Talk:Romantic orientation

‎Aromanticism expansions

The ‎aromanticism expansions by MysteryRat included very low-quality citations, such as thesis sources. MysteryRat also took liberty with some sources in the way they presented components. The big expansions are also WP:UNDUE for this article, as there is no reason for aromanticism to take up almost half the page. I undid the big edits, returning the article to this version by MysteryRat.

MysteryRat, we can add information about aromanticism without adding so much. There's also better sources for some of the information. Enlightenedstranger0 (talk) 06:35, 10 March 2022 (UTC)

Enlightenedstranger0,

I apologize for my delay in getting back to you. The feedback you have given me is rational and seems well thought-out, so I wanted to ensure that I took the time to consider it thoroughly. I have given my response to each of your main criticisms below.

Liberties Taken With Presentation of Information:

While I had not intended to take liberties with the way I presented information, there were several instances where I had trouble finding ways to relay information so that it was concise, consistent with Wikipedia’s tone guidelines, and faithful to the source material. Although I am not sure where I made these errors, I can definitely see how they might have happened, and I appreciate that you pointed them out. If you have the opportunity, I would greatly appreciate if you could give me more information about which sources I had misinterpreted/misrepresented so that I can better understand where I made mistakes and avoid making similar errors in the future.

Low Quality Citations:

It is a bit difficult for me to tell which sources were removed due to problems with the sources themselves vs. which were removed due to being outside the scope of the article, so any additional clarification regarding this would be helpful. However, I do agree that several of the sources I used needed to be removed. In fact, there were several that I added which I had planned to remove myself, after realizing that I had been a bit overzealous in editing and included sources which were…maybe not the best in hindsight.

That being said, I have reviewed the thesis sources that I included to determine which ones, if any, are worth including here as sources. Upon viewing the Wikipedia guidelines on the usage of dissertations/theses as sources, there seems to be a few main guidelines, for whether they can be included. Specifically, in order to be included, a thesis source should:

a.     be complete

b.     have significant scholarly influence (within their field, presumably) if the thesis is a Master’s thesis, and

c.     preferably, be cited in literature, supervised by recognized specialists in the field, or reviewed by independent parties.

Guidelines for honors bachelor’s theses are not specified, but since these are not explicitly prohibited under Wikipedia guidelines, I have assumed that a bachelor’s thesis should meet similar qualifications to a Master’s thesis (but should still generally be considered less reliable). The theses I included are all completed, so the main qualifying (or disqualifying) factor is whether they are influential and whether they’ve been cited, supervised by recognized specialists, and/or reviewed by independent parties.

While the theses included have been cited quite a bit by non-scholarly sources, I recognize that this is insufficient for proving that they have significant scholarly influence. Since one could argue that virtually any published source on aromanticism is “influential” in the study of aromanticism and romantic orientation due to how underdeveloped the body of research on these subjects currently is, I tried to narrow down some more specific guidelines for determining whether a given source meets the condition of “significant influence” within the context of this field.

As such, my main benchmark for deciding whether a thesis was notable enough to include were

a.     the quality of the research that referenced it,

b.    whether the source had been referenced/cited by prominent researchers in a relevant field, and

c.    the qualifications of the thesis advisor(s) involved in the source’s creation.

Information in the Master’s thesis by C. Bougie seems to be relatively consistent with the work of other researchers, but it does not seem to have been cited yet, possibly due to how recently it was published. Based off this, I agree with the rationale behind removing this source (except, perhaps, for instances where it is used to provide additional support to a more reliable source), unless it is seen to have more influence within its field following the publication of future research.

The same could be said of the thesis written by Rilee Granger since, although the thesis has received many downloads, I am not aware of any instances where it has been cited by other scholars. Some of the sources which Granger cites/references may still be useable, but I would need to do further reading to determine whether this is the case.

