現代社會的來臨，讓「浪漫愛」(Romantic love)，原先只屬於兩人之間承諾的親密關係，成為大眾關注的日常生活事件。然而，「如何談戀愛」(how to love)實際上說明著一種社會事實(social fact)：社會規範我們對情感要專一、忠貞，因此二元關係(dyadic relationship)被視為主流價值，而其他非一對一的關係則稱之為「劈腿」。甚至「劈腿」者往往必須承受來自各方的負面評價、被貼上不忠的標籤、以及諸多非正式的懲罰。
本研究以深度訪談的方式，運用Goffman所提出之污名(stigma)管理與日常生活的自我表演裡的概念，觀察出劈腿者在社會規範的壓力下，行動者如何提出對於行為的正當化論述，以及如何運用印象管理來呈現自我認同。除此之外，本研究在生活管理的部分對時間、空間及科技物進行分析與討論，發現人們在進入三角關係後，在生活管理上須隨著不同的對象和情境採取不一樣的策略。
另，本研究還發現受訪者們對於自身劈腿狀態所感受的罪惡感與行動，也呈現出受訪者們的內心與行為所產生的矛盾與不一致。本研究也運用了Douglas所提出的「不得其所(matter out-of-place」概念解釋社會何以規範人們如何談戀愛，以及為何過去文獻在劈腿的定義上未有共識。

 With the advent of modern society, the notion of romantic love, an intimate relationship reserved only between two people has become an everyday-life concern of the public. However, the question of How to love represents a social fact; that is the society dictates people to be faithful in romantic relationship. Therefore, dyadic relationship is regarded as the mainstream value, while other non-one-to-one relationship is considered as cheating. Those who cheat would even confront with predicaments of being judged negatively, labeled as “unfaithful”, and facing informal punishments. This research uses the concept of stigma management from Goffman and via in-depth interviews to examine how “cheaters” justified their behaviors under certain pressure of social norms and present self-identity through impression management. Besides, this research looks at the life management of “cheaters” in three aspects: time, space, and electronic devices. The finding is that when the agent enters a love triangle, the strategy he or she adopts varies among different targets and situations.

This research also detects sense of guilt that rouses from the respondent themselves in a cheating situation, which explains an inconsistency between their mind and behavior. Furthermore, this research applies the idea of matter-out-of-place from Douglas to elaborate on how the society teaches people to love and why there is no consensus on the definition of “cheating” in previous studies.