“These monogamy chemicals combine the fundamental, biological drive to mate with the euphoria of dopamine and focus all that attention on the prairie vole’s lucky partner. When researchers block the monogamy chemicals, the voles become promiscuous. When the chemicals are present, the cocktail proves a powerful combination—one that creates the chemical conditions for love.
You can’t fake it, though. When researchers injected oxytocin and vasopressin into the faithful vole’s promiscuous cousin, the montane vole, nothing happened. The philandering voles didn’t have receptors in their brains to receive the monogamy chemicals. Humans, however, possess both the chemicals and the receptors. Variations in the quantity and location of receptors, scientists say, may account for some people staying more monogamous than others. Our capacity for enduring love, it seems, is rooted in the physiology of our brains.
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Fisher and Aron call love a “goal state,” closely linked with addictions. Unlike emotions, which can flare, a goal state requires a stable yearning for something—for warmth when you’re cold or a hit if you’re an addict. It’s a state that drives us continually until we can satiate our appetites.
”
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Love and heartbreak as brain chemistry. Some day, it may be possible for heartbreak to be treated medically. I need my medicine.
(via gainfulunemployment)
As traumatic as it is I wouldn’t want to live in a world without heartbreak. It can make us grow and change in important ways.
Reblogged from Hard-Boiled Wonderland.
December 27, 2011, 9:29pm Comments
