Love Stories- IELTS Reading Answers | Passage
Table of Contents
![ielts logo](/v3/images/homepage/desktop/ielts_material_logo.png)
![ielts img](/v3/images/article/cta-assets/cta-3-img-mob.webp)
Limited-Time Offer : Access a FREE 10-Day IELTS Study Plan!
The IELTS Reading Module offers a fantastic chance to achieve excellent scores. It assesses a candidate’s reading comprehension skills in English. You must comprehend the various question types in order to perform at your best in this area. Ideally, you should not spend more than 20 minutes on a passage.
The Academic passage, Love Stories reading answers appeared in an IELTS Test. Try to find the answers to get an idea of the difficulty level of the passages in the actual reading test. If you want more passages to solve, try taking one of our IELTS reading practice tests.
So, let’s see how easy this passage is for you and if you’re able to make it in 20 minutes.
The question types found in this passage are:
- Matching Features (Q. 1-8)
- Yes/No/Not Given (Q. 9-14)
Aiming to achieve a band score of 9 in IELTS Reading? Check out the video below for some quick tips.
IELTS Reading 2023 | TOP 10 BAND 9 Tips & Tricks
Reading Passage
Love Stories
A “Love stories” are often associated — at least in the popular imagination — with fairy tales, adolescent day dreams, Disney movies and other frivolous pastimes. For psychologists developing taxonomies of affection and attachment, however, this is an area of rigorous academic pursuit. Beginning in the early 1970s with the groundbreaking contributions of John Alan Lee, researchers have developed classifications that they believe better characterise our romantic predispositions.
B This involves examining not a single, universal, emotional expression (“love”), but rather a series of divergent behaviours and narratives that each has an individualised purpose, desired outcome and state of mind. Lee’s gritty methodology painstakingly involved participants matching 170 typical romantic encounters (e.g., “The night after I met X..”) with nearly 1500 possible reactions (“I could hardly get to sleep” or “I wrote X a letter”). The patterns unknowingly expressed by respondents culminated in a taxonomy of six distinct love “styles” that continue to inform research in the area forty years later.
C The first of these styles — eros — is closely tied in with images of romantic love that are promulgated in Western popular culture. Characteristic of this style is a passionate emotional intensity, a strong physical magnetism – as if the two partners were literally being “pulled” together — and a sense of inevitability about the relationship. A related but more frantic style of love called mania involves an obsessive, compulsive attitude toward one’s partner. Vast swings in mood from ecstasy to agony — dependent on the level of attention a person is receiving from his or her partner — are typical of manic love.
D Two styles were much more subdued, however. Storge is a quiet, companionate type of loving — “love by evolution” rather than “love by revolution”, according to some theorists. Relationships built on a foundation of platonic affection and caring are archetypal of storge. When care is extended to a sacrificial level of doting, however, it becomes another style — agape. In an agape relationship, one partner becomes a “caretaker”, exalting the welfare of the other above his or her own needs.
E The final two styles of love seem to lack aspects of emotion and reciprocity altogether. The ludus style envisions relationships primarily as a game in which it is best to “play the field” or experience a diverse set of partners over time. Mutually-gratifying outcomes in relationships are not considered necessary, and deception of a partner and lack of disclosure about one’s activities are also typical.
F While Lee found that college students in his study overwhelmingly disagreed with the tenets of this style, substantial numbers of them acted in a typically ludic style while dating, a finding that proves correct the deceit inherent in ludus. Pragma lovers also downplayed emotive aspects of relationships but favoured practical, sensible connections. Successful arranged marriages are a great example of pragma, in that the couple decides to make the relationship work; but anyone who seeks an ideal partner with a shopping list of necessary attributes (high salary, same religion, etc.) fits the classification.
G Robert J. Sternberg’s contemporary research on love stories has elaborated on how these narratives determine the shape of our relationships and our lives. Sternberg and others have proposed and tested the theory of love as a story, “whereby the interaction of our personal attributes with the environment — which we in part create — leads to the development of stories about love that we then seek to fulfil, to the extent possible, in our lives.” Sternberg’s taxonomy of love stories numbers far more, at twenty-six, than Lee’s taxonomy of love styles, but as Sternberg himself admits there is plenty of overlap. The seventh story, Game, coincides with Judus, for example, while the nineteenth story, Sacrifice, fits neatly on top of agape.
H Sternberg’s research demonstrates that we may have predilections toward multiple love stories, each represented in a mental hierarchy and varying in weight in terms of their personal significance. This explains the frustration many of us experience when comparing potential partners. One person often fulfills some expected narratives — such as a need for mystery and fantasy — while lacking the ability to meet the demands of others (which may lie in direct contradiction). It is also the case that stories have varying abilities to adapt to a given cultural milieu and its respective demands. Love stories are, therefore, interactive and adaptive phenomena in our lives rather than rigid prescriptions.