However, I do think that the thesis by Christina Lang has merit, since it has been cited in a study by Ela Przybylo and in a paper co-authored by Ela Przybylo and Kristina Gumpta (where it is explicitly mentioned as one of few scholarly works published directly on aromanticism). This would seemingly imply that Lang’s paper has the approval of these two researchers, which is notable since Ela Przybylo and Kristina Gumpta are both prominent asexuality researchers, and Ela Przybylo is among the few scholars who have published notable research articles on aromanticism. Lang's advisor also seems to have done quite a bit of research on LGBT+ topics, which is another point in Lang's favor. As such, I think that Lang’s thesis is worth including, despite the fact that it is a thesis rather than a paper by a more experienced researcher in the field.

Undue Weight:

I can definitely see your rationale here, since in hindsight, I definitely included some information that was outside the scope of the romantic orientation article. However, I do feel that the information included was well within the scope of the topic of aromanticism, which leads me to the following question: If there is too much information on aromanticism to reasonably include in the page on romantic orientation, then should we consider splitting aromanticism into its own article, with a shorter summary given in the romantic orientation article?

It has been two years since this possibility was last discussed, and the reason it was decided that aromanticism should be merged with romantic orientation in the first place was, according to my understanding, that there was not enough reliable information on aromanticism for it to be a standalone article. Although I will admit there are definitely problems with some of the information/sources that I added, I don’t think all of the information is completely unsalvageable. If enough of the information is indeed found to be salvageable, it may merit inclusion in an article on aromanticism even if it does not merit inclusion in an article on the broader topic of romantic orientation. This would ensure that the topic of aromanticism can be expanded upon with relevant information without said information dominating the romantic orientation page.

Furthermore, even if the removed information is not enough by itself for a standalone article, there is now a relatively short list article of aromantic characters in the media, which did not exist at the time of the previous discussions on splitting the article. It might be beneficial to create an article on aromanticism and discuss merging the List of Fictional Aromantic Characters article with the new aromanticism article, especially since the aromantic characters list is much shorter than comparable lists. MysteryRat (talk) 03:26, 11 March 2022 (UTC)

There wasn't much of a delay. No issue with your response time.

For Wikipedia's views on taking liberties, see WP:STICKTOSOURCE and MOS:EDITORIAL.

For Wikipedia's views on low-quality citations, it looks like you have reviewed WP:SCHOLARSHIP. I think you should avoid all thesis papers. While WP:SCHOLARSHIP doesn't prohibit them, it does emphasize caution for using them and gives good reasons for not using them. It provides no good reasons for using them. WP:SCHOLARSHIP says "prefer secondary sources – Articles should rely on secondary sources whenever possible." There is more information at WP:PSTS.

To have an aromanticism article, proving WP:Notability should be what you're aiming for. You've read previous discussions at Talk:Aromanticism. I've reviewed them now also. "There was not enough reliable information on aromanticism for it to be a standalone article" wasn't the only reason given for not having a standalone article on it. You have to show editors that it needs to have its own page rather than remain a section here per WP:PAGEDECIDE. Were you trying to give aromanticism its own page by expanding its section so much? If so, that isn't the path to seek. There needs to be evidence of notability. And if evidence of notability is demonstrated, there needs to be a good reason to move past WP:PAGEDECIDE.

Drawing up a blueprint to show where you want to go with the topic and getting editors to chip in to improve it is a good path to seek. Enlightenedstranger0 (talk) 07:17, 11 March 2022 (UTC)

Just adding on that I think the best place for content on aromanticism is here, for the reasons noted at WP:No page, and based on what sourcing seems to exist on the topic. Crossroads ^-talk- 23:32, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

I have to agree with Enlightenedstranger0 and Crossroads here, that it shouldn't be its own page unless there is enough sources to make it its own page. And the List of fictional aromantic characters page was originally created as someone on the List of fictional asexual characters talk page requested it, and the reason it is "relatively short" is that there are many lists of aromantic characters out there, its just that reliable sources on such characters are very hard to come by. Historyday01 (talk) 04:16, 13 March 2022 (UTC)

I apologize for the delay in responding. (I know I said that last time I responded to this thread, but I think the apology is more justified this time since I took much longer than before to reply).

