Finch, Teresa Marie. “Relationship Satisfaction among Lesbian Couples: the Effects of Fusion and Love Styles.” PSYD, Miami Inst. Of Psychology of the Caribbean CTR. For Advanced Studies, 1999.

Abstract:
This research study examined the degree of relationship satisfaction in lesbian couples and how it relates to their level of fusion and to their individual love styles. The study helped elucidate how a lesbian couple is affected by their interaction with each other, in terms of their degree of closeness and caregiving and intrusiveness, and specifically in terms of their reported level of relationship satisfaction. In addition it explored how their individual differences in terms of love styles affected their reported level of relationship satisfaction.

The sample included thirty two lesbian couples from Florida, Pennsylvania, Washington, D.C., Massachusetts, and Nevada. The ethnicity consisted of 22 Caucasian couples, four Hispanic couples, four couples with one partner Hispanic and one partner Caucasian, two Bi-racial couples, one Caucasian with an African American partner, and one Mulatto partner with a Caucasian partner. The average age was 40 years with a range of 22–68 years. The average length of the relationships was five years with a range of two or more than twenty. The majority of couples did not have children. All of the couples lived together six months or longer. Each individual of each couple was either mailed or given a research packet including a demographic data sheet, and three different measures assessing relationship satisfaction, love attitudes, and fusion. The Relationship Assessment Scale, The Love Attitudes Scale and the California Inventory for Family Assessment were utilized. Fusion in lesbian couples defined as intrusiveness was found to be lower than fusion defined as closeness/caregiving. This reinforces the fact that lesbians may simply be close as the result of their ability to share warmth, time together, nurturance and consistency. This is consistent with previous findings (Werner & Green, 1993). Even more impressive was that fewer than 20% of the couples in this sample qualified as exhibiting fusion. This finding runs counter to the usual stereotypes for this population and further emphasizes the need for more research in this area.

In addition this study replicated in a lesbian population what was previously found in heterosexual couples (Hendrick, 1988) in that relationship satisfaction is higher in those couples with an eros love style. This finding may show that lesbian couples share similarities with heterosexual couples in certain variables. When looking at love styles, the majority of lesbians scored either as eros or storge; pragma, agape, mania and ludus followed in that order. There was no relationship between similarity of love styles and relationship satisfaction, however.