The Science of Love, Desire and Attachment

Psychology and Biology of Desire, Love, and Attachment

• Desire, love, and attachment are biologically driven
• Neural circuits for desire, love, and attachment are plastic and can change in response to thoughts, feelings, and actions

Influence of Menstrual Cycle on Attractiveness

• Menstrual cycle influences both men’s perception of women as attractive and women’s perception of men as attractive
• Studies show that men find women’s odors most attractive during the pre-​​ovulatory phase of their menstrual cycle
• Women in the pre-​​ovulatory phase of their menstrual cycle rate men’s odors as more attractive, especially if the men are more physically symmetrical
• Oral contraception eliminates the peak in perceived attractiveness during the pre-​​ovulatory phase for both men and women

Role of Odor in Attraction

• Odor is a powerful cue for attractiveness, especially for some individuals
• Innate body odor can be a deal breaker for some people, regardless of other attractive qualities

Desire, Love, and Attachment

• Focus on romantic love and neural mechanisms
• Most studies focused on monogamous heterosexual love
• Desire can mean lust or desire for long-​​term partnership

History of Love and Desire Studies

• Early 1900s: love and desire seen as opposing themes within romance
• Love includes attachment and dependence
• Desire refers to sexual desire for another
• Romance encapsulates both love and desire

Biological Mechanisms of Desire, Love, and Attachment

• Animal studies show various mating behaviors and mate selection
• Hard to make direct comparisons between animal models and humans
• Focus on human studies for understanding neural circuits and biological mechanisms

Attachment and Attachment Styles

• To be discussed in the following notes
  Attachment Styles in Relationships

• Attachment styles discovered through studies by Mary Ainsworth in the 1980s 
• Strange Situation Task: a laboratory experiment involving a parent, child, and stranger 
  • Measures child’s reaction to parent leaving and returning, as well as interaction with the stranger
• Four attachment styles in children: 
  1. Secure Attachment
     • Child engages with stranger while parent is present
     • Upset when parent leaves, happy when parent returns
     • Trusts that caregiver will be responsive to their needs
  2. Anxious Avoidant/​​Insecure Attachment 
     • Child avoids or ignores caregiver
     • Shows little emotion when parent leaves or returns
  3. Anxious Ambivalent Resistant Insecure Attachment 
     • Child shows distress even before separation from caregiver
     • Clingy and difficult to comfort when caregiver returns
  4. Disorganized/​​Disoriented Attachment 
     • Child appears tense and exhibits odd physical postures
     • Unsure how to react to separation from caregiver
• Attachment styles in children can predict attachment styles in romantic relationships later in life
• Attachment styles can change across the lifespan through psychological and biological adjustments
  Neuroimaging Studies on Parent-​​Child Interactions
• Studies show that the brain of a child and the brain of a parent enter a coordinated state of relaxation during soothing interactions 
• This is a bi-​​directional interaction, with the child also calming the parent
• Excitement and relaxation scenarios release different neurochemicals (dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin)

Attachment Styles and Romantic Relationships

• Attachment styles in romantic relationships are based on a template established in childhood
• Neuroimaging, hormone measures, and neurochemical measures support the connection between early attachment styles and adult romantic attachments
• These templates can shift over time through neuroplasticity

Book: Attached by Amir Levine and Rachel Heller

• Addresses the connection between early attachment styles and adult romantic attachments
• Offers actionable tools to form and maintain secure attachment styles
• Secure attachment style leads to more stable and predictable long-​​term relationships

Neural Circuits for Attachment

• No single brain area controls desire, love, or attachment
• Multiple brain areas work together to create these complex emotions
• Autonomic arousal is a core element in forming, maintaining, and breaking loving attachments