I did not mean to imply that the list of fictional aromantic characters page is not useful or needed, so I apologize if my previous response came across that way. What I had intended to express was that, if information of the topic of aromanticism in fiction is considered notable enough to warrant its own list article (as the existence of said article would seem to imply), the broader topic of aromanticism should, by extension, also be considered sufficiently notable and to warrant its own article. Furthermore, since the list article now exists, it may be useful to have an aromanticism article to provide more in depth context on the aromanticism and different experiences of those on the aromantic spectrum, especially since the list article includes several examples which deviate from the "stereotypical" understanding of aromantics as exclusively asexual, nonpartnering, and unable to experience any romantic attraction whatsoever.

Additionally, while I can see why it might make sense, in theory, to have aromanticism as a subsection under romantic orientation, in practice, this carries the implication that aromanticism is much more analogous to other romantic orientations than it actually is. While other romantic orientations do not seem to have prevalent communities outside of those for the "corresponding" sexual orientations (e.g., there does not seem to be a cohesive biromantic community outside the bisexual and asexual communities, even though there are people who may identify as biromantic heterosexual biromantic homosexual, etc.), there is a relatively large aromantic community outside the asexual community. This is not to say other romantic orientations are any less important. However, it does seem a bit misleading to categorize aromanticism as a subset of romantic orientation in the same way that homoromanticism, heteroromanticism, biromanticism, and panromanticism are subsets of romantic orientation, because this makes it so that the amount of weight given to aromanticism is not reflective of the actual prevalence of the aromantic community.

This is why I think having an article on aromanticism would be beneficial, provided that the available sources on aromanticism are sufficient for creating such an article. I am entirely willing to do the research to find sources that could be used for such an article, though I am not entirely sure how many sources would be necessary, since I don't really have much experience in regards to this sort of thing. If I were to begin doing more research to gather sources, approximately how many reliable sources would suffice to show that there are enough to create a separate page for aromanticism? MysteryRat (talk) 20:35, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

Notability here isn't about how many sources you can add to an article. It's about significant coverage. Have a look at WP:SIGCOV and WP:CITEKILL. As one of your goals is to show deviation from the "'stereotypical' understanding of aromantics as exclusively asexual" and that "there is a relatively large aromantic community outside the asexual community," you might want to start with locating sources that report this.

Maybe the list article shouldn't have been created. But it exists now, and there aren't calls to delete or merge it. Enlightenedstranger0 (talk) 06:56, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

You mean the List of fictional aromantic characters article, right? I only created that because one person had requested it be made and it seemed logical to create it at the time. I will admit it has been a challenge to find reliable sources for aromantic characters at times. There are all sorts of lists online, but when you dig into it, very few of them actually provide reliable sources... its a bit frustrating. Historyday01 (talk) 15:24, 28 March 2022 (UTC)

Thank you for the advice. I will look into researching in order to find articles with significant coverage, and if I am able to find sources that seem promising, I will share them here (or elsewhere, if you would prefer) for feedback. (Although it may be a bit before I do so, since I have been very busy lately with personal responsibilities). MysteryRat (talk) 03:12, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

Glad to hear that. Same here with being busy with personal responsibilities this year as well. I did a lot of editing on here last year, but this year I'm trying to scale it back a bit. Historyday01 (talk) 13:03, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

Historyday01, yes, that's the list I meant.

MysteryRat, you're welcome. I look forward to seeing what you come up with. Enlightenedstranger0 (talk) 23:51, 29 March 2022 (UTC)

Sources reporting that aromantic people are not exclusively asexual, that there is an active aromantic community outside of the asexual community, etc.

(This is by no means an exhaustive list, and many of these sources provide more information on aromanticism than I have relayed here. However, to start with, I am focusing primarily on showing the existence of a publicly recognized aromantic community consisting of people who are not necessarily asexual).

