Yingnan Jin and Mengya Xia, Arizona State University, United States
published in the Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Love and Relationship Studies, 6-8 March, 2026
You can see the full video recording of this presentation at the YouTube channel of the International Institute of Love Studies
Introduction
Feeling connected with significant others is central to the feeling of love with them (Baumeister & Leary, 1995; Pastor et al., 2025; Uchino, 2009). Giving and receiving of emotional support and relational resources occur concurrently within close relationships, as individuals both contribute to and benefit from shared emotional resources. The family system functions as a “resource bank” through which members provide and receive love and support in daily interactions (An et al., 2024; Cohen, 2004; Cox & Paley, 1997). However, less is known about how family members’ connectedness dynamically interplays with felt love across different dyads.
The aim of this study was to explore the dynamics of individuals’ perceived connectedness and felt love in relationships between adolescent and mother, adolescent and father, and mother and father over 30 days. By measuring day-to-day fluctuations within and between dyads, this study intended to elucidate the reciprocal emotional processes that sustain family connectedness and felt love.
Methodology and Methods
A sample of 107 two-parent families completed a daily diary protocol for 30 days (adolescent_age =14.75; 59% male). Mothers, fathers, and adolescents each reported felt love(i.e., “to what extent you think the following word described you today: Loved”) and perception of connectedness(i.e., “[My partner]/[My parent]/[My Child] and I were close and connected with each other today.”) with two other family members (e.g., mother reported connectedness in adolescent-mother dyad) each day on a 0–10-point slider. Three parallel multilevel vector autoregressive models were conducted in Mplus to explore the same-day, lagged-day, and between-dyad associations between felt love and dyadic connectedness in adolescent and mother, adolescent and father, and mother and father.
Highlights of Results
At the same-day and between-dyad levels, all variables showed significant positive correlations across the three dyads. These results indicate that individuals’ felt love and perceived connectedness covaried on the same day both within individuals (i.e., within the same person) and across dyads (e.g., adolescents’ felt love covaried with mothers’ felt love and mothers’ perceived connectedness).
At the lagged-day level, three dyads exhibited different dynamics. In the adolescent-mother dyad, there was a positive feedback loop between adolescents’ perceived adolescent-mother connectedness and mothers’ perceived adolescent-mother connectedness across days. And mothers’ perceived adolescent-mother connectedness predicted increased mothers’ felt love the next day.
In the adolescent-father dyad, there was a positive feedback loop between fathers’ perceived adolescent-father connectedness and fathers’ felt love across days. Moreover, adolescents’ felt love predicted increased fathers’ felt love the next day, and fathers’ perceived adolescent-father connectedness predicted increased adolescents’ perceived adolescent-father connectedness the next day.
In the mother-father dyad, there was a positive feedback loop between mothers’ perceived mother-father connectedness and mothers’ felt love across days. Moreover, mothers’ felt love predicted increased fathers’ felt love the next day, and mothers’ perceived mother-father connectedness predicted increased fathers’ perceived mother-father connectedness the next day.
Discussion and Conclusions
The findings highlight the reciprocity between individuals’ felt love and their connectedness with other family members at both daily and dyadic levels. Each family member’s felt love was related to distinct interpersonal dynamics. Specifically,
(1) parents’ felt love was positively predicted by prior day’s connectedness with adolescents, suggesting that parents’ daily connectedness with their child was linked to greater feelings of being loved;
(2) mothers’ and adolescents’ perceived adolescent-mother connectedness reciprocally reinforce each other over time, implying dyadic enhancement in adolescent-mother connectedness; and
(3) fathers’ felt love was positively predicted by both adolescents’ and mothers’ felt love, indicating that fathers’ feelings of being loved were closely tied to family’s broader emotional climate.
References
An, J., Zhu, X., Shi, Z., & An, J. (2024). A serial mediating effect of perceived family support on psychological well-being. BMC Public Health, 24(1), 940. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-024-18476-z
Baumeister, R. F., & Leary, M. R. (1995). The need to belong: Desire for interpersonal attachments as a fundamental human motivation. Psychological Bulletin, 117(3), 497–529. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.117.3.497
Cohen, S. (2004). Social Relationships and Health. American Psychologist, 59(8), 676–684. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.59.8.676
Cox, M. J., & Paley, B. (1997). FAMILIES AS SYSTEMS. Annual Review of Psychology, 48(1), 243–267. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.48.1.243
Pastor, Y., Pérez-Torres, V., Angulo-Brunet, A., Nebot-Garcia, J. E., & Gallardo-Nieto, E. (2025). School, family, and peer connectedness as protective factors for depression and suicide risk in Spanish adolescents. Frontiers in Psychology, 16, 1547759. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1547759\
Uchino, B. N. (2009). Understanding the Links Between Social Support and Physical Health: A Life-Span Perspective With Emphasis on the Separability of Perceived and Received Support. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 4(3), 236–255. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-6924.2009.01122.x
Key words: Connectedness; Daily Dynamics; Family Relationships; Parent-Adolescent Relationships; Interparental Relationships