Autonomic Nervous System

• Controls automatic processes like digestion, breathing, alertness, and sleepiness
• Autonomic tone is developed through interactions with caregivers early in life
• Autonomic tone affects how easily we move between states of alertness and calmness
  Effects of Stress on Children’s Physiology
• Studies during WWII bombing showed children’s stress levels were affected by their mothers’ stress levels 
  • If mothers were stressed, children’s stress persisted long after the event
  • If mothers turned the situation into a game, children experienced less stress and trauma
• Autonomic nervous systems of children tend to mimic those of their primary caregivers 
  • Explored by Alan Shore at UCLA
  • His book “Right Brain Psychotherapy” discusses the impact of caregiver-​​child interactions on the autonomic nervous system

Autonomic Nervous System and Attachment Styles

• Autonomic nervous system governs how we react in response to a romantic partner being present or leaving
• Healthy interdependence in relationships involves adjusting our autonomic nervous system in the presence of another and being able to self-​​regulate in their absence
• Tools for adjusting the autonomic nervous system include physiological sighs (two inhales through the nose, long exhale through the mouth) and cold showers or ice baths

Neural Circuits Associated with Desire, Love, and Attachment

• Pioneering work by Helen Fisher, an anthropologist turned neuroscientist
• Dopamine system in the brain is associated with desire and motivation 
  • Brain areas involved include the ventral tegmental area, substantial Niagara, and basal ganglia
• Serotonin and oxytocin are associated with love and attachment 
  • Released from brain areas such as the raffa nucleus
  • Responsible for feelings of warmth, calm, and soothing in the presence of another
    Neural Circuits for Desire, Love, and Attachment
• Three neural circuits involved: 
  1. Autonomic nervous system
  2. Neural circuits for empathy
  3. Neural circuits for positive delusions

Neural Circuits for Empathy

• Empathy is about matching the emotional tone or autonomic tone of another person
• Autonomic seesaw of one individual drives the autonomic seesaw of the other
• Important for falling in love, forming attachments, and the mating process

Mating Process and Autonomic Nervous System

• Mating process involves autonomic regulation and matching of autonomic nervous systems
• Arc of mating: 
  1. Sympathetic arousal for pursuit
  2. Parasympathetic arousal for sexual arousal
  3. Sympathetic response for orgasm and ejaculation
  4. Return to parasympathetic activation for bonding and relaxation
• This process is present in all mammalian species that mate

Neural Circuits for Sexual Behavior

• Studies on neural circuitry for sexual behavior in animals by Donald Pfaff and Frank Beach
• Human neuroimaging studies have mapped brain areas associated with arousal, orgasm, and post-​​orgasmic phase
• Spinal cord areas controlling erection, vaginal lubrication, ejaculation, and orgasm have also been mapped

Neural Circuits for Empathy in Mating

• Two main structures involved: 
  1. Prefrontal cortex (perception and decision-making)
  2. Insula (interoception and exteroception)
• Insula coordinates attention between one’s own body and sensations and the other person’s body and sensations
• Communication can occur through words, sounds, touch, and subtle cues like pupil size
• Autonomic nervous system plays a crucial role in coordinating this silent dance between individuals
  Empathy, Autonomic Matching, and Self Delusion in Relationships
• Empathy involves autonomic matching 
  • Insula and prefrontal cortex play a crucial role
• Self delusion in love and attachment 
  • Overestimating the differences between individuals
  • Neural circuits for attachment can become deeply wired
• Desire, love, and attachment are three separate phases of romantic relationships 
  • Desire typically comes first, followed by love, and then attachment
• Touch is a fundamental aspect of the process 
  • Activates somatosensory areas and insula cortex
  • Insula links internal feelings with external perceptions and assigns value or interpretation
• Positive delusion is predictive of long-​​term attachment 
  • Belief that only a specific person can make one feel a certain way

