2023-04-21 15:30:44
You love in three ways
You can love someone in different ways. The love you feel for your mother and your boyfriend is not the same, and the reason must be found in the chemistry behind the different variants of the feeling.
Globally we know three kinds of love: desire, attraction and attachment. They are fundamentally different from each other, but one person in your life can trigger several at the same time.
Each shape influences your behavior in its own way, and each serves its own evolutionary purpose.
In desire, we seek sexual satisfaction. This feeling can arise very spontaneously, and you don’t have to know the person you desire personally.
The feeling is often triggered by the other person’s smell or appearance, and research shows that traits that turn us on are often associated with high fertility, or a signal that someone is a good genetic match. So the purpose of the feeling is to help you pass on your genes.
Attraction, on the other hand, isn’t about sex — although attraction and desire sometimes go hand in hand. But attraction is more the need to spend time with another, and the evolutionary goal is to create a social safety net.
Because this feeling strongly activates the reward centers of the brain, we form new close relationships with people. We feel good, safe and accepted in their company. They also help us through difficult times.
Attachment, the last form of love, unlike the other two forms, is not about seeking new relationships, but about strengthening the ones we already have.
Attachment is closely linked to the hormone oxytocin, which is released in the brain during intimate activities, such as during sex and childbirth. Over time, a special bond develops between two people as oxytocin levels continue to rise.
This bond causes us to put aside many other needs and focus our energy on the most important people in our lives.
Fireworks in your brain
The heart is seen as the seat of love, and not without reason. We feel it thumping when we are in love, for example. But the increased activity of the heart isn’t the cause of the sensation – it’s just a side effect.
The source of love can be found in the brain and in the hormones and signaling substances they release. Love arises when the brain makes a mixture of all your sensations and experiences – without you being aware of it.
When you fall in love, it’s because the brain has judged your crush on a few simple parameters, such as facial symmetry, physique, and smell, as well as more complex ones, such as behavior and personality.
These parameters are compared to learned preferences and your own experiences – and when it all comes together, it’s fireworks in your brain.
The brain’s messengers include hormones—chemicals that circulate in the blood and bind to receptors on the body’s cells. Here they start a chain reaction that can, for example, influence the activity of your organs – such as your heartbeat – or trigger nerve signals that change your behaviour.
Especially the sex hormones play a major role in love. Estrogen is especially important in women, testosterone in men – although both hormones occur in both women and men.
The level of sex hormones is crucial for love, primarily because it affects our sex drive. A high testosterone level in both men and women makes them more interested in sex. Studies do show that men with low testosterone are more likely to marry and enter into serious relationships.
Sex hormones are released according to a fixed pattern. Estrogen cycles over a period of about a month, while testosterone fluctuates considerably in one day. Those fluctuations affect not only your sex drive, but also who we seek out.
Researchers from the University of California showed that women who are ovulating and therefore have a lot of estrogen in their blood are more attracted to men with very masculine features than women who are not ovulating.
In addition to the regular cycle of hormone levels, external influences can lead to fluctuations.
According to an American study that men can smell when a woman is ovulating and that a man’s body responds by increasing the amount of testosterone in the blood. As a result, the man especially desires the woman at the time when she has the best chance of becoming pregnant.
Love is addictive
Sex hormones control only one aspect of love life. Many other chemicals are just as important, such as the neurotransmitter dopamine.
Dopamine is released between the cells of the brain and gives you a sense of well-being and pleasure. That can happen when someone you already have feelings for touches you and focuses all their attention on you.
The nice feeling makes you crave someone like a drug addict craves his favorite drug.
This desire can be intense and completely control your behavior and thoughts. You can’t think about anything but the one, and you may be pacing as you wait for a message or a call.
Chasing the dopamine rush can also release dopamine. So the prospect of spending time with your true love is also a rush of joy.
In addition, the run-up to your time together determines exactly how much dopamine is released during the meeting. And according to some studies, a touch of uncertainty elicits more dopamine.
Maybe that’s why a new love relationship – where you don’t know what’s going to happen yet – feels more intense, and it also explains why you get less pleasure from a relationship that has crystallized into a routine.
So you need excitement and surprise to keep the love alive.
Love for a long life
Although love evokes an addictive state, unlike drug addiction, it is not harmful. In fact, it has a positive effect on our physical and mental health.
For example, people who are married are less likely to suffer from depression and addiction to drugs and alcohol than single people – probably because of the protective effect that love chemicals such as dopamine offer against psychological problems.
From an American study also shows that people in a happy marriage have lower blood pressure than single people, and low blood pressure is associated with a lower risk of serious cardiovascular disease. However, marriage alone is not enough to lower blood pressure, because people in unhappy marriages have higher blood pressure than single people.
Other analyzes show that people in a long-term, loving and secure relationship have less anxiety and cope better with stress. They also have a better immune system, which allows them to better fight wounds and colds.
In general, love contributes to a healthier and, above all, longer life. But perhaps most importantly, love improves the quality of life – much more than, say, money does.
So if you’re not getting enough love, there’s good reason to seek it out – and get a healing and uplifting shot of C8H11NO2 into your prefrontal cortex.
#truth #love #brain #beats