the glossary · study
what are the 36 questions that lead to love?
the 36 questions
The 36 questions come from a 1997 study by Arthur Aron and colleagues. Two strangers take turns answering a set of questions that escalate in how personal they get, and finish with four minutes of silent eye contact. The pairs who did it reported significantly more closeness than pairs who made small talk. The headline turned this into a love hack, which it mostly is not. What it actually proves is more interesting: intimacy is a process you can run deliberately. Escalating mutual disclosure, met with a decent response, builds closeness reliably. That works on friends too, and hardly anyone tries it there.
where it comes from: Aron et al., 1997 ↗
this one has a whole chapter under it. read: why we should fall in love slowly →
what to read on this
- Hold Me Tight Sue Johnson adult love as an attachment bond, a safe haven and a base you leave from. the science of why calm is the signal and not the absence of one.
- Platonic Marisa G. Franco how adults actually make friends, from attachment research. the part about initiative being the whole game is the part that changed what i do.
amazon affiliate links. buying through one costs you nothing extra and keeps this page free. every book i recommend →
also asked
do the 36 questions actually work?
They reliably increase felt closeness, which is what the study measured. They do not manufacture romantic attraction, and the famous couple who married after doing them are an anecdote rather than a finding. Treat it as a shortcut through small talk, not a spell.
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