LOVE AND POWER IN MEXICO, SPAIN, AND THE UNITED-STATES

The semantic differential technique was used to examine the subjective meaning of the concepts ''love'' and ''power'' in Mexico, Spain, and the United States. The following groups were tested: 102 Mexicans and 97 Spaniards in Spanish and 78 Hispanic Americans and 79 Angle Americans in English. Ah subjects were college-age students. The evaluation dimension of the subjective meaning of love was significantly lower for Mexicans than for the other three groups. Mexicans also judged love to be less potent than did the other groups. The four ethnic groups differed significantly in their evaluation of power. In particular, the Spaniards were significantly lower than the other three groups. Angle and Hispanic Americans attributed greater potency to power than did the Spaniards and the Mexicans, The Spaniards also attributed lower activity to power than did the other three groups. The D statistic was used to characterize the difference between love and power in the four groups. D was significantly greater in Spaniards than in the other groups. Furthermore, the meanings of love and power were significantly correlated in the Spanish sample and were uncorrelated in the Mexican sample. The present results do not support the proposition that the meanings of power and love to modem college-age Mexicans reflect historical differences between them and the other groups.