I Steinberg also explores how our love stories interact with the love stories of our partners. What happens when someone who sees love as art collides with someone who sees love as a business? Can a Sewing story (love is what you make it) co-exist with a Theatre story (love is a script with predictable acts, scenes and lines)? Certainly, it is clear that we look for partners with love stories that complement and are compatible with our own narratives.
j But they do not have to be an identical match. Someone who sees love as mystery and art, for example, might locate that mystery better in a partner who views love through a lens of business and humour. Not all love stories, however, are equally well predisposed to relationship longevity; stories that view love as a game, as a kind of surveillance or as an addiction are all unlikely to prove durable.
K Research on love stories continues apace. Defying the myth that rigorous science and the romantic persuasions of ordinary people are incompatible, this research demonstrates that good psychology can clarify and comment on the way we give affection and form attachments.
Questions 1-8
Look at the following statements (Questions 1-8) and the list of styles in the box below.
Match each statement with the correct term, A-F.
NB: You may use any letter more than once.
1 My most important concern is that my partner is happy.
2 I enjoy having many romantic partners.
3 I feel that my partner and I were always going to end up together.
4 I want to be friends first and then let romance develop later.
5 l always feel either very excited or absolutely miserable about my relationship.
6 I prefer to keep many aspects of my love life to myself.
7 When l am in love, that is all I can think about.
8 I know before I meet someone what qualities I need in a partner.
List of Love Styles
A Eros
B Mania
C Storge
D Agape
E Ludus
F Pragma
Questions 9-14
Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in the Reading Passage?
YES if the statement agrees with the claims of the writer
NO if the statement contradicts the claims of the writer
NOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this
9 People’s notions of love affect their relationships, rather than vice versa.
10 Some of our love stories are more important to us than others.
11 Our love stories can change to meet the needs of particular social environments.
12 We look for romantic partners with a love story just like our own.
13 The most successful partners have matching love stories.
14 No love story is more suited to a long relationship than any other.
Love Stories Reading Answers and Explanations
1 Answer: D
Question type: Matching Features
Answer location: Paragraph 4, line 5
Answer explanation: In the concluding line of Paragraph 4, it is mentioned that “In an agape relationship one partner becomes a “caretaker”, exalting the welfare of the other above his or her own needs.”. It indicates that in an agape relationship, the concern of one of the partners is to make the other person happy and it takes more precedence over his/her own desires. Hence, the answer is D.
2 Answer: E
Question type: Matching Features
Answer location: Paragraph 5, line 2
Answer explanation: In the fifth paragraph, it is noted that “The ludus style envisions relationships primarily as a game in which it is best to “play the field” or experience a diverse set of partners over time.”. It can be pointed out that in the ludus style of love, people enjoy having multiple partners as relationships are treated as a game and different partners provide different experiences. Hence, the answer is E.
Unlock Explanations
If you want to have a look at the remaining explanations, sign up!
3 Answer: A
Question type: Matching Features
Answer location: Paragraph 3, line 2
Answer explanation: In the quoted line, it is stated that “Characteristic of this style is a passionate emotional intensity, a strong physical magnetism – as if the two partners were literally being “pulled” together — and a sense of inevitability about the relationship.”. From the given reference, it can be said that in the eros love style, the partners enjoy an emotional bonding and sense of ending together (inevitability). Hence, the answer is A.
4 Answer: C
Question type: Matching Features
Answer location: Paragraph 4, line 2-line 3
Answer explanation: In the mentioned portion, it is reported that “Storge is a quiet, companionate type of loving — “love by evolution” rather than “love by revolution”, according to some theorists. Relationships built on a foundation of platonic affection and caring are archetypal of storge.“. It can be concluded that in the storage form of love, the partners begin as friends (platonic affection) which gradually changes into love. As a result, it is considered being ‘love by evolution’ where love evolves from friendship, rather than ‘love by revolution’. Hence, the answer is C.
5 Answer: B
Question type: Matching Features
Answer location: Paragraph 3, line 3-line 4
Answer explanation: In the cited lines, it is stated that “A related but more frantic style of love called mania involves an obsessive, compulsive attitude toward one’s partner. Vast swings in mood from ecstasy to agony — dependent on the level of attention a person is receiving from his or her partner — are typical of manic love.”. Here, it is clear that manic love or the mania love style involves vast mood swings which make the person either very happy and excited (ecstasy) or miserable (agony). Hence, the answer is B.
6 Answer: E
Question type: Matching Features
Answer location: Paragraph 5, line 3
Answer explanation: In the fifth paragraph, it is given that “Mutually-gratifying outcomes in relationships are not considered necessary, and deception of a partner and lack of disclosure about one’s activities are also typical.”. The quoted line points out that in the ludus style, the partners engage in a relationship with different people and so lack of sharing (keep many aspects of my love life to myself) or deception are features of this type. Hence, the answer is E.
7 Answer: B
Question type: Matching Features
Answer location: Paragraph 3, line 3
Answer explanation: In the specified line, it is given that “A related but more frantic style of love called mania involves an obsessive, compulsive attitude toward one’s partner.”. In other words, when a person is involved in mania style of love, he/she becomes obsessed with their partner and could think of nothing other than that. Hence, the answer is B.