I.              Source 1: “Examining Concordant and Discordant Sexual and Romantic Attraction in American Adults: Implications for Counselors” https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15538605.2016.1233840?needAccess=true

Key Results:

a.    Overall Prevalence of Aromanticism in the General Population: In a survey of 414 American adults, about 1% of participants indicated that they were romantically attracted to neither sex (i.e., 1% of participants were aromantic). Similarly, about 1% (or 0.7%, to be more exact) of the participants indicated that they were sexually attracted to neither sex (i.e., about 1% of participants were asexual). This figure is corroborated by the fact that several other studies have also around 1% of the general population to be asexual. [It is worth noting that, if these survey results hold true for the general American population, this would mean that the approximate percentage of aromantic people in the American population is the same as the approximate percentage of asexual people in the American population. While this does not necessarily mean that the community of self-identified aromantics is equal in size to that of self-identified asexuals, it does show that there may be similar numbers of aromantic people and asexual people in the American population.]

b.    Prevalence of Allosexual Aromanticism: The study found no significant difference between the proportion of the sample that was alloromantic asexual vs allosexual aromantic. In other words, of those surveyed, the percent of people who were asexual but not aromantic vs. those who were aromantic but not asexual were close to the same. More specifically, of the 10.6% of participants whose romantic orientation did not “match” their sexual orientation, 6.8% were allosexual aromantic (Although this is not said in the article, I will point out for reference that this is equal to 0.7% of the total sample for the study). For the comparison, of those surveyed, 3 of the 414 were found to be aromantic but not asexual, while an additional 3 of the 414 were found to be asexual (including both alloromantic and aromantic asexuals).

Summary of Key Results: This study found the overall percentage of aromantic people to be roughly equal to the percentage of asexual people in a survey of 414 American adults. The study also found that participants were about equally likely to be aromantic but not asexual as they were to be asexual but not aromantic.

II.            Source 2: The Erotic Worldmaking of Asexual and Aromantic Zines

Key Ideas: This source discusses zines made by people who are aromantic and/or asexual. The source discusses how the aromantic community uses zines as a platform for exploring aromantic identity and experiences. The authors of this source describe aromanticism as being “too often explored as a tag-on to asexuality,” and note that aromanticism “coexists with both asexual and sexual identities.” The source also discusses social issues relevant to the aromantic community by exploring how aromantics are affected by amatonormativity. https://scholarlypublishingcollective.org/msup/qed/article/8/1/25/286334/The-Erotic-Worldmaking-of-Asexual-and-Aromantic

III.          Source 3: 日本におけるアロマンティック／アセクシュアル・スペクトラムの人口学的多様性

https://ipss.repo.nii.ac.jp/index.php?action=pages_view_main&active_action=repository_action_common_download&item_id=276&item_no=1&attribute_id=22&file_no=1&page_id=13&block_id=21

• Note: Since I know very little Japanese, my translations are going to be kind of rough, so I apologize in advance for this. (If I were to cite this in an actual article, I would definitely want to seek help from someone who is actually fluent in Japanese to ensure accurate translations.)

Key Ideas: In Japan, alloromantic asexuality and aromantic asexuality are treated as much more distinct categories than in English-speaking countries. Japanese communities often use asexual (アセクシュアル, pron. “asekushuaru”) to refer to someone who does not experience romantic OR sexual attraction, whereas alloromantic asexuals are referred to as nonsexual (ノンセクシュアル, pron. “nonsekushuaru”). This distinction is made because of how Japanese society tends to emphasize romantic feelings. I mention this because the existence of an aromantic asexual community (i.e., the Japanese-asexual community) that is considered its own distinct community rather than a subset of a larger asexual community does contradict the notion that aromantic communities don’t exist outside of asexual communities (even though the Japanese-asexual community is not completely divorced from what English speakers conceptualize as asexuality).  

Note: A Japanese person wants to describe themselves as aromantic would simply say aromantic (アロマンティック, pron. “aromantikku”). (see: https://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20220322/k10013544761000.html) If I understand correctly, there are also some Japanese speakers who use aromantic specifically to refer to allosexual aromantics (see: https://myethicalchoice.com/journal/sustainable/aromantic/). I don’t know quite enough about the Japanese language to tell you that for certain though.