Predicting Relationship Stability and Failure

• Gottman’s Four Horsemen of relationship apocalypse 
  • Criticism, defensiveness, stonewalling, and contempt
  • Contempt is the most powerful predictor of breaking up
• Contempt runs counter to the neural circuits important for desire, love, and attachment 
  • Antithesis of empathy
  • Inversion of autonomic seesaw matching
• Gottman’s Love Lab at the University of Washington focuses on what makes people find appropriate partners and maintain partnerships over time

Helen Fisher’s Observations on Neural Circuitry in Relationships

• Fisher’s work maps well onto the knowledge of neural circuitry in humans and other species
• Conducted studies involving data from millions of individuals on dating sites
  Sex Drive, Love, and Attachment
• Sex drive or desire may be a way to forage for potential love partners 
  • Sequence: desire, love, attachment
  • People can get confused between desire, love, and attachment
• Dr. Fisher’s work on categorizing people into four groups based on neurochemical and hormone systems 
  • Dopamine, Serotonin, Testosterone, Estrogen
  • These categories are not strict, but provide a general understanding of how people pair up

Dr. Fisher’s Four Categories

1. Dopamine Category
   • High sensation seeking, novelty seeking, spontaneous, adventurous
   • Tend to pair up with others in the same category
2. Serotonin Category
   • Grounded, soothing activities, rule-​​following, homebodies, stability
   • Tend to pair up with others in the same category
3. Testosterone Category
   • Directive, know what they want, comfortable telling others what they want, challenging
   • Tend to pair up with those in the Estrogen category
4. Estrogen Category
   • Nurturing, prefer when someone else makes major decisions, like to be heard
   • Tend to pair up with those in the Testosterone category

Autonomic Nervous System and Pairing

• People may select partners with similar autonomic nervous systems before they even meet 
  • Dopamine and Serotonin categories tend to seek out people with similar autonomic tone
  • Testosterone and Estrogen categories establish balance within the relationship
• It is not necessary for people to pair up exactly according to these categorizations, but they provide a general understanding of how people may select partners based on their autonomic nervous systems and preferences.
  Understanding Romantic Attachments
• Recognition and respect for different attachment types 
  • High sensation seeking, novelty seeking individuals may have exciting relationships but lack stability
  • High serotonin preference individuals may have stable relationships but lack excitement
• Autonomic coordination in romantic attachments 
  • Autonomic nervous systems of individuals tend to synchronize during romantic interactions
  • Seeking autonomic likeness or autonomic differences
• Neural synchronization between individuals 
  • Studies show that people tend to select partners with different or opposite resting brain states
  • Mapping neuroanatomical and neurophysiological findings onto psychological categorizations
• Matching of same to same or same to different can both be effective in creating desire, love, and attachment 
  • No one form of attachment will predict good outcomes
  • Opposites attract is not always the best rule to follow
  • People may pair up with similar or different partners depending on individual preferences
    Attachment and Relationships
• People tend to pair up with individuals of similar educational background, income, and attractiveness 
• Different categorizations of attachment and mate-​​seeking play a role in desire, love, and attachment
• Autonomic nervous system coordination is key for the establishment of desire, love, and attachment

36 Questions That Lead to Love

• A New York Times article in 2015 listed 36 questions designed to help people fall in love
• Questions progress from ordinary to deeper, more emotional topics
• People who go through this exercise report feeling closer and more attached to the other person
• Autonomic nervous system synchronization may play a role in this phenomenon

Self-​​Expansion and Attraction

• Self-​​expansion: one’s perception of self as seen through the relationship with another person
• People may enter relationships to enhance the self and increase self-efficacy
• A study in Frontiers in Psychology found that manipulation of self-​​expansion alters responses to attractive alternative partners
• The study suggests that how people feel about themselves can impact their attraction to others and potential for infidelity

Infidelity and Cheating

• No solid evidence linking specific attachment styles or neurotransmitter profiles to infidelity
• More research needed to understand the factors contributing to cheating in relationships
  Healthy Interdependence in Relationships
• Self-​​expansion model: how great others can make us feel 
  • Not just about explicit statements or gestures, but how we believe they feel about us
• Love languages: people have preferences for certain expressions of love 
  • Quality time, physical touch, acts of kindness, etc.
  • Pushes autonomic nervous system and neurochemical systems in a positive direction