8 Answer: F
Question type: Matching Features
Answer location: Paragraph 6, line 3
Answer explanation: In the sixth paragraph, it is specified that “Successful arranged marriages are a great example of pragma, in that the couple decides to make the relationship work; but anyone who seeks an ideal partner with a shopping list of necessary attributes (high salary, same religion, etc.) fits the classification.”. From this reference, it can be concluded that the pragma style of love is more practical as people know what they are looking for in the partner before they meet them. Hence, the answer is F.
9 Answer: Yes
Question type: Yes/No/Not Given
Answer location: Paragraph 7, line 1
Answer explanation: In the cited line, it is stated that “Robert J. Sternberg’s contemporary research on love stories has elaborated on how these narratives determine the shape of our relationships and our lives.”. Based on this statement, it can be commented that according to Sternberg’s research, it is clear that people’s notion of love (narratives) affects (determine) their relationship as well as their lives. As the statement agrees with the claims of the writer, the answer is Yes.
10 Answer: Yes
Question type: Yes/No/Not Given
Answer location: Paragraph 8, line 1
Answer explanation: In the indicated line, it is given that “Sternberg’s research demonstrates that we may have predilections toward multiple love stories, each represented in a mental hierarchy and varying in weight in terms of their personal significance.”. It can be concluded from Sternberg’s research that people may have liking (predilections) to many love stories but they are organized in a hierarchy where some are more important than others. As the statement agrees with the claims of the writer, the answer is Yes.
11 Answer: Yes
Question type: Yes/No/Not Given
Answer location: Paragraph 8, line 5
Answer explanation: In the eighth paragraph, it is noted that “Love stories are, therefore, interactive and adaptive phenomena in our lives rather than rigid prescriptions.”. This points out that love stories are interactive and can change according to the needs of particular social environments. As the statement agrees with the claims of the writer, the answer is Yes.
12 Answer: No
Question type: Yes/No/Not Given
Answer location: Paragraph 9, line 4 & Paragraph 10, line 1
Answer explanation: In the specified line, it is said that “Certainly, it is clear that we look for partners with love stories that complement and are compatible with our own narratives./But they do not have to be an identical match.”. In other words, people look for partners who complement or are compatible with the idea of their love stories and not romantic partners with similar love stories. As the statement contradicts the claims of the writer, the answer is No.
13 Answer: Not Given
Question type: Yes/No/Not Given
Answer location: N.A.
Answer explanation: As there is no reference to whether the most successful partners have matching love stories, the answer is Not Given.
14 Answer: No
Question type: Yes/No/Not Given
Answer location: Paragraph 10, line 3
Answer explanation: In the referenced line, it is stated that “Not all love stories, however, are equally well predisposed to relationship longevity…”. Here, it is clear that some love stories have longevity, while others do not. So, it is not true that no love story is suited to a long relationship (longevity) than any other. As the statement contradicts the claims of the writer, the answer is No.
Need expert guidance for IELTS? Sign up today!
Tips for Answering the Question Types in the Love Stories Reading Passage
Let us check out some quick tips to answer the types of questions in the ‘Love Stories’ Reading Answers passage.
Matching Features:
In this type of question, you will have to match a list of options with the relevant set of statements. Some tips to answer matching features questions and obtain a high band in the IELTS examination are given below:
- Read questions and underline or circle keywords. This will help you find out where you would have to read and find later. Also, focus on how often every detail or name is appearing in the passage.
- Scan the passage and look for information given in the features and questions.
- Skim through the areas that are surrounded by keywords and features in the passage.
- Don’t get confused in case the text has synonyms of the information that is originally present in the question.
- Keep in mind that answers will not be in an order as questions.
Yes/No/Not Given:
In IELTS Reading, ‘Yes/No/Not Given’ questions are based on facts. Several factual statements will be provided to you, and it is up to you to determine whether or not they are accurate by reading the text.
To answer this type of question, you can use the following strategies:
- Read the question and identify the keywords – Before reading the material, have a look at your list of Yes, No, and Not Given questions.
- Scan the passage for synonyms or paraphrased words of the keywords – When you have highlighted the keywords, swiftly read the text to look for paraphrases or synonyms.
- Match the highlighted words in the questions with their synonyms in the text – Once you find both sets of keywords, cross-check them to find the answer.
- Identify the answer – If the facts match, the answer is YES, and in case it doesn’t match, it is NO. If you are unable to find the answer or unsure of it, mark it NOT GIVEN.
Also, check:
Practice IELTS Reading based on question types
![ielts logo](/v3/images/homepage/desktop/ielts_material_logo.png)
![ielts img](/v3/images/article/cta-assets/cta-2-img-mob.webp)
Start Preparing for IELTS: Get Your 10-Day Study Plan Today!
Recent Articles
![IELTS Reading Note Completion with Tips & Practice Tests](https://ieltsmaterial-content.s3.ap-south-1.amazonaws.com/blogContent/blogContent/ielts/blog/banner-images//ielts_ielts-reading-note-completion_1723639723.webp)
Kasturika Samanta
![IELTS Reading Topics and Examples of Question Types](https://ieltsmaterial-content.s3.ap-south-1.amazonaws.com/blogContent/blogContent/ielts/blog/banner-images//ielts_ielts-reading-topics_1723096220.webp)
Kasturika Samanta
Post your Comments