Science says: this is how long it takes to fall in love

Love at first sight: some believe in it, some do not. I myself fall a bit in between, as I am more of a believer in lust at first sight. But love? Nah. Maybe that person I find intensely attractive and fun right away is actually quite grumpy, lazy, or incredibly boring. You need to know those kinds of things before you can really talk about love, I think. According to research, it also takes a little longer than just that one glance.

In 2013, YouGov conducted research on this in collaboration with the dating site eHarmony and the results are quite striking. They found that men generally fall in love much faster than women. Funny, I would have expected the opposite. Men take an average of 88 days to fall head over heels, compared to 134 days for women. Side note: this research only focused on heterosexual couples. In 2000, a similar study was conducted among lesbian couples and it showed that they take an average of six months to feel that love. That's still quite long, right?

So if you're unsure about your new fling whether it's love or just a fling, at least give yourself those 134 days. According to science, you should know by then.