Study: Manipulation of Self-​​Expansion Alters Responses to Attractive Alternative Partners

• Assessed how self-​​expansion influenced perception of attractiveness of others outside the relationship
• Participants rated on self-​​expansion metric
• Participants heard narratives from their significant other about: 
  • Exciting, novel, and challenging aspects of the relationship (self-​​expansion)
  • Strong feelings of love between the two
• Brain imaging conducted while participants assessed attractiveness of others
• Results:
  • Those primed for self-​​expansion had lower activation of brain areas associated with assessing others’ attractiveness
  • Perception of others’ attractiveness influenced by self-​​expansion from significant other

Implications of Study

• People who need self-​​expansion are more prone to seeing others as attractive
• Better self-​​regulation and self-​​worth independent of others can lead to more stable relationships
• Unstable bonds can form when one person relies too heavily on self-​​expansion from their partner

Subconscious Processes in Attraction

• Biology below conscious awareness (hormones, pheromones) shapes attraction and romantic interactions
• Chemistry: subconscious processes that drive attraction 
  • Smell, taste, etc. can be exciting or repulsive to different people
• Chemistry not absolutely required for stable attachments, but plays a role in romantic relationships
  Sex Drive and Attachment
• Sex drive is one way to explore potential love relationships and attachments 
• Stable attachments in humans generally mean long-​​term attachments

Biology of Testosterone and Estrogen

• Testosterone and estrogen are often mentioned in relation to desire, love, and attachment
• Both hormones are required at appropriate ratios for libido or sex drive
• Testosterone and some of its forms, like dihydrotestosterone, are strongly related to libido and sex drive
• Estrogen is also strongly associated with libido and mating behavior

Dopamine and Libido

• Common misconception: increasing dopamine will increase libido and sex drive
• Some level of dopamine increase is required for increases in libido
• However, driving dopamine too high can lead to states of arousal where one seeks sexual activity but cannot engage the parasympathetic arm of the autonomic nervous system to become physically aroused
• This can lead to a chronic pursuit of sexual activity but an inability to perform sexually

Supplements for Libido

• Some legal, over-​​the-​​counter supplements have been shown to increase libido
• Three supplements with peer-​​reviewed research supporting their effectiveness: Maca, Tongkat Ali (Longjack), and Tribulus
• Maca: consumption of 2–3 grams per day has been shown to significantly increase libido in both men and women 
  • Does not seem to increase testosterone or change estrogen levels
  • Can offset SSRI-​​induced sexual dysfunction
• More research needed on the effects of Tongkat Ali and Tribulus on libido
  Maca, Tongkat Ali, and Tribulus for Libido
• Maca supplementation:
  • Does not significantly adjust testosterone or estrogen levels
  • Increases libido
  • Points to multiple systems in the brain and body influencing libido
• PEA (found in chocolate): 
  • Increases sexual desire and perception of sexual experiences
• Tongkat Ali (Eurycoma Longifolia or Longjack): 
  • Herb with Malaysian and Indonesian varieties
  • Indonesian variety is more potent for libido effects
  • Taken in 400mg per day capsules
  • Increases free (unbound) testosterone by lowering sex hormone binding globulin
  • Reports of increased libido and sexual function
• Tribulus Terrestris:
  • Over-​​the-​​counter supplement for increasing testosterone
  • Mixed results in studies for increasing libido and testosterone
  • Some studies show significant improvement in sexual desire and function
  • More research needed

Important Notes

• Always consult a doctor before taking supplements
• Monitor blood work and subjective measures to evaluate effectiveness and safety
• The relationship between libido, testosterone, and estrogen is complex
• More research is needed to understand the full effects of these supplements on libido and hormone levels