Arthur Aron is a professor of psychology at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. Arthur is known for his work on intimacy and relationships – he notably compiled a list of 36 questions people ask to fall in love.
How did the 36 questions come about?
They were first described by Mandy Len Catron in The New York Times. According to the girl, she and her colleague decided to become guinea pigs in Professor Aron’s experiment and ended up falling in love with each other without memory in just two hours.
Is it like magic outside of Hogwarts? In fact, there is no witchcraft in what happened. When creating his questionnaire, Aron started from the fact that vulnerability and sincerity are two very important factors for the development of feelings. He conducted a whole series of experiments on volunteers, from which he chose 36 questions that evoke the strongest emotions.
As the psychoanalyst and author of Loving without instructions Sophie Cadalen explains, the power of Professor Aron’s exercise is to unbalance people, to make them doubt and choose – this is when we are particularly close to ourselves.
And, of course, no questionnaire will inflame you with feelings for the first person you meet: it is important that there are already prerequisites for communication – for example, common points of view or friendship. Arthur Aron’s system awakens unconscious or dormant emotions, but does not create them out of thin air.
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How to ask yourself 36 questions
You will need an hour and a half or two hours – find a quiet place where no one will distract you. Answer each question in turn, be sincere, do not take notes, do not comment on other people’s answers.
The questions are divided into three groups: after each one, you can take a short break of two or three minutes to rest. After the last question, look each other in the eye for four minutes.
First set of questions
- If you could invite anyone to dinner (including a celebrity or someone who is no longer alive), who would it be?
- Would you like to become famous? In which domain ?
- Have you ever repeated a line before making a phone call? For what?
- What is the ideal day for you?
- When was the last time you sang alone? And for someone else?
- What will you choose: “freeze” the state of the body or the mind at 30 for the rest of your life?
- Do you have a secret premonition of how you’re going to die?
- What do you think are the three things you have in common?
- What are you most grateful for?
- What would you change about the way you were raised?
- Tell your life story in as much detail as possible in four minutes.
- With what skill or ability would you like to wake up tomorrow morning?
Yes
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