Exploring Lay Understandings of Romantic Chemistry Using Inductive and Deductive Content Analysis

TL;DR

This study explores how people understand romantic chemistry, finding that it involves multiple facets and varies individually.

Contribution

The study provides new insights into lay conceptualizations of romantic chemistry using mixed content analysis methods.

Findings

Romantic chemistry is perceived as multifaceted, involving interactivity, connection, and attraction.

Mutual feelings are seen as essential for romantic chemistry.

Little differences in understanding were found across gender and minority identity groups.

Abstract

Romantic chemistry is an important indicator of compatibility between prospective romantic partners, but, despite theoretical work, lay understandings of romantic chemistry that could inform theory are still unclear. We used an online survey question to collect romantic chemistry conceptualisations from 571 Australian adults who were currently looking for a romantic partner, of whom 53.06% identified with minority gender and/or sexual identities. We analysed responses using inductive content analysis, which resulted in the construction of categories and sub-categories concerning the multifaceted nature of romantic chemistry, the importance of mutual feelings, and central concepts of interactivity, connection, and attraction. We performed a deductive content analysis using these categories and sub-categories to re-code responses and observed little evidence of differences between groups based on assigned sex, gender, sexual, and minority identities. Our findings suggest that romantic chemistry is only perceivable when multiple facets are experienced and that experiences of facets vary individually, which provides ample grounds for future investigation and measurement of romantic chemistry.