Happy summer to everyone! Whether you’re on summer break, vacation, or getting things done, we hope that you are feeling loved! 🥰 Read on to see what we’ve been up to, and what we’re going to be doing soon…
To begin, we are honored to let you all know that Saida was a presenter this year at the 2026 International Association for Relationship Research (IARR) Biannual Conference at the beginning of July in Glasgow, Scotland🏴. In her talk, titled “Shared Beliefs About Love in Everyday Life: A Cultural Consensus Theory Investigation Across Six Countries,” Saida provided an overview of the Love Across Cultures Project to an audience of relationship science researchers.
It was an incredible experience to share details about our project and some of our preliminary findings, and to engage directly with the relationship science community during the conference. We hope to return to IARR soon!
Also this month, Saida was featured on a YouTube video podcast with Vicente Cassepp-Borges, our collaborator in Brazil 🇧🇷 (research conducted this past January). This video has been published on Dr. Cassepp-Borges's YouTube Channel (ScientifiCaliente, or @CientifiCaliente)—a Love-Science-based channel that explains various concepts in love and relationship science to Brazilian and Portuguese-speaking audiences. Saida discussed the overall Love Across Cultures Project as well as preliminary findings from the Brazilian data collection. For example, faith and spiritual care were found to be particularly culturally relevant for love in everyday life for Brazilians. Other unique Brazilian facets included food as a "love language," strong family bonds, and the concept of “saudade” (a unique, often positive feeling of longing or missing someone). To watch the episode, see the YouTube video embedded in this post (interview conducted in English, with Portuguese captions). YouTube Link here.
Lastly, we have commenced the project operations for the fieldwork in Japan 🇯🇵, the third country for the Love Across Cultures project timeline. The team has been in constant contact with Japanese collaborators and faculty for logistics and cultural guidance as we prepare for the project. We’re also grateful to have started collaborative efforts with faculty from Teikyo University of Science and Technology and Meiji University in Tokyo. We look forward to beginning the data collection process at the end of this month and continuing into most of August. We’re excited to learn about what makes Japanese people feel loved in everyday life! 👋🏼
