Aimer bien?

Question

Somewhere in my past studies, I was told that using "bien" with "aimer" actually lessens its meaning from love to like.  Did I get that wrong, because in my recent lessons, it's used more as an intensifier.  Sorry if I missed this on the thread before.

Accepted Answer

Bonjour Rebecca,
I have found the following links to previous queries on this point.
https://progress.lawlessfrench.com/questions/view/aimer-bien-and-negation
https://www.lawlessfrench.com/expressions/aimer-expressions/
Hope this helps.
Bonne continuation
Jim

Answer

Hi Rebecca, you're right: adding bien kind of steers the meaning away from "love" to "like". More on this in the lesson linked by Jim in this response.

Answer

I would just add that ‘aimer bien’ may ‘weaken’ it from (strong) love to like, but does not mean a weak liking.
 “Tu n’aime pas le repas?”-  “Si, j’aime bien ce repas”