DA, your post made me remember that I once (MANY years ago) I didn't appreciate the difference between lust and love. Most find that as they get older, there is a difference.
When you're young you love when you lust but actually you often don't know the person very well. You've projected your love onto them, idealised them. Sometimes it turns out fine, your lust changes to real appreciation of the person over time. Sometimes there's a rude awakening when you realise the fantasy and reality are poles apart. Lust is fairly common (for some of us anyway
) whereas love is rare.
I've wondered if EAs are largely all about unrequited love. I know only one man who's admitted to having one. The sexual and emotional are important for both men and women and in stable long term relationship both will be expressed fully. In affairs so often for women the sexual seems to be expressed through the emotional and for men the emotional through the sexual. Maybe that's why women are more vulnerable to EAs.