IV.          Source 4: https://www.cosmopolitan.com/sex-love/a9644122/aromantic-definition-meaning/

Key Ideas: Aromanticism is often confused for asexuality; however, the two are distinct, and one can be aromantic without being asexual, or vice versa. The aromantic community also has its own pride flag, which includes gray and black stripes that symbolize the diverse sexual identities within the aromantic community. The article also notes that “there is a vast community of people who identify as aromantic on TikTok.”

V.            Source 5 : https://psychcentral.com/health/what-is-aromantic

Key Ideas : This source explains that there is a “significant difference” between aromanticism and asexuality, and that not all aromantic people are asexual. It also explains that aromantic people can have “any sexual orientation or no sexual orientation” and that many aromantic people enjoy sexual relationships, but not aromantic relationships.

VI.          Source 6: https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/oct/11/meet-the-aromantics-not-cold-dont-have-romantic-feelings-sex

Key Ideas : Although many online aromantic communities are “overwhelmingly asexual,” there are many online aromantic communities that are specifically for aromantic people who are not asexual. These communities include “a wide variety of Facebook pages” and many tumblr blogs dedicated to aromanticism. Some of these online aromantic community groups have hundreds of members.

VII.       Source 7: https://www.walesonline.co.uk/whats-on/arts-culture-news/aromantic-spectrum-awareness-week-what-23181019

Key Ideas : Since 2014, the aromantic community has celebrated Aromantic Spectrum Awareness Week, which is now celebrated every year in late February. The purpose of Aromantic Spectrum Awareness Week is to “spread awareness and the acceptance of aromantic identities across the world.”

* Additional note: Aromantic Spectrum Awareness Week is described by its organizers as an international event (see: http://www.arospecweek.org/), and, interestingly enough, was officially declared in the state of Minnesota in 2021 (see: https://mn.gov/governor/assets/02.21.21%20Aromantic%20Spectrum%20Awareness%20Week_tcm1055-470035.pdf). (I’m not sure if ASAW has ever received official government recognition in other states or countries, but the fact that it did in at least one state does show some level of government recognition of the aromantic community, at least in the US). MysteryRat (talk) 03:45, 31 March 2022 (UTC)

The article says, "Of the academic studies which discuss aromanticism, these tend to discuss aromanticism as it relates to asexuality, and there are very few studies which focus primarily on aromanticism." Historyday01 and I have looked, and this is still how the scholarship is. While there are sources acknowledging aromanticism as different than asexuality, it doesn't appear to be frequent or substantial. And while aromanticism can be said to be different than asexuality, this isn't enough to give it its own article. The topic has a section here at the romantic orientation article, not the asexuality article, and terminology and meanings for it are covered here.

Historyday01 and Crossroads, what do you think of the sources MysteryRat has gathered? Enlightenedstranger0 (talk) 23:30, 2 April 2022 (UTC)

I don't think a separate article is warranted yet. We should really stick to the peer-reviewed academic sources. These are by far more qualified on this topic than others - WP:SOURCETYPES. Crossroads ^-talk- 04:57, 4 April 2022 (UTC)

Good question. I think Source 1 and 2 are good. Not sure about source 3, as it is in Japanese, and I don't know enough Japanese apart from a few choice words from watching a heck ton of anime, to accurately look at that one other than throwing it in some translation program. Not sure about about Source 5, but sources 4, 6, and 7 can all be considered what I'd call the popular press. And the other two are good too. But, I do think we need some more experts on this topic to cite, so in that sense, I can agree with Crossroads on peer-reviewed academic sources. Basically, the sources in the popular press should be used in a supportive way to support the peer-reviewed academic sources. Historyday01 (talk) 17:56, 4 April 2022 (UTC)

That makes sense. In that case, I can see the perspective on why it might be a good idea to hold off on creating an aromanticism article, at least until there are more non-thesis scholarly sources on the topic. The feedback you've all given me has been extremely helpful, especially since I'm still relatively new to Wikipedia (as an editor, at least). I'm really grateful that y'all have been so willing to hear me out.

