lotufo Neto;
Andrea Seixas Magalhães
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| Advisor: | Monica Levit Zilberman |
| Abstract | |
Psychologists have studied love relationship using various questionnaires assessing behaviors and quality of relationship. Pathological love (PL) consists of repetitive and uncontrolled behavior of caring for the partner in a romantic relationship. Previous studies have shown that individuals with PL are different from healthy volunteers because they have high impulsivity and selftranscendence, unsatisfactory and compulsive love relationships, predominance of mania and agape love styles, and anxious-ambivalent attachment. Because there are no instruments that specifically measure this kind of behavior, the objective of the present study was to develop a scale to assess PL and to analyze its psychometric properties. This case-control study was conducted in two parts. During the 1st part, the scores of 154 patients (79 with PL and 75 healthy volunteers) were compared considering the characteristics mentioned above. These characteristics were determined based on the administration of 137 items of questionnaires used to measure each one of the characteristics alone. Exploratory factor analysis reduced the 67 original items that differentiated the samples to 26 items. Thus, the primary factor structure included 5 factors: Control (13 items), Dissatisfaction (4 items), Impulsivity (2 items), Abnegation (4 items), and Idealization (3 items). These items showed good internal consistency (alfa.74; CI=.72-.76; p =<. 001). Some items were adapted, 4 new items were created, and then the pilot model of the Love Scale (LS) was created including 30 items. In the 2nd part of the study, 320 individuals (20 with PL, 28 without PL, and 272 with unknown status for PL) completed this pilot scale. Factor analysis was used again, and the final model of the LS was built including 22 items divided into 4 factors: Control (10 items), Dissatisfaction (5 items), Abnegation (5 items), and Idealization (2 items). Internal consistency was higher (alfa=.88; CI=.86-.89; p =<. 001) and the ROC curve method showed that the discriminative power of the scale was excellent (AUC=.989, SD=.12; p <=. 001). The development of this LS will help to optimize the evaluation of PL and to improve research and analysis of the treatments offered (AU) | |