As a side note, since I already have quite a few sources gathered, I was wondering if it would be okay for me to create a section on this talk page to keep an updated list of sources on aromanticism so that in the future, it will be easier to determine if/when there are enough scholarly sources published to warrant an article, and said sources will be readily available to any editors who have use for them. MysteryRat (talk) 22:02, 4 April 2022 (UTC)

Sure, it would be fine to create a section on the talk page to keep an updated list of sources. If an article is created in the future, then it could also be good because the List of fictional aromantic characters could be rolled into an Aromanticism article (currently just a redirect) like the Bisexuality page which has a "Media" section, or a "Media depictions" section like the Pansexuality page, to give two examples. And aromantic characters are becoming more common too, with ScreenRant even doing a whole article "10 Asexual Icons in Movies" a couple days ago, with two confirmed as aromantic (Lilith Clawthorne in The Owl House and Yelena in Marvel Comics) and others headcanoning characters as aromantic. Historyday01 (talk) 23:52, 4 April 2022 (UTC)

(edit conflict) You could create a subpage for it. Talk:Trans woman/Definitions is an example of a talk page with a subpage for sources. After that, maybe a link to it could exist at the top of this talk page or in a permanent section here at this talk page. Enlightenedstranger0 (talk) 23:53, 4 April 2022 (UTC)

A subpage is a good idea too and I'd argue it would fall under the allowed uses outlined on WP:SUB. Historyday01 (talk) 12:51, 5 April 2022 (UTC)

I think I'll try doing that then. It might be a few days from now though since I'll need to set aside a bit of time to make sure that I correctly understand how to create the subpage. MysteryRat (talk) 20:11, 11 April 2022 (UTC)

I have spent the last several weeks writing a new comprehensive article on Aromanticism that encompassed all the feedback that was discussed here, including some of the sources that User:MysteryRat has collected and also new articles and research that have come up since the discussion last year. I hope my expansion on the new main page article now on Aromanticism are sufficiently notable and sourced now that the recreation and splitting of the content out from here is accepted. Raladic (talk) 21:47, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

That looks pretty good to me as a split from this page and thanks so much for creating it! I'll see what else I can add when I have some time Historyday01 (talk) 23:12, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Sorry for the delay in responding. The page looks great! I hope some of the sources were helpful. Thank you so much for writing the article! MysteryRat (talk) 05:39, 14 April 2023 (UTC)

See also section

Isn‘t it very confusing, that all links in the “see also“ section are platonic relationships? They have nothing to do with ones romantic orientation. They just use the terms romance but are not actual linked to romantic Love but rather very close friendships. Shouldn‘t the “see also“ section be there for topics directly linked with romantic orientation? It could just cause confusion for the reader to understand what romantic orientation/Love actual mean. Bromance and Womance shouldn‘t be confused with romantic Love. Ni der Co (talk) 14:51, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

I see your point. According to MOS:SEEALSO, "links in this section should be relevant and limited to a reasonable number. Whether a link belongs in the "See also" section is ultimately a matter of editorial judgment and common sense. One purpose of "See also" links is to enable readers to explore tangentially related topics; however, articles linked should be related to the topic of the article or be in the same defining category." It would be duplicative to put Aromanticism, Asexuality, Split attraction model, Gray asexuality, Demisexuality, Heterosexuality, Bisexuality, Pansexuality, or Polysexuality in the see also section they are already there in the main article. If we were to completely gut the "See Also" section, and start over with new articles, which ones (excluding the nine articles I previously mentioned) would you like to see listed in that section instead? Historyday01 (talk) 15:23, 3 January 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for the fast reply:)

Yes I understand that it would be duplicative but as you mentioned the articles should be related to the topic which isn‘t really the case. Rather that than to cause confusion. The only article I could think of which istn‘t linked in the main article would be Infatuation or Limerence. Ni der Co (talk) 15:58, 3 January 2024 (UTC)